Psychosurgery Procedures

The following alterations can be accomplished with psychosurgery. At the GM’s discretion, other mind-editing procedures can be attempted, using these as a guideline.

Awareness Block

This technique is used to block your awareness of specific actions, skills, memories, or even the environment around you. This differs from memory editing or skill suppression in that nothing is removed from your mind; you are simply prevented from accessing this knowledge. For example, you can be blocked from ever being aware of the color red, from remembering how to use a gun, or to automatically tune out anything to do with a specific hypercorp.

When used to block out your own actions or behaviors, you are completely unaware of the blocked activity — even while you are doing it. If the action/behavior is pointed out, you will be inacapable of recognizing it or addressing it (attempts to force you to will instigate a Stress Test of SV 1d6/1).

Awareness block is sometimes applied as a second layer of protection for edited memories or suppressed skills. In this case, not only is the memory/skill excised, but you are incapable of reflecting upon the possibility.

Awareness blocks are exceptionally useful for espionage and mind-control programming. Couriers carrying secret information in their hands can be made completely unaware of the trove of data in their minds, reducing the likelihood they will be intercepted or accidentally leak what they know. Spies can be programmed with personality editing to exercise certain activities but be blocked by this procedure from ever being aware they are doing them, thus allowing them to lie convincingly if interrogated. The combination of awareness block and personality editing enables the creation of unwitting pawns.

Removing an awareness block is an equal procedure to installing one.

Behavioral Masking

Given the ability to switch bodies, many security and law enforcement agencies have resorted to personality and behavioral profiling as a means of identifying people even when they resleeve. Though such systems are far from perfect, your unconscious habits and quirks could potentially give you away. Characters who wish to elude identification in this way can undergo behavioral masking, which seeks to alter and change your unconscious habits and social cues. If successful, apply a −30 modifier to Kinesics Tests and similar identification systems to identify you.

Deep Learning

Using tutorial programs, memory reinforcement protocols, conditioning tasks, and deep brain stimulation, your learning ability is reinforced, allowing you to learn new skills more quickly. You can spend 2 Rez Points in a week to increase skills. If improving skills over 60, you may spend 2 skill points per week.

Hidden Knowledge

This procedure takes specific memories, knowledge, or skills and locks them away in a safe place in your mind. Like memory editing, you are unaware that you had this information. When a certain trigger condition is met, however — a passphrase, a specific face, a certain event, etc. — the knowledge instantly becomes available. It is also possible to program another trigger condition to lock the knowledge away once again (unless an awareness block is put into place, you will be aware that you knew something, but won't be able to recall what).

Interrogation

Psychosurgical interrogation uses lie detection and brain scanning techniques including the measurement of unconscious physiological responses, analysis of brain activity to detect falsehoods, measuring brain activity and memory activation in response to specific images or other stimuli, and repeated forking and time-accelerated simulations to verify results and undermine willpower.

The dividing line with interrogation lies with the use of pain and other mental manipulation torture techniques. Physical torture is widely regarded as being ineffective, due to the likelihood that victims will lie, admit guilt when innocent, or generally say whatever they need to say to stop being tortured. When combined with the technologically enhanced interrogation techniques described above, however, it can be extremely effective.

The timeframe and SV for psychosurgical interrogation is variable, depending on the situation and the questioning. The GM should decide on these as appropriate. One subjective week should be the baseline, with modifiers provided for additional weeks. SV may range from nothing with basic interrogation to 1d6 +2/half for moderate torture and 1d10 + 2 for severe torture, possibly more. Keep in mind that torture is extremely unpleasant and may inflict stress on the practitioner and witnesses as well. Such scenes may also not be appropriate to your gaming group, so be aware of your players’ comfort levels.

Memory Editing

By monitoring memory recall (forcibly invoked if necessary), psychosurgeons can identify where memories are stored in the brain and target them for removal. Memory storage is complex and diffused, however, and often linked to other memories. It is extremely difficult to target one specific memory for removal; instead, general groupings of memories must be targeted, such as rough time periods or topics. Removing a memory almost always affects others (GM discretion).

Adding or replacing memories is a much more complicated operation and requires that such memories be copied from someone who has experienced them or manufactured with XP software. Even when successfully implanted, fake memories may clash with other (real) memories unless those are also erased. Characters injected with a false memory can make an INT Check to identify a memory as fabricated or wrong if they have a valid reason to question it.

Mental Evaluation

Psychosurgery can be used to detect previous edits to your mind. This exploratory procedure can detect previous psychosurgical procedures, neural pruning, fork merging, exsurgent infection, or even the long-term effects of trauma, mental disorders, drug use, and addiction.

