Dumpshock Forums > Alright. Cyberlimbs. Why the hate?

Ol' Scratch

Jul 28 2007, 04:03 AM

Yes. The cybertorso is for pushing it beyond your natural racial limits with the rules in the main sourcebook.

Dancer

Jul 28 2007, 04:12 AM

QUOTE (Doctor Funkenstein)

Yes. The cybertorso is for pushing it beyond your natural racial limits with the rules in the main sourcebook.

Say I'm a human and buy a Strength 6 custom cyberarm. I then buy a Rating 3 Strength Enhancement (possible without a cybertorso). Haven't I hit the augmented cap without needing a torso? Or does the torso allow you to exceed your augmented cap?

Blink

Jul 28 2007, 04:16 AM

Has anyone looked past the rulebook here? You could use cyberware as a great storyline tool. For example, if I was running a game and one of my characters was facing death and wanted to burn a point of edge to stay alive I would ask him how he felt about replacing a limb with a cyberware equivalent. It would all cost the same (essance and nuyen) but it would add depth to his character (people would ask, so where did you loose your right leg and skull?) and you could award him XP for it. Another example...say if a character wanted to start off with a cyberware finger, you could say she worked for the Yakuza, failed on the job and got the origional chopped off as punishment. Now she uses the cyberware finger as a monowhip container/smuggling compartment.

Ol' Scratch

Jul 28 2007, 04:16 AM

Yep, you've reached your limit without needing one and you're honkey-dorey. Nope, you can't exceed your augmented cap. I think redlining allowed you to do so, but that's a temporary thing and not a permanent augmentation.

However, if you had the Enhanced Attribute for one of the relevant Physical Attributes or are any of the other metahumans affecting one of your boosted Physical Attributes, you'll still need a Cybertorso to push it to the absolute maximum of your potential. They've essentially done all they can for you up til that point without requiring extra oomph to get the job done. Which, for a troll in paritcular, was quite a remarkable feat up til that point anyway.

Ol' Scratch

Jul 28 2007, 04:18 AM

QUOTE (Blink)

Has anyone looked past the rulebook here? You could use cyberware as a great storyline tool.

The basis of my favorite character, a satyr adept named Ol' Scratch, revolves around that very concept. Which is why I was so happy to see cyberlimbs made viable so that he wouldn't completely "suck ass" in the new system.

pbangarth

Jul 28 2007, 04:03 PM

QUOTE (Dancer)

QUOTE (Doctor Funkenstein @ Jul 28 2007, 04:03 AM)

Yes. The cybertorso is for pushing it beyond your natural racial limits with the rules in the main sourcebook.

Say I'm a human and buy a Strength 6 custom cyberarm. I then buy a Rating 3 Strength Enhancement (possible without a cybertorso). Haven't I hit the augmented cap without needing a torso? Or does the torso allow you to exceed your augmented cap?

Don't you still need the Torso to put Enhancements into the cyberlimb that take it beyond its Customized rating?

Whipstitch

Jul 28 2007, 05:22 PM

QUOTE (Blink @ Jul 27 2007, 11:16 PM)

Has anyone looked past the rulebook here? You could use cyberware as a great storyline tool. For example, if I was running a game and one of my characters was facing death and wanted to burn a point of edge to stay alive I would ask him how he felt about replacing a limb with a cyberware equivalent. It would all cost the same (essance and nuyen) but it would add depth to his character (people would ask, so where did you loose your right leg and skull?) and you could award him XP for it. Another example...say if a character wanted to start off with a cyberware finger, you could say she worked for the Yakuza, failed on the job and got the origional chopped off as punishment. Now she uses the cyberware finger as a monowhip container/smuggling compartment.

