At its core, Cybercore is a game of telling stories and challenges; one of the pillars of those challenges is conflict.
When the chips are down, and the leads being laid, you have several options for defending yourself.
Your Origin has a base Armour Factor, which is the sum of your Fortitude and Mass, the rest is determined by the Armour you are wearing.
However, it's tiring, and you only have so much combat awareness. Your Reflexes determine the number of times you can Dodge in a Round, this is capped by your armours Armour Reaction Cap (ARC). As your training improves, you learn to keep track of more assailants and improve your Dodge Factor.
Your Origin has a base Dodge Factor, which is the sum of your Agility and Perception, Gear can also help or hinder here.
Your Origin has a base Evade Factor, which is the sum of your Reflexes and Foresight. AI Mods can help predict enemy firing solutions and ensure you are not in them.
AF is how well your stats, armor, and experience protect you from incoming Hits. Roll a d100, add your AF, and compare to the attacker's Threat Level (TL).
AF = Fortitude + Mass + Armour AF + Rank
Your Armour AF is half the sum of your armor's combat DR values (excluding Grav, which is environmental). Round down.
The GM sets the TL. Beating it cleanly is good; the further past it you roll, the better you come out. You only need to hold the TL and a couple of margins around it:
TL − 30 | TL | TL + 30 | TL + 60
The weapon's Hit Rating determines how many Hits the attack deals (see Weapon Hit Ratings). Your AF roll determines how well your armor handles those Hits:
| Roll + AF vs TL | Result | Effect |
|---|---|---|
| ≥ TL + 60 or nat 96+ | Critical Deflect | No Hits, DR not degraded, +5% AF next turn |
| ≥ TL + 30 | Deflect | No Hits, DR not degraded |
| ≥ TL | Solid Hit | Full Hits, DR applies (degrades by 1) |
| ≥ TL − 30 | Clean Hit | Full Hits, DR applies (degrades by 1) + Glitch Check |
| < TL − 30 or nat 1-5 | Punishing | Double Hits, no DR, Quality loss + Glitch Check |
Natural extremes: A d100 roll of 1-5 is always the worst result (Punishing / Direct Hit), regardless of your defence. A roll of 96+ is always the best (Critical Deflect / Reposition / Clear). Nobody is ever completely safe, and nobody is ever truly cornered.
After determining the number of Hits, check your armor's Damage Reduction (DR) for the matching damage type. Your DR rating absorbs Hits up to its value, any Hits beyond it pass through to your HITS track. Each time your DR absorbs damage, it degrades by 1. On a Punishing result, DR does not apply, all Hits go straight to your HITS track.
Griffin (Rank 1 Human, Fortitude 1, Mass 3) wears a Syntheleather Vest (combat DR sum 19, Armour AF 10). His total AF is 1 + 3 + 10 + 1 = 15.
A Full Husk lunges (TL 40, the bottom of the ladder). Griffin's reference numbers: TL − 30 = 10, TL = 40, TL + 30 = 70, TL + 60 = 100.
Griffin rolls 60 on d100. Total = 60 + 15 = 75. That's past 70 (TL + 30); Deflect! The claws skitter off his vest. No Hits, no DR spent.
Next round, Griffin rolls 8. Total = 8 + 15 = 23. Below 40 but above 10 (TL − 30), Clean Hit. The claws deal 2 Hits of Slash damage. His Syntheleather has 2 Slash DR, it absorbs both Hits, then degrades by 1 to Slash DR 1. His armor must also make a Glitch Check.
If Griffin had rolled a 3 (natural 1-5); Punishing. The weapon deals 2 × 2 = 4 Hits of Slash damage straight to his HITS track. No DR. His armor takes a Quality hit and a Glitch Check. Bad day.
Dodging is a gambit. Land it clean and the attack misses entirely; come up short and you're clipped (the hit lands, but your armor still soaks it); miss badly and it hits you harder than if you'd just stood and taken it. Choose wisely; every failed dodge hurts.
