Characters have 12 Attributes in Cybercore, this is slightly more than your average role-playing game, but we felt you couldn’t represent the wide varieties of creatures held in the multiverse with a mere 5 or 6. Also when you run out of them you are dead, so bonus.
These Attributes are grouped into 3 Categories, Physical, Mental, and MetaPhysical or just ‘Meta’ for short.
| Physical | Mental | Metaphysical |
|---|---|---|
| Agility | Intellect | Perception |
| Fortitude | Willpower | Allure(+/-) |
| Might | Tech | Foresight |
| Reflex | Persuasion(+/-) | Harmony |
Attributes in Cybercore are the sum total of your bonuses from your Origin, Background, Training, Feats, and Equipment. While your Race and background provide a generally static bonus, talents and feats gained through training specializations can improve your attributes as you gain experience over your adventuring career.
When you fail in Cybercore (and oh, you will), the consequences cascade down the list: first Armour, then Health or Stress. If those run out, you can burn Grit or Luck. If those run out, you must sacrifice a point of a relevant Attribute. Hit 0 in any Attribute? Congrats, you're toast.
Attributes can be improved (cybernetics, anyone?), but not healed, so keep track of your base stat, without enhancements. They are your character’s soul scaffolding — treat them with care.
In addition to Attributes, characters have Active Stats, which include:
Armour: Blocks damage before it reaches your juicy insides. Energy: For moving, combos, or doing sick combat rolls. Grit: Raw willpower to keep going when things get spicy. Health: Physical punishment meter. Luck: The universe throws you a bone... or doesn’t. Stress: Mental strain — the kind that makes your eye twitch. Bonds: You gain a Bond when you have meaningful interaction with another player.
Characters may have a natural Armour score based on there Origin, this stacks with any armour granted from equipment, and is used to reduce the damage taken from attacks.
Armours have a DR for each damage type. Each time you take damage you can deduct one or more dice of that damage type by crossing off one or more points of DR from your Armour.
Weapons often have several damage dice and certain weapons can do a combination for damage types. In this instance you deduct one DR point from each type of damage you want to mitigate.
If you have no DR left, you take the remaining damage dice as pass though damage.
Armour recovers DR slots when it is repaired.
You and the player you bond with both gain a Bond when you have meaningful interaction. For example one of your takes a bullet for the other.
You either have a Bond with a given player or not. You can have multiple Bonds with different players.
You can spend Bonds on Bonded Maneuvers such as Rally Comrades, or Take a Bullet. These are special moves that can be used in combat to help your team out, or to save a player from certain death.
Characters have a base Energy score of of one point per Tier, this is used to perform significant actions in combat, such as dodging, or performing special moves. You regain Energy when you spend a turn doing nothing, and so generally start combat with full Energy. Training in Skill tricks, Corp Talents and Origin Feats can give you extra energy to use in certain circumstances.
Grit is your characters ability to "Walk it off", to keep going when the going gets tough, or when you are shot clean through with an Assault Carbine and need to walk yourself to Medical.
You gain Grit when a Wound is Triaged, or when you are Critically injured.
The amount of Grit you can have is capped by your Rank. You loose grit when a wound is healed, or when you burn it to ignore a Wound.
"Yes recruit that happens, Yes it hurts"
You can Burn a Grit point to ignore the effects of a Wound penalty for a given check. You can also Burn Grit to keep going when you would otherwise be required to deduct an Energy point.
"I was once stuck groundside on the Ice Rim belt of the Kelplar system, The Environment was taking it toll and I had no energy left, I was shot clean through with an Assault Carbine and I had to walk myself to medical, I did it on grit alone, I was 12, It was my Birthday."
“Right Health, we check you, scan you and probe you before you get in past the front door. What? No recruit you are still standing out here in the rain, No you are not at the front door yet, are you! No that was the Janitor, that was not part of the official medical, yes he is a dirty alien. When you get to medical ask for the blue pill.”
