Vision and Hearing enhancements fall into the same Medkit category too. It's basically a DP modifier you can purchase. (So is a Smartlink, I guess.) Now, maybe Medkits (and using Program ratings as a DP bonus) is a problem because they go up to 6, while Vision/Hearing enhancements cap at 3.

Or is it the lack of any potential DP penalties for Hacking tests that's the issue?

Well I'm old so I get to use that word. And I likely picked the word up from my Grandmother decades ago.

With the SR4 dice system capping successes when you are doing a lot of vs. tests isn't generally a good idea. Magic sort of gets away from that by having really high caps. Even an also-ran mage with Magic 4, at will, raise the cap spellcasting success cap to 8. 8 is fairly high, capping at 3, 4, or even 5 is not, especially if that is a defensive vs. roll. Among other things it severely cripples Edge.

Of the house rules I've seen here Buster's has likely the best IMO. But I probably feel that way partially because when GMing that's similar to what I do for NPCs. Comlink Response=program rating, and they either have a hacking comlink/device with all the programs or a legit comlink/device with none of them but all the standard apps. EDIT: That isn't really a house rule, it's just a paperwork notation shortcut.

EDIT: Of course the other things I like about are:
- it is that it makes it more about characters and less about stuff. RPGs are at the code are about characters and the further you get from that the less it is an RPG, and I happen to like RPGs.
- if anything it reduces the futz-osity vs. RAW.
- it is a different way of fixing the wacked program pricing table (by effectively tossing it), although it makes comlinks a steal of a deal so the already relatively cheap to make decker becomes even cheaper...maybe it'd make sense to price 'hacking' comlinks with hacking suite bundled higher...or as Buster has done just accepted that hacking is even more prevalent among the population than even the SR4 rules have made it

ok guys, thanks for the positive feedback on "Suerte o Muerte", pity I seem to have deleted the positive part ( showing) Of course feel free to yoink, tear apart and futz around with it.

Another house rule I remembered is that we gave contacts a capacity of 2. We don't like contact lenses too much I guess. A couple of players are using AR / smartlink monocles that are quite nifty.

A couple minor ones:

some Augmentation qualities meant only for CZ and cyborgs are open to everyone (i.e. phobias, other mental quirks)

Also: SOTA; hacking programs degrade every month, but you can pay an update fee similar to the cyberware upkeep of augmentation; or else write some bit s of code.

Cheers,

Max

...I've thought about incorporating capacity for the various wearable sensory mods. Somehow 5 different vision mods in something half the size of a dime and almost as thin as paper seems a real stretch of the imagination. Since they can't be hardwired about the only mod I have characters take on contacts is Low Light (since I usually play human characters). Personally, I am actually kind of surprised that capacity wasn't already implemented (basically it is supposed to be inferred at Chargen though adding all the availability factors together & when you reached 12, that was it).

As to CZ Negative Qualities in Augmentation it mentions that characters may take them on GM approval. Phobias, Manias, Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, and Delusions would be the most likely ones for a PC.

Playing a Matrix Specialist currently I would actually prefer the SOTA rule for programmes. Gives the character something to do during downtime and makes skills like Programming a little more useful.

Yeah, I wouldn't mind program upkeep. But don't go over board. There is like 15 programs. So maybe a 1 hour extended test per program. Not sure what to put the threshold at.


Oh, I usually slash the build times on all programs by at least 1 category (day becomes hour, week becomes day, etc.). When you can program in VR at the speed of thought it shouldn't take you a month to write a simple browse program.

My GM's house rule on recoil:
STR 6 gives +1 recoil compensation. +2 at STR 9, +3 at STR 12, etc. There is lotsa fluff about trolls with big guns, but no actual rule in RAW making them any more effective with a big gun than a STR 1 human.

Well I used a system where the System rating WAS all the common use programs. They had no SOTA because they updated all the time just like today. You didn't really have a rating for individual programs anyway. I almost never had a player roll for a common use program in the first place so I stopped bothering. If they didn't have a computer skill then they had to roll to default though.

One of the ideas I had for hacking programs is that a hacking program rating isn't based on giving extra dice or anything like that. You roll your Logic + Hacking to do actual hacking. The rating reflects what level of system that your programs can handle. So if you are trying to hack a rating 4 firewall you need rating 4 hacking programs. If you don't then the time increment goes up by one by the difference between what you have and what you need. So if you have rating 3 then you take a minute vs a rating 4 system. If you have a rating 2 then it takes an hour. If you have a rating 1 then it takes a day. If you have a higher rating then the system you get extra actions. It doubles each level above the system rating of the target.

I was thinking that the hacking rating would be limited by your software and hacking skill ratings. Whichever is lower is the limit on your rating. Your commlink's response is also still a limit.

If you use someone else's hacking programs the base time interval is a minute. You can only fast hack with your own stuff.

Another thought I had was that the hacking rating fluctuated because the sysadmins are fighting to close holes all the time. The only way to stay ahead of this is to keep up with other hackers. So before each run on a site where they keep the system SOTA roll an opposed test of the site's system rating vs the hacker's Hacker Contact's Connection Rating. If the hacker gets equal or greater successes then their rating stands. If the site's system rating wins then lower the Hacking Program's rating by up to half it's rating rounded down.

If the hacker does no leg work or exploratory hacking of the target then they will not know this in advance. Otherwise they can pay to increase the rating back up to the limits stated above. This is from buying code from other hackers and reworking it to serve them better.

I still use:

1/2 cost for skills.
No Karma Awards (characters get extra BP instead).
Contacts cost "contact points" of Loyalty times connections.
Contact Points cost 1/3 of a BP.

No complaints on any of those.

And I use a triangular scale for Ally costs and don't alow people to Invoke them into Greatform. But that's more of a "pre-editting I don't agree with" rule than a house rule per se.

-Frank

3 sides. Useful for weighing things.

@Frank Trollman
at half cost skills how do you implement that house rule with a specialize knowledge skill?

WMS

Frank's House Rule thread.