DF = Rank × 11 + (Agility + Perception − 4) + Armor Dodge Bonus
Armor Dodge Bonus: No Armor +10 | Light +5 | Medium +0 | Heavy -5
Rank carries your dodge (×11, the same curve a creature's TL climbs), so a same-Rank attacker is a roughly even gamble; Agility and Perception tilt it either way around that.
The number of times you can Dodge in a Turn is limited by your Armour Reaction Cap (ARC). Heavy Armours have an ARC of Zero, Medium Three, Light Five. Without armour, your ARC equals your Reflex stat (min 5). Investment in Movement skills increases your ARC, giving you more dodge attempts per round; but it does not improve your dodge roll.
Roll d100 + DF vs the attacker's TL:
| Roll + DF vs TL | Result | Effect |
|---|---|---|
| ≥ TL + 30 or nat 96+ | Reposition | Dodge + move 1 sq free |
| ≥ TL | Dodge | No Hits taken |
| ≥ TL − 30 | Grazed | Full Hits, DR applies, Quality loss + stacking Bother |
| < TL − 30 or nat 1-5 | Punishing | Double Hits, no DR, stacking Bother + Knocked Prone |
The Dodge Gambit: A clean Dodge takes no Hits at all, but a missed dodge is its own risk. Come up just short and you're Grazed, the attack clips you for full Hits (your armor's DR still soaks them) and you stack Bother, which makes the next dodge harder. Miss badly, or roll a natural 1-5, and it's Punishing: Double Hits with no DR, more Bother, and Knocked Prone. Dodge when the odds are with you; lean on armor when they aren't.
Evade is used against area effect attacks; grenades, explosives, blast cones, and alien acid spray. Your evade roll determines how far you can move to escape the blast zone. Whether you actually escape depends on your position relative to the blast radius.
EF = Rank × 11 + (Foresight + Reflex)
Rank carries your evade (×11, the same curve a creature's TL climbs), so a same-Rank blast is a roughly even gamble whatever your armor; Foresight and Reflex tilt it your way. This is the equaliser for heavy-armour fighters who can't dodge: they can still read a blast and clear it. Evading area attacks is about reading the battlefield, not raw speed.
The maximum number of times you can Evade in a Round is determined by your Agility (Minimum One).
Roll d100 + EF against the Evade TL:
| Roll + EF vs TL | Result | Effect |
|---|---|---|
| ≥ TL + 30 or nat 96+ | Clear | Full move. Out of blast = no Hits. Still in blast = half Hits (round down), DR applies |
| ≥ TL | Partial | Half move. Out of blast = no Hits. Still in blast = half Hits (round down), DR applies |
| ≥ TL − 30 | Caught | No move. Full Hits, DR applies |
| < TL − 30 or nat 1-5 | Direct Hit | Double Hits, DR applies, Quality loss |
A grenade lands with a 2-square blast radius. Vex is 1 square from the center, Koda is at the edge (2 squares).
Koda rolls Clear; full move. She's at the edge, so 1 square of movement gets her out. No Hits.
Vex rolls Partial; half move (1 square). He's 1 square from center, so half move takes him to the edge but not out. He takes half Hits, DR applies.
If Vex had rolled Clear, his full move would have carried him out entirely; no Hits. Position matters.
Armor provides typed DR; separate damage reduction ratings for each damage type. When you take Hits of a specific type, matching DR absorbs them first.
How DR Works:
You take 3 Thermal Hits. Your Combat Rig has 3 Thermal DR. It absorbs all 3 Hits; no Hits pass through. Your Thermal DR then degrades by 1, dropping to 2. Next time you take Thermal damage, you've only got 2 DR left.
DR Types:
DR Degradation: Each time your DR absorbs damage, it degrades by 1. When armor loses Quality (from Glitch Checks or other effects), it also loses 1 DR of the damage type that caused the Quality loss. When DR of a type reaches 0, your armor no longer protects against that damage type.
Character Sheet Tracking: Track each DR type as a current/max value on your character sheet:
ARMOR: Combat Rig (Quality 6)
Blunt: 2/4
Thermal: 2/3
Slash: 3/3
Pierce: 2/2
DR Repair: Engineers can repair DR during Stim Breaks and Lockdowns. Armor Patch Kit consumables can also restore DR without an engineer.
