Every Night City Gang Explained

Night City is carved up between gangs, and the city's police only go where the corporations pay them to. By 2077 every district has its owners: chromed-up lunatics in Watson, a yakuza-style syndicate in Japantown, a Chicano family gang in Heywood, war veterans in Santo Domingo, and voodoo netrunners in the ruins of Pacifica. Phantom Liberty adds a militia that has taken a whole district for itself. This guide covers every gang in Cyberpunk 2077 and Phantom Liberty, where it operates, what it wants and who leads it. (Cyberpunk 2077; Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty)

Maelstrom: the chrome fanatics of Watson#

Where. Maelstrom controls Watson's Northside Industrial District, and in 2077 its base is the All Foods plant, with the Totentanz club as its hangout. (Cyberpunk 2077)

What they want. Maelstrom worship cyberware. Members are known by their faceplates and extra optics, and the gang is famous for brutal public executions, illegal braindance production and "experiments" on anyone who crosses them. The game's own database points out that the madness is partly an act: the scarier the rumours, the better for business. (Cyberpunk 2077)

Key members. In the main job The Pickup, V meets Royce, who has just pushed aside the old leader Brick and wants to sell a stolen Militech bot. Dum Dum is Royce's second. Depending on how V handles the deal, Royce stays in charge or Brick gets his gang back. Meredith Stout of Militech is the corpo on the other side. (Cyberpunk 2077)

History. Maelstrom is one of the oldest gangs in the setting. It is already a boostergang in the tabletop game's Night City of 2020. (Night City; Cyberpunk 2077)

Tyger Claws: Japantown's syndicate#

Where. The Tyger Claws operate mainly in Japantown and Charter Hill in Westbrook, and Kabuki and Little China in Watson. (Cyberpunk 2077)

What they want. Money and control. The Claws are organised and businesslike, but known for shocking punishments for enemies and traitors. They make their money from nightclubs, casinos and braindance bars, and they run dollhouses like Clouds. (Cyberpunk 2077)

Key members. The Claws are behind many of the street jobs in Westbrook, and Wakako Okada, the fixer who gives V work in Japantown, has close ties to them. In Judy Alvarez's story the Claws control Clouds through its manager, Woodman, until Judy and the Moxes take it from them in the side job Pisces. (Cyberpunk 2077)

History. The Claws began as an Arasaka-backed motorcycle club and were a small combat gang in Japantown by 2020. They hate the Moxes, who were born in riots against them. (Night City; Cyberpunk 2077)

Valentinos: the family of Heywood#

Where. The Valentinos are strictly territorial and hold Heywood. (Cyberpunk 2077)

What they want. To protect their own and their neighbourhood. They are known for loud vests, gold cyberware and Santa Muerte tattoos, and they draw on Chicano culture, but anyone who grows up with them can join. Their legal businesses (restaurants, nightclubs and garages) are fronts for laundering money, smuggling cars and guns, and trafficking. Their loyalty is famous: friendship with a Valentino follows you to the grave. (Cyberpunk 2077)

Key members. Jackie Welles grew up around the Valentinos in Heywood and left them, and they still respect him: in the side job Heroes, they help send him off at El Coyote Cojo. Sebastian "Padre" Ibarra, the fixer who works Heywood, is a former Valentino. (Cyberpunk 2077)

Their war. The Valentinos are in an open turf war with 6th Street, fought mainly over Vista del Rey. (Cyberpunk 2077)

6th Street: veterans who became a gang#

Where. 6th Street's main turf is Arroyo in Santo Domingo, with garages and bases elsewhere in the city. (Cyberpunk 2077)

What they want. "Order", on their terms. 6th Street formed after the Fourth Corporate War from career soldiers with no jobs, and in 2077 it takes ex-cops, former corporate security and civilians given a crash course in combat. It presents itself as protecting the city, but its money comes from robbery, extortion, arms dealing and car theft. (Cyberpunk 2077)

History. The tabletop game tells the founding: veterans organised in the years after the war to protect the citizens of post-war Night City, before sliding into the gang they are by 2077. (Cyberpunk RED; Cyberpunk 2077)

Animals: brawlers with no turf#

Where. Anywhere. Unlike other gangs, the Animals have no defined territory and are split into small packs led by independent alphas. (Cyberpunk 2077)

What they want. Strength. The Animals are obsessed with the wild side of human nature, and pump themselves full of Juice, their homemade hormone cocktail, along with implants that make them bigger and stronger. They work as bouncers and guards, fight in illegal brawls and hijack transports. (Cyberpunk 2077)

Key members. Sasquatch leads the pack that NetWatch hires to guard its operation in Pacifica's Grand Imperial Mall, where V has to deal with her during the Voodoo Boys story. The Animals and the Voodoo Boys are rivals. (Cyberpunk 2077)

Voodoo Boys: the netrunners of Pacifica#

Where. Pacifica, the abandoned resort district, where the Voodoo Boys act as leaders of the mainly Haitian community. Phantom Liberty adds a Dogtown branch. (Cyberpunk 2077; Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty)

