Cyberpunk: Cash vs. Points Implications
 

So, I know this question has been addressed - repeatedly - and I know that everyone has a slightly different answer as to how body mods should be bought in cyberpunk games.

My specific concern is one of consequences. What are people's takes on the different consequences of using cash, points, or both to purchase cyberware/bioware/etc?

To try to summarize what I see as the implications and raised questions of each:

Points Only:
1) Character growth is slower, since points will be divided between both "gear" and all other character developments, unless CP are awarded generously
2) What happens - or SHOULD happen - if something removes a PCs ware? For instance, if the PCs lose a combat, and the bad guys salvage their cyberlimbs rather than kill them, do the characters' point totals just plain drop? If so, is that reasonable and/or fun, in your opinions?

Cash Only:
1) Character growth has the potential to outstrip the rate of CP advancement, if characters can get their hands on the requisite cash. Fairly strong reflection of the cyberpunk genre, but has the potential for abuse, and for creating incentives to make less "punk" characters, such as a rich kid who just buys everything in the first game session. (Obviously, can be mitigated by disallowing Increased Wealth)
2) GM doesn't need to worry as much about the balance effects of stolen/damaged ware, since CP totals are fluctuating anyway.
3) Economics of body mod pricing become more sensitive, and a balance must be struck between the laws of supply and demand, and the power/utility of various mods. (This is the one that worries me most)

Points AND Cash:
1) Character advancement slowed by need to both save up points (or accept point debt) AND find the money.
2) May strain disbelief if character has one but not other, yet can't use it.
3) Seems to share economic concerns with "Cash Only."

I know I'm approaching this the long, in-depth way, but what are people's experiences, comments, and recommendations to a would-be GM new to the challenges of the genre?

Thanks!

Re: Cyberpunk: Cash vs. Points Implications
 

The general problem for cash vs points is that being able to buy the same thing with two different currencies, where the prices don't work out as identical, distorts character building, and if there's a conversion method (e.g. Wealth), really really distorts character building.

Re: Cyberpunk: Cash vs. Points Implications
 

You've missed option #4: Points or cash. If you provide two ways to get cyberwear, the presence of each mitigates the problems of exclusive use of the other. Got the money? No obstacles to getting the cyberwear you'd expect to be able to get. Got the points? Ditto.

And, yes, if they lose cyberwear, their point total drops, just like it'd drop if they sustained any other permanent crippling injury.

Re: Cyberpunk: Cash vs. Points Implications
 

I'd do what I always do when it comes to actually paying points - what you've paid for, with your points, is plot-protected. If not, someone may very well steal the PCs' cyberware while they sleep if that makes sense plot-wise. However, the character who has paid points will not lose it unless he does something actively stupid and/or heroic, such as giving up his arm to pay for his niece's surgery, for instance.

Re: Cyberpunk: Cash vs. Points Implications
 

Well, you're right, I hadn't considered that. Let me specify that I'm concerned with in-game developments. Character generation will be strictly points, if only for sanity's sake.

If you allow Points OR Cash for enhancements acquired in-game, how would you, as a GM, justify the different methods of acquisition? What precisely is a character *doing* if s/he lacks the cash for a Reflex Booster implant for Enhanced Dodge +1, but puts up the required CP between sessions anyway? Would you simply assume that s/he found a way to pay for it? Would you require a temporary subplot dealing with incurred debt?

Even more problematic, what if a character DOES have the money to buy a body mod, but chooses to use only CP instead? For the sake of the narrative and the setting, what the hell just happened to allow that character to get a "free" piece of hardware, economically speaking?

Re: Cyberpunk: Cash vs. Points Implications
 

Unspecified favors owed. Sudden windfalls from work they're doing off-screen. Lucky find from an evening of dumpster diving. Maturation of investments they've had put aside but didn't specify up to this point. Charitable assistance. Bank error in your favor. Really, many things bought with CP (skills characters haven't specifically been studying for, completely novel advantages) requires some sort of rationalization along those lines.