Once your Armour reaches a Qualty ( or Glitch level ) of 0 it's broken and no longer provides any protection. If it's powered armour it powers down until repaired.
See Equipment Quality for more details on how to repair your equipment.
Your HITS represent how much physical punishment you can take before going down. Characters have a track of HITS boxes on their character sheet; mark boxes when you take damage. See the Attributes page for the HITS formula and origin HITS table.
HITS = 8 + Fortitude + Mass + (Rank × HITS per Rank)
HITS per Rank (by line of contact):
| Core | Line | HITS per Rank |
|---|---|---|
| Combat | Front line | 3 |
| Engineering | Medium line | 2 |
| Overwatch | Rear line | 1 |
| SysOps | Rear line | 1 |
As you adventure you will from time to time, take Hits; mark them on your HITS track.
When all your HITS boxes are marked you gain one Wound, go DOWN, fall prone, and gain the Wounded Condition.
See Wounded Action for the Actions you can spend your Wounded Actions on.
Certain Feats, Tricks and Talents also consume Wounded Actions.
With a Medic (Stabilization Protocol): You come back at 1/4 of your MAX HITS (round up). You regain all of your Actions and can act normally.
Without a Medic: You must use a consumable; you recover only what the consumable provides (e.g., Hot Patch = 1 HIT, Nanite Cluster II = 2 HITS). If no consumable is available, you stay DOWN.
This makes Medics genuinely critical. Without one, going down is dire.
Keep track of your current Wounds; they are retained until treated. Recovery from DOWN does not reset your Wound count.
When your Wounds equal your Max Wounds, you are comatose and on the brink of death. You need immediate medical assistance or you will die.
As you adventure and get hurt, you pick up Wounds. Each Wound brings you a little closer to death.
Max Wounds = Fortitude + Willpower + Mass
Wound Penalty: Bane(1) per Wound to all attack and skill checks. This stacks; 3 Wounds = Bane(3).
Grind can be burned to ignore 1 Wound penalty per check. See Grind.
When your Wounds equal your Max Wounds, you fall into a coma; see Death and Dying.
If your Wound Count is ever greater than your Max Wounds, your character dies.
As you can see the more Willpower, Fortitude, and Mass a character has the harder they are to kill.
A well-trained Medic or Medbay can treat Wounds. Wound removal requires a Medic with Trauma Surgeon (Rank 8+) during a Lockdown, or access to a medical facility.
When your Wounds equal your Max Wounds, you are Unconsious and on the brink of death; you need immediate medical assistance, or you will die.
You will stay this way for several rounds equal to half your Max Wounds score (round down); if you have not recovered by then, you gain one more Wound from internal hemorrhaging and die; your character is now clinically dead.
A well-trained Medic or med-bay can treat Wounds, as can some nanite applicators. However, you can only recover HITS once your Wound count is less than your Max Wounds.
When you are clinically dead, a Medic with Advanced AED (Rank 10) can attempt revival; the target returns at 1/4 MAX HITS with Wounds remaining at Max. They cannot recover HITS until at least one Wound is treated. This is usable once per mission. Without Advanced AED, rapid application of a defibrillator in a Medbay or particular Alien tech might save you. However, the chances are slim unless you have a very skilled Medic to hand (not including yourself). Often, the best you can hope for in this situation is that it was a Heroic Death.
Or is it?
Each Race has made attempts to cheat death in their own way. The Om, it appears, can overcome death for the other Organic races and can offer a 'biological failure insurance' for a price of course.
Across all the role-playing genres, all games end, but most games die. Exceptions and long-running groups exist, but as a general rule, a module will run to completion. But longer campaign arcs tend to fall apart as people's changing lives and work schedules rarely mesh for longer than a few years. It's even hard to keep online pick-up groups together, which frequently petter out after a few months.
To that end, Cybercore has definitive endings and short cycles of play. We have introduced the Tag system and Heroic deaths to assist with this. That's right. Your character will die before or at Rank Ten; by that stage, you will have written their story. All that remains is an Epic, Heroic, Infamous, or Iconic Ending.
Let the TechBards Sing and the Synth-Scribes Chronicle their deeds for the ages.