I was inspired by this artwork (sorry, I can't find the artist, I believe I got it from a SR thread on a different site) to make a twenty-something female with Neoteny that was a master with swords. Naturally, a "neotenous" character would have low physical stats, so with my SURGE points I took Metagenetic Improvement: Agility and Biocompatability: Cyberware (along with Extravagant Eyes) to create a highly cybered little girl ninja pirate etc. I also took Restricted Gear: Custom Cybertorso.
Give her ones in Body, Agility, and Strength. Technically, Agility is a two, but you know what I mean: no BP cost. Give her these cyberlimbs (Essence cost includes Biocompatability):

Synthetic Cybertorso [¥25,000; Av. 12; Cap. 5; Ess. 1.35]
Customized Agility R4 [¥6,000; Av. +4]
Customized Body R3 [¥4,500; Av. +3]
Customized Strength R1 [¥1,500; Av. +1]
Enhanced Agility R3 [¥750; Cap. 3; Av. 9]
Cybergland [¥500; Cap. 0; Av. 4]
Now, with the remaining two slots, you could either take Armor R1 or Breast Implants. I'm leaning towards flavor, but that might be crossing the creeper line. Armor R1 is ¥300, Breasts are ¥3,000.

Obvious Full Cyberarm (Left) [¥15,000; Av. 4; Cap. 15; Ess. 0.9]
Evo Kali Optimization [¥5,000; Av. +4; Cap. 2]
Customized Agility R3 [¥4,500; Av. +3]
Customized Body R1 [¥1,500; Av. +1]
Enhanced Agility R4 [¥1,000; Av. 12; Cap. 4]
Enhanced Strength R3 [¥750; Av. 9; Cap. 3]
Enhanced Body R2 [¥400; Av. 6; Cap. 2]
Armor R2 [¥600; Av. 10; Cap. 4]

Obvious Full Cyberarm (Right) [¥15,000; Av. 4; Cap. 15; Ess. 0.9]
Evo Kali Optimization [¥5,000; Av. +4; Cap. 2]
Customized Agility R3 [¥4,500; Av. +3]
Customized Body R1 [¥1,500; Av. +1]
Enhanced Agility R4 [¥1,000; Av. 12; Cap. 4]
Enhanced Strength R3 [¥750; Av. 9; Cap. 3]
Enhanced Body R2 [¥400; Av. 6; Cap. 2]
Armor R2 [¥600; Av. 10; Cap. 4]

Obvious Full Cyberleg (Left) [¥15,000; Av. 4; Cap. 20; Ess. 0.9]
Customized Agility R3 [¥4,500; Av. +3]
Customized Strength R3 [¥4,500; Av. +3]
Customized Body R2 [¥3,000; Av. +2]
Enhanced Agility R4 [¥1,000; Av. 12; Cap. 4]
Enhanced Body R4 [¥800; Av. 12; Cap. 4]
Enhanced Strength R2 [¥500; Av. 6; Cap 2]
Armor R2 [¥600; Av. 10; Cap. 4]
Hydraulic Jacks R6 [¥6,000; Av. 9; Cap. 6]

Obvious Full Cyberleg (Right) [¥15,000; Av. 4; Cap. 20; Ess. 0.9]
Customized Agility R3 [¥4,500; Av. +3]
Customized Strength R3 [¥4,500; Av. +3]
Customized Body R2 [¥3,000; Av. +2]
Enhanced Agility R4 [¥1,000; Av. 12; Cap. 4]
Enhanced Body R4 [¥800; Av. 12; Cap. 4]
Enhanced Strength R2 [¥500; Av. 6; Cap 2]
Armor R2 [¥600; Av. 10; Cap. 4]
Hydraulic Jacks R6 [¥6,000; Av. 9; Cap. 6]

Grand Total: ¥174,150 (35 BP); Ess. 4.95

35 BP gives us these attributes for all limbs: Body 1/6 (7/9); Agility 2/7 (10/10); Strength 1/6 (6/9)
Arms have 10 Agi, 6 Bod, and 6 Str; Legs have 10 Agi, 9 Bod, and 8 Str. She also has an additional unencumbered 9 B/I armor. With an Evo HEL, FFBA, and PPP, that's B21/I23 with no encumbrance, and room for 5/1 more armor before encumbrance.