Require? No. But I might throw something in if I can think of something interesting.

Let them. The above rationalizations still work.

They're not getting it for free. They're getting it in exchange for character points. Those points are a pure game construct, so it's up to the GM and the players to decide what, if anything, they represent beyond narrative convenience and privilege which players earn to customize their characters, but it seems to me that that's a determination which needs to be made at the time, and by its very nature more or less requires retcons.

Re: Cyberpunk: Cash vs. Points Implications
 

FWIW, I ran a minicampaign years ago where this came up during character creation, and then a world-jumping campaign where it arose in the course of play. My general solution was this:

• Starting characters who want implants and modifications must use points. They can justify these however they like: stint in the army, good pay on past missions, dad was a surgeon, great wealth, working for the company that makes the stuff, whatever. If they want these background elements to matter going forward, then they should spend some points on suitable social traits – Allies, Contacts, Patrons, Rank, Reputation, Wealth, etc. – none of which grant any cybertech at the start of the campaign. The association between cyber-stuff bought with points and social traits bought with points is purely background material.
  
  
• Characters in play can obtain implants and modifications in two ways:
  
  
  1. They can spend money. Yes, this means that someone could drop 50 points on Filthy Rich and get a bajillion dollars worth of stuff. However, this has a few implications:
     
     
     • The money is really spent. This means less money for other gear.
       
       
     • Surgery isn't instantaneous. There's a waiting list, the procedure itself takes time, and then there's recovery time. All of this is in play, which means sitting out adventures and their rewards (which might include cybertech . . . keep reading). That's the player's decision!
       
       
     • Surgery and recovery can fail. All rolls are made in plain view. Failures don't mean money back unless the PC paid extra for insurance.
       
       
     • Rich people who expect admission to high-end clinics have to pay cost of living for their apparent Status level (e.g., Status 4 if Filthy Rich) for at least as long as they're on the waiting list, under the knife, and recovering.
     
     
  2. They can earn it. This is instead of or as well as discretionary points. In the course of their adventure, they impress someone enough to get into a testing program or special branch – whatever the adventure justifies. In this case, I waive money and cost of living, and assume that the benefactor keeps trying until the procedure works (no need for insurance). Since all the PCs get such a reward, the downtime means that nobody has to sit out anything. Players can opt out of the reward, but I don't give extra points to compensate, and when the inevitable majority who accept the reward recover, the action resumes, whatever Special Snowflake is off doing.

However the modifications are acquired, they raise point value. This is self-evident with starting points, but no less true of items bought with money or granted as rewards. Likewise, short-circuited, ripped-out, and generally messed-up implants lower point value, regardless of how they were obtained. This stuff never gets plot protection, wherever it came from.

Note as well that while cybertech always raises point value, points cannot buy cybertech in play. Or to be precise, they can't buy it at advantage prices. It's legitimate to trade points for cash, as the usual rates and with the usual excuses (lottery winnings, investments, whatever), and then use that like any other money.

All of which is a way of saying that in any kind of transhuman or posthuman setting, the notion of rigid character-point accounting and point-level parity among PCs has to go out the window. Fluidity is more realistic and truer to the source fiction. People gambling a lot of money on implants can get very powerful very quickly, but there are social ramifications (if only missed opportunities while sat in the clinic, and the need to keep up one's payments) and there's always the chance of being stuck with obsolete gear or zapped with a weapon that fries your machine parts. People who prefer to avoid that circus are giving up a quick path to power, but may well end up saving more money in the long run, and certainly won't be at the mercy of skeevy surgeons and dodgy parts.

Re: Cyberpunk: Cash vs. Points Implications
 

Something I've been considering is to treat all character advancement in this way - not awarding character points at all, but instead letting players earn advantages during play. It's obvious how this could be implemented for traits like Allies, Contacts, Wealth, cyberware, gadgets, etc. It's less clear how to let players develop purely mental traits (Combat Reflexes, removing existing disadvantages, etc). Skills would of course use the normal training time rules, so this method may need more downtime between adventures than stories with primarily cp-based improvement.

