Bionic - The Card Driven Cyberpunk RPG Experiment

I've got a thread over on RPG Geek that I use to brainstorm for this project, but I thought it might be of interest to people here (and I'm keen, especially at this early stage of the design, to get as much feedback, thoughts and opinions as I can).

The gist of the idea is this: I have a set of custom cards that I had made for a game I was making years ago. Long story short: the game didn't pan out and I've just got these cool cards kicking around. So, I'm turning them into the heart of an RPG. There will be two decks of cards required to play - a Master Deck that is shuffled and sits in the middle of the table (this is shared by all players) and a Character Deck that each player will have (that will be customized to their character).

The core mechanic works like this:

The basic unit of interaction is a conflict (think of this as a 'check' in any other system; I use the term conflict to try and reflect that in this world, everything everyone does is always about getting themselves one step ahead at the expense of someone else. It's a zero-sum world). When a player starts a conflict, they describe their actions and the GM indicates which skill the player can use (there are 6: Gather Information, Deception, Athletics, Fighting, Hacking, Engineering). The player then spends skill points (up to their skill rank). Players may also spend Vitality (for physically demanding tasks) or Resolve (for socially or mentally demanding tasks). For each point spent, they draw 1 card from the Master Deck. This set of cards forms their conflict pool. Then, they may discard 1 card from the pool and replace it with 1 card from their hand. Keywords on the cards may trigger abilities that the player has. The value of the cards in the pool is then summed, a bonus is given for each card that matches the skill used, and the result is compared to the conflict TN. If the player beats the TN they succeed. If they tie, they succeed with a setback. If the result is lower, they succeed with a complication.

There's some other details (the GM has a pool of three resources that ebb and flow as the game proceeds, which the GM uses to modify checks, and spends to make setbacks and complications worse/more significant). However, the basic idea is that instead of dice, there is a tactical card-and-resource-management game that players play. It is important to note that the GM doesn't have a deck of cards, and doesn't engage with player characters the way they engage with the game. The system is designed to be asymmetric (unlike, say, D&D where the same rules apply to everyone. In Bionic the GM's rules will be different from the Player's rules).

For those interested less in mechanics and more in the setting/world underlying those mechanics this post digs a bit into the world of BIONIC.

One of my favourite things about the L5R RPG is how well the metaphysics of the universe are entwined with the game mechanics. I'm aiming for something similar with BIONIC. The narrative inspired by the game, and the way the parts of the system hang together, will (hopefully) reflect the world itself. The caste cards and castes themselves (discussed in the linked post) are a big part of this.

My first reaction - based only on reading your description here - is "cool."

Second reaction is: why have a GM? It reads like it would work well for collaborative storytelling and/or the table determining an initial encounter/location deck. But maybe I've played too much Fiasco and too many board games.

I have considered the GM-less angle. I think I'm going to try and accommodate both approaches (although I will design the game with a GM in mind),

The way it's shaping up, I expect I could write GM-less modules for the game. Where the slow building of the Danger/Plot Twist/Wild pools and their automatic expenditure during the ebb and flow of the game provides the 'unexpected twists'. The modules would be broken down into scenes, with charts that you consult to add complications, costs and consequences when things don't go smoothly (the specifics would be determined by the 'GM Resource' pool + random card draw).

That said, a GM allows the game to be more free-flowing and allows for, like with any RPG, larger scale and more intricate plots/adventures. Which is to say, when there is a GM you have a dedicated 'story director', who can add life and depth to NPCs and events. But, it could be totally possible to play without a GM.

This sounds great! My personal preference calls for GM-supervision but I agree with you and spaceseeker that a GM-less mode is a worthy idea too: and as you say, if the provided modules have sufficient steps (almost a script of sorts) to follow then that's something that could work both with and without.

Anyway I really dig that fluff too, it's flavoursome and characterful but not to the point of over-engineering every aspect of the universe. The Twisted are evocative of the Essence-degradation problem in Shadowrun but with a dark, well, twist that's like something out of WH40k. Good stuff.

