PPP doesn't count as additional pieces of armor for the purposes of encumbrance, but the additional armor rating does correct?

i.e. Armored Vest + Leg/Arm Casings + Vitals Protector (total 8B) requires Body 4 to wear without penalty?

Yes, their all accessories which add their rating to your armors for determining penalty.

You are correct, they add to the total armor rating on which the eventual encumbrance penality is derived from; if the GM allowes it go for custom tailored armor to have an armor allowance of Body x 3 instead of Body x 2 (optional rule from Arsenal), take an Urban Explorer Jumpsuit with its helmet (6/6 + 0/2), a Full-Body Form Fitting Armor (6/2 count as 3/1 for encumbrance), ad Leg/Arm (1/1), Casings Vitals Protector (1/1), Forearm Guards or Shin Guards (both 0/1), now you have a 14/13 armor set that counts as an 11/12 against an allowance of Body x 3 (and none of the pieces is restricted nor forbidden, they are also all aviable at chargen).

As a GM I disallow that armor, and instead use the arsenal optional rule that you can have one piece of armor that will never encumber you, as long at it is one piece of armor. It saves me a lot of headache on record keeping, and I don't have every guy running around with 14/13 armor at chargen.

Thank you for not answering the OP's question.

But yes, it does work exactly as you believed it does.

where can I find this optional rule?

edit: nevermind, found it.

and probably looks padded enough that anywhere but a sports arena or z-zone will wonder what your up to...

He's wearing a helmet, so that's a bit of a given.

heh, now i got a vision of someone coming to work wearing all the PPP parts, then start to strip them of at his desk while talking to the coworkers about how intense the gang activity that morning.

I'm reminded of a character some forum guy made for a friend of mine's play-by-post games. Dude had like 20/20 armor with Body 3 or something crazy like that. GM told him (indirectly) that he was an idiot because of the encumbrance rules: he'd not be able to move, thus be helpless.

"Doesn't matter! They can't shoot me and do damage!"

"Yes they can. They walk up to you, remove your helmet, and take an aimed shot. At your head."

"No they can't!"

"Yes. They can."

(He gets a lot of crazy-stupid characters submitted for his games)

I'm suddenly reminded of SR1 and the live grenade eating competitions trolls used to get into...

-paws

Ah, but once they remove his helmet, he'll be able to move again. He's like a temple guard.

In Arsenal is stated that the PPPs come in three version, discreet to be worn below clothes, obvious to be worn above and in the form of sport gear, so if you use the underwear version you shouldn't stand out that much; however I have to say that underwear PPPs are way off in my opinion, and that they should only come as sport gear (making a stackable set similar to the suits from Mortimer London) or extra plating worn above clothes/armor.
@ Degausser: that set of armor has a price tag of 3'050 (not much but not little either) and can be taken care off with neurostun gas, or a supersquirt loaded with DMSO/Narcoject or DMSO/Slab, freaze foam granades, S&S rounds, lasers, the screetch rifle, stunbolts, called shots, etc. it's not that game breacking.

heh, again my faulty memory gives me a foot in mouth moment.

hmm, that vitals protector sounds like a high tech jock strap...

and a helmet can never be considered high fashion, right?

i can almost see it now, a lady walks up to the charmer at the bar, cops a feel and ends up asking "how do you visit the bathroom in that thing?"

Yeah, the helmet is bound to stand out and that vital protector is going to be pain in certain situations; however in a world in which there are people that use PMV (Arsenal p.107, the Horseman) to go around inside stores to avoid leaving the protection provided by the vehicle you can probably overlook someone going around with an helmet.
However I would like to point out that a jumpsuit isn't meant to be high fashion, if you want high fashion go for Mortimer or an Actioneer suit and the FFBA, or a Zoé's Moonsilver line for female (females have the disadvantage that fashion often tries to exalt their femminity, which usualy doesn't allow alot of covering limiting the armor wearable).

The Vashion Island Synergist line actually has some of the best armor available for high fashion, and it comes with a longcoat with a concealable holster. (Total -4 Concealability!) That plus the PPP system (sans helmet) gives you 8/7, and you look ready to hit a corporate ball.

Thats one of the biggest reasons why i think the rules should just allow stacking of all armors, so my face could att least wear a coat or jacket over her second skin for extra protction on the way to the meet.

supposedly the horseman is a high-tech wheelchair. so i cant really see the argument. that is unless i yet again have missed some kind of semi-fluff on that vehicle...

You're thinking of the Transys Steed. The Horseman is more like a segway with a shell. People would accept either vehicle rolling about in a department store, but the former gives a sort of Stephen Hawking image while the latter is more like Bill Gates in a Popemobile.

