Alright, I may be joining a new group, and it turns out that I'll most likely end up playing the muscle. So in the interest of creating a viable and still entertaining character I'm going with the character concept of an Ork ex-professional Boxer. Story wise he got kicked out of his league for use of Jazz, though in his mind it's justified as the league started accepting adepts, and they use magic to cheat. He was just trying to keep up. Since then he's gone into the underground bare knuckle rings, and illegal gambling rings. Blah blah blah, he ends up beating a yakuza brat who's been heckling him in a back alley to death. Gets a price on his head (Brat happens to be an Oyabun's son) so he's stepped out of the more visible underworld into the shadows.

I tried to avoid the standard Ork ganger who's going professional becuase he's nearly 20. Not sure how well I did on that but here's the actual character. I used Build points. Basically what I'm looking for is glaring inconsistencies, but from my limited point of view he seems relatively solid save for the lack of AP in close combat. Other than that I've been thinking about ditching Climbing for another Edge and specialization. And he has about 20 BP of Contacts, mostly in the gambling, money laundering and illegal fighting aspects of the underworld.

Ork
Qualities
Martial Arts 10 BP (Boxing)
Advantage (+2 DV on unarmed combat attacks)
Maneuvers: Clinch, Herding, Set up, Finishing Move -8 bp
Tough as Nails 10 BP
Vindictive +10BP
Prejudice +10 BP
Wanted +10BP
Mild Addiction Jazz +5 BP

Bod 7
Agi 5
Rea 5
Str 7
Cha 2
Int 3
Lo 2
Wil 3
Ess 6
Edg 1

Skills
Running 3
Climbing 3
Unarmed Combat 5 (Boxing +2)
Intimidate 4 (Torture +2)
First aid 3
Long arms 3 (Shotguns +2)
Dodge 4
Infiltration 3 (Urban+2)
Etiquette 3 (Street+2)
Pilot Groundcraft 3 (Bikes +2)

His gear is very minimalistic (5BP), and I've kept him unaugmented out of personal choice.
Hardliner Gloves H.D. Scorpion
Remington 990 3 Doses of Jazz
40 rounds of regular ammo 2 of Cram
Armoured Jacket Various other gear including commlink, a fake sin and licenses.

I'd dump Dodge and just get him the Athletics group at 3 to save some points. I know fluff wise Gymnastics dodge sounds dicey since it mentions flips and cartwheels, but frankly I just kinda view the Athletics group and particularly Gymnastics as being trained in movement in general-- the gymnastics skill honestly covers so much stuff that virtually any character who takes it will be good at something their background doesn't really explain anyway. Ask your GM to see how he views it if it really bothers you. Besides, any good modern boxing regimen includes some plyometrics (You show me a guy with no explosiveness and I'll show you a crappy boxer) and tons of footwork drills, and a combination of Gymnastics and Unarmed hits me as just a good approximation of that as having plain ol' Dodge does.

Doing that and dropping every specialization but Boxing would save you 20 bp, which is quite the haul. You could bump up your Athletics to a 4 that way and grab some Edge or maybe just ditch a negative quality or two. Besides the nice thing about dropping specializations is that they're technically cheaper while you're in play (You can get more for 2 bp than you can get for 2 Karma), and they cost so little that you could potentially pick up a specialization or two after every successful run. That's some nice instant gratification right there.

I'm sorry, but I have to say it: "I coulda been a contenda!"

this character reads well - even the nuts and bolts have a nice self-consistency. He has a good mix of skills (which is good, because melee, by itself, is a very niche role). But in Shadowrun, mundane characters are like Deckard in Blade Runner, needing luck, cunning, and vicious improvisation to take down superhuman enemies who would tear them apart in a straight-up fight.

This guy is nice and tough, and put together well, but he can only beat up enemies like gang punks and security grunts. Any adept or augmented character would have a huge edge in a fight against him. It depends on what kind of enemies the GM throws at you. But sometimes, even when you have a great idea, you have to ask yourself if it is practical in this particular game.

Thanks for the suggestion Whipstitch, I have a habit of disregarding the straight up mathematics of character creation and going with what looks good. But I had to take the advice. It made sense, and fit in with the character. And Glyph, I understand this is a severe disadvantage but I was planning to get him some augmentations later on during the actual gaming time. Until then however I'll be hoping to take advantage of a base 5P damage with the hardliner gloves and 14 dice worth of net hits to add to that. Not the best option but one I'm willing to work on. Also this character still needs GM approval, and I have to talk to him about how he intends to set up his game play.

Anyway here's the character edited with Whipstitch's advice, and his fully fleshed out gear.

J.J Braddock - Ork
Qualities
Martial Arts 10 BP (Boxing)
Advantage (+2 DV on unarmed combat attacks)
Maneuvers: Clinch, Herding, Set up, Finishing Move
Tough as Nails 10 BP
Vindictive +10BP
Prejudice +10 BP
Wanted +10BP
Mild Addiction Jazz +5 BP

Bod 7
Agi 5
Rea 5
Str 7
Cha 2
Int 3
Lo 2
Wil 3
Ess 6
Edg 2

Skills
Athletics 4
Unarmed Combat 5 (Boxing +2)
Intimidate 4
First aid 3
Long arms 3
Infiltration 3
Etiquette 3
Pilot Groundcraft 3

Knowledge skills
4 Seattle Underground fighting rings
3 Gang ID
2 Gambling Dens
3 Money Laundering Operations
Boxing stats
English N

Gear
Hardliner Gloves, Remington 990, 40 rounds of regular ammo, H.D. Scorpion, 3 Doses of Jazz, 2 of Cram, Armoured Jacket, 2 rank 4 licenses (Hunting for the long arms, and a drivers), 1 rank 4 Fake SIN, contact lenses with Image link and Flare Compensation, one rank 3 medkit,and a hip flask of Hurlg.

