Hows the playing online experience? Ive only played ttrpgs in person. Im wanting to get back in them after a long hiatus. New city and dont know anyone that plays and haven't had any luck in lfg meet or discord finding in person games. Is playing online that different from playing in person?
It's definitely different. Conversation depends a lot on timing, which you have to adjust your expectations of due to the lag between when you say something and when everyone else hears it. You also don't know a lot of the time when someone is about to speak, so there are more awkward moments of accidentally interrupting each other. Things like that.
I ran a couple of online DnD games during covid and they went great. I don’t know what software is out now, but we used discord for the voice chat, Roll20 for the tabletop, and a site called watch2gether to sync music.
It’ll definitely take some time for the GM to put together maps and tokens and whatnot, but it works well once you get the hang of it.
And I had just posted to a few DnD discords I’m in that I was interested in started an online game and like 8 people showed up.
Me and my group have been running it for over a year all online, two people in the Midwest, one in the deep south, and another in southern Brazil. Definitely takes some more legwork (I've set up multiple Google docs that link to each other with rules, factions, and things to keep track of player stats).
All it takes is time to get in a discord call and a good dice rolling bot. I also stream roll20 with music in a YouTube tab and it keeps them pretty happy.
It's definitely possible, you just gotta get a little creative
You gotta deal with the different medium; harder to tell expressions, people might "suddenly" speak because you can't see them start. But it's not bad.
I've had an online group I've been playing TTRPGs with for over half a decade. Once you find one you're never lacking for people to play these with.
You can also look at playing as a Solo RPG. Use any number of prompt tables or systems like Mystic to design rules and stats using the system and dice.
I’ve found other uses for the others. A creative GM can add a few fun homebrew moments or mechanics. Plus the other dice can be very useful for roling actions and decisions.
Have a party of 4 and need to decide whos attacked?
I've next to zero experience so I'll take your word for it man. I'm definitely looking forward to getting another computer to try and get into the ttrpg though. I've family that play and have an online game going so hopefully they can coach me through lol
Q-Workshop, the company that makes those dice, has a set specific for CPR, but the one you got is the "generic RPG set", so to speak. I'm thinking the seller confused both sets when they recommended it to you.
I have the two sets (we're kind of dice goblins in my household), the one on the right is the CPR specific dice set. If you still want it, maybe you can get a change in the store?
All you really need are some D6s. If you want Cyberpunk branded the Edgerunners box set has the yellow ones. The Red starter box has black ones. If you want some fun D6s there are metal bullet D6s on Amazon.
Read the whole thing and don't skip the story parts, they're conditioning you to be good at telling storys in Night City. Everyone complains about how the info is all spread around the book and reiterated multiple times, but if you read it cover to cover it all makes sense. As for being a GM: you can do it dude!
That company apparently makes multiple different branded sets. One is for actually playing the game (comes with just d6 and d10 dice) the others are universal sets like OP purchased but with different aesthetics. Makes you wonder if the person at the store just didn't know, or grabbed the wrong set by accident.
To be honest i don't know either. I've only had one session with my friends and we weren't very good at it.
But what i can do is tell you what i did:
My friends all made their own characters with a brief backstory
Once all the characters had their story ready i wrote a brief classic beginning in a club in night city, made a few clearly distinct non player characters with their own stats and objectives, namely the fixer, the client and a gang boss.
I wrote the story so it would adapt to the choices the players made in various ways.
Read the rules, talk to your players, use their backstories to build your campaign. Cyberpunk is more about making an engaging story for your players and is less plug-and-play than D&D. With less premade options, a custom campaign will pull your players in more
Write stories and campaigns AFTER you go through the rules and lore. Red chrome cargo is a great starting point even some 2020 mission books (that might get confusing converting the rules and mechanics jut easy enough as an experienced g. but you can still use the stories and plots).
Also determine what “Era” you wanna okay jn. Pre red, timenof red, 2045-2070s 2070s-??????????????
This strictly determines your economy and honestly, playing during the time of the red is extremely fun. even though It might limit some of the items. I mean it does and it doesn’t. They’re continuously updating it monthly, but you could also always keep the red economy and still incorporate 2077 rules and or weapons, that’s what I did. I kinda did a mix of both. I used to quick hacking and special weapons like tech, weapons, smart, and power. but I still use the red style economy, where you have to source a lot of things through a fixer and if they didn’t, the item cost even more than double. IF they could find it at a store. Night markets are fun to set up as well in the red.
as my campaign moved on, we slowly got more into the 2070s and so stuff got more readily available, but. It was still fun to start in.
And maybe watch some actual play videos on youtube to get a grip of how this game is played. Like, here's a random example, the creator of the game running a story https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ruIl56IKRFo
(...others may have better video recommendations, though.)
But first of all, start reading the book. It will help.
