WorldNet Classics

Cyberspace is enticing. The idea of riding the electrons in the vastness of cyberspace between fortresses of digital data in a cityscape at night, ready make a run on a corporate presence in the virtual world, to unleash demons and code cracking programs all the while dodging or destroying I.C.E. or Intrusion Counter Electronics. Yet as enticing as it is, it has always been a solo affair, something going in virtual space whilst anyone else on the job was hustling time in meat space. It is a problem that has always beset the roleplaying game where hacking played a prominent role, such as Cyberpunk Red or Shadowrun – Sixth World. In these roleplaying games, hacking often becomes a solo game between the Game Master and the Player Character hacker or netrunner, effectively playing a rules subsystem or subgame within the roleplaying game whilst the other players and their characters waited for the hack or netrun to play out. In game time, it might only take a few seconds, but in real time, effectively, too long. In truth, roleplaying games subsequently published since the first Cyberpunk roleplaying game have all attempted to address this issue in one form or another. Typically, making the netrunner or hacker go on the mission with the rest of the Player Characters and need to be on the spot to access the local grid to perform his role. What though, if the whole were need, or could, go on the netrun and work together to perform the necessary in the cyberspace that is the WorldNet? This is the set-up for Netcrawl.

Netcrawl is a supplement for use with the Dungeon Crawl Classics Role Playing Game and the Mutant Crawl Classics Roleplaying Game – Triumph & Technology Won by Mutants & Magic, both published by Goodman Games. Published by Horse Shark Games, it shifts the Player Characters, or ‘Users’, out of ‘Reality’ and into ‘Cyberspace’ as ‘Avatars’. Inside this virtual world, they face not I.C.E. or Intrusion Counter Electronics per se, but Intrusion Counter Entities. There is not so much a virtual world as a cyberdungeon. These are not the only dangers in Netcrawl. There is a chance of being detected and worse being noticed by the deities that are the A.I.s. Netcrawl is a setting suitable for one-shots as perhaps the Player Characters from another setting suddenly find themselves transported into a virtual world, hacking into a system in a Science Fiction setting like Mutant Crawl Classics as well as various also third-party settings such as Cyber Sprawl Classics, Crawljammer, Umerica, Terror of the Stratosfiend, and Star Crawl Classics. Plus, of course, it can simply be a roleplaying setting all of its own.

An Avatar in Netcrawl have six characteristics—Power, Agility, Vitality, Wits, Psyche, and Hack. The latter enables an Avatar to manipulate the code which runs the WorldNet and its modifier affects critical hits, fumbles, and the like, and points of it can be permanently expended to gain a one-time bonus. It is the equivalent of Luck and can only be regained by great acts or courage, the Ciphomorph and Grifter Classes. An Avatar has access to three categories of skills—Security, Investigative, and Code Execution—of which he will typically be trained in one. Security covers breaking into and avoiding hazards in secured systems; Investigative skills provide clues; and Code Execution is exactly that. An Avatar will also have a certain amount of RAM. This varies by Class and Level, but is spent to purchase Daemons or equipment, Mod Chips, Programs, and Scripts.

Netcrawl has five Classes. The Avartarist sees the WorldNet as being alive and can Repattern WorldNet and holographic objects to heal them, receives a bonus Holo Die to run programs, and is bonded to an A.I. The Ciphomorph is native to the WorldNet and gains bonuses when rolling for Execute Program and the use of Hack, as well as being able to share Hack with others. The Cybernaut specialises in running Programs and can Burndown Vitality, Wits, or Psyche score to enhance the Program check. The Grifter specialises as either an Intrusion Specialist, Threat Eliminator, or Data Savant. The Intrusion Specialist is good at breaking into systems and hiding his tracks; the Threat Eliminator can harm ICE; and the Data Savant focuses on finding, analysing, and synthesising data. The Grifter also uses finished Scripts, programs with a static outcome and is also good at using skills. The Wardriver focuses on speed and power, relying on Mod Chips rather than Programs or Scripts, as well as Daemons for offensive and defensive countermeasures. Mod Chips give bonuses in combat and the Wardriver has a number of slots for his Mod Chips, being to swap and activate them, as necessary. There are different models for each type of Mod Chip, each proving a better bonus than the earlier ones and as the Wardriver’s Mod Die improves the better the bonus he gains from the Mod Chip. For example, the Brute Mk. I Mod Chip grants a +1 bonus to unarmed attacks, but the Brute Mk. II Mod Chip gives a bonus to both unarmed attacks and damage. Then with a Mod Die of three, the Wardriver gains +1 to his Armour Class whilst unarmed, whereas with a Mod Die of three, he gains the Armour Class modifier and an additional attack with a fourteen-sided die. The various Mod Chips cover ranged attacks, rate of fire, initiative, and more.