Re: Cyberpunk: Cash vs. Points Implications
 

With skills, it has never hurt my campaigns – which rarely involve truly discretionary points – simply to say things like, "You each get 2 points to invest in existing skills used on this adventure, may move up to 2 more points from skills not used in a few adventures into ones you did use, and finally get 2 points in any new skill you could justify brushing up on during your week off." I don't enforce training times . . . well-written PCs have backgrounds, and its fairly easy for me to believe that some long-forgotten background skill could emerge after a few nights of practice to knock the rust off. Beyond that, even when I do subscribe to training times, I tend to think that they're just suggestions. I have little difficulty accepting that some DX 13, IQ 13 fantasy hero or secret agent with 150 points in skills could learn a new skill quickly.

Re: Cyberpunk: Cash vs. Points Implications
 

Hmm, good point about "new" skills potentially being old ones that have been re-learned; my main issue was when characters suddenly acquired a skill in the middle of a multi-session adventure (long dungeon crawl, for instance) but in that context it could make sense.

Re: Cyberpunk: Cash vs. Points Implications
 

I use a formalized system based on this.

It's a two-part system. Upgrades that come from technology have to be bought with money (or social currency like favors). You use that to get the plot point lined up: allocate hardware/bioware, technicians, buy consumables like nanobots/pharmaceuticals, etc.

However, you also have to pay in points. When you first get the implant, you buy related disadvantages and limitations equal to the cost of the implant. Then, you buy off those disadvantages with points.

Certain disadvantages (e.g. Temporary Disadvantage: electrical, for cyberware) can never be bought off. But most reflect temporary, post-operative advantages that with treatment eventually go away. Addiction, Dependency and Maintenance are good examples. Psychological disadvantages like bloodthirsty or confused might reflect neurological imbalances that eventually get resolved. Limitations on the advantages are nice because they reflect gradually acquiring an ability that you eventually internalize. There's no end of options here. Of course, the costs might be social instead (Debt if your treatment required financing, Duty if it cost favors to get).

This has several beneficial effects on the game.

1. Players have an incentive to buy up things that reflect natural growth rather than bio-enhancement, because such things don't usually come with strings attached.
   
2. It lets me have several variations on the same Advantage with differing benefits and costs, letting players pick their poison and adding flavor to the bio-enhancement.
   
3. They get to buy on the installment plan. A player who loads up on upgrades too fast gets what they paid for, plus a host of medical disadvantages that only fade over time (realistic, if the side effects interact with one another). This fits the thematic cyberpunk theme of power with a price.
   
4. Most such disadvantages can be bought off slowly, by raising control numbers, for example. Or reducing the Maintenance requirements incrementally.

Of course, it means you have to feed players points at a rate commensurate with smooth operation of the game. But it does keep things even, and players who load up on too many disadvantages have an in-game rationale for why they can't buy more until they've paid down some of what they've already acquired (your metabolism is overloaded with all the tinkering you've done!)

My one recommendation here is to write out the Advantage and the commensurate limitations/disadvantages as a single power. Have a low initial point cost, and then show precisely what each installment of points buys you. Do this in advance. You don't want arguments later. And you, the GM should have final say on the structure of the power's levels. What you want are limitations and disadvantages that the player has a strong incentive to buy off. "Desirable disadvantages" need not apply, except perhaps as permanent features of the power.

Re: Cyberpunk: Cash vs. Points Implications
 

Points only is well suited to games where the characters get their gear from an organization, or the GM doesn't want the hassle of keeping track of money. What should happen if something removes a PCs ware is that he gets replacement gear.


[Cash only is well suited to games where every single character is going to be getting it although this tendency can be mitigated by making EMP weapons common.