I've continued puzzling out the mechanics in detail, and I'd love some thoughts on it. I'm trying to work towards "1 check per scene" and using the card play and resources expenditure to direct the flow of the narrative in the same way that the dice icons in the star wars FFG systems direct narrative. The formatted post is here. If you'd prefer I just post the details here I can do that too :)

Have you ever played any Munchkin games? This sounds a lot like that (which I love) but with extra detail added (which I've always felt the Munchkin setup could use)! My response is, as spaceseeker put it, COOL!

I have played Munchkin. I'm not a fan. I find the game too chaotic, and more importantly too long.

This is less like Munchkin than it may look like on the surface. It's a proper RPG, but instead of rolling dice you play cards (so all the randomness and chance comes from the 'set up' of the scenario and from interacting with the GM). At least, that's the theory. I'm still working it out. In the meantime I'm trying to play more narrative driven games to see how other designers handle the relationship between narrative and mechanics. You get some games like D&D that use mechanics to define narrative, and others like the Mistborn Adventure Game that use mechanics to guide narrative. Ideally, this game balances between the 'mechanics driven' and 'narrative driven' "extremes" - but to properly do that, I need to play some more games and study them! :)

Now that I got to thinking more about it, I've had another brainstorm idea -- here's a copy of the text from the BGG thread:

I've taken a break from design to play some narrative driven games and get ideas for how to better streamline this system (bring the 'gameyness' down a notch and make it 'support' the narrative better). To that end I'm now playing several play by forum games of Star Wars: Edge of the Empire and running one of Mistborn Adventure Game. There's a common mechanic to both that I want to leverage. 'Advantage' (and 'Threat') results from checks in Star Wars, and 'Nudges' from checks in Mistborn.

In both cases, 'Nudges' (I'll use that term from here on out, but it refers to the same kind of mechanic) can be spent to modify the story, or gain a minor mechanical benefit. Star Wars provides more guidance on this than Mistborn does (in the form of handy, if overwhelming tables). The idea is the same though. Small mechanical benefits are things like regaining Strain (in Star Wars) or Resilience (in Mistborn), giving bonus dice to followup actions (in both) or penalizing actions of foes (in both). Alternatively they can be spent for 'narrative control', to introduce convenient narrative advantages that may not have specific mechanical counterparts (such as it turning out you know the information broker from a previous job).

In BIONIC, the Abilities (each character has exactly 2) your character has are meant to be sources of 'strong' narrative control. They temporarily give you the power of the GM to direct the narrative, and so they usually come at a cost (discarding cards, and typically also require set up - making certain icons or keywords appear in the card pool). The GM 'resources' (Wild, Danger and Plot Twist) are meant to be different degrees of narrative control. Danger represents the 'risk' associated with the actions players take (and until a player suffers a consequence, actions become riskier); Plot Twist represents signifiant turns in the story (these are unpredictable scenarios, like random guard patrols, or it turning out that the head of security is a characters lost, thought-to-be-dead, brother); Wild are, in my mind now, like GM nudges. Details about NPCs and the scene provide the GM with options, but don't limit the possibilities.

From the player side, where can nudges come in? Since BIONIC is meant to be about risk, and control, they can't be sourced in chaos like in Mistborn and Star Wars. Thus, I think they will come from 'spending' resources. Instead of setting up a check pool, as described above, players declare actions and goals and the GM assigns a difficulty. Players then play cards, and spend resources to reduce that difficulty to zero (and so complete the action). Bad stuff, instead of coming from failure (like most RPGs, where you roll the dice and if you fail things go off rails), are going to come from the accumulation of GM resources. If you have the means, in BIONIC, you will succeed... but at what cost? On this view of the mechanics, resources players spend are being used as nudges mechanically, so why not allow them to be used as nudges narratively. Thus, players can spend resources for minor story effects as well (I spend 1 Stamina to have remembered to pack my grappling hook).

I like this approach better. Less gamey, but still about hand and resource management. The GM will still draw random cards off the main deck after every action a player takes. Caste cards will form a pool in the middle of the table that anyone can use, even the GM (there will be a cost for using your caste cards, of course - probably Resolve). Later I'll repost an overview of the core mechanics, and then I think I'm finally going to be ready to design a test-drive mission and make up some test characters.