So, right. I wanted to ask you Dumpshockers some things. Namely, how would you go about having a character pretend to be the opposite gender? Such as a woman pretending to be a man. Obviously, a Fake SIN with the proper gender is a must. I'd say so is a good Disguise skill, and a good Con skill. But what else?

A background story. That is more a matter of roleplaying than a matter of equipment or stats. If the character is really a transsexual he wouldn't even need a disguise or con skill, because his personality is already male. Considering the situation of modern day transsexuals I'm also pretty sure that in the 2070s gender is much more a question of definition than of birth.

Also, there are a host of enchanced senses that might be able to give you away as well. Anyone with an olfactory booster or gas spectrometec will be likely to ID you. High gain thermographic scans might give you away. Milimeter wave radar might too. Anyone with really enhanced hearing might also be able to pick you out based on your voice. You would be obvious to astral perception.

Depends on how far you want to go. An implanted voice modulator fixes the sound problem. Some implanted scent glands plus a clean metabolism mod get past most scent based scans. A bit of, erm, extra bioware will get you past the high gain thermographics. Most everyone using mm wave radar is going to be looking at you weapons, not the shape of your pelvis, so hopefully no problems there. Of course, the last hurdle, asrtal perception is almost unbeatable (one thing I don't like about it, it's basically the unbeatable sense).

…Or perhaps the player just notes down ”Gene-Treatment” and “Gender-Reverse cloning treatment” in the background of the character to switch his/her entire body into a female template based on the characters DNA and actually BECOME female.

Considering how much genetic science has moved forward in SR I would find it perfectly legit.

It would cost a bit essence, but possibly that's the only reliable way to accomplish posing as a male.

That's why the disguise skill exists (it's for more than camouflaging oneself). There's a reason that ElfPosers was a fad in the early 60's, and why so many of the non-human race can pass themselves off as human. People aren't standing on street corners doing DNA testing, or Gene testing. Sure, under intense scrutiny, disguises fail. Would be hard to get past a LoneStar strip search, or a doctor's exam, but going through most building 'detectors' should pose no threat at all, and without an intense examination, a good disguise shouldn't fail to even an inspector with enhanced senses, IMHO.

Ultrasound. If you get close to someone with ultrasound, would the womb be noticeable?

Is the question "What does the character need?"
Or is it "What does the player need the character to have?"

The character will need all sorts of things that people have already mentioned - voice training or modulation cyberware, breast-taping or concealment, et cetera. The list could go on for days if you seriously wanted me to list all of the different things that could help the lie. This is the kind of list I mentally compile while taking a shower, seriously.
(My brain is occupied with spy stuff and Shadowrun stuff a lot of the time.)

What does the player need the character to have? The disguise skill, the con skill, a disguise kit, and high charisma. The special stuff the character has are simulated by a) their skill and stat, for training, and b) their die bonus from 'special equipment' to replicate other things.

The die system is an abstraction of natural talent, training, and gear.

And Cray?
I only think the womb would be noticable if the target had their shirt up, their stomach smeared with a bit of sound-conducting jelly, and the listener's goggles or eyes stuck against the target's stomach.

In which case, the target's probably already screwed.

Ahh yes, that modifier.

I'm all for realism in game rules.... up to a point. I mean, seriously, now they've probably got some poor (or weird) GMs somewhere making up house rules to dictate someone's cycle.

My advice: Ignore that particular modifier.

That's just it, pheromones just hang out in an area. Picking up pheremone signatures from a female could have been put there hours ago. I would think, the Disguise Active skill would teach a person to not just hang out with anyone for too long alone though. I've not got a diguise skill to speak of, but I'd know to not hang out too long in one place with just one other person for too long if I was aware such scanners existed.

Or they might just imply that the technology is still forthcoming by saying something like the sensors only being able to differentiate metahuman from animal, and notice a gender pheremone should it encounter it, but not be sophisticated enough to detect individuals.

Or, maybe they just didn't want to bog the system down with saying how long it takes based on different ventilation systems for the pheremones to become too diluted for the scanner to pick up.

Regardless, I'm pretty sure the technology is not high enough to differentiate between old and new pheremones.

