Hello Hackers,

Well, I've spent most of 2020 revising this game and all those playtest notes and edits are finally out in the wild with Neon Black 7.0. This update carries some pretty substantial changes from the previous version but here are some of the biggest:

• New and revised character playbooks. Characters now have a max of 3 action ratings and 4 attribute ratings. This changed because I found most players didn't feel incentivized to bother with cyberware to get an edge, so now you can only get 2 action ratings in any one action before needing to get chrome or take other risks. Players also now have the option to be employed or not, influencing what they can accomplish during downtime (and what they can steal from their corporate jobs).
• Character milestones. Milestones replace special abilities. I wanted each character to have narrative justifications for their abilities and feats baked into the mechanics. So now in order to get these powerful milestones, you need to accomplish a certain story beat. For example, the Decker playbook has this milestone: "ADMINISTRATIVE PRIVILEDGES: You’ve successfully infiltrated a tier V faction’s network. When you successfully Hack a target, you also gain access to one connected network, target, or subsystem." You get mechanical benefits and narrative permissions not by gaining XP, but by accomplishing things in the fiction.
• Community playbooks replace crew playbooks. This is a pretty big and needed change. The last iteration of Neon Black was too focused on the personal accumulation of wealth. You needed money to gain more playbook items, and for certain downtime actions, and the crew only flourished if the players hoarded their wealth. Now Neon Black is about addressing the needs of the community that the characters are part of. The more you steal from the rich and help your friends, the more your community thrives.
• Luck. In this version luck replaces stress. It works the same way, but instead of gaining ticks of stress, you start with luck already marked on your character sheet, and need to spend it to assist, push yourself, etc. The only way to gain luck is through CRITs and the engagement roll. 
• Calamities. When your luck runs out, your character suffers a calamity. This is a special kind of consequence that cannot be resisted and makes the current score and their lives much more difficult. Players select from 4 types of calamities, including additional heat and plot twists.
• Conditions. These replace harm. Conditions cover a lot more ground than harm, including broken or faulty cyberware, awkward social situations, sudden fame or infamy, and loss of specific resources. You only have 3 places to mark conditions, and if you run out of space you suffer a calamity.
• Bonds. Characters start with 2 bonds with other PCs. These are relationships or beliefs that help players define their characters, and can change over time. Bonds also determine who you can assist as a teamwork action, and how many dice you give when you do so.

There's also changes to downtime actions, XP, and more. I'm so happy to finally get this version out the door, and more changes are coming in the future. But for now please enjoy this latest release of Neon Black.