Cyberware, the SR3R way Options

[Kagetenshi]

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Decided:
(All of these are subject to reopening for discussion should there be any strong argument for a different path)
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In progress:

1) Cyberlimbs are nearly worthless

They cost more than meat arms, are weak for all but very crippled characters, and eat Essence like there's no tomorrow. This is Shadowrun, people should be chopping off perfectly good arms to get at that sweet, cyberlimb goodness.

Proposed changes: cyberlimbs/partial limbs, the cybertorso, and the cyberskull have their Essence cost divided by 2 and their Nuyen cost divided by 5. Speed and Strength upgrades for cyberlimbs also receive this Essence and Nuyen reduction.

Also, we should consider whether we need to change the formula or guidelines for unbalanced strength. Any thoughts?
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1) Cyberlimbs are nearly worthless

They cost more than meat arms, are weak for all but very crippled characters, and eat Essence like there's no tomorrow. This is Shadowrun, people should be chopping off perfectly good arms to get at that sweet, crunchy cyberlimb goodness.

Proposed changes: cyberlimbs/partial limbs, the cybertorso, and the cyberskull have their Essence cost divided by 2 and their Nuyen cost divided by 5. Speed and Strength upgrades for cyberlimbs also receive this Essence and Nuyen reduction.

Also, we should consider whether we need to change the formula or guidelines for unbalanced strength. Any thoughts?

~J

[Crossfire]

I totally agree. Plus, the cost for improving strength and quickness is way too high and I'm not even talking of the rules concerning multiple limbs!!! I've seen more than one player reading the cyberlimbs rules for 5 sec than decide to play an adept or a mage lol.

Peace!

Crossfire

[Kyoto Kid]

...Almost, almost considered getting cyberfeet for Leela (so she could get those nifty built-in inline rollerblades), even worked it into her backstory. Alas, buying up the attribute mods to where her augmented quickness attribute was at were way too spendy to make it worthwhile.

Same goes for the Cyber + Shock Hand combo, neat until you have to buy up the Strength/Quickness mod to match the character' attributes.

I always thought the Cyberskull would be great for a decker with a headware cyberdeck.

[Kagetenshi]

Another proposal was to have the cyberlimb begin at the base strength of the character at implantation. While that may, from some perspectives, have realism issues, it seems the sanest way to handle things.

Thoughts?

~J

[tisoz]

How was it done in previous editions? I do not recall problems until late SR2 or SR3, but we may have been ignoring some rules back then.

If no one recalls off hand, I have the old books and can look. It will not help with the cost too much, other than the slight reduction in obvious cyberlimbs as IIRC all cyberlimbs used to be obvious.

My opinion is that a full body replacement should not cost more than 6 essence. The rationale being, the recipient only has 6 essence worth of body to begin with, if it is cut away, where is more than 6 points coming from? Using this logic, perhaps the total cyber replacements that can be packed into an individual should be determined, then the relative impact of each piece of cyberware determined as a ratio of the total. The individual piece of cyber might cost slightly more as a stand alone piece as it loses the benefit of attaching to/working with other cyberware.

The previous rationale would pretty much make cyberzombies (less than 0 essence) impossible, but that actually makes some sense to me. As long as there is meat left, there should be essence left.

Is the irony of losing a body part costing no essence until it is replaced with cyber going to be addressed? As it is now, if you lose an eye and decide to wear an eye patch, you lose no essence. The eye is gone. Insert a cybereye though and you lose essence. Same goes for a limb or anything really. The only problem I see reconciling the situation with current rules is if the person is awaiting a cloned part, when they are then restored to full body and full essence. The solution I see is a virtual essence loss for missing, unreplaced body parts that either becomes permanent essence loss when the cyber is attached or essence is restored when the cloned part is inserted.

[Kagetenshi]

The game disagrees with your rationale, since one can get to -4 Essence by only augmenting the nervous system (Wired-3 + VCR-3).

Although it makes sense in this thread as well, the question of "what is Essence" already has a thread. See the navigation chart, it's "Astral Space, Essence, and the Awakened".

~J

[tisoz]

As is, I agree, and pointed out my way of thinking means cyberzombies, or characters below 0 essence, are no longer feasable. If essence costs are reduced for limbs, why should they remain so high for Wired Reflexes 3 and Vehicle Control Rig 3? (Although those 2 examples in combination could be explained as having the same "meat" removed for each, so if combined in the same individual should get a synergetic essence and price break by not including the redundant parts, or not extracting the same meat twice.)

[Kagetenshi]

[nezumi]

In addition to reducing the essence and monetary cost of cyberlimbs, there should be some other basic advantages...