With a nodachi, and assuming Blades 6 (Two-Handed Swords +2), she has a dicepool of 10+6+2+2(Evo Kali two hands)=20 (and likely a positive reach modifier), and deals 6/2+4=7P AP -2. Not to mention any Martial Arts bonuses I could tack on.

One glaring weakness to this build is 1 IP. The thing is, I don't want her to be too crazy (i.e. Cyberpsychosis) or detached. I'm not sure how "levels" of detachment are affected by Essence. For example, dropping to 0 Essence means death, but dropping to 5 Essence means 1 point of magic lost. Right now this character has 1.05 Essence. If she takes .5 Essence's worth of ware, does she drop to the "next level" of detachment, as seen in death, or does she stay at her current level as seen in magic loss? Because Enhanced Pheremone Receptors would be nice to tack on. The options include biting the bullet and taking Synaptic Boosters R2 at chargen, Lightning Reflexes, or later upgrading the limbs to a higher grade and getting Revitalization (mega-spensive), giving Essence space for an IP booster. I think I'll go with LR and a psychologist. However, is Jazz incompatible with LR?
And another character portrait.

IIRC the art in black & white form appears in Shadows of Asia.

Thanks, I have little knowledge of 3rd edition, the only book I have for it is Paradise Lost.

Essence is a measure of how much cyberware you can put in before you die, and that's all, unless your GM uses house rules. There are qualities that you can take if you want a cybered character with physiological or mental problems, and you should certainly roleplay how someone with an almost complete body replacement reacts to that. But other than some social penalties for obvious 'ware in certain situations, there are no RAW mental effects for low Essence beyond some general roleplaying advice.

Low natural Body can come back to bite you. Sure, your cyberlimbs may help you soak damage, but things like disease, toxins, gas, and powerbolts can take you down in a hurry.

just add in an autoinjector for cheap IPs in the short term. later on you can fill it with something other than jazz/cram.

oh, and i think you actually get to use augmented body for power bolt.

I'll tell you a story about a cyberzombie who had a natural Body 4.

Our mission was to take him down. this was probably the most cybered thing I have ever seen (Gm told us he was around the -3 or -4 essence range, in deltaware), plus biotech which in SR3 didn't cost essence.
He even had an extra arm with a laser attached to it.

So our team assembled and the adept used a bow. He used poison in his arrows for which the GM gave a 30 minute rant because it was a) dishonorable and b) bows were primitive so he should get a decent gun instead, blah blah blah.
After a fight (involving a banshee -the VTOL- a grade 4 initiate and a panther assault cannon shot in point blank that blew up our troll samurai) the adept injected himself with Kamikaze. The GM gave him another 30 minute rant about how drugs would kill his magic rating and eventually send him to the grave. The adept lost initiative, got zapped with the laser and a few assault rifle rounds, surviving with 9 boxes out of 10 filled up in the condition monitor (because Kamikaze would negate 4) and shot the cyberzombie.

The zombie reduced the arrow shot form a crazy damage of like 10D to 2L, and took the light wound. Then the GM started to laugh about how he had proven the futility of bows... to which the player answered calmly: "Roll Body, please."
-GM: "What? Why"
-Player: "Atropine. It has a 7D code".
-GM: (grabbing 21 augmented body dice) "Haha, its nothing!"
-Me: "Uhm... I don't think the cybered augmented body counts... I mean unless he has nephritic screens or antitoxins, his plating and cybertorso and stuff don't apply to poison damage: its his meat that is being attacked. His cyber will remain in pristine condition, but his heart will be dead..."
-GM: (reducing his hefty dice poll to 4 dice and failing the roll) "The Bad Guy... falls down, dead."
-Players: (Victory cheers and joyful laughing)

A) Shadowrunners are criminals, so why would the PCs care about "dishonorably" poisoning a foe, and B) why should the GM care what kind of weapon any given PC uses?

C)It's a flat-out brilliant tactic.

I have no answer to any of your questions. Said GM might, but you'll be on the receiving end of the 30 minute rant he'll be repeating.

In this case I'd go for the blissful gift that is ignorance.

Why the bow hate? If you have a decent strength they are damn good. Silent, good range, versatile (based on arrow type), inexpensive, and legal just about anywhere, the only real negative is that they are kind of difficult to conceal, and require both hands.

I just can't get past only shooting once per action.

Depending on GM interpretation, there's at least one or two possible ways around that. The "Ready Weapon becomes a Free Action" Krav Maga advantage (Arsenal p.157) or, if you can talk your GM into it and you're playing an adept, the Nimble Fingers power (Street Magic p.179) could also apply. Granted, these are both rather hackish and prone-to-GM-fits workarounds.