Merging

Merging is the process of recombining a fork with its originating ego (Forking). Merging often results in mental stress and/or lost fork memories. A successful test will reduce the SV; use the numbers listed after the slash on the Merging table. Each superior success will reduce the amount of memories lost by one level, each superior failure will increase it one level. Memory loss usually only affects the fork’s memories (not the alpha’s); apply a modifier to memory-related COG Checks (−10 for Minor loss, −20 for Moderate, −30 for Major).

The process of merging also integrates any stress, traumas, and ego traits acquired by the fork back into the original ego.

Merging

Divergence Period	Modifier	SV (failure/success)	Base Memory Loss
Up to 48 hours	—	1d6/—	Solid merge, no memory loss.
48 hours to 1 week	−10	1d6/half	Solid merge, no memory loss.
1 week to 1 month	−20	1d10/1d6	Minor memory loss.
1 month to 6 months	−30	2d10/2d6	Moderate memory loss.
6 months+	−30	3d10/3d6	Major memory loss.

Neural Pruning

Neural pruning is the process of creating a beta fork from an alpha fork. Make a note of what skills and memories you want to decrease, eliminate, or keep. If you succeed, the fork is created as desired. If you fail, the beta fork acquires one of the following penalties, plus one per superior failure. Some of these penalties can be combined for a cumulative effect:

• 1 skill decreased by −30.
• Fork acquires a Negative ego trait.
• Fork suffers SV 1d6.
• Extra memory loss (GM discretion; beta forks only).
• 1 Positive ego trait lost.

Personality Editing

Personality editing alters a specific behavior, emotion, or personality trait from the subject’s psyche. The personality factors that can be modified are almost unlimited, including traits such as openness, conscientiousness, altruism, extroversion/introversion, impulsiveness, curiosity, creativity, confidence, sexual orientation, and self-control, among others. Specific emotions can also be targeted: sadness, disgust, remorse, anger, etc. The same is also true for specific behaviors, which can include everything from substance abuse to your study habits. These traits can be enhanced or reduced to varying degrees.

You can use personality editing to limit, block, or expunge a specific behavior, trait, or emotion from the subject’s psyche. For example, a murderer can be conditioned against acts of aggression or a kleptomaniac might be restricted from stealing. Many people seek this adjustment willingly, such as an introvert that seeks to be more social, a mercenary that seeks to eliminate fear, a partner that desires to remove their sexual inhibitions, or a researcher who wishes to enhance their focus.

Personality editing can also be applied as an unleashing or reinforcement. A medical professional might boost their empathy, an athlete might boost their competitiveness, or a hypercorp exec can boost their commitment to work above all else.

If successful, the subject acquires either the Enhanced Behavior or Restricted Behavior traits at the level chosen. At the GM’s discretion, this procedure may apply other ego traits instead.

As psychosurgery has become more accessible, personality editing has become a common elective procedure. Some people adjust their emotions and habits on a monthly basis. On the flipside, legal authorities use personality editing on criminals to reduce recidivism and authoritarian regimes have been known to pacify rebellious elements in their populations. And, of course, experimental mindhackers seek out new emotional states, previously unexperienced by transhumans.

Psychotherapy

Therapeutic psychosurgery is beneficial for characters suffering from mental stress, traumas, and disorders. See Psychosurgery Care.

Remove Infection

This procedure involves tracking down and removing the alterations the exsurgent virus has made to the subject’s mind. It can only be applied to those in the early stages of infection; it is ineffective against those who are already full exsurgents or asyncs. The Medicine: Psychosurgery Test is opposed by the virus’s Infection Rating. If successful, the exovirus is purged. This procedure is considered risky due to several instances of the virus infecting the psychosurgery VR and psychosurgeons themselves.

Skill Imprints

Skill imprinting is the use of psychosurgery to insert skill-set neural patterns in the subject’s brain, temporarily boosting their ability. Skill imprints are artificial boosts, however, degrading at the rate of −10 per day. No skill can be boosted higher than 60. You must have access to the skill being imprinted, either by copying it from the brain of someone who has the skill or an appropriate skillsoft.

Skill Suppression

Skill suppression attempts to identify where skills are stored in the brain and then block or remove them. The subject’s skill is lost entirely.

Tasping

Tasping is the use of deep brain stimulation techniques to tickle the mind’s pleasure centers. Though this procedure is often used for therapeutic purposes for patients suffering from depression or other mental illnesses, the intent with tasping is to overload the subject into a prolonged state of almost unendurable bliss. Such stimulation is highly addictive, however, so if you are exposed to it for repeated or extended periods you will need to make a WIL Check at −30 or pick up the Addiction trait. Some criminal organizations have been known to use tasping addiction and rewards as a means of controlling those under their thrall.