Oops, for some reason I got Cellular Repair mixed up with Revitalization, mela cupa on that.

Although I've yet to see a good "Uber Mage" built within the average campaign timeframe, how much Karma was the Mage build on?

Cellular Repair actually means that there is no longer any reason to persecute Vampires at all. What was once a permanent cumulative injury has been reduced to little more than a light playful spanking. With the low availability and relatively low cost, of the procedure, Vampires are going to become much more popular amongst the upper class.

I'm not so sure that something which is both addictive and costs between 15,000-120,000 with 1-8 weeks of "rehab" involved with fixing the damage from each "dose" is going to be popular anytime soon, even among the elite who can afford the monitary costs.

So the RAW now tracks your essence by the 'high water mark' of the essence lost by a type of implant? (Using 'essence hole' as the term for discussing things seems to be part of the problem)

So a Sam who starts with 4 essence in cyber and 1 essence in bio looks like:

Cyber
Current total 4
High Water mark 4
Bio
Current total 1
High Water mark 1

Actual Essence 1.5 (6 - (4+ (1/2))

---------

Later on, the Sam gets 1 more point of bioware:

Cyber
Current total 4
High Water mark 4
Bio
Current total 2
High Water mark 2

Actual Essence 1.0 (6 - (4 + (2/2))

-----

After hitting it big, the Sam wants to swap out his wires for stuff that won't set of the airport sensors (he switches out wired-2 for synaptic-2)

Cyber
Current total 1
High Water mark 4
Bio
Current total 3
High Water mark 3

Actual Essence .5 (6- (4 + (3/2))

---

If I understand correctly, you are supposed to calculate essence loss based on the two 'high water marks' rather than the current total. This means that the above sam can never get more that 3.999 essence worth of bioware, since his cyber 'high watermark' of 4 will always take 4 essence away in the calculation.

Correct.

This results in the limitation several people are complaining about - ie. there's a limit to switching from cyber to bio after you hit a certain point.

Step 1
Let's see the "complicated" bookkeeping on this (changes to the character sheet in yellow, my notes in orange). Bob the Street Sam's implants look something like this:

Cyber
Cyberlimb (arm): 1.0
Cyberlimb (arm): 1.0
Cybereyes rating 3 (various mods): 0.4
Cyberears rating 3 (various mods): 0.4
Skillwires 3: 0.6
Cyberware subtotal: 3.4

Bio
Chemical Gland: 0.3
Exhalation Spray: 0.1
Orthoskin rating 2: 0.5
Ortho. Electroshock Mod: 0.25
Synaptic boosters 2: 1
Bioware subtotal: 2.15
Essence loss total: (3.4+(2.15/2 or 1.08) 4.48
Essence rating: 1.52

Step 2
During a fight Sam is hit hard and using the Heavy damage rules from Augmentation the gamemaster rules one of his cyberlimbs is torn to shreds. Sam's street doc removes it after the run after which Bob's sheet looks something like this:

Cyber
Cyberlimb (arm): 1.0
Essence hole: 1.0
Cybereyes rating 3 (various mods): 0.4
Cyberears rating 3 (various mods): 0.4
Skillwires 3: 0.6
Cyberware subtotal: 3.4 (no changes except the notation where the cyberarm used to be)

Bio
Chemical Gland: 0.3
Exhalation Spray: 0.1
Orthoskin rating 2: 0.5
Ortho. Electroshock Mod: 0.25
Synaptic boosters 2: 1
Bioware subtotal: 2.15
Essence loss total: (3.4+(2.15/2 or 1.08) 4.48
Essence rating: 1.52 (no changes)

Step 3
A few weeks later Bob's Grandad bites the farm and he comes into a lot of cash and decides to get an alphaware arm to replace the one he lost. Coming out of surgery his sheet now looks like this:

Cyber
Cyberlimb (arm): 1.0
Essence hole: 0.2 (previous 1.0-0.8 of the new cyberlimb)
Cybereyes rating 3 (various mods): 0.4
Cyberears rating 3 (various mods): 0.4
Skillwires 3: 0.6
Cyberlimb (arm) alphaware: 0.8
Cyberware subtotal: 3.4 (still hasn't changed despite the addition of the cyberlimb above)

Bio
Chemical Gland: 0.3
Exhalation Spray: 0.1
Orthoskin rating 2: 0.5
Ortho. Electroshock Mod: 0.25
Synaptic boosters 2: 1
Bioware subtotal: 2.15
Essence loss total: (3.4+(2.15/2 or 1.08) 4.48
Essence rating: 1.52 (still no changes and no recalculations needed)

Step 4
A month later, Bob gets an implanted Biomonitor (just in case). This is what he looks like now.

