Aldarc
Legend
FWIW, Player Intrusions are now a thing as of the latest iteration of Numenera and the Cypher System.He gets close a few times, you can expend an XP to amend the fiction, but ONLY to remove a 'GM Excursion', which is basically a forced obstacle where the GM imposes a consequence, entirely at his discretion and outside player control. I think you can also force a reroll by paying an XP point, again simply allowing the player to UNDO something. When I first looked at the description of the game, I really thought it would inevitably do something modern, but in the end, sadly no.
I generally think that this is how Monte Cook and a number of fans of the Cypher System understand the Cypher System as a story-focused game.I agree with much of your criticism @AbdulAlhazred , but I do not think Monte Cook wanted to create a game that was anything like Apocalypse World. When you look at the other games he has developed and the videos where he is running Numenera it's fairly obvious that Monte Cook is very much attached GM storytelling and world building as a central feature of play. I think Cypher is pretty much custom tailored to enable that sort of play in the most seamless way possible. It does it more smoothly than pretty much any game I have come across.
I would like to see MCG play around with IS or even offer a more stripped down version without elaborate language and terminology. Unfortunately, MCG seems more interested in publishing materials for the Cypher System and some upcoming heist game for Kickstarter.My opinions on the Cypher System pretty much match the majority of replies here. It's got enough good ideas that I really, really want to like the game and see it work. But the unfortunate reality once you do more than casually peruse the rulebooks is that it just falls short.
What's even more frustrating for me is that a viable alternative exists. Invisible Sun, also by Monte Cook Games, is clearly inspired by the Cypher System. It includes all the elements that people have said that they like about CS while also solving every single issue with it that people have raised in this thread. It's a true 2e of Cypher, rather than what was released as the 2e of Numenera. It also has the single best XP system that I've ever seen, one that I often adapt to other games ever since I came across IS.
Unfortunately the company seems to be dead set on keeping the game system as a dirty secret that they hide from the gaming community as a whole. Invisible Sun is very, very steeply priced and that paywall stands between Joe Gamer and the single best product that Monte Cook Games has every produced. I will recommend IS to anyone who asks about it, but I also fully understand if anyone doesn't want to take the plunge and risk it.