Remind me then in your games, to have my invisible mage make the break in attempt early in the evening, when the lingering scent of all the office workers who just got off their 9-5 shifts would render the pheremone scanner useless for its primary security system purpose: detecting otherwise undetectable unauthorized personnel.

Of course, if the things are no good for several hours after an authorized person passes through the detector's area, it raises the question of why any security system engineer would even bother with the thing. The beancounters over in accounting don't like to blow money on gizmos that aren't likely to do anything productive.

Please, break in with your invisible mage early in the evening. There's a huge difference between detecting old/new pheremones, and detecting completely new ones that don't match the database of known pheromones.

However, this is getting off topic hugely. A good disguise roll is a resisted roll, you want more successes than the detector gets is all. He's not trying to hide the fact he's there, he's trying to hide the fact that he is a she (or visa versa), and to do that, the person with the Olfactory Boost would need more successes on a perception roll, than the disguise roll got.

However, the Olfactory Booster has no idea if that pheromone he's picking up (heavily masked my whatever 2070 odor masking products exist) is old or new, or belongs to the guy that just walked by, and most likely would just comment similarly to those of us that see a guy that looks feminine... "Is that a guy or a girl?", but not make a big deal out of it, since we really don't care either way.

Sphynx

that pheromone detector acutally gets bonuses to spot someone w/ tailored pheromones equal to the level, on top of the +2 the sensor gets for menstrating characters. Remember also that the security sensors are advanced enough to pick out individuals pheromones and identify them as the ywalk down a hall to tell who is and who is not authorized to be there. So they are pretty advanced.

As far as posing as the opposite gender, another thing to take in account is body language. If the character already ahs combat training, soends a lot of time around men, is more of a tomboy type, these things might make that a bit easier. if she's more feminine, the body language could be more pronounced. But that would fall under the disguise skill. The Con skill could also come in to play in some circumstances.

Another thing to consider is just how big her breasts are. If she's farily average, say a 'C' cup, some tape and loose clothing may be enough, although that's got to be uncomfortable. Bigger than that, and things will get more difficult (say modifiers to the disguise roll).

Ultrasound and millimeter radar may be able to detect the difference in the chest depending on breast size as well, taped or not. A thorough scan, like a x-ray, would show the difference as well, since breast tissue is different from normal body fat. There are men that do have actual breast tissue instead of just chest fat, although they just look like 'man boobs'. I knew a guy that had that and had to have it surgivally removed because it started to grow. The doctor told him somewhere around 20% of men have it to varying degrees. Don't know how accurate that is, but that's what the doctor told him.

Nano paste can go along way to give someon more 'manly' features. I see no reason that you coulnd't modify some of that gunk to change around more of the body type though. probably be expensive though.

But assuming she's got the right type of build for it (no very skinny neck, pronounced collar bone, nice butt or shapely ladies legs and keeps most of her body clothed, it shouldn't be too difficult. Millimeter radar would be the only thing I would worry about, and that isn't that common for security (at least according to STOA 63).

Take a few of the suggestions mentioned, like odor sprays, male genitalia underware, facemask with voicemodulator (part of the concept already right?), baggy clothes. Doesn´t matter if it´s enough or not game whise, its just fluff anyway. What really matters is your disguise roll compaired to the scanners.

As a GM I would give you bonus dice for using high tech disguises, but then I would give you hefty penalties for trying to hide something as major as your gender. So basicly it would be your disguise skill against any scrutiny you face.

Even if it can't pick out which individual is responsible for which scent, it tells you when there are people of a particular gender in proximity to the sensor, and do it well enough to be used as an intrusion detection method.

Where this comes into play, is in situations where there are only a few people in proximity, who's apparent genders are known to the person operating the scanner. Sooner or later, you'll have a scent of the wrong gender where there shouldn't be.

Staying in mixed gender company can only protect against this for so long.

I agree with your assertion. I was just referring to some earlier comments regarding the unique nature of human scents.

One thing to also keep in mind is assistance from the GM. GM saying "okay you are there with John and Sam and you smell a woman" is very different from saying "the cyberware you picked up last year from that street doc is starting to give you anomalies in the readings such as saying that John or Sam is a woman, never stiff a street doc". It is all in the framing. Setting it up properly can help far more than some dice rolls.