Cyberpunk EdgeRunners RPG World

Raffen Shivs:* Outcasts among outcasts. Brutal bandits who rob anyone who dares to venture outside the city.

• Biotechnica: A corporation that maintains vast fields of synthetic grain in the Wasteland for fuel production (CHOOH2).

Why is leaving the city so hard?

Night City is a trap with no easy way out. It's not just a "weekend getaway"; it's almost always a one-way ticket.

"Night City doesn't let you go easily." "Either you leave in a body bag, or you lose everything that connected you to this world."

1. Bureaucracy and Borders: The city is surrounded by enormous walls and checkpoints. To leave legally, you need a visa, a passport, a bunch of permits, and most likely a hefty sum to bribe the border guards.
2. Economic Shackles: Most residents are mired in debt. Your implants often belong not to you, but to a corporation or bank. If you try to escape, your "chrome" can simply be remotely disabled (or it will start killing you).
3. Road Danger: As soon as you cross the city limits, you enter the world of the Wasteland. Without an armored vehicle, water, fuel, and survival skills, you won't survive there for more than a couple of hours—the Shiva Raffen or mutants will quickly take you out.
4. Psychology: The city makes you addicted to dreams. Everyone believes they're "just about to hit the jackpot." Leaving means admitting defeat and becoming a nobody in the empty desert.
   If you had the chance, do you think you'd risk crossing the border with the nomads or try to make it to the top in the city itself?

Night City is a city-state that's simultaneously a consumerist paradise and a technological prison. In short, the city is built to suck you dry (and your money dry) until you're nothing but trash.
Infrastructure: Vertical hell and neon glitz
Life in Night City is centered on verticality. The higher you are, the richer you are.
Architecture: The city is overcrowded. Megabuildings are massive, self-sufficient "vertical slums" that can house tens of thousands of people. Inside, they house everything from shops to shooting galleries, so many residents can go weeks without leaving the streets.
Transportation:

• NCART: High-speed metro (though in Edgerunners, we often see it as a place for robberies or trips to nowhere).
• AV: Flying corporate cars. They hover above traffic jams, literally looking down on everyone.
• Traffic: The roads are perpetual chaos, and parking is an unaffordable luxury.
• Digital Environment: The entire city is permeated with local networks. Advertising is beamed directly into the eyes (via implants), and vending machines (SCSMs) sell everything from burritos and soda to disposable pistols and drugs.
• Ecology: The waste management infrastructure is barely able to cope. The city is surrounded by gigantic landfills, and the sky is often covered in smog or acid rain.

Badlands: An Ocean of Dust and Rust

The Badlands is an arid desert surrounding Night City. It is a lawless territory where the only rule is endurance.

• Terrain: Scorched earth, abandoned oil rigs, giant solar farms, and endless mountains of garbage. The air here is saturated with chemicals, and sandstorms can literally peel off your skin or ruin your electronics.
• Who lives there:
• Nomads: Those who chose the freedom of the road over corporate slavery. They live in clans and travel in armored vehicles.

"Valentinos"
Who they are: One of the largest gangs in the city, primarily composed of Latin Americans.
Appearance and Style: Abundant gold jewelry, Santa Muerte tattoos, flashy suits, and customized lowriders.
Personality: Unlike other thugs, they have a code of honor. For them, family, brotherhood, and religion are paramount. They brutally avenge their own.
"Voodoo Boys"
Who they are: A secretive and dangerous gang from Haiti, based in the abandoned Pacifica district.
Talents and Methods: The best netrunners (hackers) in the world. For them, the physical world is secondary; their real life takes place in cyberspace (the Net). They try to escape the Black Shield and connect with free Artificial Intelligences. They distrust outsiders.
"Animals"
Who they are: A gang of musclemen obsessed with physical strength.
Appearance and Methods: They despise metal cybernetic implants. Instead, they modify their bodies with massive doses of steroids, hormones, and bio-additives (called "The Juice"). They are huge, muscular fighters who work as bouncers and security guards.
Scavengers
Who they are: The most despised caste in Night City (mostly from Eastern Europe and the USSR).
Occupation: They kidnap people off the streets (both living and dead) to harvest their expensive cybernetic implants and organs for resale on the black market. They have no honor or ideology.
Outside the City
Nomads
Who they are: People who have rejected corporate slavery and live in the Wasteland (the desert surrounding Night City) in huge clans (for example, the Aldecaldos).
Lifestyle and lifestyle: They live in camps and drive modified armored buggies and vans. Their main values ​​are freedom and family. They engage in smuggling, logistics, and cargo protection. In the city, they are considered rednecks, but the nomads are incredibly loyal to each other.

