[Genres]
A spacesuit-clad tech struggles to repair the warcraft's sensors, field generators, and torpedo magazines, even as the vessel suffers another barrage from enemy starfighters. Propelled by a flickering fusion drive, a pilot plunges the spacecraft deep into Jupiter's gravity well, attempting a slingshot maneuver even as the gas giant's atmosphere attempts to drag down another victim. The freighter's weary crew shambles into a neon-drenched spaceport bar, eager for some R&R after their recent escapades on an interdicted moon. The exploration team descends into the lightless chasms of a derelict megastructure, the spotlights of their antigravity harnesses playing across inscrutable machines left behind by a long-dead species of galactic architects.
Science fiction explores imaginative and futuristic concepts such as advanced technology, space exploration, artificial intelligence, genetic engineering, parallel universes, the possibility of extraterrestrial life, possible aftermaths of postapocalyptic annihilation, and much more. This means a near-future setting where aliens attack earth and a setting on a megastructure halfway across the universe set a few billion years in the future are both science fiction even though the Venn diagram for what's shared between these two games is probably slim.
Despite science fiction's wide-open space, the genre usually focuses on how the situation affects society and especially the characters caught up in the setting. In our case, that means the characters you'll play as you delve into your GM's sci-fi game. You'll face themes related to transhumanism, dystopian societies, extinction, and probably a lot of exploring the unknown, likely using tools and other equipment that lies far beyond modern technology (or tools you've scavenged from a devastated modern world).
Though science fiction is rife with unreal things, it's often grounded in some kind of real-world framework of potential technological advancement and shared history. In any case, science fiction can attempt to be predictive while providing a compelling game, narrative, or, in some cases, a warning of what might happen if we don't change our ways. There are literally dozens of popular sci-fi subgenres.
The Cypher Character Rulebook focuses on three: hard science fiction, space opera, and postapocalypse. Beyond all the setting details, types help distinguish the setting. For instance, in a hard science fiction setting, you might play an Engineer, Diplomat, Soldier, and so on. But in a postapocalypse game, you have the option to play as a Survivor, Heavy, or Tender—people just trying to stay alive after the world has ended.
Just like in other genres, your character's type grants you a handful of special abilities.
These skills are appropriate for hard science fiction and space opera games.
| Astronomy | Athletics | Attacking † | Biology |
| Chemistry | Crafting | Cybernetics | Deception |
| Defending † | Disguise | Driving | Engineering |
| Escaping | Forensics | Gathering information | Geology |
| Gunnery † | Gymnastics | Hacking | Healing |
| Heavy equipment operation | History | Identifying | Initiative |
| Intimidation | Lockpicking | Magic lore | Mathematics |
| Mining | Navigation | Outdoor survival | Perception |
| Performance | Persuasion | Philosophy | Physics |
| Pickpocketing | Piloting | Piloting spacecraft | Plumbing |
| Psychology | Publishing | Recognizing motive | Religious lore |
| Riding | Scavenging | Stealth | Systems operation |
| Tracking | Zero-G fluency |
† Some of these skills are tier restricted, meaning there’s a minimum tier requirement before you can become trained or specialized in them.
If you want more type options than those presented in one science fiction subgenre, your GM may allow you to choose a type from another subgenre (especially between hard science fiction and space opera) and convert it with just a little work. Types from the postapocalypse genre may require more customization—possibly a slight boost because they're a little less capable in certain ways. Work with your GM to see what's possible.
It might also be possible to choose types from other genres. You'll want to work with your GM, and will need to adapt or reskin the type a bit more comprehensibly. For instance, a Paladin or Mage from the dungeon fantasy genre might make an interesting science fiction character, but their equipment, background, general description, and basis for their abilities would all require a rework. Any magic these types do would have to be reimagined for science fiction as energies generated by devices they carry or some other in-world source.
The difference between a hard science fiction game and a space opera game is not especially large. Both operate with a nod toward scientific principles, even if one takes more liberties with what might eventually be possible. Scientific rigor between settings lies on a spectrum, and what one GM considers a fundamental scientific “sin” in their hard sci-fi game, another GM might view as a necessary narrative abstraction. Often, the deciding factor is the existence of faster-than-light (FTL) technology, which usually exists only in space opera games. Exceptions, of course, can always be made.
At tier 3, your science fiction or postapocalypse character gains a mid-tier ability from the following list of Science Fiction Genre Abilities, and at tier 6 you gain a high-tier ability from the same list. In addition, at tier 6, you can replace one of your mid-tier genre abilities with a different mid-tier ability.
