Don't forget about protective covers. They add another +1/+1. The rules aren't clear however when it applies.

Since runners can get customized cyberlimbs that don't require a cybertorso I would imagine that you would only see them on the gangers and other similar organizations that don't want to fork over the cash for a customized limb.

Also I think I might have shorted myself some nuyen when I did her arm. I wasn't quite sure on how the cyberlimb attributes were done could somebody look at the following and tel me if I did it right, this is the first time I've really worked with high attribute cyber.

Elisha "Artiste" Berns
Bod(9), Agi(3), Rea(4), Str(7)

Only one full alpha cyberlimb (right, synthetic) Bod(6), Str(4) +gyromount and shock hand.

Now to get up to my "natural" attribute do I take the std limb attribute of 3 and buy Bod(6) and Str(5)? Or is it the difference divided among my limbs some how?

Well, if a human with 3 in body, strength and agility wants a cyberarm with a stat of 6 instead, he'll have to take the torso first, since customized limbs can only exceed your natural stats if you have a torso. Of course, you could also just stuff a 3-3-3 cyberarm with some strength, body and agility enhancements, but that takes up a lot of capacity.

Well, the difference between str. 7 and 3 is 4, so you shorted yourself of 1500 (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nuyen.gif) (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

You calculate the average value by adding the attributes for all limbs, torso and head together and dividing by 6, unless you roll a test that specifically only involves a certain limb.

Which means that limbs with lower Attributes can significantly impair your perfomance. If you have very high physical attributes to begin with, cyberlimbs are not a very interesting choice, you'll have to spend a lot of (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nuyen.gif) to customize them adequately.

If, on the other hand, your physical attributes are slightly above average at best, cyberlimbs are a very easy way to get a few bonus points.
Not to mention all the nifty stuff you can still put in there, even if you go for non-customization cyberlimb improvements.

In the case you are describing, it gets difficult to fully utilize a cyberlimb, especially a synthetic one with it's limited capacity rating.
Is your character an ork, dwarf or troll? That would allow you to buy some points of BOD and STR without decreasing capacity.
Expensive, but if you also customize AGI up to unaugmented max and then buy 3 more points of AGI improvement, it could work and be worth the cost.

Oh I guess I must have left that out when I was editing it before I posted it. She's a troll the stats I listed are her natural attributes.

Oh.
Okay...
Troll cyberlimbs that match the natural attributes will get crazy expensive.
In fact, they involve a level of customization that will make it hard to not break the Availability 12 cap for starting gear.
That would leave 8 Attribute points through customization at best (unless you take Restricted Gear).
Bringing the arm up to the natural Attribute values entirely through customization wouldn't even work under that assumption, and the shock hand and gyromount would leave only one Capacity point.

If you want to avoid lowering your average dicepools, you'll either need an obvious arm or the Restricted Gear quality.
And that's just to be as good as your meatbody while being able to use a gyromount and a shock hand, while shelling out crazy amounts of (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nuyen.gif) and Essence.

One more time, SR shows that it still doesn't like troll cyberlimbs.

I wouldn't call it 'not liking'. It makes sense that a very strong limb is more expensive and harder to get. Trolls just happen to *be* strong.

Redline both arms for Intercontinental Arrows from the Troll-Bow.

YAY!

There is no real troll bow in SR4A. Strength 12 is the maximum and such a bow can "only" inflict 18P.

Just chalk it up to either an out-of-game balance issue you have to put up with for being a troll, or an in-game racism/corporate bottom-line issue.

I still claim the SR4 troll bow was fine!

I'd chalk it up to corporate bottom line. Why should companies develop stronger tougher cyberarms for a troll, and not charge them any extra for making them stronger and tougher?

My only real complaint was in game consistency with other muscle powered weapons. If everything else is str/2+X a bow should be as well.



Monetary cost seems like bottom line, no additional capacity for a troll arm, and additional essence cost to get it to troll max seems like a rules screw up to me. Though I guess it could have been intentional instead of just an oversight.

There isn't any additional essence cost to get it to troll max. As for the capacity, you could figure it a few ways. First you could consider that trolls have to use the same cyberarms as humans (makes sense) unless they order special onces to match them better (alla customization and bulk modification). The other is that you could figure everything needs to be sized up. A troll cyberarm is larger than a human one, but in order to fit a troll sized pistol in it, you need to use up more room. In order to get hydraulics to work with equal efficiency in a troll cyberleg, you need to make them that much bigger.

Sure, there are some items which wouldn't be affected by that so much, but trolls have never gotten more essence to jam stuff into their body, even though they have meat, so why should they get more capacity to cram stuff into their cyberlimbs? Same goes for eyeballs. Presumably trolls should have larger eyes, but their cybereyes don't get extra capacity.

Also remember that you have the other end of the spectrum with dwarves. Should they have half capacity because they are smaller? Should they have less essence because there is less meat to replace? I know some mods will scale with size, but some don't, and they don't have a variable essence cost based on what metatype they get put in.

K, I just wanted to make sure that I didn't have to have buy a torso, because I don't have the available cash (at least not without stripping everything else down to the bare essentials).