Militech
Who they are: An American megacorporation and private army. Arasaka's main rival.
Style and Methods: Heavy armor, military uniforms, tanks, and brute firepower. They do not stand on ceremony in achieving their goals. Closely connected to the government of the New United States (NUS).
Urban Services (Law and Survival)
Trauma Team
Who they are: An elite paramilitary ambulance service.
Methods and Traits: They arrive in heavily armored avi (flying machines) within three minutes. If you have paid "platinum" insurance, they will rescue you at any cost, shooting anyone in their way with machine guns. If you don't have insurance, they'll leave you to die in a pool of blood.
MaxTac (Max-Tac / Psycho Squad)
Who they are: Elite police special forces.
Methods and Traits: They are called in only when a cyberpsycho is rampaging through the streets and the regular police can't handle it. They use lethal force. Many Max-Tac fighters are cured cyberpsychos who have been given a badge and a gun.
Street Gangs (Masters of the Neighborhoods)
"Maelstrom" (Maelstrom)
They are: A gang of cybernetic fanatics. They live in industrial zones.
Appearance and Style: Disfigured by chrome. Their signature trait is a deleted face and spider-like red optics in place of eyes. They wear black leather and spikes.
Personality: Cruel, unpredictable sadists. Due to the abundance of implants, most of them are one step away from cyberpsychosis.
"Tyger Claws"
Who they are: A Japanese crime syndicate (yakuza) that controls Japantown.
Appearance and style: Glowing Asian tattoos, motorcycles, neon colors. Their preferred weapons are katanas and smart pistols. They try to avoid heavy and ugly implants.
Activities: Underground casinos, brothels, business protection. Secretly financed by Arasaka.

The Cyberpunk universe is a grim dystopia of triumphant capitalism. Night City is an independent metropolis governed not by politicians, but by Megacorporations. Society is divided between the super-rich "corporates" and the impoverished population, surviving on crime. Everyone is obsessed with cyberimplants (chrome), but excessive body modification leads to cyberpsychosis—a loss of humanity and insane aggression.
Between the corporations and the streets are fixers (shadow brokers) and edgerunners/mercenaries (such as Maine's gang), who do dirty work for both sides for money.
Here are the main powers and factions of Night City:
Megacorporations (Lords of the World)
Arasaka
Who they are: A Japanese zaibatsu, the most influential megacorporation in Night City. Specializes in corporate security, banking, and the production of cutting-edge weapons.
Style and Methods: Strict black suits, discipline, corporate ninjas, and the world's best netrunners. They operate covertly, ruthlessly, and arrogantly.
Role in the Plot: The main antagonists of the Edgerunners. They conduct cruel experiments (like on Lucy) and test secret technologies (cyberimplants).

Faraday
Attitude: Fixer (a middleman who issues orders).
Appearance and clothing: Dressed in a strict, impeccable business suit. The main feature of his appearance is his face, with three cybernetic eyes on the right side.
Personality: An arrogant, cold-blooded schemer and manipulator. He views mercenaries as expendable.
Weapons and talents: His main weapons are connections, money, and information.
Relationships: First hires Mayne, then David. Secretly works for the Militech corporation, and then tries to curry favor with Arasaka. The main antagonist.

Pilar
Who she is: The gang's technician and engineer.
Appearance and Clothing: A tall, gangly man with a strange, elongated skull. Distinguished by his long, golden cybernetic arms. He dresses in a street punk style with an abundance of chains.
Personality: Eccentric, loud, and vulgar, he's the comedian of the team. He likes to provoke people, but is a genius at what he does.
Weapons
Talents and abilities: Modification, repair, and maintenance of any weapons and implants. His long, manipulative fingers assist him in delicate technical work.
Relationships: Rebecca's older brother (with whom he constantly argues, but loves her).

