I've been playing around with various builds, mostly including cybered parts just to test the funtionality of them. For the low low price of .25 essense and 6,100 nuyen, you can get modular hands and feet with Armor R2. If you replaced all of them, thats 1 essense and 24,400 Nuyen (not even 5 BPs) for 8/8 natural armor. Additionally, based on RAW, there is no negative impact on attributes, except perhaps fine, manual dexterious manipulations with your fingers or toes on a rare basis. Thoughts anyone? Does cyber armor count against your encumberance total by the way? If it doesn't, that's pretty awesome.

Well, it's not "natural armor", but it's also not "worn armor" so as such by the books it stacks.

Which is why there usually so much debate about the brokenness or not-brokenness of cyberarmor every time it's been brought up here.



-k

Yup. Cyber-armor is quite broken if you're going by the FAQ.

Maybe I'm just old school and a little more worried about role playing than roll playing, personally, but if one of my players said "I want to be tougher to kill in a fight, so I'm going to have them cut off my hands and feet to make me bulletproof," I'd be a little disappointed at their eagerness to game the system so very obviously.

Just pointing out how awesome it is compared to dermal sheath. Maybe the guy got his hands blown off, put on some modular hands with armor, noticed it was pretty rad, then did it to his feet because it was soooooo awesome.

Or more accurately, why would you shove plates of armor under your skin? At that point, wouldn't you be willing to do other things for protection.

Sure. but the last place you're going to armor up is your hands and feet.

Umm 8/8 base .. no... a hand is 1/4 an arm, (.25 ess.vs1 ess. for full arm replacement.) therefor the cyber armor rating of the HAND at 2 equals a rating of .5 for the whole arm, in other words, nothing. Ho idea where you get the idea that armoring a hand counts for the whole body. there are 6 locations, Left , and right arm, Left and right led, torso , and head. Any cyber armor added to any one of these locations is then divided by 6 to come up with Bal/imp armor rating. so 2 armor in each hand and foot would equal .5 per limb for 2 total. divided by 6 for .333... over entire body and again no armor at all. except at the specific points which would get the armor rating VS called target shots etc..

Sadly this is not how it works according to the books & FAQ. This is probably a better idea than the way that it is, though.

That's wrong, Maxwell.

Much as I hate to admit it Maxwell, the others are right, that isn't how it works at all.

I could see armored hands working (covering your head, etc) but armored feet seems kind of dubious. Then again, the whole cyberarmor rules in general are highly dubious, since no mater how you look at it, the armor is made of awesomeite. Or maybe that is munchkinite. They can be hard to tell apart sometimes

There are no hit locations. Everything is everywhere. Nothing can ever make 'sense'.

Yeah, this is something I've noticed before. It gets extra stupid when you consider that you could go with one lower leg for 5k and .2 more essence. In exchange you get a full 8 more capacity, so you could fit in a nanohive while still having 6 points worth of capacity to install enhancements and mods. 6 points worth of attribute enhancements is actually cheaper than a single point worth of Cyberlimb Customization, so while it's possible the limb may be used in more tests (although, really, kinda doubtful) it's also much cheaper to spruce up the leg "just in case."

Anyway, I like the idea of armored hands for melee artists, since grabbing the other guy's blade is a scenario made of win, but I've decided if I pursue cybered unarmed combatant concept I'll take a pair of optimized full arms even if it really is spending more nuyen and essence on melee than I would like to. It'll still be pretty damn effective that way (and sadly, still likely a better overall deal than Orthoskin) but at least I'll be paying enough build points for the privelege that I can sleep at night.

Aside from the rules based issues other folks mentioned, this has one huge logical failing. Namely, if the armor modification on a cyberhand only covers / counts 1/4 as much as that on an arm, then it should only take up 1/4 as much capacity. A capacity unit doesn't get smaller just because it is just in a hand, so logically putting1 point of armor modification means you layer it on thicker than if you do the same thing for a whole arm.

So yeah, there's issues...

Maybe the hand is just an anchor for a larger piece of armor which travels up the arm like a sheath or a bracer?

Carbon fiber and metal weave stockings originating from the feet and secured at the upper thigh.. maybe attached to a garter belt.

It doesn't have to not make sense. It's all so abstract anyway. No need to look for a standard way something has to be.
Cyberlimbs are a custom body mod thing as much as a utility thing. Why pigeon-hole them as having to be or look like anything?

