Supplemental Essence Determination Options

[Faenor]

Everyone; I wanted to see if anyone abandoned the old "Everyone has an Essence Score of 6" method. It doesn't seem realistic at all to me that everyone from a 90 lbs wet geek to a hulking athlete to a slim acrobatic woman have the same score. It would seem it would be a combination of body, Charisma, Willpower and Intelligence to me
(note: this is for third edition)

I wanted to make it so that the peak of all the attributes would be six, but I didn't want people down the line getting maxed attributes getting an essence of 9 or even higher if a troll or other meta human type. Should I just cap it at six?

Any ideas on this? I just wanted to add some more pseudo-realism to it instead of "This is how it is. Accept it"

[Kanada Ten]

Every animal from the smallest insect to the largest whale has an Essence of 6. The only thing that changes this score is a being's magic nature.

[Essence] is the glue that holds your soul to the physical plane... I'm not sure why having it locked at 6 is bad.

If you're talking about Essence Loss, then I don't follow either since two people with Str 3 and Str 6 get Muscle Replacement Level 2. The guy with Str 3(5) took less machine to get the 5 than the guy with 6(9) needed to get 9, but they cost the same essense. The bonus is worked in, for the most part.

[hyzmarca]

Being unable to raise or regain essence (unless you are a Dragon or a vampiric Being) is fundamental to Shadowrun. Changing it isn't a good idea at all.

[eralston]

Essence is a contrived means of limiting the installation of cyberware. Any tampering with that mechanic (especially something that might increase essence by as much as 150%) cannot be done under the supposition game balance will be preserved. If that's cool with you and changing power-level if your objective in this then go for it; otherwise, I think you would be wrong to change an artifact of game balance to make things your perception of "realistic"

[ChuckRozool]

Would it help make it more psuedo-realistic if you just said the rating is relative? Do you know what I'm saying?

So while it would seem the hulking athlete would have more essence than the 90lb geek because of his size/mass. The fact that he don't got any cyber means he's got all his essence, hence the six rating. Does that make sense?

Or how bout this esplination, if you think of essence as more of a precent rating, it make perfect sense. If the geek or athlete gets a cyber arm, well that would take 25% of either one's essence away. See? The hulking athlete might require a cyber arm that's larger than the geeks but in relation to the athlete it still would take 25% of his essence. It's all relative, they just use a six instead of 100.

Get it?

[Faenor]

it's not really a raising or lowering of essence. it just seems to me that there should be something that differentiates someone from someone else. I was wanting essence to be maxed at six and have it be different for everyone. Kind of Like CP2020's humanity rating. Especially with M&M's explanation of essence being a limit of the neurological augmentation the brain can take. It would seem that some people would be more adaptable than others, but not to the extent of the Delicate System Flaw. Besides, this hasn't occured in my game yet. I was just wanting input before I implemented it.

[Shrike30]

If you don't like essence, you could always do a rip on CP2020... every "point of essence you lose" is -1 dice to charisma-based checks. You don't come down from 6, you just have an absolute essence cost rating. At some point, you start dealing with cyberpsychosis... your ability to empathize with your fellow humans is so drastically reduced by the distance you've put between them and yourself (by being so much a machine) that you begin acting on what more sane people call strange or violent impulses.

[Kremlin KOA]

do you want athletes to be magically healed easier than weaklings?

[Tanka]

Faenor: Let's just say "game balance" is the issue.

And then, to define the game balance so it's in line with the game: Essence is, more or less, what keeps your soul from going "WHEE!" and biting the big one.

Essence is not some physically, mentally or emotionally (well, some say it can be) measurable stat. It's rated in how much of you there is left to be you.

So if the 90lb geek gets a new cyberarm to hold all the tech he carries with him (portable deck, et cetera), he loses some Essence for the arm (let's just ignore all the other rules for now, for simplicity's sake).

Now the 200+lb jock gets a cyberarm because he ruined his real one playing football. He gives it a boost to his normal ability levels so he can keep playing like he did before. Same idea as the geek in terms of how much is him. It's still an arm, and it's still fake.

Why not move on to something more advanced, like, say, eyes. Geek gets a package that includes image mag, microscopic imaging, low-light and thermo. Jock gets a package with image link, low-light, flare comp and rangefinder. Different mods, yet add up to the same Essence in-game. Why? You're replacing bits of yourself with advanced technologies, so your soul (or whatever you believe in) goes HURK and doesn't recognize part of itself.

Now let's move on to Magic. Essence and Magic are linked. If you lose Essence, you lose Magic. So does that mean that all characters with a Magic Attribute should have 6 in all pertinent stats to have that Essence of 6, lest they lose Magic?

Essence is especially important for them. Why? Well, it mediates how well they can link with Magic, which then mediates how well they can use magic. Cyberware detracts from how well they can use magic by decreasing their Essence, and therefore their Magic rating.

If you build some guy with 1s in all his pertinent (under your proposed rules) Essence stats, this means, by game rules, he's got a Magic of 1.

[ChuckRozool]

What if you leave Essence as is and add a new attribute, Humanity.
Base it on an average of Body, Willpower, and maybe Charisma? I'm thinking Charisma since Humanity would probably be used for social based tests.

Then if the PC starts losing Essence they also lose Humanity. The only problem with this is that if they don't have a six Humanity, then the amount of cyber they have could get would be reduced.