Cypher System Review
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 15 เม.ย. 2024
- Ready for a deep dive into the Cypher System Rulebook by Monte Cook Games? In this review, we're sharing our honest thoughts on what makes this game engine shine, where it excels, and where it falls short. Whether you're a newbie or a seasoned player or GM, join us as we discuss if this system is the perfect fit for your gaming group! #CypherSystem #TTRPG #TabletopReview
▶Cypher System: cypher-system.com/
Monte Cook Games provided us with a complimentary copy for review purposes, our thoughts and opinions are our own.
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Hi, we're Ryan and Dawn! Here on Roll 4 Initiative we discuss all things geeky: Tabletop RPGs, Board Games, Warhammer, Books, and Geek Lifestyle.
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Cypher System is my go to system. I have been a GM for the system for a while now. I do use the white books (sourcebooks with white covers). I have run all genres of games with the system. My players enjoy it. I try to run roll order the following way, I think of or look at a difficulty (in my mind I do the math X3), sometimes I tell the players, most times I do not. I ask for things like do they have skills, do they have cyphers, do they want to spend effort (remind them of edge), reduce difficulty (quick x3 for TN) roll, if it is a dodge and they fail they take difficulty in dmg. Rinse, repeat. If you run the system enough these actions become faster over time. It usually does not slow the game too much, there are other games that have longer combat IMO. Players roll the dice, GM does the math. After you get over the refresher to the 3 times table, it gets faster to play.
Cypher System is one of my three favorite systems to run. It’s SO fast at the table, and the players are engaged. The math at changing levels is, I find, less complex than adding up a bunch of modifiers to a roll, since each level shift is +/- 3. My players love it because they are always involved in the rolls. And I can make up a monster on the spot by just giving a level and saying, “It’s good at this and does this damage.”
Out of curiosity, what are the other two?
@@duncandewar9885 EZD6 and BFRPG (though Dragonbane and Shadowdark are vying to get in the top three).
I have played in 1 on 1 Cypher system games. 1 was a fantasy game in a Dark Sun world and the other was a collage kid investigation that ended up with me becoming a Slider just before the Earth was destroyed! I have also played Numenera!
I've seen it played as Shadowrun and a Cyberpunk/superhero campaign!
Cypher is my favorite System, it is so customizable and using your stats as Hit points and spell points is great!
My favorite TTRPGs and systems: 1-Cypher(generic), 2-Teenagers From Outer Space(anime), 3-Gamma World 4E(not based on D&D 4E(post apocalyptic), 4-All Flesh Must be Eaten(zombie), 5-Battlelords of the 23rd Century(sci-fi), 6-Pathfinder 1E(fantasy), 7-5E(fantasy), 8-Palladium system(generic), 9-AD&D(fantasy), 10-Shadow of the Demon Lord(sci-fantasy/horror) and 11-Star Frontiers(sci-fi)
Cypher is my favorite system for adventure/exploration type of games
We love Cypher System, I’ve been converting my players all slowly over. Unfortunately, there are some rules that are scattered in weird places, like special abilities always having to roll against the creatures level being in the special ability section, instead of the rules section.
Would love to run a session for you!
Ah, that's good to hear that some of those rules were scattered. There were a few things that didn't make sense to me on the first read and it's probably due to the structure and location of some of those rules.
I usually make a onesheet for the player so they arent looking for their abilities.
@@Roll4Initiative yeah, it’s definitely can be annoying because it requires you to have to read nearly everything.
I would have had all of the gameplay rules and special rules in the “how to play” section if I were organizing it. But once you have a good solid session where you understand the rules it really clicks, that’s when I was hooked.
Cypher is also one of those games that I would say is 100% better digitally than any other TTRPG. Roll20 and Foundry have decent character sheets, and MCG just released a character builder on their website which is neat!
Hit me up if you ever want to try playing in a one shot to experience it more. When I ran it for other creators like BobWorldBuilder and NerdImmersion, they said they had a ton of fun, but that done things didn't click till I ran them through it. It definitely involves a paradigm shift for play style.
It’s actually REALLY fast at the table.
I think the best ways to have a first look into the Cypher system are Numenera or Old Gods of Appalachia. The Core Rulebook is more or less for advanced GMs and writers of homebrew campaigns, for those who want to see behind the mechanics. I think the Cypher System Rulebook is pretty damn good and a great approach to ttrpg mechanics but it could be a little bit of an overdose. Using one of the games based on the system that INCLUDES the rules (like the ones I mentioned in the beginning) makes it much much faster to understand. The new online character generation tool is btw pretty awesome.
Cypher is awesome. The actual system rules are only a handful of pages. Most of the books are player options. Agree there must be an easier way to set up the rules in the book.