I'm sorry that I am arguing against a common misconception, no insult is meant, but no, I am right. Its right there on PG335 SR4. " the attributes of partial limbs (including cyberhands, and cyberfeet) may be enhanced, but their attributes only apply for tests directly involving those limbs." And, "if he gets shot, he uses the average value of his body attributes rounded down." Armor is an attribute when you put it into a cyber-limb. and for non-specified targets I.E. "I shoot him" just like body, armor is averaged out across the entire body, six locations, Arms, Legs, Torso , and Head... and as the attributes of partial limbs are only important when they are SPECIFICALLY targeted, armoring hand and feet does nada for characters over all armor rating.

Cyberlimb armor isn't an Attribute, and unfortunately the big A is important. By the RAW, there is 13 Attributes and those Attributes are further categorized under Mental, Physical, or Special. Armor isn't included under any of those. It might be nice if it was, but by the RAW and by the FAQ, it is not. It's actually rather explicit about what constitutes an Attribute in the game concepts section.

I'm tired of wearing steel toed boots. OSHA lets me get by with my armored feet

Also: OMFG, not this topic again

Double post...

Yeah, I don't mean to be a dick or nothin, Max, but if you're dealing with 7 people who have over 20,000 posts between them I don't really think that you're going to give them a book reading they haven't already heard..

Again, Maxwell… no. It's not like we're crazy.

For a GM wanting a RAW counter to the armored hand/foot cheesiness, you can rule that 1) Like the rules say, when you get shot, you get the average Body, so the ratings of the hands and feet get added in there to bring the overall total down, and 2) Anything using the hand, such as firing a pistol, uses the Agility of the hand, and anything involving movement uses the Agility of the feet.

Cyberlimb armor may stack, but cyberlimbs were designed so that you have to balance armor against Attribute bonuses and the other goodies such as nanohives that you can stick in cyberlimbs. Foregoing everything else just to armor up should have in-game disadvantages (and does).

Did this get posted?

http://www.shadowrun4.com/resources/faq.shtml#10

Gylph's got it. I'm a big fan of cyber limbs. Looking at it out of the box, the armor could get real high. But you still need to keep capacity to average those limbs attributes, and add armor.

I'm rolling lately with a fella that has a full body replacement minus the head. I armored him up to 10/10 by giving him 2 armor on every limb. I lose out on body a little though because of averages, I can't get the Torso's body up to par yet. I doubt I will ever up the armor, I have no more capacity.

I have a level one synaptic booster, so I am slower than others, but thats the price I paid . I have no room for anything else till I upgrade.

It's important though for GM's to average those partial limbs, or else they are free armor. Though, but most things can get out of hand if the gm isn't imposing the proper counters.

Technically, *partial* limbs generally aren't averaged, though. It depends largely on the GM deciding that they're relevant, which is fine.

You want to be really careful with that though, because I'm sure if you enforce that, then you'll have plenty of sammies chopping off their own hands and buying agility 9 cyberhands. Same with body, you have low body people actually getting their body increased by installing a cyberhand.

Mmm, badass chicks in combat lingerie.

...I'll be in my bunk.

...Wait, did you just justify several common tropes?

(Public service warning: TVTropes Will Ruin Your Life.)

That's what already happens, Karoline (in some cases, because partials generally don't average).

Armour on hands and feet is broken, that's the sad truth. If you allow it, everybody with a remote chance of encountering physical combat will figure out that 8 Arm for 1 Essence, with 0 encumberance and unlimited stacking, is the best bargain ever.

Armor rating in SR is just an abstract rating of how much punishment somebody can take. In general this works quite well, just with mini-mods like hands, feet or earlobes it gets ridicolous.

<sarcasm>You know what's better than having armor? Not getting hit in the first place! And if you cut off a body part, it can't be hit in combat! So, it stands to reason, if you cut off your hands and feet and never replace them, you get extra dodge dice, right?</sarcasm>

Yeah, but it makes it rather hard to shoot someone in the face

Nonsense. Just implant a cybergun in your fore-arm, or get an articulated arm gun mount for your cyber-torso.

Whats that- you can't walk? Really? Huh, I though hands and feet didn't affect attributes; your quickness should be unnaffected!

No Quickness in SR4.

Micro target –6
Mini target –4
Small target (dog-sized) –2

I blame catalyst for not giving us much new crunch to debate, resulting in extended reruns of old debates.