You're just thinking about the clothings that can be armor as well. Try talking to your GM and seeing if he'd be up to letting you buy a piece of clothing that has all the benefits of, say, a long coat (-2 Conceal underneath), but none of the armor, for the same price. Odds are he'll say yes.

as if the current pope was not bad enough...

The armor rules are a headache.

The encubrance rule is a problem, because it's based on body. Characters with high Body can wear more armor, making the gulf between street samurai and faces all the wider. So I don't like that. Besides that, shouldn't future armor be more user friendly?

Now, with PPP and form fitting body armor in Arsenal, it's very easy for a beginning character to have 12 points of ballistic or more. The same gear is available to NPCs, and now everybody is impervious to gunfire - especially in light of the convert-to-stun rule.

So now everybody has to be armed with squirt guns, or sorcery, or assault cannons. The smallarm is obsolete.

NO, i wanted to combine secondskin with an armored jacket for extra protection.

Well, if you're a troll, yeah, easy. If you're human, you either have some 'ware helping out or hardmaxed Body. If you're an elf, you did both. That's just for 12.

Besides, you can still take down a party with just stun.

A couple of things here.

1) Why would Elves have to do both to compete with Humans? They have the same Body capabilities.

2) You don't have to have hard maxed body or have 'ware for 12 ballistic.

BOD 5 = up to 10 armor with no encumbrance.

Lined Coat or Urban Explorer Jumpsuit

Form Fitted Body Armor: Full Suit

Total ballistic protection = 12

Counts as 9 ballistic for encumbrance.

So you can now add a piece of PPP for a total ballistic of 13, counts as 10 for encumbrance.

Yeah, it's very easy for a reasonable-Body person to get solid Armor, with no 'Ware. You could do it like this, as well:

FFBA Lv. 2(4/1, counts as 2/0 for encumberance)
Armor Jacket(8/6)
PPP 0/2(Shin/Forearm Guards)

Total: 12/9 armor, and only counts as 10/8, so you're in the clear. It lacks the ability to tack on the extra PPP points with the Vitals protector, but has the added benefit of wearing the level 2 FFBA which is less obvious(since level 3 has the gloves and the hoodie. Though I suppose in the winter you can easily pass it off as your parka if you're outside, so no worries there. )

The armour stacking thing sounds a bit unbalanced, characters starting with 13 ballistic? Say what!? I seem to remember the securetech armour was a problem in earlier editions too. For very little money, with starting availability, and totally concealable - all characters will end up taking it to boost their effective armour by 2/4, even without a helmet. Add gel packs for 3/5. So starting armour jacket becomes 11/11. And that's before you start using the optional stacking rule? I agree with earlier posters - these sorts of combos = enemies not using guns anymore. Imo better to stick with the standard armour rules in the corebook, and either increase the availability of securetech to something like 18, or vetoing it all together.

IMO, 13 ballistic is not that horrible.

Take a heavy pistol, load it with EX-EX rounds. -2 AP. So they have an effective 11.

That same heavy pistol is now doing 6P. 2 net successes stage this up to 8. Now, 8 is less than 11-but remember, stun damage is just as good as physical. Say they bring this to 4 with a nice defense roll(4 hits.) That's 4 boxes of stun, and that's a minus.

Alternate? Stick-n-shock. Uses half Impact. 11 impact, halved, even round up, is 6. Electric weapons do the same. Keep in mind that armor has a capacity-someone can't run around with infinite protection versus everything.

If anything, my experience with those with high Ballistic ratings can end up loading up their Stun box rather quickly. Recently we had someone get fully stunned out, and I think they were sporting around 12 Ballistic, if I recall. This happened in one round and the opposition had nothing more than heavy pistols.

Also, IMO, as a GM my job is not to try to kill the PCs on a rampage. People wanting the best armor they can wear is natural. Opponents can use it too, of course. Stacking an armor jacket, 2 pieces of PPP and a moderate level of FFBA is not twinking, in my eyes-it's playing it smart. If I were a runner, and I knew I might be shot at, I won't be showing up in nothing but an armor vest if I were to be on the front lines.

Stun damage is not as good as physical when it's the PCs taking the damage. A PC is not going to be as afraid of damage when it's just stun. A PC who's unconscious instead of bleeding out isn't half as much trouble for his teammates, and in order for any PC to die, either the enemy will have to keep hosing him after he goes down, over which the players will cry "unfair!", or every PC will have to be knocked unconscious, so there's no one left to help.

And PCs are going to yell "unfair!" when the enemy starts turning up with magic, electrical weapons, and other methods to circumvent their 12 points of ballistic.