Cyber
Cyberlimb (arm): 1.0
Cybereyes rating 3 (various mods): 0.4
Cyberears rating 3 (various mods): 0.4
Skillwires 3: 0.6
Cyberlimb (arm) alphaware: 0.8
Biomonitor: 0.3 (Biomonitor has been added and the Essence hole exceed so recalculation is now in order)
Cyberware subtotal: 3.5 (subtotal increases by 0.1)

Bio
Chemical Gland: 0.3
Exhalation Spray: 0.1
Orthoskin rating 2: 0.5
Ortho. Electroshock Mod: 0.25
Synaptic boosters 2: 1
Bioware subtotal: 2.15
Essence loss total: (3.5+(2.15/2 or 1.08) 4.58 (recalculation is finally called for because the essence hole has been exceeded. The increase is only 0.1)
Essence rating: 1.42 (drops 0.1)

For those that don't like this approach, feel free to use Frank's variant from currently posted in the Augmentation Errata thread and consider it a Tweaking the Rules variant.

For the record, while playtest feedback was a factor in our decision it wasn't the only one. The converting heavy bio/cyber was another, as was the fact that this makes it just a just little bit harder for mages to augment (because they can't "convert" their generic Essence loss from cyberware to bioware as easily). There were others.

We will definitely be addressing the writeup in errata, if you feel very strongly against this version (as posted here rather than as printed), I suggest you mail your thoughts in to myself or Rob and we'll take that feedback under advisement when hammering out the errata.

[edit: have I mentioned I hate emoticons when trying to write up stats. That 8 always screws me up]

Thanks, Synner. That clears up a lot of my own personal confusion.

I just make sure that the box marked Enable emoticons? under the text box in the section marked Post Options is unchecked when I have 8) issues.

Shouldn't half of 2,15 be 1,075 instead of 1,8 ?

Not that it changes the underlying point.

I thought that in Fourth Edition, everything was rounded towards the character's favor, in which case 2.15 would become 1.07?

Err...no, actually.

While you would keep a 'high water mark' of essence loss recorded, and would have to recalculate total essence cost (high + half low) each time you add an implant, the size or type of the essence hole is, by the old rules, completely unimportant.

The new way forces you to recalculate everything every time you add OR remove something, then double-check to make sure you didn't just commit suicide.

All this seems to do is add a lot of bookkeeping (which will all have to be double-checked by the GM) to no particular gain, but a significant new limitation to upgrades.

No, the way Synner is clarifying it here, you only recalulate when you implant something new, in which case these rules are basically reintroducing the old BioIndex.

I'm still happily ignoring them though.

Yeah, that's what I meant although it appearenently didn't come out that way.

But it's still 2 additional things to track, plus the repeatedly-mentioned "death-by-upgrade."

Pointless, unless you believe sammies were overpowered.

Plus, how often are regular players adding/subtracting cyberware? Maybe my campaign is not a good example, but we have been playing for over a year and no one has changed their cyber/bioware since chargen...heck, I don't think that anyone currently even has any bioware!

Not saying I don't see the issue, just that I wouldn't think recalcing essence would be something that players are spending more than 5 minutes a month doing...if that!

~must refrain from posting something that could only be interpreted as a personally biased flame towards a certain person~

Vote for yet another Errata ... ~adds that to the list of things that should have been corrected by now but weren't~

No, I don't really see people adding and removing and re-adding implants under any kind of short-term scenario. (It's possible under very long-term campaigns, or one with some kind of fast-forward jump, though.)

It's just a handy way of pointing out that, per the new rules, you really need to have mapped out all future implants and especially replacements, while still in chargen. Which isn't easy when the books are still mostly TBA.

I always liked shadowrun because, except for magic vs. mundane, it didn't lock you into something way too early in your career. (As opposed to, say, D&D - weapon speciallization guisarme won't do you much good when the only magic weapons you can find are longswords.)

What happens when a must-have implant appears in some future splatbook? You better keep most of your essence in reserve for upgrades in potentia, because if it's cyber and you've invested too heavily in bio (or vice versa,) then you've gimped yourself.