What they want. To get past the Blackwall and reach what lives on the other side. The gang is made of netrunners whose viruses other runners recognise on sight, and NetWatch has tried to wipe them out for years without success. They were the client behind the Konpeki Plaza heist that put the Relic in V's head: they wanted it to reach Alt Cunningham. (Cyberpunk 2077)

Key members. Brigitte leads them, with Placide as her enforcer. Depending on V's choices in I Walk the Line and Transmission, the Pacifica Voodoo Boys either cross the Blackwall with Alt's help or are wiped out by NetWatch. In Dogtown, Slider leads a more practical branch that works with BARGHEST and protects Hansen's guests' data, and which thinks Brigitte's Blackwall plans are too dangerous. (Cyberpunk 2077; Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty)

Moxes: protectors of the dolls#

Where. Kabuki, around Lizzie's Bar, a braindance club that is their headquarters and main source of money. (Cyberpunk 2077)

What they want. To protect sex workers and outcasts. The Mox is the youngest established gang in the city, formed in 2067 when the murder of Lizzie Borden, a club owner and former sex worker who stood up for her workers, set off riots aimed at the Tyger Claws. It is a mix of current and former sex workers, punks, freaks and anyone the city has thrown out, with a loud style of plastic, latex and kitsch. (Cyberpunk 2077)

Key members. Susie Q runs Lizzie's Bar. Judy Alvarez is close to the Moxes and works with them, and V first meets Evelyn Parker at Lizzie's Bar. (Cyberpunk 2077)

Scavengers: the implant thieves#

Where. All over Night City, wherever someone with expensive chrome walks alone. (Cyberpunk 2077)

What they want. Implants, by any means. Scavs don't wait for their victims to be dead before cutting them open, and the game's database jokes about the "shady-looking guy with a black bag" who turns up instead of Trauma Team. Their first appearance is in The Rescue, the opening job where V and Jackie pull Sandra Dorsett out of a scav den in Watson. (Cyberpunk 2077)

In Dogtown. Phantom Liberty's scavs are a different class: well funded, well armed and rumoured to be linked to Soviet intelligence. Hansen tolerates them because they bring money into his district. (Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty)

Wraiths: the nomad exiles#

Where. The Badlands outside Night City. (Cyberpunk 2077)

What they want. Whatever they can take. The Wraiths are Raffen Shiv: nomads thrown out of their families for crimes like murder, trafficking or betraying the clan. They ambush travellers, corporate convoys and, with special relish, other nomad camps. (Cyberpunk 2077)

Key members. Nash leads the Wraiths V fights. He stole Panam's car and attacked the Aldecaldos, and settling things with him is part of Panam Palmer's story. (Cyberpunk 2077)

Aldecaldos: a nomad family#

Where. On the road. In 2077 the clan camps in the Badlands outside Night City. (Cyberpunk 2077)

What they want. To look after their own. The Aldecaldos are one of the oldest nomad nations, founded by Juan Aldecaldo, who fought the gangs of Los Angeles in the early 1990s and led thousands out of the city. Today its families are spread across America, always moving. (Cyberpunk 2077)

Key members. Saul Bright leads the group outside Night City, and Panam Palmer is the clan's hothead. Mitch Anderson and Carol Emeka ride with them. The Aldecaldos lead the assault on Arasaka Tower in The Star ending. (Cyberpunk 2077)

They aren't a gang in the usual sense, but the city treats them as outsiders, and the game lists them alongside the gangs. (Cyberpunk 2077)

BARGHEST: Hansen's army in Dogtown#

Where. Dogtown, the walled-off part of Pacifica, run from the Black Sapphire. (Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty)

What they want. To keep Dogtown theirs. Colonel Kurt Hansen's unit seized part of Pacifica at the end of the Unification War and never laid down arms. BARGHEST took in forgotten veterans, mercs without contracts, renegade gangers and ordinary people at the end of their rope, and gave them a gun, a salary and medical care in return for total loyalty. They have kept the police out of Dogtown for almost a decade. (Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty)

Key members. Kurt Hansen runs everything. Only six soldiers from his original squad remain, and they sit at the top. Hansen's dealings with President Rosalind Myers, Songbird and Solomon Reed drive the plot of Phantom Liberty. (Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty)

Gangs from the tabletop era#

Cyberpunk 2077's Night City rests on fifty years of R. Talsorian's history, and some gangs carry over. Maelstrom and the Tyger Claws are both in the Night City sourcebook for Cyberpunk 2020, and 6th Street's founding after the Fourth Corporate War is told in Cyberpunk RED. Most of the other 2077 gangs, including the Moxes, BARGHEST and the Haitian Voodoo Boys, were created for the video game era. (Night City; Cyberpunk RED; Cyberpunk 2077)

The Edgerunners anime is set in the same city a year before the game, and for the timeline of how the gangs rose after the 2023 bombing, see the Cyberpunk timeline. The people who lead and fight them are in the Cyberpunk characters guide. (Cyberpunk 2077)