The problem with your example there is that the yak soldier and edge burning characters in question don't actually lose essence until they're dumb enough to add the cyberarm or cyberfingertip. And under the old rules, a troll would arguably better off taking the Addiction: Burnout quality for flavor than they would be taking a full cyberarm. They'd lose the same amount of essence without having a massive statsink grafted to their body, and at least they'd actually get bps out of it. I have no qualms about blowing thousands of nuyen on cosmods and taking Ork Poser for the right to be a card carrying member of the Pink Mohawk crowd, but for god's sake I have my limits. Pre-Augmentation cyberlimbs were for feeble dudes who could benefit from a gyromount and little else. I often play unoptimized trolls for fun, but unless I was really attached to a character or had so much karma sunk into the character that it'd actually gimp the group or unravel the plot to start over again, I'd strongly consider just asking to roll a new sheet rather than burn edge AND inflict a standard cyberlimb on my poor trog.

Critias

Jul 28 2007, 06:06 PM

My first adept in SR, ever, is a former Tir Border Patrol infantryman who lost a limb in one of the completely-canon incidences where Torgo and his Spikes use Tir Border Patrol units for "target practice." I figured a crazy trog bitch with a missile launcher in each hand (while riding a motorcycle) was -- while completely canon -- a ridiculous enough mental picture (in particular given how we'd been hit over the head by sourcebook after sourcebook about how awesome the Tir Border Patrol was) that it would work for a bitter, cynical, PTSD-suffering character's background.

And so the world was graced by the presence of Jace. Cyberarm toting Adept, with the lowest possible Charisma for an elf, a near-pathological hatred of Trolls, and the Vindictive flaw. I never did get the chance to sucker someone into GMing a solo game for me, where he and his 12+ stealth dice went after the Spikes one bloody, vengeful, night. Oh well.

knasser

Jul 28 2007, 09:33 PM

QUOTE (Spike)

See it like this:

basic cyberarm: This arm is mass produced in a variety of sizes. Your surgeon picks an arm of approximately the right length and attaches it with whatever conventional interface techiques are in common use. Probably a mix of muscle 'clips' and 'nerve splicing'. It may even take some practice to learn to use right.

Alpha Grade: this cyberarm is custom fitted from a collection of mass produced parts just for you. It will closely match the old arm in length and only be slightly heavier. While conventional techniques are still used to interface they will be top notch. No crude muscle clipping (when this muscle fires this way, the arm does this), though probably still splicing interfaces to existing nerve pathways. there is little to no time invested in learning to use the new arm other than adjusting to different capabilities (higher or lower strength, etc).

Beta Grade: This cyberarm is custom made for the user from hand machined parts with very few 'off the shelf' bits. Nerve splicing is still used, but in addition there will be a 'track' of special purpose sythetic nerve (even skill wires) allowing for a more direct brain/arm interface. With a good coat of synthetic skin even the owner is likely to forget, from time to time, that they have a cyberlimb.

Delta Grade: This isn't even a cyberlimb by some standards. The internal structure is honeycombed carbon-fiber skeleton matching up to human bones, elastic polymer cartiledge and ligaments, synthetic muscles that act just like human muscles and attach to the bones in ways externally identical to human muscles. There is no nerve splicing here, nothing so crude. Instead, pathways of artificial nerve tissue replace the old nervous system, replicating and improving upon it in every way. The limb is a nearly perfect match, even in weight, for the real meat limb, and there is zero learning time, even for decidedly inhuman additions (such as spurs, gyromounts and more) as very special reflex recorders are prepaired and implanted as part of the 'limb construction'. Essentially, this is 'Human Limb Mk II'.

Good stuff there, Spike. Will probably find some of that deltaware description creeping into my game at some point.

Spike

Jul 30 2007, 07:06 PM

QUOTE (knasser)

Good stuff there, Spike. Will probably find some of that deltaware description creeping into my game at some point.

Thanks. I've been refining my ideas on cyberlimbs for a while now, across multiple game systems.

eidolon

Jul 30 2007, 07:46 PM

Consider that yoinked here as well, Spike. Nice take on it.