It should 'come with' the base Strength and Quickness closer to 5 for a human. I can't think of any reason why they wouldn't produce the limbs so they're better than a human limb by default (well, except cost :P). If people want to get balanced strength, it's easier to deactivate stuff that's already there than have more put on. Let cyberlimbs accept the standard increases after that (so a human can boost its strength up to 8 without losing essence).

It should also have some other basic advantages. It should never get tired, so a pair of cyberlegs means you don't have to roll Body checks during forced marches, nor do you have to roll a body test when hanging from something with your cyberarm. It should come with a default amount of armor, probably 2/2 per limb. The limb is made out of steel, not flesh, so it is inherently resistant to damage. It should count as +1 recoil compensation, since it is easy to make it "lock up" when the gun fires, holding it steady. This is twice as likely with a Smartlink, when the gun can tell the cyberlimb when exactly its going to fire, and get the cyberlimb to react accordingly.

Also, upgrading the limb to alpha or beta or whatever should increase, not decrease the available ECUs.

[HullBreach]

My understanding (taking into account this is mostly from SR2) on essence loss was that there are essentially two 'templates' to the body: the physical and the spiritual. When the physical is altered, it resembles the spiritual less, and as such things like magic become harder to manifest. Once a certain level of differnce is acheived between these templates, the spirit (or soul if your so inclined) of the individual tends to lose touch with the body and wander off to oblivion. This is why cyber-zombies require so much work to create.

Now, in the case of a limb, once the meat is gone, there is no longer any connection between that portion of the spiritual and physical templates, and as such any further modifacation to that limb should be completely irrelavant in terms of essence, unless it requires further modifacation to the meat side of things.

This is the reasoning behind why in SR2 smartlinks only cost half as much for folks with a cyberarm, and spurs and the like were free (in terms of essence) when installed into a cyberlimb.

I always liked the 'template' description, as it established a basis for why you could only modify a body so much before it withered and died. With this in mind, one must realize that 6 essence is not the whole of a bodies essence, but it is how much one can 'spend' before ones spirit (soul) stops recognizing its digs and wanders off.

[Darkest Angel]

[Thane36425]

One reason cyberarms have a lower strength rating is that the human average STR is 3. The designers didn't want to unbalance the body making it much stronger on one side that the other. Another reason cyberarms aren't super strong is that they are still attatched to a meat body. Just because an arm might be capable of lifting, say, a small car doesn't mean that trying to do so wouldn't rip the arm off the character as the flesh gave way. Mounting it to a cybertorso should fix that, but then the lifting problem would be shifted to the meat legs which would buckle. Now, if the whole body had the same strength rating, you could say the body was hardened to that degree and wouldn't have a problem, using the max strength of the arm that is.

Cyberlegs would reduce marching fatigue, but not eliminate it. The legs do most of the work, but the upper body and arms still do a lot of work too, especially if carrying a weapon and a loaded pack. So, aerobic strain on the body might be reduced by 50% or more, but it wouldn't be completely eliminated.

[Kagetenshi]

[HullBreach]

[Darkest Angel]

Except your lung capacity would decrease, as it does with any lack of excercise. Plus you're now lugging 10Kg of steel where your arm was!

[HullBreach]

[Fix-it]

[Darkest Angel]

[nezumi]

Body building can be done either for strength or endurance, since different exercises focus on different types of muscles. I suspect carrying extra mass would work on both, but primarily endurance.

Any decrease in lung capacity isn't likely to put the guy lower than he was before, so I'm not too worried about him coming out worse for the wear. Plus, most characters don't live past a year in game time anyway, so who's counting?

DA, do you have a suggestion for what bonuses or penalties a cyberlimb would confer?

[SirBedevere]

I've been thinking about cyberware costs (Essence and :nuyen: )

Here's a document I sent to my gaming group with my ideas so far:

Suggested Changes to Cyberware


The vast majority of cyberware is not used by, nor designed for, Shadowrunners. It is designed to be used by; ordinary consumers, corporate workers, corporate security and the military. I have tried to alter things with this in mind; and with the explanation of essence loss in the introduction of Man and Machine.

Level 1 Rigwires: Reduce price to 6,000¥ from 12,000¥ Very useful so demand high and therefore economies of scale and competition come into play.


HEADWARE

Brainware

Chipjack: Reduce price to 600¥ from 1000¥. Very useful so demand high and therefore economies of scale and competition come into play.

Datajack: Reduce price to 200¥ from 1000¥ Used by so many economies of scale and competition come into play.

Encephalon: As per SR2 rules

Knowsoft Link: Reduce cost to 250¥ from 1,000¥. Very useful so demand high and therefore economies of scale and competition come into play.