Contacts
Huang Pho – Seoulpa Ring Money Launderer 2/2
Viktor Uzenski – Underground Boxer 3/2
Lucas Alexander – Runs a Mafia Gambling Den 2/4
Philip Demarche – Fight Organizer/fixer 3/3

This guy is almost identical in concept to one of the starting PCs in my current campaign (which is running down towards its end). Of course, Plisskin was not a custom build and just used the stats of the Enforcer from 4E.

Anyway, I think you can modify your concept VERY slightly and wind up with a much more mechanically efficient character. Namely, what if your character was kicked out of pro-boxing because of augmentation instead of performance enhancing drug use? I think a little Muscle Replacement (which I like better than Toner in terms of flavor-consistency for this character) could go a LONG way. I personally would recommend dropping natural Strength to 5 and then getting Muscle Replacement 2 (Alpha, if possible). You'd wind up with Agi 5 (7), Str 5 (7) and you could put the two points you took out of natural Strength into Edge. Having Edge 4 instead of Edge 2 can be a huge, game-making difference. (On a quasi-related dote, another point of Charisma could help your intimidate dice pool, as could a specialization in intimidate.)

But I mean, if "no-cyberware"is really crucial to concept then I can understand that.

Also, there are various little other things that would give you a few dice here and there that it wouldn't hurt to do. Why not give his gun and his goggles smartlink, for instance?

Heheh, good ol' Snake Plisskin.

That's actually not half a bad idea Neurosis, if I did the math the right I'm still left over with 3BP, which I was probably just going to waste on a specialization, and a contact point. Instead I could spend it on gear to afford the muscle replacement. The rules for Alphaware are 1.5x the cost and .75x the essence correct? And I see no reason why it can't be both. The Muscle augmentation in order to keep up with the damage they can dish out and the performance enhancing drugs to keep up with their "IP's". Any nuyen left over can go into the smartlink, or that can be taken care of in game.

It's actually slightly worse than that. Double cost and .8 * Essence.

Glad you liked the idea. : )

(Smartlinks are really cheap.)

Pity, I unfortunately wouldn't be able to put the nuyen into Alpha level Muscle Replacement. As it is I've pretty much stretched out my resources to the max, and I'd still need 5000 to cover the cost of Alphaware with the 3BP I have. Normal Muscle Replacement 2 would work, and that's a BP left over for any other gear can think about. (Which is pretty much your smartlink idea)

Normal is probably more flavor appropriate anyway.

Also, your character might want to have a pistol (roomsweeper?) even if he can't use one.

To cover the gap between 'I can bring a shotgun' situations and 'I can't bring anything' situations. (Obviously he's better off using his fists, but having a pistol in those intermediate situations gives you something to do while closing.)

Normal is probably more flavor appropriate anyway.

Also, your character might want to have a pistol (roomsweeper?) even if he can't use one.

To cover the gap between 'I can bring a shotgun' situations and 'I can't bring anything' situations. (Obviously he's better off using his fists, but having a pistol in those intermediate situations gives you something to do while closing.)

A sawed-off Defiance T-250 is as concealable as a heavy pistol, and is the functional equivalent of the Remington Roomsweeper. Why one is still treated as a shotgun, and the other is treated as a pistol, who knows - the rules make your head hurt if you think about them too hard. But it is an answer for someone with the long arms skill who needs something slightly more concealable.

I'll keep that in mind as well, on both counts. Especially the sawed of Defiance. There's something just iconic about that.

"This is a Defiance T-250 boomstick! .22 gauge, stainless steel with a synth-walnut stock. Shop smart. Shop S-Mart."

While yes, you can wait to get this stuff in play and it is group dependent. The biggest hit I see to your character for the role of muscle is the lack of additional IPs. Initiative boosts are a big deal. Even level 1 wired reflexes makes a huge difference. With punching someone being a complex action that means you are only getting 1 of those 7DV punches a turn.(7/2=4+2from boxing+1hardlines=7). Yeah 7base DV hurts, but the geeky technomancer will be popping off 2 shots at 5DV and might be hitting as often as you do given the extra dice someone gets to defend against melee.

If he's on Cram and Jazz he gets three IPs, Shinobi. : )

He is only addicted to Jazz so I was not assuming he was using both. And with Jazz its short duration means you have to turn it on for the fight, he doesn't seem to have a auto injector even. So first round dive for cover and get Jazz ready, second round use Jazz, 3rd round you can finally fight? If you are taking both, it is first round dive for cover, second round use Jazz, 3rd round first pass pull out and use cram, 2nd pass fight. If you are on a run, I guess you can assume he is on Cram and has two passes but in the legwork stages, ambushes etc I think it generally would not be going.

This is something of a problem, but I feel not such a big one. On a run there's usually enough of a implication of trouble that you can take the cram first which will usually last you long enough. The jazz is there as something to fall back on when he really needs that extra IP. So I suppose I really should switch out the addiction. Jazz just made more sense because of it's duration which would fit better for a prizefighter.