However, the following stipulations apply:
When repairing, modifying, or building machines or devices of any kind, your task takes you half as long as normal.
You can bear one additional cypher at a time. You can gain this ability multiple times.
Each time you do, you can bear one additional cypher at a time.
With a successful Intellect attack to hack a machine, robot, or device (intelligent or not) within immediate range, you disrupt it in one of the following ways:
You must touch the machine, robot, or device to disrupt it (if you are making an attack, it inflicts no damage).
Effort: Increase the range to as far as you can directly see (through your own eyes, not through a remote camera or other interface). Target a mechanism through a network interface you have unrestricted access to (this requires two levels of Effort).
You gain 4 points in one Pool of your choice.
You gain a level 3 follower.
When you pilot or drive a mechanical craft and your roll is less than a 9, treat the roll as a 9. (This means you don't get a GM Intrusion if you roll a 1.) This ability's benefit persists until you take a ten-minute or longer recovery.
Durations that persist until you take a recovery end immediately, not when the benefits of the recovery are gained after ten minutes, an hour, and so on.]
Effort: Increase the minimum number rolled for this ability by 3.
At tier 3, the minimum number rolled for this ability increases to 12.
Due to unusual circumstances—alien physiology, injection of nanobots, exposure to strange radiation, your natural immune system coming into its own, or something else—you are now immune to diseases (and, if you wish, mutations) of any kind.
A level 3 robot of your size or smaller (purchased or built by you) accompanies you and follows your instructions as an intelligent follower. You and your GM must work out the details of your robot. If the robot is destroyed, they can be restored using your resources and a few days of tinkering. and a few days of tinkering.
If you already have a robot assistant, machine companion, or similar device, you either gain a new one or upgrade the previous one by 1 level, whichever you choose.
You can read the surface thoughts of a creature you can see within short range. If the creature is unwilling, you must make an Intellect attack against them to read their thoughts. Once you have established contact, you can read the target's thoughts until you use a ten- minute or longer recovery.
You spend one action aiming at a foe. If you attack that foe on your next turn, your attack is eased, and if you hit you inflict an additional 5 damage. First
If a weapon has the ability to fire rapid shots without reloading (usually called a rapid-fire weapon, such as a crank crossbow or submachine gun), you can spray multiple shots around your target to increase the chance of hitting, gaining an asset to the attack. This ability uses 1d6+1 attacks' worth of ammunition or power (or all of the weapon's stores, if it has less ammo or power than the number rolled). If the attack is successful, it deals 1 less damage than normal. You can also use this ability on multiple thrown weapons (such as stones, shuriken, daggers, and so on) if you‘re carrying them on your person or they are all within reach.
If a weapon has the ability to fire rapid shots without reloading (usually called a rapid-fire weapon, such as a crank crossbow or submachine gun), you can fire your weapon at three targets (all next to one another) at once. Make a separate hindered attack roll against each target.
You create, find, or otherwise acquire a level 5 intelligent machine companion follower that accompanies you and acts as you direct. If it's destroyed, it can be restored using your resources after a few days of labor. If you already have a lower-level machine companion, you choose whether it is upgraded to level 5 or you retain the level 3 companion and gain a new level 5 companion.
If one ally can see and easily understand you, you can instruct that ally to take an action . If the ally chooses to take that exact action, they can do so as an additional action immediately. Doing so doesn't interfere with the ally taking a normal action on their turn.
You are trained as an expert in two broad science and/or knowledge tasks (such as mathematics, physics, engineering, geology, history, hacking, and the like) that you are already specialized in. Being expert eases the task by three steps.
Alternatively, you can increase your skill in two science or knowledge tasks (from no skill to trained, or from trained to specialized).
You've mastered how to kill with a particular attack. You inflict an additional 5 damage with attacks of one specific type, such as a thrown knife, a shot with a firearm, a swing of an axe, unarmed attacks, or some other specific attack you prefer.
You can gain this ability more than once. Each time you do, choose a different specific attack.
With a successful Intellect attack to hack a machine, robot, mechanism, or device (intelligent or not) within immediate range, you disrupt it in all the following ways simultaneously:
You must touch the machine to disrupt it (if you are making an attack, it inflicts no damage).
Effort: Increase the range to as far as you can directly see (through your own eyes, not through a remote camera or other interface). Target a machine through a network interface you have unrestricted access to (this requires two levels of Effort).