I've suggested holding an example character sheet with a pregen in your hand as you go through the book. A few of the flagship setting books have Starter books that only show Tier 1 material that make it easier to consume for your brain.
Its a player facing system, the Players roll pretty much all of the dice, but as a GM I like the card decks and I prefer drawing cards over dice rolling... the cards are a great investment as you may use them with other systems for quick situational inserts.
I've seen several comments about the rules being a little scattered through the book. Feels like a system that might be easier to teach once you have experience but not as easy to just pick up the book and run straight away.
Oh snap this is the engine that Old Gods of Appalachia is made in. I've been wanting to pick this up for a long time.
Ryan is really interested in running something in Old Gods of Appalachia
That’s a great one!
I need to try this system. Currently learning Blades in the Dark and don't plan to go back to 5e for a bit. Great video.
I have been running Numenera and a handful of oneshots over the last few months. I have to say the fact that we don't have to go to the book at the table is delightful. All of the player abilities fit easily on a character sheet, and I have a few cheat sheets for the players that cover the core mechanics.
Me and my players love Cypher once they try it its wonderful to see them fly.
I use a chart and magnets to visually show the task difficulty and easing steps to give the target number. Without any maths. Players get it instantly, and its painless.
The d20 gives the gm intrusion on the 1 and the damage changes on 17-20. Thats why its not a base 10 system.
The swing of cypher power is a feature not a bug. Its a mindset shift to embrace it.
See subtle cyphers for a way to move away from scifi and fantasy genres.
You can swap out cyphers during an adventure. Your not stuck with them. Giving players a choice on these is important even in a oneshot.
Cypher system is best played by an improv DM not a fixed story/fixed power level DM.
These are the secrets that unlock and set this system free.
I haven't tried the Cypher System but find it very interesting to learn about systems I haven't played yet. Thank you for the video :)
Monte Cook Games just put out a free character generator, too.
I have run Numenera, and I personally loved it. Didn't make as much of an impression on my table though (Coming off of things like AD&D 2nd Edition, Pathfinder, and D&D 5e, I think it felt a little too alien/rules lite to them) but I'd love to run it again in the future, and am thinking of using Cyper for a one-off I'm in the early planning stages of.
thank you for this. i've been wanting to play cypher system for ages. i played a short demo at Gencon 2019, but haven't had a chance to play anything more.
I played some Numenera a couple years ago. I really liked it, but the guy in my circle who was really into it passed away last year, so I'm not sure when I'll get back to it.
I'm planning to bring the idea of cyphers into some of my other games, like Dungeon Crawl Classics.
Thanks for the review 😃😃🙂🙂
Answer: yes it is. Next.
Sorry there are a ton of Cypher System videos that give us introductions to the Cypher System and not a lot of videos that do a deep dive into it.
You know how Dungeon Dudes review the subclasses for D&D character classes? It would be nice if someone did that for the Foci in the different Cypher System game books.
LOL cool idea, however there's a metric ton of Foci.
As a GM, I find Cypher to be an absolute joy to run. I do need to keep a list of cyphers and intrusions at the ready to spring on the PCs, but I love not having to roll.
That said, the two most common complaints I’ve heard from my players are that they don’t like having to pay Might/Speed/Intellect points to power their abilities, and they don’t like burning through their XP if they are having bad dice luck. If I can find a way to mitigate those two issues, it would be the perfect system.
Great point. The ability a GM has to just focus on story and "do my players need more excitement if yes GM Intrusion!" Is such a great feeling to run.
The way I'm planning on mitigating XP consumption is by having two separate XP pools, one for long-term benefits and tier-ups and one for immediate/medium-term rewards. That way, all of my players will gain permanent boons at roughly the same speed.
This is kind of necessary for me to do because I have a LOT of players and will be running an episodic, "join-if-you-want" kind of thing, and I want all of my players to have an opportunity to level up so long as they can prove that they got information from the players who were present (or from me). (Basically I'll have a check-in system for all players so they can cash in by proving they know what's going on narratively.)
As for the stat pool payment, you could probably add a fourth stat that'll be a separate HP pool! Though you'll need to subtract from your other pools to balance it. Alternatively, you could halve all of your stat pools but duplicate them - one of them is for HP and the other is for... mana/ability use I guess. (Maybe players could, once per long rest, balance the ability pool and the HP pool of each stat block however they like, so long as they have at least 1HP in each block? That way the amount of points is the same, and it's more choosing whether or not they're tanky rather than an in-the-moment risk-reward thing.)
@cassou124 how many sessions ypu planning to run?
