This week we go to a new game for us, CY_BORG. Inside the core rulebook is this NPC your PUNKS (players) can combat. Deadly, dangerous and delightful to run, this is the CY_RAGING MENACE.
CY_RAGING MENACE
The CY_RAGING Menace is a wild entry of the CY_BORG RPG launched by Stockholm Kartel (SK).
We can get the basics out of the way – the most notable stats this guys has are:
- HP 14
- No Morale (meaning no running away when he gets low HP)
- ‘More metal than flesh’ armour (-d4 to damage)
- They are equipped with a CyberBlade, worth 1d6 damage.
- Special ability: Raging: Attacks twice per round, defense tests against the Menace are DR14, attacks are DR10.
- The game recommends selling one of these guys can offer 100-1K credits if yuo sell this to reapers.
Seems like a standard list, but for those who have played any of SK’s stuff, you’ll know this fella is a little more dangerous than the average grunt. These guys are self proclaimed as “Hyperdoped kill-dome champions, Murder Junkies, Engineered Megasoldiers” and much much more…
To begin with, their HP pool is very reasonable which combined with the damage reduction, is very good. The Cyraging Menace is a robust combatant in a game for your players in this regard. Their resilience in combination with a decent damage output of 1d6 with their Cyberblade, and getting to attack twice per round are what make them very dangerous. Also, for those who haven’t played CY_BORG, enemies don’t roll to hit, players roll to defence. With this enemy, the difficulty rating (DR) is 14 which is higher than base (which is 12 standard).
These special abilities make these characters dangerous for a small group of your players, and lethal for someone on their own.
So how does it work in practice?
In our tester game of CY_BORG, we used the fantastic Mission Generator from the CY_BORG PUNK CREATOR tool to get started quickly and get an objective. In short, the adversery was supposed to be a hit squad, so I naively added a 3 of these guys and it turned out… difficult :)!!
In our game, we learned in heavily on the short descriptors on the Cy_raging menace’s page, making our evil group of menace’s to be a handful of nano-machine seeking monsters. One thing CY_BORG does that both the players and I enjoyed was the unexpected horror leanings of a lot of the content in the game. Cy_raging menaces are no different, leaning into the body horror aspect of the game heavily, these creatures seem to work well as violent, screaming psychopaths that will kill anything int heir path.
Practically, the Cy_raging menace can be a handful for players, especially with the 2 attacks per turn, their resilience and the CR14 defence rolls against their attacks. We found out during the game that they can quickly overwhelm players, so it’s worth using them more sparingly than we did. However, if your players a suped up with lots of hitpoints and an array of abilities, it could make for an adreline fueled game if a couple (or more) of these guys show up to ruin the party’s fun.
-KJ