Kiwi
About: The team's experienced netrunner.
Appearance and Clothing: A tall, slender woman with short red hair. She wears a long red cloak. Her distinctive feature is a metal mask implanted in place of her lower jaw. She's almost always seen smoking a cigarette.
Personality: Cold, pragmatic, and cynical. Her main credo in Night City is "Trust no one."
Weapons and Talents: Advanced hacking of enemy electronics and implants.
Relationships: Lucy's mentor. A longtime member of Maine's team, but due to her pragmatism, she's capable of betrayal for profit (she collaborates with Faraday).

Dorio
About: The second-in-command, the team's muscle.
Appearance and Clothing: A tall, muscular woman with short blonde hair. She wears a revealing top and shorts that show off her cybernetic abs and arms.
Personality: Calm, level-headed, and good-natured among her peers. She smooths out Maine's rough edges and acts as a "big sister" to newcomers.
Weapons and Talents: A master of hand-to-hand combat, she possesses immense physical strength thanks to her heavy cybernetic arms.
Relationships: Maine's right-hand man and romantic partner.

Maine
Who is he: The leader of the Edgerunners gang, a veteran mercenary.
Appearance and Clothing: A huge, broad-shouldered dark-skinned man with blond hair. He is composed almost entirely of cybernetic implants. Due to his size, he wears minimal clothing (pants and belts) to allow him to move freely, and he also wears dark glasses.
Personality: A charismatic, stern, but fair commander. He acts as a father figure to his team, but is obsessed with becoming stronger through augmentations, which drives him insane.
Weapons and Talents: Incredible physical strength. He has a missile launcher built into his arm. An excellent tactician in battle.
Relationships: Dorio's lover, David's mentor.

Rebecca
Who she is: Mercenary marksman (solo), team member.
Appearance and clothing: A petite girl ("loli cyborg") with pale skin and green-pink pigtails. Her eyes are fully augmented. She wears a voluminous black jacket over her bare body, underwear, and chunky sneakers. Her body is covered in pink tattoos.
Personality: Explosive, chaotic, foul-mouthed, and a keen shooter. At the same time, she is incredibly loyal to her friends, straightforward, and caring toward those she loves.
Weapons and talents: Expert in the use of firearms. Later, he installs giant cybernetic arms to fire the heavy Carnage shotgun and machine guns without recoil.
Relationships: Pilar's younger sister, he has an unrequited love for David (while remaining his most loyal partner).

Lucy (Lucyna Kushinada)
Who she is: Netrunner (hacker), David's lover.
Appearance and clothing: A slender girl with white hair dyed neon at the ends. She wears a white crop top, black shorts, a red translucent jacket, and a red fanny pack. She wears distinctive makeup with red eyeliner.
Personality: Mysterious, independent, and secretive. Distrustful of others due to her difficult past, she is willing to do anything for David. Her ultimate dream is to escape to the moon.
Weapons and talents: A brilliant hacker, capable of hacking into the minds of her enemies and complex corporate networks. In close combat, she uses a "monostring"—a glowing, red-hot thread embedded in her forearms that cuts through flesh like butter.
Relationships: In love with David, former Arasaka Corporation test subject, and Kiwi's apprentice.

David Martinez
Protagonist: The main character, a mercenary (solo/edgerunner), and later the leader of a gang.
Appearance and clothing: Initially a thin Latino teenager with shaved sides and short brown hair. After his mother's death, he wears her bright yellow lifeguard jacket with a fluorescent blue collar. Over time, he gains muscle mass and transforms into a huge, muscular cyborg.
Personality: Initially a smart but impulsive schoolboy. Later, he becomes a devoted, selfless, and caring leader. He tends to take on the dreams and burdens of others, which leads him to the brink of cyberpsychosis.
Weapons and talents: Unique tolerance for cyberimplants. His main advantage is the military-grade spinal implant "Sandevistan," which allows him to move at superhuman speeds by slowing down time. Later, he uses pistols and heavy weapons.
Relationships: In love with Lucy, Gloria Martinez's son, Maine's protégé, Rebecca's best friend.