Now the more Health you have the fewer pills you will need to take when you are shot clean through with an Assault Carbine.
Yes recruit that happens, Yes it hurts, here I’ll show you.” “Zap, Arrrghhhhh!” “See, kicks like a Bavarian-combat-sow doesn’t it? Hey you’re still alive, slightly impressive, you pass the Superior Health Orienteering Training, now MEDIC!! Get this guy cleaned up and over to medical. Remember recruit when ya get there ask for the blue pill.
The old adage that you have to fill your bag of skill before you empty your bag of luck is very true in Cybercore.
Keep track of your failures, fail 3 rolls in a row and you must roll luck!
When granted a luck roll you must roll it. You cannot spend luck to raise or lower a luck roll.
The Luck pool has a cap of 15, you shouldn't hoard it.
Lady Luck is fickle and turns her back on those that do not flirt with chance.
If you have to roll luck and you exceed 15 points, you lose 15 luck and the remainder is your new luck score..
Psych is the mental strain of being in the Corps. It represents your character's ability to cope with the horrors of war, betrayal, and the constant threat of death.
Your maximum Psych is equal to your Willpower + Harmony Scores, and you can gain Psych when you get stressed, fail a roll, or when you are exposed to traumatic events.
When your Psych reaches your maximum, you must make a Willpower check to avoid becoming Psyched out and gaining the Unstable Condition. If you fail this check, you become Unstable until you recover.
For every point of Psych you have, you take a stacking Bother penalty to all rolls. This penalty stacks, so if you have 3 points of Psych, you take a -6 penalty to all rolls.
Players can elect to take one or more Psych points to gain a to gain a stacking Boon on a saving throw, or to succeed skill check.
The Sum of the abilities under each category forms your Physical, Mental, and Meta 'Saving throw' bonuses. You may be called to roll against one of these if the situation calls for it, generally a check against a category, is one where the GM just wants to make sure the character doesn't 'roll a one' and totally wreck something that was tricky under duress, but not difficult.
Challenges however come up far more frequently, and it's more likely that your will be called out to roll a save or success check against one of your stats.
Take a look at the Cybercore skill list and decide what kind of character you want to play.
if you would rather be a space marine or an assassin look at the skills that would complement your play style.
Weapons are not keyed to an attribute, but their Maneuvers often benefit from Stats, so if you wan to pull of M240 Sub-machine Gun Heavy Weapon Maneuvers take a quick look at the weapons List.
Unlike most other RPG’s, skills in the Cybercore universe do not have a fixed key attribute. In fact, you get to decide (or at least beg) if you can use an attribute to recover from a spectacularly botched skill roll.
You will generally do this after you completely wreak a skill roll, and you really needed to succeed when you find out what the consequences are. You can recover by rolling against an attribute to see if you raw prowess can get you out of the shit hole you currently find yourself in.
Doing so is a flat
It's a strain to rely on your raw prowess,
You can be as creative as you like as to which attribute you want to burn, as long as you can justify it to your GM. for instance if you want to Use Allure to save you from an Engineering mishap, maybe there is another Engineer around that you can convince to do/fix it, or set up to take the fall for your failure... Of course the Failure would leave you horribly scared from a bust acid pipe, dropping your Allure by one permanently, but you get to tell a story about it, and at least it wasn't your good side...
In these instances like the one above, where the player wishes to use an Ability to recover from a skill that is outside the norm, feel free to be creative.
In dire situations — like when your only ride off-planet is melting in atmosphere — a player can declare they’re leaning into an attribute before the roll. Add the bonus, but then lose a point from that stat.
The player can choose to burn the stat permanently, or temporarily, depending on the situation. If they burn it permanently, they can never recover that stat lose, but it guarantees a Critical Success. If they burn it temporarily, they can recover it with some R&R.
If you have chosen to Succeeding Backwards, Falling Forward is off the table. Though likely if you failed under these circumstances, you got permanently promoted into the Dead Book anyways.