When you roll to use any kind of mechanical device (other than a weapon) and your roll is less than a 9, treat the roll as a 9. (This means you don't get a GM Intrusion if you roll a 1.)
Effort: Increase the minimum number rolled for this ability by 3.
At tier 3, the minimum number rolled for this ability increases to 12.
You create a telepathic network between yourself and ten willing creatures you know, no matter where they are. All creatures in the network are linked and can communicate telepathically with one another. They can also “overhear” anything said in the network. Activating or using this ability doesn't require an action and doesn't cost Intellect points; to you, it's as easy as speaking out loud. The network lasts until you choose to end it.
Effort: Increase the base number of people in the network to twenty (5 Intellect), lasting until you use a ten-minute or longer recovery; each additional ten people costs 1 Intellect.
Enabler to create a network, Action to create an expanded network (twenty or more people).
Intelligent species other than humans are often encountered in science fiction settings, particularly space opera.
For example, it's possible PCs could run into mutants in a postapocalypse game, cyborgs in a hard science fiction setting, or either one plus any number of alien species in a space opera game. Or the player characters might be of such a species themselves.
The GM may decide to handle species with narrative description (and maybe advice on how to adapt the type and focus you already have) rather than introduce additional mechanics. For example, if you're a 7-foot-tall furry rigellian, it might not change your stats or skills—though it may have interesting roleplaying challenges and benefits.
However, the GM might decide to offer species choices that do grant mechanical benefits. In this case, choosing the Rigellian species would change your stats.
If the GM decides that species with mechanical benefits are appropriate for their game, they may give you the choice to gain one described here and/or a species they've created to suit their setting.
Species offer a one-time package of characteristics for your character, much like a descriptor.
| Aarak |
| Cyborg |
| Delph |
| D’nec |
| Drakain |
| Human |
| Mutant |
| Naron |
| Prota |
| Rigellian |
| Stelan |
| Vendeer |
| Zantari |
In some science fiction settings, certain species can be so advanced or so different that type might be a better option for characters than species as presented here. The most obvious example is in the space opera setting, with its Android type.
Alternatively, a type from another genre could serve as the basis of your preferred alien species, once adapted or reskinned to make it fit the sci-fi genre. For example, if you want to emulate a Predator-style species, the fantasy Ranger would make a reasonable foundation for your character. In any event, work with your GM to see what's possible.
In such cases where your type describes your species, but other PCs are choosing standard species from this section, you instead gain the benefit of two descriptors.
Aaraks like you hail from a canyon-carved volcanic world that enjoys an embarrassment of thermals, updrafts from when the wind streams over mountains and ridges, and “cloud streets” of aligned lanes of cumulus clouds running parallel to the wind. Feathered, light-boned, and described as “avian” by certain other species, you've left your homeworld, looking for adventures (and thermals!) on other planets and habitats.
You gain the following characteristics:
You can extend your glide duration and perhaps distance if you find a thermal, a series of thermals, or a low-gravity environment that can keep you aloft longer. Work with your GM to determine what local conditions are like.
You sport a variety of cybernetic implants, some of which replace missing organs you would have had if you were a human, with others designed to enhance whatever biology you still possess. You might have been born of a birthing process all the people of your colony undergo, willingly augmented as part of a stint of military service, or assimilated into a cybernetic collective against your will (from which you later escaped)—or you might be ignorant of why you're half machine. Most days, you figure it doesn't matter. It's not what you're made of that counts; it's your actions.
You gain the following characteristics:
Delphs are welcome almost anywhere, usually because of their skin artistry—your people's metachrotic ability to create colorful, unique designs and patterns across your entire body, including your luxurious head tendrils. When you really apply yourself, you can make amazingly beautiful patterns (or help camouflage yourself in some environments if you have about ten minutes to create a new design on your skin). What's less well known is your people's capacity to produce intraspecies pheromones (usually whether you want to or not) that almost anyone—delphs and other species—find alluring, or at least pleasant.
Delphs are welcome almost anywhere, usually because of their skin artistry—your people's metachrotic ability to create colorful, unique designs and patterns across your entire body, including your luxurious head tendrils. When you really apply yourself, you can make amazingly beautiful patterns (or help camouflage yourself in some environments if you have about ten minutes to create a new design on your skin). What's less well known is your people's capacity to produce intraspecies pheromones (usually whether you want to or not) that almost anyone—delphs and other species—find alluring, or at least pleasant.
You gain the following characteristics:
Your pheromones don't affect machines and may not affect all alien species. Work with your GM to see who might find your presence pleasant.