Maybe You get Armor 8/8 and no cyberarmor does NOT count against enc. ....
but your Attributes are either BOD3 /AGI 3 /STR3 and you have to average with your natural
Arms and Legs (Which means it drops these Attributes) or you have to get customized Hand and Feet (much more expensive and check for Availiabilty)

JahtaHey
Medicineman

It also gives 4 extra boxes on the condition monitor, making them (by RAW) even harder to kill.

That much at least I've houseruled out.

I'm fairly certain that only full Arms/Legs(& Torso and Skull) give a full extra Box. 1/2 Arms give only 1/2 Box (Round Up) and Hands/Feet don't add anything by RAW
(According to the German Rules IIRC)

with a fairly certain Dance
Medicineman

SR4A only states "one box pr limb" with no detail.

Wait, really? No negative impact? I mean, I suppose if your Strength, Agility, and Body are all 3, then yeah. If not, then I suspect that the conversation around our table would go something like this:

Player: "I shoot the guy right in the face."
GM: "You're using your hand for that, aren't you?"
Player: *sadness*

Your GM could even go as far as to limit nearly anything you do when you're standing (if you want to simulate having feet that are less agile than the rest of your body, try putting on shoes that are one or two sizes too large and go play football). End result: maybe those extra armor dice are worth it, and maybe they aren't, depending on what you're going for.

Obviously you haven't read the book. There is nothing stating in RAW that the 3's average into your arm's attributes, which then get averaged into the whole body's attributes. 2nd, if you've ever fired a gun....its not just the hand. Definitely not the agility of your hand That might affect your ability to pull the trigger...but thats about it. The only presidence is that somethign that uses the specific location, so fine manual dextious situations, forgery via hand writing maybe or lockpicking might be affected. Definitely not any weapon skills. Finally, as with anything, it should be discussed with the GM prior to actually being brought into the game, but based on RAW, it is a valid idea.

I thought the FAQ was pretty clear:



If you have a partial limb the GM retains the right to screw you over.

Too bad FAQ =/= RAW

Yeah, first off, I'm not saying I'd do this. I think its cheap, and an abuse of the rules. I'm not trying to justify it for my own ends. I was just merely pointing out how annoying it is.

And then you don't get money, then you starve and die anyway.

Yes, the cyberarmor/partial cyberlimb rules need to be rewritten. We know.

This has been brought up umpteen million times on the boards already. And every single time triggers a multipage raging argument that ends up going nowhere.



-k

Cyberhands with cheap armor have stock Agility of 3. If your natural Agility is higher than that, you're gonna be looking at a penalty for any Agility roll which involves your hands - which is any attack roll, some defense rolls, and any manual-dexterity skill. Depending on the circumstance it might be the straight hand's stat or an average, but if you're a character who SHOOTS GUNS this might be something you take into account.

I have to say that there is quite a lot of "its over powered and doesn't make sense" on this post.

I think that the cybered characters need quite a lot of decent stuff to make them comparable to magicians and physical adepts, and am happy to see that there are powerful alternatives. So far I have only ever really played wizards or adepts because they are so much better: with a few sustained spells, spirits, foci, they can mostly do anything any cybered character can do. I'm glad to see that the cyberlimbs option is a credible alternative.

As far as making sense goes, its worth noting that armour is an abstraction, and the entire damage system is an abstraction. In melee combat especially armoured hands and feet are very useful. Note also that a called shot is almost certainly going to bypass this armour "I shoot at the chest" or "I shoot at the head" sounds like a good option.

Yeah, I think it would be pretty hard to rewrite the rules. Right now, they are actually not bad. Besides the massive armor stacking, everything else makes fair sense. Really, they just need to provide descriptive details on how to determine "partial limb use" and that sort of stuff. So does a cyberhand affect the agility used for firearms? Does it take a partial or full arm? Idk, I don't have enough to tell you. They just need to elaborate.

You've never shot a gun before have you....already addressed this above. It's more than your hand to aim the gun and track a target. Its your hand (finger) to pull the trigger, but thats hardly the most important part.

When I take partials, which is fairly often as a I have a thing for characters with a single cyberforearm, I stat match to meat purely for the sake of avoiding arguments.

Except that nothing stops mages and adepts taking this same setup, its does after all only cost 1 point of essence(or even less if you manage to booze up your GM enought that he approves it as a suite )