Its not that hard to reach max teir in Cypher system
@@JasonVDM Absolutely no clue, honestly. Until my players get bored, I suppose. One or two long-term XP per adventure would take twenty-four-ish adventures (plus whatever they'd get for other long-term rewards, such as Artifacts and extra skills), for whatever that's worth, and my players tend to do far more than one session per adventure, at least when we play D&D. Oneshots tend to last 3-4 gaming sessions aelkgjealkgj we're kinda slow and very roleplay-heavy
The expending energy to fuel powers and to also for tracking health works nicely enough.
Seperating XP from the Advancements though is an option in the book itself.
Because it can be an issue.
Iv been into Cypher System for some time...
Its also been the first system Iv been covering on my channel... so, Iv really enjoyed the breakdown and review here!
I think, if I may, your hurdle might be that you're going "RAW"...
Given the creator behind it, you may want to think more...loosely...as Monte Cook has stated on his own blog some years ago, that if you're stopping the game for who-knows-how-long for things, likes rules or meanings or details...and its not fun...then your fun is wrong.
My rule of Cypher has always been to find the spirit of the mechanics, and to go with them first...
Cypher's #1 rule is "The Narrative Leads"... so thats what should be the focus; behind the scenes it might mean that the GM has to do some more work between sessions for players, but the end result is a more conversational, streamlined game.
...as a side-note, I think for this reason, Cypher is a terrible system for Con's; because GM's should know their players, to not only be able to work with their characters, but to make the adventures still enjoyable and challenging...
The difficulty-target number thing also serves its purpose too, because its not just "Difficulty 3, roll a 9 or higher to hit or defend against it"... unless it has modifications, 3 is how much damage it can do, what any skills it may have are going to be at... 9 is its HP, the max any modifications it can have, etc. That generally permiates throughout the system too. And while characters only have a single Action on their turn...I differ back to the #1 rule... I always allow the players action to be a sentence *that makes sense*; so a player could just say "I move to the next range for Immediate combat"... but they could also say "I dive behind cover, and throw an Alchemists Fire at the enemy!"...oooh! Now we're having fun!
...and whats that difficulty? Well, the throw will be a blind-throw, so a Speed task of 5 (normally 3, but blindly throwing the AF Cypher gave a +2 Hinderence to the difficulty); so they need to beat a 15...
But, this is where the player needs to actually be knowing and involved with the character they created...because they'll have all those skills on their sheet...Maybe they're a Mechanical Adept who Sees Beyond! So that Foci has straight-up negated that Hinderence; Difficulty 3, TN 9.
But throwing things is what they do, and have a skill in thrown improvised weapons... Difficulty 2, TN 6.
Bugger it, they're using their Effort, so now its Difficulty 1, TN 3... and they feel like they can roll above a 3 on a D20!
I dunno...maybe Im just use to it! LOL!
Tis a fun system, though... I need to do a convo some time with a friend whose learning the system, so that I can answer questions for someone whose not quite getting the system, and what things mean, or are ment for.
Cypher is simple at the core.
Count 'levels' from 1 to 10 and then multiply by 3 for difficulty.
The system is static on the GM side and dynamic for the players.
Static rules allow for more GM quick prep prior to the dynamic chaos.
I find that the "Phrase" really helps in getting a new player up to speed.
The player just says choices from Descriptor/Noun/(that)Verbs and the GM can set up a starter character for them.
Sample characters can be made beforehand even.
And then one can fall down the rabbit hole of finding every fun combo.
One can even try to powergame it, for all good it might do in that there is no one true way to "power" in the system.
I love how it discards so much of the classic character bookkeeping that older systems imposed.
Ammo counts and money tracking seem to get set aside to be brought back if desired.
Cypher....Cypher.
I have run Cypher. I've played Cypher. I like Cypher. I don't love it, I don't hate it. It's easy to play, until it's not; character creation is flexible, until it isn't. Cyphers are brilliant until they don't make sense, and the whole thing is story-over-system until...
... you get the idea. Honestly, it comes across as something so eager to be revolutionary but relatable that it stretches too far in both directions, leaving a kind of... you know when you stretch out your bubblegum, and it's all either between one thumb and forefinger or the other, and not much is left in the middle, so when you try to catch it on your tongue, you're, like, "wait, do I...is there gum? In my mouth? Is there enough to chew?"
And, again - I don't think it's bad. Not at all. It just feels like it does a 6.5 job at things that other games do at a 9 or 10. It works, but if you're familiar with, say, Fate or D6, you might catch yourself wondering why you're not playing those instead.
That said - I came to the system through The Strange, which is one of my own personal favorite game conceit since Mage: the Ascension back in 1993. That, I think, is whence comes my conflict: I love what it CAN do, just... not always HOW it does it.
You got yourself a subscriber today, though. Good work!
Great review. I found that the best way to learn was from watching videos on it, like those from Qedhup. I found the rules to be a bit obtuse until I actually understood them.