Daemons are divided in several categories—Melee, Ranged, Protective, and Support. The weapons and armour are mix of the old and the new, but all with a Cyberpunk theme. Thus, the katana alongside razor claws and the monowire whip. Some of these are nicely adjusted so that nunchuku has a bonus to Fumble rolls and the ICE pick will subvert ICE! In general, the melee weapons are more fun than the ranged weapons, though going into battle with a screamin’ skull that fires a cone attack or a viral gun that shoots malware is entertaining. The Protective daemons are more descriptive, but it is possible to use a Firewall as temporary ablative armour, although some versions reduce a character’s Action die. There are also Datagrams which provide small, one-off boosts to an action, such as ‘Electric jolt’, which forces a target to lose its next action if it fails a Reflex saving throw or ‘Logon credentials’, which grants a bonus to a False Identity check.

In general, combat in Netcrawl works like combat in the Dungeon Crawl Classics Role Playing Game. However, there are some changes to account for the change in genre and setting. This includes ICE being able to enact ‘Traceback’ and track and even attack an intruding Avatar, HupLock an Avatar to prevent it from logging out or a Kick to force a disconnection. Lost Health is regained in Maintenance Cycles, whilst an Avatar reduced to zero Hit Points is de-rezzed, begins to pixelate and lose digital cohesion, but can be re-rezzed, either through certain programs or the Avartarist’s Repattern ability and restored to positive Hit Points. Some Avatars—Ciphomorph or Grifter—can channel their Hacking ability to attack opponents, shatter objects, and even launch a counterattack against program assaults. This requires the expenditure of points of Psyche, the result determined by a roll on the ‘Hacking Result Table’ or compared with the roll made for the program targeting the hacker, this being resolved as per the rules for spell duelling in the Dungeon Crawl Classics Role Playing Game.

Netcrawl has a repository of Programs. Seven are given. They include Decrypt/Decompile, which makes the source code of a program human readable; Glitch causes a robot, A.I., or computerised target to buzz quietly and do nothing for one or more rounds; and Exploit allows an Avatar to implant malice code—computer virus, worm, backdoor, and the like—and so mechanically, impose a penalty into a creature biological or artificial. This can be imposed by upon Luck, a characteristic, attack or damage rolls, saving throws, Armour Class, and more. The Programs have variable effects like those of spells in the Dungeon Crawl Classics Role Playing Game or mutant powers in the Mutant Crawl Classics Roleplaying Game.

In terms of running the game, Netcrawl does discuss the possibility of ‘The Gig’. This is the entry-level scenario, designed for Zero Level Avatars. This is the equivalent of the Funnel, one of the signature features of both the Mutant Crawl Classics Roleplaying Game and the Dungeon Crawl Classics Role Playing Game that Netcrawl is mechanically based upon—in which initially, a player is expected to roll up three or four Level Zero characters and have them play through a generally nasty, deadly adventure, which surviving will prove a challenge. Those that do survive receive enough Experience Points to advance to First Level and gain all of the advantages of their Class. As entry-level software, the Avatars are essentially network & system software, developer toolkits, and hacker tools. Netcrawl also includes the short adventure, ‘The Core Queen Slumber’. It is designed for First Level Avatars, who have to infiltrate a data server and locate a one-eyed wizard who has the information that they are looking for. They will need to manipulate the systems around the data server, hopefully without alerting the Core Queen, in order access it. There is a puzzle element to the adventure, which will definitely take a playing group less than a session to complete. It works as a taster for the setting or as task to slot into a loner and fuller scenario.

Physically, Netcrawl is decently written, but the layout is often jarring because it uses different colour text on a black background in several places. This can be difficult to read. The switch to the standard layout for spells in the Dungeon Crawl Classics Role Playing Game or mutant powers in the Mutant Crawl Classics Roleplaying Game for the Programs is also jarring, although more easily red. The artwork is decent and a nice touch for ‘The Core Queen Slumber’ adventure is that the locations are drawn as per the ray-traced depiction of the virtual world a la the film Tron.

Netcrawl has a problem and that is that it a far more technical roleplaying game than either the Mutant Crawl Classics Roleplaying Game or the Dungeon Crawl Classics Role Playing Game, both of which provide the architectural underpinnings upon which it is built. There is shift conceptually, in terms of what the game is about and what the Player Characters do, and a shift—in some ways a more radical shift—in terms of terminology and language. Both shifts are some things that the Judge and her players are going to have to accommodate when running and playing Netcrawl, especially if they have been playing the other two roleplaying games and also in conceptualising the game. The lack of examples of play and the rules does hinder the shift. Otherwise, Netcrawl is in some ways a standard Cyberpunk roleplaying game except that it is all played within the virtual space and the Player Characters are all Avatars and there is no ‘meatspace’, at least not in the basic version of Netcrawl. Also, this version does not explore who wants the data that the Avatars are after and what it is used for, so there is no push or pull in terms of Avatar motivation. That said, a Judge can easily develop these or explore the genre for source ideas.

Netcrawl contains all of the basic rules needed to explore a virtual world in classic Cyberpunk style. However, it is begging for that virtual world to be developed and presented as a setting that can be explored. Both will be expanded upon the Netcrawl Roleplaying Game and its first supplement, Netcrawl Arcologies.

—oOo—

Both the Netcrawl Roleplaying Game and its first supplement, Netcrawl Arcologies are currently being funded on Backerkit.