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What changes do you make to the N&SS base settings to simulate a higher tech environment like our modern day has? What skills do you chunk? (Microfiche/Microdot I'm looking at you), what skills do you leave, what skills do you add?

Have you reworked the gizmoteer programs and the example gizmos? Have you knocked down the number of skills in certain skill programs, added martial arts? Revised the OCCs?

The most basic change is one of equipment. Using real prices for modern equipment is simple enough.

And once all that's done, you need a world to interact with. Do you use our exact modern world, or maybe one based on Bond, the Transporter, Bourne, or even Covert Affairs and Burn Notice.

I changed Microfilm/fiche/dot to Data Storage Technologies which would encompass the film/fiche/dot as well as all other forms of electronic media/techniques.

I doubled starting money to account for the rise in inflation. Added x2 to agency pay so Base Pay x4 is now Base Pay x6. All prices are derived via Google. I have not knocked down the number of skills, if anything, I have added to them. In the real world, spies of this caliber are highly trained and highly versatile. I have created a few OCC's and gen'd up a generic one which allows players to create something in their own image.

For references, I use N&SS, Mystic China, Rifters 3,7, 19 and mainly 25 as well as the Rifts Bionics Source Book for cybernetics and a couple of websites.

As far as settings, for some reason I never watched Alias when it was airing, but over the last two weeks I have been doing the marathon. It is probably the closest thing to what I view the N&SS world to be and is damn near a mirror to the setting I have been running for the last several years.

FaerieKnight wrote:I'm not so sure that doubling starting funds is needed. Especially if you use real world prices. I for example have a set of websites saved that sell to PI's. And the prices are typically half that of the book for many items.

Technology has a tendency of dropping in price over time, especially when cheaply mass-produced. Look at the VHS player. When it first came out back in 1980 or so, it was $900. Now you can buy a DVD player for $50. Besides, most of what you buy on those online PI shops is of VERY low quality. A government/law enforcement grade covert audio device such as the Loki II with crystal microphones and GSM retrans is approaching $25,000. The rest of the equipment is about half price of what it would be today.

I will say it. For the most part all the gear for sale is low end equipment. Sure, PI's and police departments can buy their stuff online (the operative word being 'can'), but the only ones who do are small budget operations. Larger law enforcement agencies and larger metropolitan police departments are not going to buy from The Spy Store. They are going to go directly to manufactures which produce products not open to the public (i.e DaTong, Spectronics and TSE) or they are going to have their own technical surveillance shop manufacturing mission specific gear which components are acquired from companies like B&H. The latter being something in which I have experience with.

So it'd be perfect for a PI game with small potatoes budget is what you're saying.