Cyborgs in Shadowrun, Problems with canon metaphysics? Options

[ixombie]

You know, I'm a little tired of ways for scientists to reduce essence to improbably low levels. Where's our arcane, rare process for increasing someone's essence, huh? I want a procedure to feed a mage's soul to another mage and give that mage twice the essence and twice the magic power, GDI! (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif)

[hobgoblin]

essence drain? vampires and similar has it.

[Rasumichin]

Yeah. I never sincerely considered ever doing this, but like you were saying, both cybermancy and cyborging are crazy enough on their own not to think about bringing them together.

As to why magical healing isn't more common in the cyborginization process, I think that the main reason is that the facilities that are equipped to make the jarheads probably have a rather nasty background count built up. I guess it wouldn't be too much worse than where they work their cybermancy magic, though.

That's something i was really wondering about when reading the new cyberzombie rules.
Just consider the amount of astral pollution a single cyberzombie causes by RAW.
A clinic with cyberzombies as patients is not exactly a good place to conduct warped healing magic and quests to abhorrent metaplanes.

They'd have to do the whole postsurgical care in a completely different place than the original operation/ritual combo, or they're mightily hosed.

[ixombie]

Except the magic is cast by toxic shamans. Don't they benefit from the twisted nasty stinky aura of a cyberzombie? If they don't per RAW, they probably should...

[Rasumichin]

Except the magic is cast by toxic shamans. Don't they benefit from the twisted nasty stinky aura of a cyberzombie? If they don't per RAW, they probably should...

Hm...no exact statement regarding that issue, i think.
Toxics take well to background count caused by environmental pollution, but i don't know wether the astral hazing caused by cyberzombies should fall under this category.

I'd say, if anyone benefits from cyberzombie background count, it's the guys who practice cybermancy (which would solve the problem with the astrally polluted clinics).
Maybe this could even be extended to mages following the path of the dead in general, since SM mentions that cybermancers fall under this category.

[Lionhearted]

You know, I'm a little tired of ways for scientists to reduce essence to improbably low levels. Where's our arcane, rare process for increasing someone's essence, huh? I want a procedure to feed a mage's soul to another mage and give that mage twice the essence and twice the magic power, GDI! (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif)

Hm, since cyberware is limited by your essence.. wait, dont dragons have shitload of essence?
I present to you Cyberdunkel! (IMG:style_emoticons/default/cyber.gif)

[krakjen]

Dragon cyberzombie !
Some runners are gonna cry :>

(although a dragon with only wired reflexes would already be frigging scary)

[Kanada Ten]

Hm...no exact statement regarding that issue, i think.
Toxics take well to background count caused by environmental pollution, but i don't know wether the astral hazing caused by cyberzombies should fall under this category.

I'd say, if anyone benefits from cyberzombie background count, it's the guys who practice cybermancy (which would solve the problem with the astrally polluted clinics).
Maybe this could even be extended to mages following the path of the dead in general, since SM mentions that cybermancers fall under this category.

There was a rule in SR3 MitS about background count being aspected to the type of magic which caused it, IIRC. Such as blood magic sites becoming more powerful for blood magic as time went on, while simultaneously making it harder to perform other magic there. There was also a metamagic which allowed a group to aspect power sites towards one form of magic or another. This comes up in game fluff a few times, along with a similar issue sparking the SS/Tsmishian war.

[Rasumichin]

Dragon cyberzombie !
Some runners are gonna cry :>

(although a dragon with only wired reflexes would already be frigging scary)

You mean "scary" as in "gimped"?

There was a rule in SR3 MitS about background count being aspected to the type of magic which caused it, IIRC. Such as blood magic sites becoming more powerful for blood magic as time went on, while simultaneously making it harder to perform other magic there. There was also a metamagic which allowed a group to aspect power sites towards one form of magic or another. This comes up in game fluff a few times, along with a similar issue sparking the SS/Tsmishian war.

That's practically the same in SR4.

[krakjen]

You mean "scary" as in "gimped"?

Why gimped? He would lose a few dices of magic (compensated with initiation) in exchange for more initiative passes.
A dragon playing more each turn is bad news...

[Rasumichin]

Why gimped? He would lose a few dices of magic (compensated with initiation) in exchange for more initiative passes.
A dragon playing more each turn is bad news...