If any of your Attributes reach 0, you are dead. No ifs, no buts, no maybes. Welcome to the Dead book.
This includes if your Stat currently has a non permanent reduction, such as from a failed roll to recover from a skill failure.
Burn them wisely, or not at all.
Social attributes exist — and they’re still complicated. Welcome to space.
Persuasion(+/-) and Allure(+/-) can be either positive or negative.
Choose their bend during character creation.
These Social attributes are used with either a positive or negative bend. For instance, Persuasion as a Negative covers deception and intimidation, Allure(-) would be someone so horrifically scared they are frightening.
You can only use them within their polarity unless you have a feat (like Two-Faced) that says otherwise. So if your Allure(-) makes people quake in their boots, don’t expect it to sweet-talk a bartender.
We will leave it over to Drill sergeant Jarvis (Ironass) to explain the core tenets of the abilities found in the Cybercore universe.
"Hey, that's Master Sargent Ironass berk!"
"Ok, you intergalactic bacterial spore samples! Welcome to the Core! We are here today to evaluate your lard asses for enrolment in the Mercs! Now the Mercs and most of the other crappier organizations you could join recognize 12 key attributes in performance. Don't you even dare think about pissing off to one of those other Orgs while I'm drilling ya! you lousy runts, we all use the same intergalactic recruitment agency and so we all just photo-dupe the same damn enrolment form.
To save you whiny ass looser's having to listen to the same drivel over and over I'll cover the lot now, besides it means this will take longer and we all like standing out in the rain now don't we.
"Sir! Yes Sir!"
Represents aim and coordination and assists with the amount of damage dealt when striking unarmed.
"If you can't catch a falling plasma grenade, well suddenly the phrase 'closed casket' makes a lot more sense. It's ok though you'll be listed in the after-action report as 'biological confetti.'"
Allure is your magnetism — the way you turn heads, stop conversations, or clear rooms without saying a word. It's charm, intimidation, seduction, menace — all wrapped in one dangerously attractive package.
Whether you're trying to woo a diplomat, terrify a gang leader, or make your enemies hesitate just long enough for the jump, Allure is your social gravity.
Frightening or fascinating — it all depends on your polarity.
"Allure, recruits, is why some folks get doors opened for them… and others an airlock, learn the distinction."
"And remember: when you walk into a room, people should either want to follow you… or run."
Foresight is your cosmic spider-sense — the uncanny knack for spotting trouble right before it steps on your face. It covers tactical awareness, intuition, and the ability to read a situation faster than the average brain cell can scream "AMBUSH!"
Use it to anticipate enemy movements, avoid obvious traps (that others somehow miss), or just know when that strange humming sound means "get behind something solid."
"Foresight, recruits, is what separates the Mercs from the meatbags. It's that gut feeling that says 'don't trust the smiling android with the bone saw.'"
"Ignore it, and the cleanup crew's gonna need tweezers and a mop."
Fortitude is your body's "nope" stat — how many needles, bullets, sketchy food cubes, or questionable alien cocktails you can take before falling over, frothing, or exploding in a medically interesting way.
This governs your resistance to pain, poison, disease, radiation, parasites, and any other chemical sludge the galaxy tries to pour into your meat chassis.
"Fortitude, maggots, is what keeps you upright when your insides are trying to become your outsides. It's what says 'no thank you' to alien gastro-worms and stares down that alien syringe labeled in six dead languages."
"You want to live long enough to regret your life choices? Stack Fortitude."
Harmony represents your inner balance — your metaphysical center — the thing that stops your mind from screaming OMG a serrated space barnacle bug is crawling out my ass" when it's really just a mildly uncomfortable situation. Probably.
It combines well with Willpower to determine how much Stress you can take before you start quoting ancient Terran poetry or trying to interface with the toaster.
"Harmony, recruits, is what stops your soul from leaking out your eyeballs when you stare into the abyss. Meditation helps. So does high-grade neural insulation."
"But mostly? It's not licking strange artifacts. Write that down."
