I like both cyberware and bioware, and each has their place. I think SR4 has done a good job of preserving the difference.

Cyberware: Is still the most cost effective way to boost your combat power. It also has a lot more options and provides for a few "surprises".
-Inexpensive combat effectiveness
-Unique abilities or functions (cyberarm gyromount, control rig, etc.)
-Extending abilities (skillwires)
-Absorbing punishment (cyberarms, bone lacing, etc)

Bioware: The subtle, expensive method for power improvement. Low on the essence and focused around a few key skills - it is a natural for power gaming. However, it is too expensive at character generation to go over board with.
-Expensive - but you get a lot for what you pay for
-Limited range - Narrow focus on improving skills, attributes or combat
-Undetectable

I can't wait to see how Augmentation adds nanoware to the mix. I'm glad they fixed cyberarms to make them better. That will go a long way to making cyber sammies the damage soaking/damage dealing combat machines they should be.

Wanderer, Old age and treachery will always beat youth and speed. New and flashy just means they haven't worked out the kinks yet. No tech is reliable until it proves itself, and nothing has proven itself until it's old. But that's something a young punk can't understand. If you can't give a man tough enough to survive 20 years of the shadow some respect, you deserve what you get.

Anyone who goes all bio with the attitude that "cyber is dead", is a young punk more concerned with style than substance. I'm not saying Bio is bad, I'm saying that cyber ain't. Just cause something is newer doesn't make what came before obsolete. To adjut your analogy, It's like Win95 in a windows vista world. It still works for most tasks and is a lot more stable.

That just lets me hit you more before you die. (seriously, though, we all know that's a rules oversight, even the devs. Don't hold it against the limbs. We all know the truth.)

Except each cyberlimb also automatically adds 1 to your damage track (so 6 extra boxes in total), and with the customized cyberlimb rules in augmentation, you can have WAY more than 10 body in a limb. You can have your natural maximum+7, up to your augmented maximum. Trading your meat for metal does indeed make you tougher.

You do have augmentation, right? Otherwise you're arguing your points with only half the data.

::edit:: Never mind, you reference the blood circuit control system, so you must have access.

It's all about what you want. you can't compare a superface face biosammy against my cybered-out troll tank. They do different things.

Besides, get it all in synthetic limbs, and when the scanner detects something, just show them your fake sin which lists you as having been in a horrible car wreck.

Once you've got all that replacement done, quite a few of those lovely cyber-enchancements no longer take up essence, they take up capacity. In the end, it can actually save you on essence, depending on what you install.

That reminds me, where's the bio-version of implanted guns?

You don't need to be a full borg to take advantage of the durability of metal parts. It's just the ultimate expression of it. Makes a troll out of an elf. (no, really, I have an elf character who's a troll poseur,)

Its a slight advantage, but I give the improved durability to cyberware. All the damage reduction options for bioware are really expensive. For instance, you can get alpha grade aluminum lacing for less money and less essence than bone density 3 at character gen. They have comparable benefits. You can get betaware dermal plating 3 for 30,000 less than Orthoskin 3 - Dermal Plating is crazy cheap. Cyberlimbs are cheap compared to most bioware, and there is no comparable bioware. If you want to make a tank, a cyber sammie is your best option.

Yeah, it's hard to argue against cyberware in the pure tanking matchup; the blood control circuit leaves the Pain Editor as the only truly unique tanking item in the Bioware arsenal, and that's simply not enough to compete for pure tanking when cyberware has the new and improved limbs to fall back on. Still, I think I'd rather go with a half assed biotank rather than go for the full on "what the hell happened to my essence?" cybertank. If nothing else, symbiotes and lower essence costs in general gives biotanks a much nicer set of healing modifers, which can be a godsend if you really need the Mage to patch you up ASAP. This is shadowrun, after all. There's always a way to take damage.

My major issue with cyberlimbs (and cyberware in general) is that despite the functionality and ease of repair, there's really a difficult gap in obtaining it in game play. Not many of us would go and willingly lop off a perfectly functional limb to replace it with one made of metal, but I'd imagine the cultural stigma against artificial limbs has lessened by 2050 with ads for new models being thrown about like car commercials are now. By 2070 cyberware is looking less popular, but even then, I've yet to see a module written that has the outcome of 'each player loses 1d6/3 limbs at the end of this combat' that would make players nod and go looking for a new metal replacement. I had a houserule (that came into play infrequently) that if a character took a deadly wound (after resisting), they could 'shift' the wound to a limb (which took the deadly wound, effectively requiring a replacement either metal or clone) and the character only had a serious wound. They could still try to escape, fight, whatever, but one limb was definitely not interested in whatever they tried to do.