The need to save up points can be avoided by letting characters take disadvantages to pay the deficit. Voila. Cyberpsychos.

Re: Cyberpunk: Cash vs. Points Implications
 

Well, sometimes. Don't forget disadvantages and limitations that represent post-operative therapy, training in using the new advantage, and the body acclimating to the change.

Example:

Melanie buys a Catfall upgrade. This consists of some pretty subtle work: inner-ear changes, some nanosurgical brain upgrades and improved connective tissue and cartilage. It'll take some time for her body to recover from the surgery, and also to internalize her instincts.

Catfall costs 10 points. Consider a few options:

1. NeuYou specializes in biokinetics and physical upgrades. The physical aspects of the surgery are ready on day one... but the neural upgrades aren't well integrated and take time to seat themselves. Buy Catfall as Unreliable (Activation number 5, -80%) for 2 points. The player can later come back and buy the target number up, eventually eliminating it altogether.
   
2. Olympian Biotronics has a different version of Catfall. Their approach requires a lot of hand-holding and post-operative therapy, but integrates very quickly and cleanly with the patient's brain. Buy Catfall for free (paying the cash cost, of course), paired with the disadvantage Maintenance (Weekly, 2 people, -10). You need a physical therapist and a neurologist to check and fine-tune the implant on a weekly basis while it seats itself. Buy the frequency of the office visits down as you get the points, until the advantage is completely grown in.

There are rumors of a military version, supposedly available in black clinics, that gives you instant Catfall without any post-op treatment or side effects at all! If this were really the case, it would almost certainly come with some major strings attached (Duty, for example).

There are other possibilities, of course, but I believe that this approach should be the default in most transhumanist campaigns. It's an improvement both mechanically and thematically.

Re: Cyberpunk: Cash vs. Points Implications
 

Points don't work for character advancement, if you ascribe value to the character's perspective.

Re: Cyberpunk: Cash vs. Points Implications
 

It is a nice approach. Thanks for sharing!

Re: Cyberpunk: Cash vs. Points Implications
 

Me-tooing, in that I think this is a very suave way to do things.

Added bonus: as GM you can rule that certain disadvantages/limitations permanently come with the territory, giving different methods different flavors.

Re: Cyberpunk: Cash vs. Points Implications
 

Hmm... and then if it gets stolen or damaged you can just rebuy it and start off where you were before?

Re: Cyberpunk: Cash vs. Points Implications
 

Was desperately looking for a "reputation" or "+1" button to give you credit for this. It's well thought out, and lends the very kind of specificity to the advantages that most generic games avoid, lest they pollute someone else's ideas or prevent creativity. Consider this idea stolen in it's entirety.

Re: Cyberpunk: Cash vs. Points Implications
 

It's also well suited to a cyborg comic book superhero, who doesn't really have cybernetics at all, only superpowers that are called "cybernetics" rather than "mutant" or whatever. The same goes for just about any other technology based superhero.

Re: Cyberpunk: Cash vs. Points Implications
 

I generally do things just like you said, but wanted to emphasize this point. Justification should be, IMO, completely separate from points. Just like if you start with a bunch of points in Karate, you're free to say that you've trained since childhood, or you survived the intense training of the cult of the Barehanded Death, or you've been bestowed with the skill by the spirit of a 16th century Tibetan monk, or had the training downloaded directly to your brain, or whatever.

Re: Cyberpunk: Cash vs. Points Implications
 

Thank you - everyone - for your input so far! If I'd tried to think through all these implications on my own, it would have taken weeks!

I really like Kromm's suggestions for "earned" cyberware as payment for services rendered. I don't think it's enough on its own, but it leads down some very promising roads.

Wellspring, this is EXCELLENT! I think this is a solid base, and with some tweaks, should serve nicely. On top of everything already stated, it has the added benefit of slightly slowing character growth from being excessive by requiring the buying off of Disads. (Although, I could imagine, and would be comfortable with, some Disads being "bought off" with money - such as paying a therapist to treat Bad Temper, for example).