Intellect is raw brainpower — the stuff between your ears that isn't just skull echo. It covers memory, analysis, reasoning, and your ability to not wire the red cable into the fuel cell again.
Not technically required for the Mercs — unless you plan to survive more than a week or want to join Special Ops. Most of you failed this one the moment you showed up here in the rain, wearing metal armor, during a lightning storm.
But if you're planning to be a Space Jockey, Combat Tech, Engineer, or anything that involves circuits, pressure seals, or numbers bigger than three — you're going to need some grey matter. And probably a neural implant or two to make up for what's missing.
"Intellect, recruits, is what keeps the ship running, the doors locked, and the enemy's air supply routed through their waste system. You don’t need Intellect to die screaming. You need it to die last."
You there, down the end, I said stand up straight!, I don't care that you come from a Grav .1 Planet you gelatinous blob of Fungus, you stand up when I'm talking to ya and you stand even straighter when I'm yelling at ya!
Strength represents your physical strength, it assists with the amount of damage you might deal when striking unarmed or with a melee weapon.
Strength helps you pansies stand up in the rain on a Grav 5 planet like this one. We still like that rain don't we recruit!"
"Sir! Yes, Sir!"
"Very good, now let's move on, I'm sure you would all appreciate being issued with your slug resistant combat vests before it starts to hail."
Perception is your sensor array — biological or otherwise. It’s what lets you spot an ambush before it starts, hear the safeties click off in the dark, or notice that the “dead” alien is still breathing. Barely.
It covers sight, sound, smell — all the things that should be wire directly into your frontal cortex on a good Merc, sure twitchy trigger fingers can be an issue, but it's a life saver.
As a general rule:
"Perception, recruits, is what keeps your organs inside your armor. Check corners, check ceilings, check your squadmate’s eyes — if they’re missing, the mission’s changed. It’s called Don’t Die now."
"Dump Perception, and your last words will be ‘huh?’"
Persuasion is classic people skills — leadership, confidence, smooth-talking, and lying so convincingly even you start to believe it. It's how you talk your way out of trouble, into the captain’s chair, get out of war crimes tribunals, and convince a customs officer that the six crates of contraband were “educational supplies.”
"Now I remember this time on Varkon-6, middle of a ceasefire that was barely holding together with duct tape and denial. My squad’s pinned down in a noodle stand, right? Outta ammo, outta cover, and outta luck."
"So I step out, adjust my collar, flash a smile that could sell oxygen to a water planet, and persuade a very angry Varkoni arms captain that he should lend us some of his gear… for diplomatic stability."
"Three hours later we were geared up, fed, and flying off-world with a signed trade agreement and three noodle recipes. That’s Persuasion, recruits. Learn it — or have your service record end with ‘traded for mustard and tactical napkins.’."
"Now move it! We’ve got a ceasefire to misinterpret."
Reflex is your twitch stat — the difference between diving behind cover or becoming atmospheric seasoning. It governs your reaction speed, dodging ability, and whether you duck the plasma beam or end up decorating the ceiling with your neck.
Useful for everything from slipping past sentries to catching a dropped grenade before it turns you into meat confetti.
"Reflex, recruits, saved my rear end back on Threx Station when a crate of unstable plasma cells decided to play dominoes with a box of proximity mines. Don't think. Don't breathe. Move."
"Three milliseconds later, the entire hangar was slag. I was on the other side of it — covered in soot, short an eyebrow, and still holding my coffee."
"Reflex, Or fireproof dog tags. It's your call"
Technical is applied smarts — the hands-on brainpower that keeps your gear running, your ship atmosphere right-side, and your cybernetics from turning you into twitchy buttery space jello.
It covers fixing, modding, splicing, hacking, bypassing, reprogramming, and occasionally rerouting power from the coffee machine to the orbital cannon. You know, the basics.
"Tech, recruits, is what separates the survivors from the 'helpful volunteers' who try to hotwire an alien console and end up broadcasting their vital signs to an enemy dreadnought."
