Silicon Shadows- Entering the Datasphere; purpose built devices (Numenera)

Silicon Shadows

All cyphers and artifacts can be used as a tools to reduce the difficulty to break into the datasphere. However, there are a few cyphers which are designed explicitly to grant unfettered access to the datasphere.

House Rule: Stable Cyphers and Unstable Artifacts (Numenera)

Device Slots
Since not all cyphers are limited and artifacts are, cypher slots are device slots. They are still limited in the same way as outlined for cypher slots in the base rules.

Anoetic Cyphers
These items are simple to use, pre-package and self contained. Pills and chemicals or simple devices with small batteries or capacitors. As a result, they do not risk destabilizing and do not require device slots.

Occultic Cyphers
These items are more complex or jury-rigged. As a result they are more prone to problems, including leaking various sorts of radiation or creating strange interactions with other devices. As a result they fill device slots at a 1:1 (rather than the default 2:1).

Artifacts
While often Artifacts are self contained or otherwise pre-packaged, they are also complex and highly charged devices. As a result they are, in many ways, simply Occultic Cyphers with bigger batteries. These items fill device slots at a 1:1 basis.

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House Rule: Odd World (Numenera)

Scavenging
These rules replace the scavenging rules on pages 280 and 290 of the Numenera core book.
When scavenging for Numenera players can look for oddities, cyphers, or artifacts. Scavenging requires 3d4x5 minutes and an Intellect based task. Depending on the roll, the player can choose any of the following they beat the difficulty for. For beating difficulty 4 they produce d6 oddities, by beating a difficulty 7 task they produce 2d4 cyphers, while a difficulty 9 task produces one artifact. The actual Numenera devices are not determined until after the choice is made, though the number may be.

Tinkering and DeconstructingThese rules expand on the Tinkering With The Numenera rules starting on page 107.
Most cyphers and artifacts use numerous smaller components in their construction, any of which would be oddities unto themselves. A scavenger can disassemble these, generally more useful devices, to recover these strange components. To do so requires the sacrifice of a cypher or artifact and d20 minutes, and success at a difficulty 3 Intellect task. Success produces d4-1 oddities from a cypher or 2d4-1 oddities from an artifact.
All of these oddities are randomly determined after the roll has been made.

People in the Ninth World regularly combine various Numenera devices to create new and different devices. To produce a new cypher or artifact requires the sacrifice of at least one Numenera device (oddity, cypher, or artifact). The tinkerer can then attempt a intellect task difficulty 10 to create a random cypher or artifact. In addition to having greater skill or other assets, the difficulty can be reduced with the sacrifice of more Numenera devices for parts and components.
When attempting to create a cypher, each oddity sacrificed reduces the difficulty by one, while each cypher reduces it by 2, and each artifact reduces the difficulty by 4.
If the desired result is an artifact, each two oddities used as components provides a one point reduction in difficulty. Each cypher sacrificed for parts reduces the difficulty by one. Sacrificing another artifact reduces the difficulty by two.
If the character wants to produce a specific cypher or artifact, rather than a random one, the difficulty is increased by 3.

Oddly Useful 

This rule is added to Immediate Benefits, per pg 110.

One of the most interesting things about oddities is that, for all they are useless and bizarre in the everyday existence of the Ninth World, their existence requires some context in which they are useful. By expending an Experience Point the player can declare how an oddity has found a context, whether it was the original context or not. Perhaps it can be used as part of a key to a sealed portal, or an unusual interaction can break an otherwise unbreakable casing with dramatic effects.

The GM may accept the proposed use, make it a task with a difficulty determined by its plausibility, or reject it outright. The difficulty of the task should be stated before the experience point is accepted by the GM and the attempt destroys the oddity as soon as the experience point is spent.

If a player can describe how they might use an oddity to produce the effect of a cypher, a base difficulty for the task would be 5.

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House Rules: Expanded Cypher Use (Cypher System)

Expanded Cypher Capacity
The number of Cyphers a character can carry is doubled. This means that a Tier 1 Glave or Jack can carry four cyphers and a Nano can carry six. Similarly, abilities that increase the number of Cyphers a character can carry, such as the Adept Cypher Use, are also doubled (adding an additional 2 Cyphers).
Occultic Cyphers still require 2 slots to carry while Anoetic Cyphers require only one.

Reusable Cyphers
Cyphers are highly unstable and retain little charge, but they retain slightly more life. Cyphers gain a depletion roll. Such depletion rolls are generally 1 in d4. More "reliable" Cyphers might have a depletion of 1-2 on a d6, but even the most "stable" should never have a depletion of less than a 1-4 on d10. Obviously, some types of Cypher are completely inappropriate for this special rule (pills, elixirs, thrown devices, ammunition, etc). On the other hand, the more powerful the effect from a Cypher the more likely it is to burn out critical components or drain the device completely.

Scavenging
This replaces the rules on PG 280 and 298 describing scavenging Cyphers and Artifacts.
When exploring an area that does not see regular (humanoid) traffic or after an encounter (including any GM intrusion) a character can attempt to scavenge Numenera from the area. This is a difficulty 4 Intellect task which requires d6x10 minutes to complete. The duration is not known before attempting the task.
Trained in Numenera is always an applicable skill, as are Numenera Crafting skills (p107) if appropriate to the area. Other skills may elevate your proficiency to specialized (but not provide the basic trained level) if they are particularly appropriate. These types of skills include metalworking in an area of heavy industry or being skilled with identifying plants and animals (per the Lives in the Wilderness focus) in woodlands or jungle areas. Anything in the Ninth World can produce Numenera; acetylsalicylic acid, the active ingredient in aspirin, was a derivative from willow bark and frogs that coat themselves with hallucinogenic oils are parts of the 21st century world. Even in the middle of a desert an unusual interaction with a patch of drit might cause it to reassemble into a device otherwise destroyed by corrosion, though it might as easily set off the Iron Winds.
Unlike normal rolls, do not reduce the difficult based on effort, assets, trained/specialized, etc. Instead add bonuses to the roll (generally +3 per level of difficulty reduction). The normal limits still apply (2 skill bonuses, 2 assets, Effort limit, etc). Further, regardless of bonuses, the roll always fails on a 3 or less on the d20, with a 1 producing a free GM intrusion.
If the check to discover Numenera is successful the character discovers at least 1 cypher. For each additional 3 points the character discovers an additional cypher. If the character would find 7 or more cyphers reduce the number of cyphers discovered by 7 and they discover an artifact. Scavenged Cyphers and Artifacts are randomly determined. The GM decides the form of the items (and how they are discovered) unless the player spends 1 XP to do so.

Artifacts
Universal Charger
Level: 1d6+3
Form: A small crystal rod
Effect: When the this rod is passed over a depleted Artifact you may reroll its depletion roll. On a successful roll the Artifact is reactivated. If passed over an expended Cypher a roll other than a 1 on a d4 restores it.
Depletion: 1 in d6

Toolbox
Level: 1d6+1
Form: A rectangular belt-mounted device
Effect: When activated this device deploys a series of tendrils, multi-jointed arms ending in fine manipulators, small spare parts, and other specialized tools which work with the wearer on a project. This device provides an asset on crafting rolls of a specific type.
Depletion: 1 in 100

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