I'm not saying that having a 200 BP max on Attributes doesn't force some hard choices, but I disagree that you have to have a lopsided mix of 5's and 1's.

I'm thinking of house ruling that Armor is limited to Str + Bod before you start suffering penalties. Has anyone tried that or have any opinions on how well that would work?

If you wear armor higher than STR + BOD you start taking penalties? Is that what you mean? How would it work for military-grade armor? 1.5*(STR+BOD)?
Anyway, most people would be limited to vests without suffering encumbrance, which is fine.

Basically the rules currently state that Bod + Bod is your limit for armor before you start taking penalties to Agi and Rea. Instead I want to swap out Str for one of the Bod. It makes it so you can't have your 1 Str, 3 Bod weakling stack on 6 armor without penalty. It also means that the lifting/carrying roll (Str + Bod) is now the same as your limit for "lifting" and "carrying" armor.

As far as military grade goes, I don't know if it has special rules but whatever they are they'd be the same excepting any changes as a result of the above.

Milspec armor uses BODx3 for encumbrance. Anyway, I like these rules, might talk to Garou to use them.

So, (STR + BOD + BOD)… or vice versa.

IIRC from the old fields of fire: Shadowrunners are not military and if they get into a situation like that they are (or should be toast). IF they go military the corps respond militarily. GPS guided 250 LB bomb or mortar anyone (effectively a orbital launched cow from outerspace as far as the PC's are concerned)? If shadow runners have access to X gear, what are the chances that corp Y the GDP the size of country X would have access to better gear?

Also, one optional RAW rule to consider: Armor Degradation.

FFBA is a boring waste of time. It's only there for munchkins with too much time on their hands to minmax their numbers. There is nothing flavorful or interesting about bonus must-have armor points that stack with everything.

Milspec is for big bad guys and paramilitary runners.

PPP is for getting the most out of your Body and a lower grade armor, like if you want to use Camo with 5 Body.

FFBA has weird rules that take 5 to 10 minutes to calculate the stat, which becomes absolutely necessary if you want the best of the best. You can already get plenty of armor the old fashioned way, and I think it's more descriptive to wear an armored jacket, a helmet, and a groin protector, instead of 4x FFBA.

Also I use Str + Bod for armor, and total x 1.5 (round up) for Milspec. Also Str 4+ starts giving bonus RC, etc., because I don't like STR being a dump stat.

See, it's the opposite: FFBA is for people who don't have time and just want to *not die*. Slap it on, done.

The game I'm in has one character with FFBA who wears it under her street clothes. Since said clothes are typically noveau-chic, trying to secret a vest under them is going to be setting off some serious alarms. A partial FFBA maintains the line of the clothing and providese enough protection for her to get under a table as fast as possible before the drone rigger or the Facamurai start 'suppressing' the area.