In a future of chrome sheathed in leather, shadows prosper.
The year is 2066 and the world has changed. As humanity marches ever forward into the 21st century, the thin line between man and machine has been inexorably blurred as humans continue to rely on the enhancements of cybernetics and robots are continually upgrade to become more and more life like. This web of connectivity grows vaster by the day as common day occurrences like the internet have become even more engrossing do to advances in neurological and virtual reality technologies, that have made the dreams of "cyberspace" closer to reality. Humanity seems to have arrived at a golden age of innovation and advancements as new tech is released everyday making the augmentation outdated within weeks, but social tensions continue to bubble beneath the shining exterior.
Following the burst of the American asset price bubble in the mid 2030s and the subsequent depression whose ripples felt as far from Topeka to Shanghai, humanity was left in something of a slump. Governments failed to reign in control as entire towns and cities fell into total anarchy. To combat such chaos many governments were forced to pass acts which allowed prosperous companies primarily large PMCs to reign the populace back into control - such as the Private Intervention Act of 2035 in the United States. When the chaos finally subsided these companies manged to retain much of their power and today they made no attempts to hide their "security forces". Most national governments have either collapsed or stayed as shadows of their former selves puppets used by the corporations to pass laws and judgement in their favor. As a result nearly thirty percent of people under the age of sixteen are unemployed and over a quarter of the world's population are considered homeless vagrants as urban sprawl has slowly consumed the land and destroyed peoples homes.
These corporations, these faceless entities moving in the shadows wage a quiet war against one another and it is not uncommon for everyday citizens to be caught in the crossfire of two different enforcer groups. Rebellions and protest are crushed as quickly as they are formed, the instigators vanishing into black bags slick with rain never to be seen again. But even these revolts few and far between don't cause many waves if any. The people have become complacent to what is now everyday life for them. You wake up in your corporation paid for apartment in your crappy tenement housing, you go to your corporation paid for job where you worked like a drone for most of the day and face the ever constant danger of being fired if you move two seconds too slow with that filing report, and then you come home to watch your television who constantly remained you whose in charge. And they don't question a thing because how could they?
But this world like any has a darker undercurrent. Those forgotten by the corporate society above. Deep in the ghettos and the back alleyways, a different world can be seen. Here is a land that no even the CEOs and officials don't dare to enter without armed escorts and vans with ten inch thick windows. Those homeless and without work scavenge for what little they could to survive. Most fell into one of the many street gangs that roamed the back alleys and stalked the roads on cyber cycles. Holding strong control on many more illicit dealings such as drugs, prostitution and, black market dealings. But even they are still subject to the wills of the powerful as many have become little more than puppets for the bigger corporations to deal with threats and monopolize on illegal trade. And it is not uncommon for some of the bigger corporations to have multiple gang leaders on their payroll.
It is in this world where scheme, plot and double cross interconnect we see the rise of Divers. Divers are individuals born and raised in this world and know the ins and outs and every dark corner. These phantoms in the neon lit darkness are professionals who deal with "Special interests". Assassinations, hostile takeovers, kidnappings, drug running, and basically anything else that pays well. They are a loose confederation of members with Divers knowing one another but making a habit of not making any real personal attachments because Bob may be fine at the bar but the next day he may have five armor piercing rounds through his back halfway across the world. Most of their training either comes from just living or being taken under the wing of a more experienced Diver for a few years. Diver crews have been known to exist from time to time but they are usually short lasting only holding together for a few missions before falling apart.
Divers, Corps, Gangs and Civies. They all mixed together in a dark concoction that burned the throat as it went down and caused your stomach to do flips. This is the world of 2066, it's certainly not the end of the world but we are approaching it at the speed of light.
Following the burst of the American asset price bubble in the mid 2030s and the subsequent depression whose ripples felt as far from Topeka to Shanghai, humanity was left in something of a slump. Governments failed to reign in control as entire towns and cities fell into total anarchy. To combat such chaos many governments were forced to pass acts which allowed prosperous companies primarily large PMCs to reign the populace back into control - such as the Private Intervention Act of 2035 in the United States. When the chaos finally subsided these companies manged to retain much of their power and today they made no attempts to hide their "security forces". Most national governments have either collapsed or stayed as shadows of their former selves puppets used by the corporations to pass laws and judgement in their favor. As a result nearly thirty percent of people under the age of sixteen are unemployed and over a quarter of the world's population are considered homeless vagrants as urban sprawl has slowly consumed the land and destroyed peoples homes.