If you have bioware which is much more essence friendly overall, but something goes wrong or you want to upgrade it, someone has to cut you open to upgrade or fix it. Magic does appear to be more friendly towards bioware, and a GM could reasonably decide (since I can't find it in the rules right now) that magic heals bioware, so one spell gets the bioware'd runner back on his feet. The cybered runner would require a heal and then a fix spell to achieve the same effect.

The average cyberlimb does not have that problem, it's easy to fix or upgrade, and with the new modular mount system in play (and every character with a cyberlimb would feasibly rush out to purchase it) you could have your cyberhand and a third of your forearm blown off and after a few minutes of work have your 'backup' hand and forearm in place and you're back to work. I'm aware that more invasive cyberware (skillwires, wired reflexes, bone lacing) require just as much effort to upgrade or repair as bioware, but there is the advantage that if you blow off Samurai Bob's right cyberarm he can go out and in a matter of hours (depending on his fixer and need for a working arm) have a replacement. Samurai Dave (with bioware muscle toner, etc and bone density) isn't going to find his new cloned arm with those with those upgrades preinstalled. Bioware isn't replicated by DNA.

The real issue that occurs here is that barring the GM's whim, there's very little in terms of location-based damage in SR4. They did have the cumbersome subsystem damage rules last edition, and while that did suit my need for realistic damage, the long and the short of it was it never got used.

The advanced medical rules have a new option for limb loss when you take over a certain threshold of damage.

And don't knock cutting off perfectly good limbs. If I could get a metal arm that functioned as well as my real arm, was reliable enough that it only need maintainence as often as I go in for checkups anyway, and which I could outfit like a built is swiss army knife, I'd do it in a fricken heartbeat. I am the guy who would cut off a perfectly good arm to get that, because I think it's cool. Especially in a world where if I change my mind, I can get a cloned arm to replace it. Think of it as a very interesting type of peircing.

Umm, perhaps I'm missing some key part of fluff or rule, but it was my impression that a Heal Spell wouldn't reattach a lost limb either.

It's been said before but I'll say it again:

"It's all about style."

One thing that may be overlooked here; repairing damage.

With the lower Essence cost of Bioware a character will take a lot less surgery damage. Now compare the availability of each item; to repair your cultured bioware you'll need a pretty decent street doc or a stay with a nice hospital. Repairing common and cheap cyberlimbs however should be relatively easier for two reasons:

1) Higher "Body" stat than character average. A standard cyberlimb has Availability 4, so that's 8 points at chargen to be spent upgrading the 3s. If it's an 'embedded' implant like just in the forearm, then it's worth it to invest in Body as much as possible since it may not necessarily add to Agility or Strength (if your GM rules as such).

2) Less damage for cyberware but easier to damage due to visibility and detectability.

3) Harder to specifically target, however muscle damage can mess up those Muscle Toner and Muscle Aug implants. Harder to target but more widespread in damage.


Helluva tradeoff. Do you trust in your armour and toughened cyberlimbs? Pay for higher maintenance?

It seems to me that those going Bioware these days may want to invest in a Nanohive and keep several Implant Medics going. At the very least they'll make it easier to repair what might be cultured sets of organs.

A mostly or all bio sammy isn't any worse off than a cyber one, just different. In my wednesday group (I play a troll adept with one group wednesdays, an elven TM in another group on saturdays), we have a human sammy, only cyber he has is titanium bone lacing, everything else is bio, and he keeps up fine with my adept. He's not as fast or with as high of armor, but his body stat is actually higher (just barely, I have 7, he has . The pair of us are the team's damage sponges/killing machines, him from a distance, me from close up.

The best cyberware is the one you can conceal... Why arouse suspiction or make everyone look at you??? In a game where steath is so important, obvious cyberware is a minus...

That's why I always liked Ghost Who Walks better than Argent...

And I think that absolutes are wrong... Cyberware mixed with bioware is the way to go...