"You want things to go ‘ping’ instead of ‘boom’? Learn to Tech. Otherwise, get used to phrases like 'user error' and 'open-casket optional.’"
Technical is applied intelligence — the difference between fixing a security loop and becoming a cautionary tale in someone else’s onboarding slideshow.
"Tech, recruits, is what separates the engineers from the smouldering corpses with a screwdriver still in their hand. I once saw a rookie crosswire a medbay door and reroute all life support into a vending machine. Great snacks. Dead crew."
"So unless you want your last words to be ‘Huh, that shouldn’t spark like that,’ I suggest you get good with a toolkit — or get used to being the cause of your own posthumous court-martial."
Technical is applied smarts — the difference between activating and ejecting a cryopod, while you are in it.
It’s the art of fixing, hacking, splicing, bypassing, and making miracle repairs with half a toolkit and a prayer to the firmware gods.
It covers hacking, bypassing, rewiring, overclocking, underclocking, crosswiring, and praying to ancient machine spirits while mis using duct-tape.
If you’ve ever wanted to say “I saw this in a tutorial once” before hitting a big red button — Tech is your thing.
"Tech, recruits, is what kept my squad alive on Vantar-12 when the evac shuttle decided it didn’t believe in ignition sequences anymore. I hotwired the thrusters with two hairpins, a combat knife, and my moms rubber glove."
"We made it to orbit. Shuttle screamed the whole way up. So did Jenkins. And my mum, but they were out the back doing the double mass pony ride prayer to the great space vacuum in the sky"
"Moral of the story? Learn your Tech — or someday your eulogy’s gonna start with ‘he meant well’ and end with ‘mostly in one piece.’ Also you can wipe the in shuttle cam system cause no one wants to see that shit."
Willpower is your mental spine — the grit in your brainpan that keeps the wheel spinning long after the hamster’s fallen off and been eaten by something with too many eyes.
It’s what helps you hold the line, stay cool, and make sense of the chaos when logic takes a lunch break and your reality check bounces.
You’ll use it to resist fear, psychic interference, gaslighting AIs, hallucinations, and whatever horror just oozed out of the vents whispering sweet nothings like you Ex on Sargoose IV. Then you realize it is you Ex from Sargoose IV.
"Willpower, recruits, is what kept me sane when a Xarnith Mind-Flayer tried to reroute my thoughts, tentacles are not "romantic" in any known language. I held strong. Jenkins? Well Jenkins now flinches every time he hears poetry."
"Nobody can hear you scream in the metal recovery cubes free floating round the station, The nanowire usually keeps them in orbit. Usually. So unless you want to spend the rest of your career screaming at the dark or trying to marry a vending machine, Willpower."
Mass represents your weight more or less, the more massive you are the more weight you have to throw around, this is useful if you have to wrestle a Bovarian-combat-sow. It also ensures a quicker death when you attempt to re-enter a planet’s atmosphere without a re-entry suit.
Humans generally have a starting mass score of 2. This represents 100kg’s. Every point of Mass is worth 50kg.
Mass synergizes well with Strength and the combination of the two determines if you can weld large or oversized items. For every point in Mass, you can lug another 25kg.
“Oh for plasma’s sake, Pick that sack of iron ore back up recruit, Ya don’t faint on the first day of training you whinny, you got nothing to be afraid of, you won’t be wrestling any Bovarian Sows until you are well into your training. Tomorrow. If you survive the entry exam. Yes, that’s ‘entry’ as in re-entry you berk.”
“Oh just leave him down there, he will probably wake up when it starts to hail”.
An Origin's Average Mass is in the Origin Table. Players can use the table or Choose there Origin's Mass for most Origins, but Nanocoids have a fixed starting Mass score.
Speed is the distance you can move as part of an Action, unless that action states otherwise. Certain Combat Maneuvers for instance make you Restrained.
It is generally 5 squares for a human, but can be modified by Skill Tricks, Origin Feats, Equipment, and Tallents.