I also saw a good idea (I forget who posted it, though I'll link if I find it) for "cyberpsychosis" that involved HT and Will checks by the patient of a cybersurgery, modified by the quality of the ware and the medical care, where failures meant acquiring physical or mental Disads (for HT and Will, respectively). I don't know if there's a simple way to use that AND your suggestion, but I might try to do so.

So, now that we've plumbed those depths, anyone have any thoughts on handling dollar-value market prices for body mods?

Re: Cyberpunk: Cash vs. Points Implications
 

Therapy takes time.

Re: Cyberpunk: Cash vs. Points Implications
 

Variant I've considered for any cyberware that replicates the capabilities of equipment (e.g. night vision) is to pay points for payload (possibly with some enhancement) sufficient to carry the gear, and then pay money for the actual ware. Solves the problems of gear vs implants.

Re: Cyberpunk: Cash vs. Points Implications
 

This sounds like an argument for a range of Accessory Perks- Accessory: Gun Mount; Accessory: Vision Mod; Accessory- Onboard Cyberdeck, etc. Each equipment "slot" would be one Perk, specialised by body location, then plug in whatever you can afford with cash.

ETA: Seems the write-up for Accessory Perk vetoes guns except for one-shots. You'd either have to overrule that, or make it some kind of Modular Ability.

Or... Go with Payload, as you suggest, then allow Accessory Perk to activate items mounted in the payload. That way you pay for a certain weight-class of weapon then you can use it as a cyberweapon, without having to recalculate your Innate Attack CP cost every time you change ammo type or maybe swap out weapons. Then you could write up a bunch of payload limitations, e.g. max of BL/4 pounds in the forearm, BLx2 in the abdomen, etc. The Exposed limitation is useful here, for externally mounted items.

Re: Cyberpunk: Cash vs. Points Implications
 

I prefer payload enhancements. Probably something like:

• Internal Arm: you may have an arm inside your payload bay; it's typically short (-30%) with no physical attack (-50%) for 2 points.
• Access Port: +20% per level. You have an access port you can open to allow use of items in payload without taking them out of your payload. Causes items to be exposed and visible; -1 to see or attack them per level of this enhancement. For an always open access port, reduce by 50%. This limitation is incompatible with Exposed.

Re: Cyberpunk: Cash vs. Points Implications
 

For mean if you get something with cash or just as adventure rewareds (even if they cost points) that nice but I fee free to mess with them how ever I feel is needed with the plot, if they results in a lost oh well.

whoever if you spend earned points on it (and hence I approved the spending) this represents to me you consider the change a permeated change which means if mess with it in away the deprives you of it the will be opportunity for you to follow up to get it back either as part of the plot or a follow up plot. Of course if you ignore the opportunity it can become a perment loss.

Re: Cyberpunk: Cash vs. Points Implications
 

Uh...wut? If you lose something you bought with money you buy another one.

Re: Cyberpunk: Cash vs. Points Implications
 

That's my point bought with money, but gear can be bought with points like Signature gear.

or Gadgets cyber gear like Parabolic Hears 3 (cybernetic -10%) [11] can either as Kromm describe be given by role playing outcome by the GM or the Player buying with earned points.

I'm saying if you just pick up then treated it as possible transient as any other gear bought with money, Which doesn't mean you will get the opportunity to find another one you can afford.

But if you have also spent earned points you get plot protection the same as if I change you Racial Template to a Duck that you can expect if you will be give the opt unity to get to get ride of the cures and get your Racial Template back. (My cyberpunk tends to be Shadowrun influenced so magical curse can happen)

Re: Cyberpunk: Cash vs. Points Implications
 

Payload with no enhancement or ancillary traits is used for weapon bays in official material (THS:Changing Times and Shell Tech both I think).