No different than swinging the katana once per action...

Well, actually it kinda is different.



Given, that's not a fantastic way to try to kill people, but at least the option to hit more than one person is available. I'm not saying I'd take that over the ability to kill someone silently from over a half mile away, but you can technically attack more than once per action with a melee weapon.


~R~

Well, you still only attack once, but you hit multiple people

If you want, maybe convince your GM to let you do a zen archery martial arts quality or something.

Also, I just can't get past that

I stay the hell away from melee if I can. Never has been my thing.

Unless the adept did a called shot "for the meat" (which would require him to know cyber-anatomy), the augmented body should have counted. Getting hit in the cyber chest with an arrow might cause damage to the meat through short circuiting the cyber or some such (hence the light wound) without landing the poison anywhere near the heart, or indeed in any biological system of any sort. Allowing body dice from cyberlimbs would simulate that nicely.
Unless of course you figure cyberlimbs have a circulatory system connected to the users heart...

I have had a few successful melee concepts in my time, and they were all a lot of fun. They took a bit of finesse, to be sure, but were still a lot of fun to play... My current Ninja is a prime example... a bit of Throwing (Shuriken), Armed (Blades) and a bit of unarmed (Tai-Jutsu) for a fairly well mixed character in my opinion (No gun skills whatsoever)... takes a bit of thinking from time to time to ensure survivability, but that is the fun of such a character for me.

Yeah in any edition I think you'd get your body. In 2 or 3e where I assume the example came from given the damage codes every 2 limbs gets you +1 body with no mention of it not working vs toxins. If anything I'd be tempted to give them more protection or virtual immunity unless some kind of called shot implied it actually hit meat. Without hit locations that 2l could have been a shot to the arm where there isn't any meat. You just did enough damage to the cyber that his overall integrity dropped down a small amount. But as far as I can tell he'd get his full body, though there may be a sentence I am missing somewhere. Though given the example of 21 dice I wonder if something is happening that I am unaware of. A cybezombie special or something.

I think multiple targets is more hitting more than one person with the same swing. That's a bit harder to do with a bullet. Spray maybe.

Sounds by the book. Cyberzombies explicitly had higher racial maximums in SR3. Still do. If the cyberzombie was a troll, its totally possible.
I did a Sr3 troll imroved body adept power and (low essence, body boosting) cyber who got something like 20 body dice for most damage resistance. You can actually do better as a mundane, but I wanted a Mystic adept, to avoid being mana-bolt bait; I figured that was worth a couple body dice.

Neoteny does mean prepubescent.

Just putting that out there...

Not always, but often it does. RC specifically mentions potential issues re: underdeveloped sexual characteristics.

You just gave me an NPC: Mob hit girl with Go-Go's personality (from Kill Bill) ^_^

Or, for that matter, Hit Girl.

Also, Man and Machine says nothing about unaugmented body for resisting poison. I would still rule unaugmented on a called shot though.

SR2: Cyberwise 20's could be attained, add in a few spell locks and some Increase (cybered) attribute +4 and you can take it further from there.* If I am not wrong the guy was actually a SR2 cyberzombie imported directly to SR3 without any adaptation.

The "21" dice could have been higher or lower, I don't remember. This was more than 6 years ago. If your OCD feels better trade that for "arbitrarily high amount of dice"


*: This is because its a topic derailment, but I feel compelled to talk about it... I remember the sorcerer adept with priority A in resources back SR2, he was cybered up, had a rating 5 power focus and cyber that would shame a samurai, he also had spell locks, low attributes were in the 6-8 range, and he was the very deffinition of cheese back then: shoots better than the sammie, kicks teh adept's ass in hand to hand and casts like a madwoman. Only things he couldn't do was decking, conjuring and astral projection, but that is something he could leave to the other teammates.

Cool, I have not looked at cyberzombies in a long time. But natural body of 4 to 20ish seems extreme in SR2-3.

Hunh. I always thought that the elimination of the adult phase of the life-cycle was the defining characteristic of neoteny. Turns out that's only one small subset of neotenic features, the majority of which are cases where juvenile features are kept on through the adult cycle, rather than adult features never showing up. That means that something like the "big head - big eyes - tiny child voice" anime cliche would be text-book neoteny.

In this instance, called shot to the face (no cyber) means one Body dice. I need a good helmet...