You wind up with firearms being all but obsolete, which sucks a lot of the cool factor right out of the game.

Fixed your typo there. Anyone who cries "unfair" when their weaknesses come up is doing just that: crying. Nobody is immune to everything, that's why you don't Run alone.

Now, if every single opponent is packing such countermeasures, they might have a point, but that's why GMing is hard fun.

I DO feel your pain chummer.

Should I state that obvious restriction on what you can wear? That is what ever lonestar will let you wear. I would think wearing enough armor to qualify as swat armor will eventually raise eyebrows (and a call to SWAT or a Rapid Response Team).

Only if its obvious armor. If you look like a bike currior because you're sporting the ppp, and an urban explorer jump suit, with a concealed FFBA under it, what are they going to know/care?

Well, I suppose at our table, a lot of times, the enemy doesn't shoot to kill unless the PCs are making it apparent they have to shoot to kill. In other words, I have them send back force in which force is given.

And IME, Stun damage DOES make people sweat just fine, but all tables are different, I suppose. The team was scared when our rigger went down from even Stun damage.

I'm not out to kill the PC's wantonly, I'm out so our table has fun playing the game. I mean, if the table has fun bleeding all over the place all the time, that's all well and good, but personally, I abide by the ''captured PCs can escape, which is a whole new adventure, escaped PCs can fight another day and a whole new adventure can open up from them trying to cover their old tracks, etc.'' I guess I just play the game differently. I just never understood why a game isn't a game unless body parts are rolling around on the floor and the party is holding their own entrails in. (In no way is this insulting other table's playstyles; it's just not our first personal choice. And yeah, this example is a bit extreme.)

THAT being said...

...I can tell when a player is *obviously* going against my good nature and just trying to uber-munchkin their armor to make the ultimate death machine. While I find armor ratings of 12-14 very reasonable, when they start carting around 25+ armor and acting like Captain Invincible, then I'm more likely to be a bit harsh. (In other words, when I see players taking my already generous nature at the table and STILL try to munchkin stuff out, I'm a bit less forgiving.)

Taking FFBA and an armor jacket with some PPP is just something any ''sane'' front-lines person would do if they could. Rolling around in a suit of bright green hardened armor with roller skates and 2 PAC's mounted on the arms isn't.

Also, 14 armor doesn't do much versus spells. A single mage can make a team sweat VERY easily; as can a couple of decent drones. Even though they might convert some of the drone's firearm damage, if the team isn't properly equipped, those drones will likely last a kind of long time.

Quite frankly... I'm not a fan of the FFBA lvl3... it is for all practical purposes a full body condom and would stand out. Especially to anyone concerned about looking 'normal'.

FFBA lvl2 is about like one of those old times swimsuits w/ the shirt and shorts, which to me makes it much better pick for wearing under a wide assortment of garments.

FFBA lvl1 isn't even too bad, when you think you're getting 3 points of ballistic for only 1 point of encumbrance.

Overall, one of the reasons I like the FFBA is because it's almost necessary for low body characters like faces and some mages.
EG: 2bod
Synergist Business line, short jacket (2/2) + Pants (1/1). Now toss on level one FFBA lvl1, and you have a reasonable 6/3 armor. I'd draw the line at the PPP as all of them I'd think would be fairly obvious, excepting the cup.

Body 3... you'd see a lot just wearing the armor vest from the BBB. Now you can manage to tweak them up to 8'ish on the ballistic side.

In any case, not the greatest armor, but enough so that you're not boned when somene pulls a concealed light pistol (or even heavy pistol w/ 3 bod).

In any case, the steps to optomizing armor now seem to be.
Pick Base armor
Pick FFBA supplementary
Pick PPP + Helmet to round out the numbers and bring them up to max

FFBA is great for those moments when you need to function as the spec ops team, complete with helmet... at that point, the body condom is generally not noticeable, and makes a lot of sense... barring htat though, I would never use the Level 3 FFBA

Everyone's game is different, but in a world that's survived multiple global crashes, the apperance of magic, SURGING, new metatypes, virals that have devastated populations, gang violence unchecked, free spirits as a fact of life,drones skittering around everywhere, televises the desert wars, and has suffered a nigh silly amount of ecological abuse, the guy running around in his FFBA3 pervert suit is probably the least weird thing seen on the street.
I wouldn't advocate using it in 'high formal' social functions, but is it any more attention garnering to a passerby then a 3 foot green mohawk, kid stealth legs,or a tail?

I always say the hood as a detachable component, similar to the gloves and booties. Hence, I kill two birds with one stone: you can look normal wearing it by not wearing the hood, and I can make a called shot if I'm REALLY having armor problems.