He should better stick with a synaptic accelerator.
But wait, that is scary.
A wizworm with 4 IP and just one die less for spellslinging...that's what i'd call more bang for your buck.

[hyzmarca]

What's really scary is having an amnesiac disembodied dragon possess a cyberzombie. He retains his full essence but also has all of the cyberware.

[Malicant]

What's really scary is having an amnesiac disembodied dragon possess a cyberzombie. He retains his full essence but also has all of the cyberware.

Don't forget to add a universal, uberpowerful magical focus into the equation. Good times.

[Kagetenshi]

Additionally, he stands at the threshold of reality and forcibly halts the return of paradise.

~J

[mfb]

I think all that cyborgs do is confirm that Essence is more pshysiological than magical. The metahuman body can only take so much alteration before it dies. It's not the soul fleeing, it's the body going critical and flatlining. That would naturally cause the soul to go poof. But with magic, they can effectively kill you with implants, then tie your soul into the artificially sustained corpse.

that's a possibility, but it's also possible that there simply isn't enough actual deviation from the astral template (or whatever terminology one chooses to use) to kill a cyborg. in SR, losing a limb does not subtract from your essence--only replacing that limb causes essence loss. from a magical point of view, popping your brain out of your skull isn't neccessarily a change--it's just like amputating your body. for all we know, the essence loss is 100% accounted for by the cybernetics attached to the disembodied brain, which allow it to survive and to control its cyborg body.

Why gimped? He would lose a few dices of magic (compensated with initiation) in exchange for more initiative passes.
A dragon playing more each turn is bad news...

well, he could spend essence on it... or he could sustain an increased reflexes spell at the cost of -2 dice pool. or use a sustaining focus for -0 dice pool.

[krakjen]

well, he could spend essence on it... or he could sustain an increased reflexes spell at the cost of -2 dice pool. or use a sustaining focus for -0 dice pool.

So THAT's why the cover dragon of Dragons of the Sixth World is wearing nipple rings !

[Bira]

Personally, I link the current Jarheads as being the "prototype" stage. Remeber when Cyberzombies first came out how they were pretty much just that: Cybernetic Zombies. Then, the second iteration, they retained a degree of their personalities, but not much, and now, they pretty much retain alot of who they are, and just suffer severe clinical depression. I expect that with Jarheads, we are going to see the initial problems we have now, then a little less, then even less as the technology and cybermancy involved in the procedure(yes..I figure that there IS some degree of Cybermancy involved) improves. I figure that Ghost in the Shell is probably about 3rd r 4th RUles Iteration of Cyborgs.

Yes, but I'm not going to wait for SR7 or 8 to get the cyborgs I want (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) .

[swirler]

Augmentation claims that this process takes several weeks, during which the borg cannot make use of his sim implants,

I do not have augmentation yet unfortunately so I have not read this.
Does this refer to sim implants added during the process or ones added prior? I mean I would think if they were previous implants (near or in the head naturally) then they could be used. I would think it would make sense that SOP would become, "get the sim mods in and working before the actual brain yanking starts".

[Moon-Hawk]

that's a possibility, but it's also possible that there simply isn't enough actual deviation from the astral template (or whatever terminology one chooses to use) to kill a cyborg. in SR, losing a limb does not subtract from your essence--only replacing that limb causes essence loss. from a magical point of view, popping your brain out of your skull isn't neccessarily a change--it's just like amputating your body. for all we know, the essence loss is 100% accounted for by the cybernetics attached to the disembodied brain, which allow it to survive and to control its cyborg body.


well, he could spend essence on it... or he could sustain an increased reflexes spell at the cost of -2 dice pool. or use a sustaining focus for -0 dice pool.

Also bear in mind the process of becoming a cyborg sets essence to 0.01. This is distinctly different than having a piece of 'ware which has a cost such that the loss works out to leave you with 0.01. Sure, there's skillwires, and a datajack, and a VCR, but what does all that add up to? There's some life-support handwavy stuff, but my point is, it could be that a large amount of that missing essence is actually usable "essence hole." There's obviously a limit to what you could use it for, but cerebral boosters, mnemonic enhancers, etc, why not? I'd like to see the VCR expanded upon to have an actual essence cost, maybe a requirement to be delta grade, and still keep the rule that the process sets essence to 0.01, if it is higher than that.

Hmmm, I don't actually have my copy of Augmentation in front of me, what all do we know cyborgs have, in addition to life-support details that we don't know exactly about?