Its also seen in breeding / evolution. In many respects, dogs are basically wolves with an array of juvenile characteristics (tolerance for humans, submissive behavior, pack bonding with strangers, reduced jaw strength) exhibited as adults.

Which provides what, 2 points of armor? But wait, shouldn't it provide your head with the same protection as the matching suit gives your body? Of course, that would mean cyber limb armor should only provide the covered limbs with protection...

Ack, stop breaking my façade of protection! Other than that, though, does this gear and attribute set-up seem viable? Do the additional limbs make up for the reduced condition monitor thanks to Neoteny? Would a 20-ish year old woman with neoteny look like a Hit Girl? Or an Enfant Terrible? And, above all, would breast implants on a 20-ish year old Hit Girl/Enfant Terrible be breaking the creeper barrier?!?

Yes, it would. But more importantly, it would be a failure of munchkin-fu. Cybernetic breast implants cost Essence because you can change their size/shape with a mental command. If you only want bigger breasts, it is a minor biomod (or in her case, chassis mod).

They can also be used for covert communication.

"Oh man! Her tits just swelled up 3 cup sizes! That's the signal!"

lol... sweetness

I'm having final episode of Excel Saga flashbacks now...

Can't you get them with capasity, she has a cyber torso after all.
Also the size changing part is exactly the reason why my Sasha has cyber breasts, along with her fibre-optic hair and cyber eyes they allow for an easy change of looks when neccesary.
After all if the guards are looking for a small breasted blonde, their unlikely to start hasseling the red headed bombshell with DDD breasts

Gunslinger Girl ftw!

Cyberzombie 10 year old girls with Social Adept "big brother" Company Men for their handlers? It's one anime that really, really, fits the setting without a whole lot of prybar work.

I am assuming cyberlimbs with Customized Strength would be large and long as natural limbs with high Strength. After all, customized cyberlimbs is made "for the natural physiques of many dwarfs, orks, and trolls"(Augmentation, p. 44).

So I figure your neoteny woman is quite similar with normal woman. Well, her torso is underdeveroped, but emphasizing things like flat breast and lack of pubic hair will break the creeper barrier.

You folks keep talking about getting near the creeper barrier but honestly I think you already hit that barrier back in post 0.

Well.. how should I say.. You have a point here.

Ugh... please don't try to apply reason or logic to cyberlimbs.

An 87cm, 37kg gnome with customized full body cyberlimb replacements has a max strength of 12 and can be bought, at a starting customized strength of 8.

A regular 182cm, 78kg human with customized full body cyberlimb replacements has a max strength of 9 and can be bought at a starting customized strength of 6.

Throw a little gene-opt and metagenetic improvement on the tiny man, and suddenly his little metal cyberbody can get to 15 Strength.

Logic?

That is less the logic of cyber and more the logic of metahuman race variants trying to cram a dwarf stat mods into a gnome just because they are both short is just silly. If you want really absurd go to the other races like the pixie etc, the pixies strength for example still allows it to be a decently strong person and its less than a 1/2 meter tall.

It's the dump stat on this character you described probably 7 out of 10 times.

Speaking of interesting neotenous characters, I was inspired the other day by the rule that children Infected with HMHVV have the Neoteny Quality.... and made a neotenous Nosferatu. I'd got about halfway when I realised it was exactly what every Twilight fanboy wants to be (and every Twilight fangirl wants to bite her).

You need to add the Striking Skin Pigmentation quality to him. You know, so you can sparkle.

Should go for vampire instead of nosferatu because then you could at least survive in sunlight. Oh, and throw on glamour.

He's got a sustaining focus and Alleviate Allergy. And the Human Looking Quality. And if that don't work, Healthy Glow. He's also 17.

17 is not neoteny. Neoteny is likely 12 at the oldest.

Oh yeah, he was Infected a few years ago, so he's a 17-year-old in the body of a prepubescent.

Oh, boy. Now you've done it. You've missed the point entirely.
BLAMMO, suddenly he's a got exceptional attribute and then gets sneezed on by a ghoul.

Now his 80cm-tall entirely robotic body can be built with 21 strength.

He picks up a tractor trailer and throws it at the sun.

He's hit by cozmic radiation! Now all that shit about strength is true about body instead.
Magically he's a little robot man with 21 body. He meets the requirements of a Small Target (dog sized,) and a Massive Target (15+ body,) both at the same time. The universe implodes on itself.