Maths SPU: Reduce cost to 1,000¥, 2,500¥ & 5,500¥ from 2,000¥, 5,000¥ & 11,000¥. Very useful so demand high and therefore economies of scale and competition come into play.


Communications

Radio Transceiver: Reduce Essence loss to 0.1 from 0.75. Connections to brain aren’t almost four times that of the eyes (0.2 Essence). Reduce cost to (Rating x 200¥) from (Rating x 2000¥) Very useful so demand high and therefore economies of scale and competition come into play.

Radio Receiver: Reduce Essence loss to 0.05 from 0.4. Connections to brain aren’t twice that of the eyes (0.2 Essence). Reduce cost to (Rating x 100¥) from (Rating x 1000¥) Very useful so demand high and therefore economies of scale and competition come into play.

Subvocal Microphones: Reduce Essence loss to 0.05 from 0.1. Connections to brain aren’t half that of the eyes (0.2 Essence). Reduce cost to 200¥ from 850¥ Very useful so demand high and therefore economies of scale and competition come into play.

Telephone: Reduce Essence loss to 0.1 from 0.5. Connections to brain aren’t more than twice that of the eyes (0.2 Essence). Reduce cost to 300¥ from 3,700¥) Very useful so demand high and therefore economies of scale and competition come into play.

BODYWARE

Auto-injector:
Reusable: Reduce cost to 600¥ from 1,000¥. So many people require drugs for ongoing conditions, that therefore economies of scale and competition come into play.
Extra Dose Capacity: Reduce cost to 50¥ from 500¥. So many people require drugs for ongoing conditions, that therefore economies of scale and competition come into play.

Balance Tail: Increase Essence loss to 0.75 from 0.5. Requires an enormous number of connections to the Central Nervous System, particularly the expert system. Increase cost to 25,000¥ from 10,000¥. Demand for such a thing low so no economies of scale.

Biomonitor: As there is no connection to the CNS, there is no Essence loss. Reduce cost to 500¥ from 5,000¥. Very useful so demand high and therefore economies of scale and competition come into play.
Diagnosis Processor: As there is no connection to the CNS, there is no Essence loss. Reduce cost to 200¥ from 2,000¥. Very useful so demand high and therefore economies of scale and competition come into play.
Subdermal Display: As there is no connection to the CNS, there is no Essence loss.
The Biomonitor and its subsidiaries can, of course, be connected to other devices by DNI or Router.

Body Compartment: As there is no connection to the CNS, there is no Essence loss. The Legality rating should be changed to ‘6P-N’, as this is not something that ordinary everyday folks would need. The number of body compartments is limited by practicality.

Bone Lacing: No Essence loss, no increase to armour, although increase to Body and Hand to Hand damage still apply. Bone lacing does not involve connections to the Central Nervous System, therefore no Essence loss. Bone lacing does not protect surface of body, therefore no armour bonus. Obviously a character can only have one type of bone lacing. It cannot be removed (at least not without very great difficulty).

Wired Reflexes involve connections to the CNS and the brain and can be switched off or used at a lower rating.

Wired Reflexes: Reaction Increase: Essence Loss: Cost (¥):
Level 1 +2R +1d6 1.0 55,000
Level 2 +4R +2d6 2.5 165,000
Level 3 +6R +3d6 5.0 500,000

Fingertip Compartment: As there is no connection to the CNS, there is no Essence loss. The Legality rating should be changed to ‘6P-N’, as this is not something that ordinary everyday folks would need.

Muscle Replacement: Reduce Essence loss to 0.2 per rating from 1.0 per rating. The idea that a level of muscle replacement requires five times the connections of the eyes is just silly.


Cyberlimbs should cost less, due to the number of nerve pathways. Standard cyberlimbs now cost 0.5 Essence.

[SirBedevere]

Kagetenshi as you see I agree with your suggestion for cyberlimbs. I also agree with your ideas on cyber skull/torso.

I do think we should still go with the cyberzombie concept; they make tough and creepy opponents.

[Thane36425]

[Kagetenshi]

I'll cover the rest when I have time, but I very much disagree with slashing the Datajack's cost so much. Given how closely connected to very, very sensitive brain-meats it is, its current price already stretches credibility.

~J

[HullBreach]

[nezumi]

I would have to agree with what's been said so far. The price of installation alone should mean that no piece of cyber should ever be below around 750 :nuyen: (discounting the price of the actual hardware). No piece of moving, 'functional' ware (discounting the cost of installation) should not be below 200 :nuyen:. 1,000 :nuyen: really isn't very much, and this is a one-time cost (certainly with excellent finance plans).