But I love this system. It's great for promoting descriptive actions instead of just rolling against stats (as in D&D has you make an attack roll against armour class, where in Cypher you're free to say "I'm going to slash at the goblins belt, so his trousers fall down", and then the goblin is easier for everyone else to hit until they pull their trousers back up.). And with combat only having 1 action per person, it flows brilliantly.
As an adult with a gaming group of other adults, life sometimes gets in the way, and our sessions have to change on the fly. We've got a Pathfinder campaign going on, but if two or more players can't make the session that week, we try to run something else so they don't get behind in the story line. We absolutely do not cancel the game unless there is no other option. But this leads to a lot of one-shots that get thrown together at the last minute. I wonder if the cypher system would be a good one to pick up for situations like that? Is it easy to learn? Or is it Pathfinder levels of commitment to get into? Don't get me wrong... love me some Pathfinder... but it's not a system you can teach a new player in a couple of minutes, like ICRPG.
Love the Cypher System. Ptolus and Predation are faves.
I do take PC tier into account when setting difficulty. Monte and I are different GMs, I give him my money and he doesn’t come to my house and yell at me. 😂
I have enjoyed by brief forays into the Cypher System, and there's a lot I like about it. But I also share your criticisms of it. It's far from perfect, and it doesn't quite do what it says it intends to do. Even so, I'm glad it exists, as the things it does well have been influential on other games.
Sounds to abstract for my tastes. Thanks for the review.
It’s my go to system!
One of my favorites. It is hard to get my players on board, though. I have more success running it at cons.
Numenera is one of my very favorite settings ever, but Cypher System (whether in the specific implementation there or the generic one here) just didn't work well for me. It's a bit too abstract, and sometimes just takes us right out of the fiction. Plus, like you, many of my friends don't enjoy all the extra arithmetic the system requires.
I have a real love/hate relationship with this game. So much of it really works for me, but the combat tuning is SO bad. There's multiple systems that lead to death spirals and difficulty of enemies is either trivial or incredibly hard. Having an enemy determined by a single number (Level) is a breeze for the GM, but it also makes most enemies either bad or good at EVERYTHING (and yes, I know you can modify individual tasks, but add too many modifiers and suddenly there's no benefit to the single number). Using pool points for damage, abilities, AND effort causes death spirals as well.
Depends, I’ve noticed people often run Cypher “wrong” at first. I know I was in the beginning.
The issue is the rules are minorly scattered throughout the book.
For example, a special ability used against ANY character then it has to be rolled against the targets level, even if it doesn’t say so in the special ability. This was strangely listed in the Special Ability section, not the how to play.
Effort costs 3 points for the first used, but only 2 points for each level of effort used past the first in an action.
Edge decreases the cost of special abilities, but of course can only use as much as you have per action, like effort.
Your Recovery modifier increases with each tier you progress. Starting at 1D6+1.
There are a few other examples of things not being where you’d want them in the rule book, but balance the game out when used properly.
It just took a lot of arguments at the table for me to find them all! 😂
@@OneShotsTavern I'm not sure what rules organization has to do with my post. I'm aware of all of those rules, they don't really solve the death spiral problem, though. Enemy difficulty scales very poorly because all the "PC Benefits" are individually pool based, whereas the NPC/Enemy level benefits are (mostly) universal.
One thing I still dislike about the Cypher system is how it presents Cyphers. Cyphers just seem like a VERY far-fetched attempt at just making the concept of consumables sound deep and innovative. My initial reaction was "They're one-shot abilities. Got it, can we move on?"
Admittedly, the revised edition is a bit clearer on what this mechanic is actually supposed to represent diegetically, the rest of the system seems really, really good, and from a game design standpoint, these things also make sense. I just feel like the system is way too proud of re-inventing the wheel here.
I agree with most of what you said, but i'd add that "subtle cyphers" feel like an ugly hack to me and trying to play "real world" (no-magic no-sci-fi gizmos) absolutely fails for me because Cyphers are SO core to the system but they feel so terrible. The 1st example absolutely turned me off: "Good fortune: Once in a while, things just go your way. You’re in the right place at the right time." SO I have a not-thing that i can invoke to have good luck? or "Inspiration" when I want it? But these are "things" that you "give" players .... arbitrarily ? It absolutely breaks me out of immersion because it makes no sense.
I looked at like that one soldier with his rosary he does before combat.
Most times it just happens as a background effect.
But one time doing so activates a minor boon for the upcoming scene.
That lucky rabbits foot on the car keys just so happens to help in one instance for avoiding an accident.
The effect attaches to a token or object already in their possession.
Too many shows have exactly that scene where the focus upon some token in their possession somehow carries the day.