Like your fellows, you are a 4-foot (1 m) tall humanoid with glowing eyes. The D'nec are a nomadic species capable of repairing broken or scavenged electronics, engines, robots, and other devices, and then find a market for the reconditioned results. Though raised with the same disciplines as other D'nec, you struck out on your own, hoping to find new opportunities and new experiences the average D'nec can't even imagine.
You gain the following characteristics:
Your skin is ridged with lines of bone and you likely stand at least 6 feet (2 m) tall. Some might compare drakain to humans, but only the foolish would do so aloud. You and other drakain deeply value combat and honor, believing that death in battle is among the most glorious of ends. After all, yours is a proud warrior people, and drakain have parlayed their prowess into great empires in the past. You cherish your birthright, but that doesn't keep you from befriending beings of other species and exploring opportunities that come your way.
You gain the following characteristics:
Humans are among the youngest species, and perhaps that's why—when considered as a whole— they're more given to explore, conquer, and expand their communities, even if that means taking from other species or other humans. Individually, Humans couldn't be more diverse. Which means you could be under 5 feet (150 cm) tall and barely 100 pounds (45 kg), or well over 6 feet (180 cm) tall and weigh in at 250 pounds (113 kg); have blue eyes or brown, black, green, or some other variation; have no hair, flowing golden locks, amazing dreads, a mohawk, or some other rakish cut; be all about your faith, exploring ancient places, keeping evil at bay, enriching yourself, or some other disposition; and so on.
What's definitely true is that you are not afraid to strive for what you want and believe in.
You gain the following characteristics:
If you choose Human as your species, your character sentence “I am an adjective species noun who verbs” gains another element: your second descriptor. For example, your sentence might be “I am a Brash and Rugged Human Fighter who Masters Weaponry.”
In a game where everyone’s human, using the Human species option may not make sense. Your GM might grant you the option to choose Human as a species only if other species are also part of the game.
Savage forces strong enough to destroy a world left you transformed. Perhaps through latent mutations passed down from ancestors that survived the apocalypse, or because something about you reacts when exposed to radiation or some other mutagenic source, you've gained mutations. You might look relatively similar to others of your species, or you might have one or more obvious physical differences that make it hard to disguise your nature—work with your GM to decide your specific features. Not that you necessarily want to hide what you are; you might wish to proudly display what makes you different and, to your mind, better.
You gain the following characteristics:
You are descended from a species of natural telepaths that communicate naturally mind-to-mind, not via spoken language. Standing about 5 feet (1.5 m) tall, your prominence—usually a subtle glow that faintly silhouettes your bald head—moves in slow waves when you're relaxed, or flashes and pulses when you're excited or stressed (unless you consciously suppress it). The naron are generally a peaceful people, but some of you have found the wider galaxy offers interesting opportunities in all walks of society among creatures where psi is a rare to vanishing trait.
You gain the following characteristics:
Naron telepathy doesn't allow you to read others' thoughts or even talk with them if they want to shut you out. But if you are a naron who wants to explore your latent telepathic gifts, choose Psion as your type and/or a psi-heavy focus such as Commands Mental Powers. However, other foci could be adapted or reskinned so the abilities granted are considered to be generated by your latent psi.
Your flesh is akin to stretchy clay in that you can change your overall shape between a basic sluglike blob (or circular sphere) to a being with up to several pseudopods useful as your arms and legs. Your control over your shape is limited; you're unable to exactly replicate other creatures or objects, but you can evoke their shapes, though it takes you about ten minutes to achieve a new shape. Prota are rare—your homeworld was destroyed by war long before you were born. You rarely encounter others of your kind, so you've learned to get along with other beings, some of whom you've come to regard as your friends or found family.
You gain the following characteristics:
Examples of tasks a prota can gain an asset for after spending ten minutes reshaping themselves include hiding in a distinct spot, squeezing through an explicit small aperture, climbing a particular wall, aiming at a specified location, carrying an especially heavy load, and so on.]
As a rigellian, you are a 7-foot (2 m) tall humanoid covered in thick fur. Rigellians are renowned for their strength, loyalty, and roaring language. Most rigellians are peaceful and enjoy life on a technologically advanced homeworld orbiting a distant blue supergiant star. While you may share the sense of honor most of your kind possess, you've probably left home behind to pursue adventure in the wider galaxy.
You gain the following characteristics:
If not for the angularity of your features compared with humans, outsiders would be hard-pressed to tell you apart. However, your difference in temperament is more obvious. It only takes a few minutes in your presence to understand that stelans prize rational thought above everything, having little use for gut feelings, emotions that cloud sound judgment, and the value of anecdote in the face of compiled data.