These corporations, these faceless entities moving in the shadows wage a quiet war against one another and it is not uncommon for everyday citizens to be caught in the crossfire of two different enforcer groups. Rebellions and protest are crushed as quickly as they are formed, the instigators vanishing into black bags slick with rain never to be seen again. But even these revolts few and far between don't cause many waves if any. The people have become complacent to what is now everyday life for them. You wake up in your corporation paid for apartment in your crappy tenement housing, you go to your corporation paid for job where you worked like a drone for most of the day and face the ever constant danger of being fired if you move two seconds too slow with that filing report, and then you come home to watch your television who constantly remained you whose in charge. And they don't question a thing because how could they?
But this world like any has a darker undercurrent. Those forgotten by the corporate society above. Deep in the ghettos and the back alleyways, a different world can be seen. Here is a land that no even the CEOs and officials don't dare to enter without armed escorts and vans with ten inch thick windows. Those homeless and without work scavenge for what little they could to survive. Most fell into one of the many street gangs that roamed the back alleys and stalked the roads on cyber cycles. Holding strong control on many more illicit dealings such as drugs, prostitution and, black market dealings. But even they are still subject to the wills of the powerful as many have become little more than puppets for the bigger corporations to deal with threats and monopolize on illegal trade. And it is not uncommon for some of the bigger corporations to have multiple gang leaders on their payroll.
It is in this world where scheme, plot and double cross interconnect we see the rise of Divers. Divers are individuals born and raised in this world and know the ins and outs and every dark corner. These phantoms in the neon lit darkness are professionals who deal with "Special interests". Assassinations, hostile takeovers, kidnappings, drug running, and basically anything else that pays well. They are a loose confederation of members with Divers knowing one another but making a habit of not making any real personal attachments because Bob may be fine at the bar but the next day he may have five armor piercing rounds through his back halfway across the world. Most of their training either comes from just living or being taken under the wing of a more experienced Diver for a few years. Diver crews have been known to exist from time to time but they are usually short lasting only holding together for a few missions before falling apart.
Divers, Corps, Gangs and Civies. They all mixed together in a dark concoction that burned the throat as it went down and caused your stomach to do flips. This is the world of 2066, it's certainly not the end of the world but we are approaching it at the speed of light.
By the year 2066 the world has changed from what we know it to be. Unchecked climate change caused global temperatures to increase by four degrees centigrade. Crops that weren't already genetically modified to withstand the increase would begin to fail at rates of up to 40%, Forests began to die and brush fires become more and more prevalent. As the coral reefs and rain forests slowly vanished biodiversity began to decrease at startling rates. Droughts became more common as the age old flows of rivers and streams began to be effected and water shortages are common in more less off areas. But most importantly the change came with the floods. As the ice caps began to melt and sea levels began to rise coastal cities began to be washed away one of the most prominent being the eventually entire submergence of the American Eastern Seaboard as well as many islands from the Pacific to the Mediterranean. The cities that now remain on the coasts hide beyond large sea walls to keep the waters back and the rise of "Arks" came into the world. These large platforms basically city sized oil rigs were constructed slowly in the place of islands and land that had been swept away and they dot the Atlantic and the Pacific.
Technology in the world of 2066 is omnipresent. Without tech you get left behind in the dust, you yourself became outdated. Technology is everywhere from the self driving cars, virtual reality programs, rail guns and the rich being able to make genetically perfect babies through modifications and gene splicing prior to birth. But the most prominent of the new technologies are of course cybernetic augmentations. These augmentations were supplement by the boom in the robotics and biomedical fileds in the late 2010s and early 2020s. As robots became more lifelike and able to perform more complex tasks so did our own cyber limbs. But most people aren't big old walking destruction machines. Today's cyborgs are stylish and sleek. Cybernetics are designed to be streamlined for that high mover lifestyle. Whither it is a simple neurochip to make you better at judging stocks or cataloging files or hydraulic piston in your legs so that you can crush a man's chest with one kick. The man of today is defined by high tech living.