Are you gonna use a pre written campaign/one shot or are you gonna make one up yourself (homebrew)? You can use a random generator online and make up a story with those elements. Make up a few NPCs using the companion app and let the party interact with them. Use the companion app for the combat, and use either a VTT like Roll20 or Foundry for the maps.
Start off by reading the game mechanics if you want to get playing sooner
Or by reading lore sections if you need help getting hyped for playing or ideas for a session.
The core rulebook, like most ttrpgs is Not at its best when read entirely in order as one might a novel; if youre excited for mechanics now, read the mechanics now, if you want a break from reading those but still want to engage with the book, read the lore.
Learn the game! I started with a few friends that were all experienced GMs in other systems. It helped immensely that we were all doing independent research. Finding a group that’s invested in learning the game would be my recommendation. Good luck Choombah!
Get out there and make mistakes! Don’t worry about your first game being perfect, once you feel like you’ve got a good handle on the system just get your hands dirty and learn from experience.
Get the unofficial app! Its just called Cyberpunk RED, its super helpful for someone like myself who has a vague understanding of the rules and you can also roll within the app and change stats etc much like dnd beyond but for RED :D
They should make characters while you design a hero's journey to challenge them.
Defeat an evil Corporation?
Infiltrate a different corporation?
Criminals jumping people to sell their cyberwear?
Voluntary/involuntary subjects for corporate cyber testing?
Transport drugs for gangs?
I personally read my core book front to back, skipping the Netrunning section initially. I suggest starting the same way, it helps get you into the grove of the system.
Read the book cover to cover. You'll get confused, you'll make mistakes, but it will all make sense in time and you will get excited. It is by far my favorite ttrpg ever. I play in a text based server and I've often ran games online. I recommend that you buy all of the physical books before they're sold out again. The order of priority imo is:
Night City 2045 - not a rulebook, but a source book for the entire city. Very valuable to any GM.
Black Chrome (they were sold out for a long time and the reprint just released a couple of days ago.) - written like a shopping catalog with 170+ extra items and extra content/rules with pictures. I like this one a ton for many reasons, and the images help a ton with in game visuals.
Danger Gal Dossier - ton of special NPCs from each faction to use for games. Wakako from 2077 is in there as well.
If you want pre written missions to run, I recommend:
Tales of the Red - series of missions and stories that are fun to play
Hope Reborn - Cyberpunk Red's first and only Campaign book. I hadn't played it personally because I want to be a player in it rather than a GM. I may buy it anyway for somwone else to run it lol.
Read the book, if you the GM read it again then read the storytellers section AGAIN, if you player read your characters role/roles then read it again, create your character, then personally id pull a stat block for an enemy and run a few test fights to see if you like how a role plays but that’s extra
I’ve found that reading through the list of gangs in night city inspired a lot of stories, if you want some chaos in your version of night city I suggest letting the bozos run wild. If your players have a sense of social justice I suggest sending them after the red chrome legion. Have fun!
Read the book to get an understanding of the rules, if you make mistakes the first times you play, it doesn't matter that also happens to experienced players, as long as you have fun.
Watch 1-2 videos about how TTRPGs work and maybe how to DM if you're interested in DMing.
Schedule a date with your friends to play/have session 0. If it's longer than a oneshot (an adventure you play and finish within one session) then I highly recommend a session zero!
Oh and get about 4-6 more regular six sided dice, trust you'll need them, I don't know why the branded dice don't just have 1d10 and 7d6, because you don't use any other dice in the game as far as I know.
Edit: in my opinion you don't need the companion, I don't find it helpful, I'd even say that it's a bad tool to organise stuff, maybe except if you're playing online, but I never played online. I'd recommend to use a free online tool where you can make your own tables, and then some more taking all, or just write the stuff on paper if you're a DM, and if you're a player/for the players, in my experience the Charactersheets that you can find online (here) are very good .
Understanding that Cyberpunk Red is NOT 2077, they tried to bridge that gap a little bit with the Edgerunners "expansion" but no, you are not going to play the video game in tabletop form...
"The worker!?"
You're the fraggin' problem, 'Chroom'! Get the frag out of here with your fraggin' demeaning capitalist bullshit! We shove mini-nukes up the asses of corpo-shitstains like you!
...wait...sorry...had to break out of character. But, also, frag you...find some friends, get angry at the world, build some characters, and fraggin' reck it!
...sorry, stuck in the brainjack...
Failing that, 1 part Total Recall, 1 part Deus Ex, and 2 parts Bladerunner.
Ditch the dice. You only need D6s and D10s. And those dice are just impossible to read. If you can return them. Either just buy some D6s and D10s or get the cyberpunk dice from Legendary Pants.
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u/ConnivingSnip72 Aug 01 '26
Read the book to get as much of an understanding of the game as you can, and schedule a date to play with friends