You gain the following characteristics:
You are a vendeer, which means that you are 9 feet (2.5 m) tall, slender, and purple-skinned. Your mane-like “hair” makes you slightly more sensitive to psychic phenomena, especially the thoughts and emotions of other creatures, intelligent or not. Vendeer are native to a lush forest moon, and though not technically advanced, your kin enjoy rich cultural and spiritual lives. But the lure of other planets and stars pulled you far from home, and now you pursue a life far different than that of the hunter-gatherers you left behind.
You gain the following characteristics:
Your antennae give you improved senses and your thick skin helps insulate you against the cold of the icy moon your people call home, but otherwise you appear humanoid. However, appearances can be deceptive, as zantari have five genders, which outsiders find difficult to distinguish. As a zantari, you value honor, ritual combat, and military service, but also artistry. Others sometimes describe you as emotional, but for you that's a compliment—without intensity of feeling, how could life be worth living? You gain the following characteristics:
Artifacts in a science fiction game can be strange relics from an unknown alien source or tech items that aren't yet widely available. In a galactic setting, for example, it's easy to imagine that innovations or specialized items might not have spread everywhere.
Level: 1d6+4
Form: Series of short, rounded tubes and hoses about 12 inches (30 cm) long
Effect: The device solidifies the air in a 10-foot (3 m) cube of space, the center of which must be within short range. The air is turned into an amberlike substance, and those trapped in it will likely suffocate or starve.
Depletion: 1-4 in 1d6
Level: 1d6
Form: Organic pod, almost like a small, hemispherical bit of brain; once grafted to a host, the host's flesh grows over the pod until it is only a lump
Effect: The pod grafts onto any living host (usually near the brain or spine) and injects chemicals that boost the creature's metabolism. This permanently raises the host's Speed Pool maximum by 5 points.
Depletion: —
Level: 1d6+2
Form: Handheld device with a plastic panel screen and wires that must be affixed to the head of a creature
Effect: This device shows a visual image of what a creature is thinking. The affected creature need not be conscious.
Depletion: 1 in 1d20
Level: 1d6+4
Form: Violet crystal the size of a fist
Effect: The crystal allows the user to transmit their thoughts telepathically at an interstellar distance. Even at that range, communication is instantaneous. Each use allows about a minute's worth of communication, and the communication is entirely one way (so having two crystals would be handy).
Depletion: 1 in 1d10
Level: 1d6+2
Form: Small spherical automaton about 8 inches (20 cm) in diameter
Effect: This device comes with a small module that can be affixed to a machine. Floating along, the sphere attempts to follow within immediate range of the module (though it can be directed to remain where it is). It moves a short distance each round. It can come to the module from a range of up to 10 miles (16 km) away. If the module is attached to a machine and that machine takes damage, the sphere moves to repair the damage with sophisticated tools that restore 1d6 - 2 points per round (meaning that if a 1 or 2 is rolled, no damage is repaired that round). This requires no action on the part of the machine being repaired. The sphere can attempt to repair a machine a number of times per day equal to its level. The sphere must be newly activated each day.
Depletion: 1 in 1d100
In a science fiction setting, some GMs may want to offer alien species or androids, who are mechanically different from humans, as options for player characters. This can be accomplished by using descriptors. Two examples are below.
You are a machine—not just a sentient machine, but a sapient one. Your awareness might make you an exception, or there may be many like you, depending on the setting.
Artificially intelligent characters have machine minds of one type or another. This can involve an advanced computer brain, but it could also be a liquid computer, a quantum computer, or a network of smart dust particles creating an ambient intelligence. You might even have been an organic creature whose mind was uploaded into a machine.
Your body, of course, is also a machine. Most people refer to you as a robot or an android, although you know neither term describes you very well, as you are as free-willed and free-thinking as they are.
You gain the following characteristics:
You are a quintar from the planet Quint. You are basically humanoid but taller, thinner, and blue skinned. Your hands end in three very long fingers. Quintar have five genders, but all quintar prefer to be addressed as female when communicating with more binary species. Human emotions and sexuality fascinate them, but not because they don't have such concepts— quintar emotions and sexuality are just very different from those of humans. In general, quintar are more cerebral than other species, valuing knowledge over all else.
Quint is relatively Earthlike, with slightly less gravity but a slightly denser atmosphere.
You gain the following characteristics: