Cyberware and Humanity

[Admin Canary]

In standard Cyberpunk, installing cyberware costs humanity, period. The more chrome you have, the more it lowers your Empathy, because most people see their bodies as part of who they are, and chopping off something attached to you for an extra boost is a fundamentally altering thing. There are a few people out there who, while being emotionally normal, fundamentally see themselves as their brain: a bundle of nerve tissue piloting a meat mecha. The difference between a meat mecha and a regular mecha are semantic to them.

These people are few and far between, however; the PCs are likely not among them. However, they are meant to be well-established edgerunners with a few years under their belt. So, PCs will have a 10 point Humanity "buffer" to spend before they start spending from their Empathy-based Humanity pool. Any of this buffer not used during character creation is lost.

If PCs want a further buffer, they will have to pay for it as though getting therapy that automatically succeeds, per page 230 of the Cyberpunk RED book. That means as follows:

When you roll 2d6 or 4d6 for this, link your rolls from Sakkaku in your PF.

For ALL Humanity recovery, including the buffer, each piece of cyberware lowers your Humanity by 2 (with the exception of cyberware than normally does not have a humanity cost), and each piece of borgware lowers your Humanity by 4. This is not included in the Buffer. This is from your Empathy-derived base Humanity pool and will lower your Empathy as per RAW.

Also as per RAW, cyberware that is purely compensatory for limb or other loss does not cost Humanity.