Re: Cyberpunk: Cash vs. Points Implications
 

Unlike Weapon Mount, a Payload doesn't include means target an attack, so can only be used with munitions that are simply released (ie, dumb bombs, or self-guided missiles). However, if a character has a direct-fire weapon that's too big to fit in a Weapon Mount, adding Payload to make up the difference could work.

Re: Cyberpunk: Cash vs. Points Implications
 

Thus it is infinitely better to buy gear with money.

Re: Cyberpunk: Cash vs. Points Implications
 

Late to the party here, but my interpretation would, in many ways, be the following:


Cash represents the ability to purchase the parts.
Points represent the ability to acquire them.

To whit: Just because I have a bajillion dollars doesn't mean I automatically know where the best parts are made, or which companies I can trust to produce these systems. As such, the slow build-up of points represents the time spend 'web browsing' for the parts, deciding which model suits best, researching how it interferes with the rest of my cyber parts.


It's rather like building a computer in that respect. Right now, I have the cash to get a new machine, near enough. But I now need to spend some time, around my job, and around my other hobbies (cough gurps cough) researching exactly what new hardware I want...

Re: Cyberpunk: Cash vs. Points Implications
 

That depends on table rules and campaign type, I think. I've run campaigns where points were "easy come, easy go," and character values jerked around in the ±50 points range due to things the players did, I did, and the environment did. Nobody cared, because points were mostly: (1) a character-creation currency, of little budgetary importance in later play, and (2) a really rough index of average character capability, this being the only reason we tracked them in play. Whereas cash . . . cash was hard to come by. In the specific case I'm thinking about, the PCs were from another world, had no legal ID, and had strange and somewhat unmarketable skills. They also had no money.

I could easily see a Gamma World-style game where random mutation, nanobot swarms, mad surgical robots, and plain old accidents regularly alter the PCs' point values up and down . . . but where widely accepted trade goods (the setting's stand-in for cash) are extremely rare, to the point where all the PCs are perpetually broke. I could also see a cyberpunk dystopia where being hacked up and reassembled, changing point values, happens all the time . . . but where the wealthy and powerful keep the PCs in the ghetto, as far as cash goes. In general, the idea of points being the be-all, end-all currency of the campaign isn't universal. Cash is often the harder thing to get and keep, making parting with it for improvements a harder call than parting with points.

Re: Cyberpunk: Cash vs. Points Implications
 

To me, money is just a social enabler, like Status or Rank. It gives you access to advantages you might want, must as an Unusual Background gives you access to weird advantages like Magery in a low-magic setting. It provides the in-setting pretext for how you might gain an advantage.

If you don't use cash, you need to have some in-game rationale for why a player suddenly gained an Advantage. Otherwise, verisimilitude suffers and players have a reduced incentive to pursue in-world rewards like money and power.

The concern here is that, in-game, your characters figure out some way to wildly inflate their bank account or social standing. Or create weird social connections that open doors that would otherwise be closed (that is, an Unusual Background). Having the characters load up on cash and then spend it on generating advantages is just a special case of this.

Other examples:

• I somehow get promoted to rank 8 in Centrum... and immediately file a dozen requisitions for a long list of cybernetic implants.
  
• I am appointed the Marquis of Crucis Court by the Emperor. As such, the local scientists and doctors are my subjects-- including the ones who implant biomod upgrades.
  
• I do a major favor for Ilabrat the Attendant, and now I can ask him to get his boss to grant me magical abilities.

In each case, there's an in-game explanation for how to earn Advantages. The danger is power creep-- each situation potentially opens the floodgates for a multi-hundred point power bump for a particular player.

So there has to be a meta-game mechanism (CP's) that we use to balance characters against one another and against the challenges they face. We also want to manage power creep. Ideally, players remain roughly balanced against one another, we want challenges to be challenging but surmountable, and we want characters to develop steadily but slowly.