Cyberware and augmentations are in style it is what everybody does these days. For those that can afford it you will probably have at least a couple of enchantments to give you that edge. Maybe your eyes are the new EYE-SEEU model with the digital display and tainted crisis (neon blue is in this year). Everybody's got something because if you got nothing than you don't got any edge over the other guy. Some keep em internal with neruochips and responders built into the body hidden beneath flesh, but some go all out and start chopping limbs off to go forge to get the newest arm model. It's addicting, it's exciting and it's all the rage.
But it is here that people begin to run amuck of chances of becoming a so called "C-Freak". Basically since these augmentations link up directly to the brain eventually the brain becomes overloaded with stimuli and information and you snap and become a ravenous psychotic murder. The only way to combat the unset symptoms of becoming a C-Freak is to take a drug called Neurotop. Problem is Neurotop besides being highly addictive it is also very pricey to produce. Meaning that Corps are usually the ones that have possession of the drug to keep their armies of cybered up robocops from snapping and murdering them instead of the other guy. Neurotop can be found on the streets very rarely where it is marked up at about 1000x the market price and when the drug already costs a small relative fortune, meaning that unless you try and rob a Neurotop facility (which would be highly suicidal, since they have some of the best security in the world and even if you do make it out they will hunt you down and find you) most of the common day man has to continually play the game of will this next aug be the one that makes me snap?
Cyberware and augmentations are in style it is what everybody does these days. For those that can afford it you will probably have at least a couple of enchantments to give you that edge. Maybe your eyes are the new EYE-SEEU model with the digital display and tainted crisis (neon blue is in this year). Everybody's got something because if you got nothing than you don't got any edge over the other guy. Some keep em internal with neruochips and responders built into the body hidden beneath flesh, but some go all out and start chopping limbs off to go forge to get the newest arm model. It's addicting, it's exciting and it's all the rage.
But it is here that people begin to run amuck of chances of becoming a so called "C-Freak". Basically since these augmentations link up directly to the brain eventually the brain becomes overloaded with stimuli and information and you snap and become a ravenous psychotic murder. The only way to combat the unset symptoms of becoming a C-Freak is to take a drug called Neurotop. Problem is Neurotop besides being highly addictive it is also very pricey to produce. Meaning that Corps are usually the ones that have possession of the drug to keep their armies of cybered up robocops from snapping and murdering them instead of the other guy. Neurotop can be found on the streets very rarely where it is marked up at about 1000x the market price and when the drug already costs a small relative fortune, meaning that unless you try and rob a Neurotop facility (which would be highly suicidal, since they have some of the best security in the world and even if you do make it out they will hunt you down and find you) most of the common day man has to continually play the game of will this next aug be the one that makes me snap?
Divers
As the saying goes Divers make the world go round. Divers or D.Vs for short are the people that get things done. Working beyond societal bounds and unafraid to go against the biggest of targets if the pay is right they are the fixers of the world. Everything task has a price and if you want that task done right chances are you are going to hire a diver or two to make sure that things go the way they are supposed to go. They say that D.Vs came into existence after the Wars in 2025. Most were soldiers who after seeing what they say couldn't in their right mind work for any corp or government again and instead just went freelance to earn enough money to drown down their memories each night with more drugs and booze. D.V culture evolved around these men and women's lifestyles of throwing caution to the wind, going after suicide run after suicide and generally making terribly stupid decisions as they move outside the boundaries mixing with upper and lower classes and everything in between.
Diver's come from all walks of life really as the rich may take up the role as gun for hire for just a little fun diversion and a kid from the slums may venture out to find a Diver to train under to get out of a bad situation. Because of this their is no real central organization to keeps track of Divers or collects membership dues or things like that. Instead Divers are usually united through mindset more than anything else. They all tend to be thrill seekers of sorts that live fast and die young usually by getting shot in some alleyway and being left to die by their "partners". Because of this Divers don't really make permanent teams that much because most of them are natural loners or wanders searching for that next adrenaline hit and the high mortality rate of their job didn't help things either because it was just easier to keep a degree of separation between everybody, emotions only got in the way of the job.