GM's don't have to use character points to accomplish this-- but even if they're winging it, these are factors that have to be managed somehow. That why ideally, you manage character power creep in a way that has both a mechanical basis (game balance) and an in-game rationale (verisimilitude).

Re: Cyberpunk: Cash vs. Points Implications
 

Well, certainly it's dependent on which rules you're using, but as long as you can spend points for money, and the amount of money you get for the point cost of a given item exceeds the cost of an item, it's better to spend money (the reverse is also the case; it's a simple exchange rate issue).

Re: Cyberpunk: Cash vs. Points Implications
 

You know, I was quite unaware of this trait, had to go looking for it. But how do you calculate if a gun's too big for a Weapon Mount, just go off nominal Arm ST? The limitation says it's incompatible with Weak, but that would seem appropriate for a Pistol-only Weapon Mount or something similar.

And Weapon Mount doesn't imply concealment, so you'd need Payload for that anyway.

Re: Cyberpunk: Cash vs. Points Implications
 

The Weapon Mount trait itself doesn't specify. In UT, Bionic Hand and Arm Mounts have capacities of 1/2 BL and full BL, respectively, though they are priced the same.

Yeah, that would make sense. Payload is notably lacking from the aforementioned UT cybernetics, despite the implication that they can be concealed.

Maybe instead of limiting what weapons can be mounted based on weight (which I can only find reference to in UT, not in the Basic entry for Weapon Mount) it should instead be based on the MinST of the weapon, with the assumption that anything heavier than that won't fit anyways. Also, for normally two-handed weapons (ie, rifles) you'd need to take two Weapon Mounts, or brace it with another limb, else you'd suffer the normal penalties for firing a rifle one-handed (Tactical Shooting p13). I do like the suggestion of requiring Payload if the weapon is concealed, though that adds quite a lot of expense (10cp per BL lbs) and doesn't match the assumptions from UT and TS.

Actually, looking through TS:Changing Times, they seem to use Weapon Mount and Payload interchangeably - WM for small weapons, and Payload for large ones or individual ordinance. For example, the UCAV has a Payload that is typically loaded with a 15mm emag cannon plus ammo, but doesn't have a Weapon Mount. This means I was wrong before in my assumption that WM was necessary to aim and fire a weapon stored as payload...

So I guess Weapon Mount should be used for anything carried and fired "externally" (and thus limited by MinST rather than overall bulk, though it does add to encumbrance) and Payload for anything carried "internally" (and its weight doesn't add to encumbrance).

Re: Cyberpunk: Cash vs. Points Implications
 

I think stick with weight instead of MinST- it's more general, so can cover non-weapons in the mount, and it meshes more easily with the Payload rules.
And some characters might like to carry an overpowered weapon on their mount, with a high MinST, and just wear the to-hit penalties for being under strength.

As for the expense of Payload, could it be limited by type of object to make it cheaper?

Re: Cyberpunk: Cash vs. Points Implications
 

I'm a big believer in cash only for an ongoing cyberpunk game. It reduces the distance between the players and the character and encourages players to play their character realistically rather than meta-gaming.

The character wants $10,000 for a mod and the player wants $10,000 for a mod.

The character won't hold off on getting a mod that they want and have in-game access to on the grounds that the player wants to use those points elsewhere.

I feel the same way about any Advantage gained directly in the game world. If you make a friend, you get a friend - you don't have to save up and spend points for them. If you find some treasure, you get some treasure - you don't have to save up and spend points for it. If you achieve something awesome in a public place, you get a reputation, etc.

Re: Cyberpunk: Cash vs. Points Implications
 

This has always been my approach too; as Kromm said of some of the games he's run, I use the points system primarily for character creation, and then keep track of changing values in PCs and relevant NPCs as a (very) rough gauge of overall character capability, as well as in instances where someone has an ability tied to point values (Modular Abilities, DR with Absorption, etc); that and bonus points for advancing any skills or other abilities used in game, where appropriate.