The easiest way to spot Divers from the crowd though was their tendency to be teched out. For a Diver going all natural just didn't work, you died way too easily. Instead most were conglomerations of augmentations and powered exoskeletons with most of the looking like one man armies ready to take on the world while in the field. The only groups usually more decked out compared to them where the Corps and well the Divers tried their best not to anger Corps Enforces. They might be adrneline junkies but only some are suicidal enough for that.
Diver's come from all walks of life really as the rich may take up the role as gun for hire for just a little fun diversion and a kid from the slums may venture out to find a Diver to train under to get out of a bad situation. Because of this their is no real central organization to keeps track of Divers or collects membership dues or things like that. Instead Divers are usually united through mindset more than anything else. They all tend to be thrill seekers of sorts that live fast and die young usually by getting shot in some alleyway and being left to die by their "partners". Because of this Divers don't really make permanent teams that much because most of them are natural loners or wanders searching for that next adrenaline hit and the high mortality rate of their job didn't help things either because it was just easier to keep a degree of separation between everybody, emotions only got in the way of the job.
The easiest way to spot Divers from the crowd though was their tendency to be teched out. For a Diver going all natural just didn't work, you died way too easily. Instead most were conglomerations of augmentations and powered exoskeletons with most of the looking like one man armies ready to take on the world while in the field. The only groups usually more decked out compared to them where the Corps and well the Divers tried their best not to anger Corps Enforces. They might be adrneline junkies but only some are suicidal enough for that.
- T-Papers: Transit Papers. Actually a small chip that people carry on their persons for the most part. T-Papers are your donor card, passport, identification and lifeline all wrapped in one. Once the Corps started taking over they pushed for T-Papers to help standardize travel and break down national borders to promote trade and such.
- Cybered: To have or use cybernetics such as augmentations
- Corps: Short for Corporations can also be a general term for the entire idea of corporate repression sort of like today taking about the Man.
- C-Freak: A individual that had too many cybernetic augmentations and snapped becoming a psycho killing machine. C- Freaks are generally bad news, considering when they snap they were already basically walking tanks and now the have no moral fibers to hold em back.
- D.Vs: Another term for Divers.
- Spooks: Also called fixers, the bogymen of the Corporations. Heavily cybered up with stealth and sensory augmentations you never see these wraiths come before it's too late. You really don't want to piss a Corp off to such a degree that they send a Spook after you. You can run but the Spooks always find you.
- Enforcers: The catch all term for the regular grunts on the Corporations payroll, big and nasty they are usually picking lots of guns and know how to use em.
- Sparks: Hackers but more importantly hackers that actually "jump" into the net. Like Case in Neuromancer. They are called Sparks becuase of their tendency to be very jittery and twitchy. They say it's because in the Net where everything is data you can cross the world in a couple of minutes since your going at the speed of light. But back in the real outside of their terminals and nodes everything seems slow to them.
- Arks: The large oil rig like cites that now dwell above the waves where rising sea levels have swept away the land. Most people living on the arks are scavengers that take trawlers and subs to the sunken cities to try and reclaim lost tech and sell it for a nice price.
More will be added as we go along.
Rules
01: I'm not the biggest fan of rules because I like to assume everybody is sane human being so I'll keep this short. If you have to abide by any rules be it these two. Common decency and common sense is something that everybody should strive for. Treat your fellow humans like they are just that your fellow humans and with all the respect that implies. Disputes between players should not be long blown out affairs in the OCC, hell disputes should not happen at all if we are doing this right. If you want to argue have your characters dispute about something mundane like the importance of starch or something.
02: In regards to any role play involving the dark depravity of mankind there are mature themes within this story. This is not a very nice world and terrible things happen to good people for no good reason. In that regard I heavily suggest you treat these matters with the weight that they would actually entitle. Romance falls into the same thing, sure it can happen just don't be stupid about it
03: Quality matters people, show me that you care. And remember I'm asking for your best not the best of Shakespeare or the like. I've been doing this shit for about a decade now and I'm still learning things everyday. Just remember Quality over Quantity and always remember Fail Faster.
