You can simsense via one-shot BTLs, why not get a one-hour skillsoft in a chip?

Nu'uh it's totally a measure of how connected your soul is, and if you don't have much of a soul left (low essence rating) your totally a soul less machine and hard to heal. Real people with real feelings practice magic and angst about it a lot, all street sams are unfeeling sociopaths because of their low essence.

It's that way in Cyberpunk 2020 but not in Shadowrun. Low Essence has never forced you to be uncaring, unempathic or even a sociopath. Whether a whole lot of sociopaths have very little essence is a different story.

Well, the fluff does suggest low essence has all those psychological side-effects, they just haven't put them into rules. Which I think is a good move, I don't think everyone want rules telling them how their character should feel.

Ok, so... basically... the entire section of ware needs to be reworked for a consistent cost model.

Basically, since it's ONLY a game balance thing, it should have some sort of underlying mechanic:

You gain a die, and it cost so and so much essence, and so and so much (perhaps with a difference based on how often it's applicable: A die to Agility should be worth more than a die to athletics.)
You gain an IP, it costs so and so much
You gain an obscure non-numerical effect, so you have to look more closely at what it does, and then assign costs

And then there is just basically the differentiation between bio and cyber, and the other new spiffy stuff:
Bio does it for more money and less essence, and cyber does it for less money and more essence. It gets iffy when high-grade ware is concerned, since basically for the same effect and essence cyber should never get more expensive than bio.

Now there SHOULD be another way to do it, too: Basically you don't give a crap about the cost at first, just like the books do, but then you simply make market price adaptions until people start getting the ware:
If NOONE ever takes a piece of ware you start making it cheaper and cheaper until it's bought by someone.
If EVERYONE gets the same ware, you start making it more expensive, until people at least think about getting it
The same could go for weird races and such. For every new pixie mage that's created, increase the cost by a BP or two.

If you did that for a larger online community it should eventually produce a passable cost model.

Rebuilding the whole Essence system from scratch would be a lot of work. I think I'd rather tweak the cost of those implants that are too-popular or too-unpopular.

I think it's nice if Essence costs suit both the game-mechanical power of the implant, and also fluff-wise just how invasive such an implant would be. For example the bone augmentations: extremely invasive (just ask Wolverine), but the power is a tad low. So amp up the power a bit until players think it's a decent buy.

The fluff suggests that some heavy users of ware have those psychological defects maybe that percentage is even above average. It does not suggest a) that those defects are caused by low Essence b) that uncybered characters do not have those defects.

My favorite fluff argument, I'm pretty sure from SR3 Man and Machine, is not that it's the ware itself that lowers your essence but learning to use it properly. Basically, when you learn to use ware properly, you're thinking, and thinking of yourself, more like a machine and less as a man. For example, bone augmentation is very invasive but it wouldn't change your daily life too much, other than you'd feel heavier and you might accidentally punch through the occasional wall. Wired Reflexes, by contrast, requires you to rethink every single action you take every day. Unfortunately, the writers have never really all seemed to agree on what essence is, just that it is necessary for game balance.

Are you a company rep trying to convince us your product doesn't have scary side effects?

Unfortunately because of house rules, variations in acceptable dice pools sizes between tables, and the complete bloody uselessness of some items, probably not. As an example, the largest dice pool pornomancer gets many of it's dice by assuming the GM gives the maximum amount of dice under optional rules, making things like Enhanced pheromone receptors actually valuable as opposed to an item that should be avoided at all costs. The value of those items are directly related to the Monty Hall style of the GM and the munchkiness of the player rather than the value the community at large places on them.

The other issue is that only one side of the coin would have cost balance. The other side (awakened) doesn't have the same checks and balances because it uses a completely different model.

But being able to summon spirits and sprites and destroy people around you when you're having a temper tantrum leaves you thinking normally or perhaps, given centering, even more clearly than the unawakened man. "I am at one with the universe and the universe has spoken through me that it doesn't like you. This is why the spirits of the universe will now tear you to shreds."

Shadowrun has always gone out of it's way to make sure that nowhere ever anywhere the word soul was mentioned in regards to both essence and spirits . .

I agree, it's messed up that powerful magic doesn't have harmful effects. Especially something like summoning a sentient spirit of man(metahuman)kind, binding and enslaving it to your will, and then forcing it to serve or potentially die for you.

On the other hand, while thinking like a machine probably isn't very holistically healthy, I don't see how it would lead to psychosis.

True, that too would be disturbing to the human psyche, although perhaps not for exactly the same reasons or in the same ways.



It wasn't my idea.. but that is the general vibe put to it by '80s-'90s cyberpunk fiction. I think it's a bit of an anachronism; we've become a bit more comfortable with man-machine integration than we used to be.

Fortunately, no actual rules depend on it, so a GM can decide for or against it without having to change actual rules. If the group thinks the dehumanizing aspects of man-machine integration (or man-magic integration) are nice to explore, they can, but if they don't want to, the rules don't force them to.

No I'm only saying that there is no rule for mandatory psychological issues, and the game world should reflect that. You can build

• a 0.01 ESS Psychopath
• a 6 ESS Psychopath
• a 0.01 Ess sane person
• a 6 ESS sane person
• Anything inbetween

The rules do not reflect that low Essence causes psychological issues and as such the game world should see it the same way just as the game world should see SnS as the most effective ammunition versus living beings.
Mentally ill characters should have an underlying illness that may have caused them to cyber up, not the other way around.

The other problem is that even if you houseruled a connection between 'ware and psychological illness, Essence is a poor measurement for alienation. Cybereyes and Ears and a cerebral booster (up to 1.3 Ess) should change the way you view the world a lot more than Titanium Bone Lacing (up to 1.5 ESS).

I disagree about that. The reason there's no rules isn't because they "didn't really mean it" in the fluff; it's because they shy away from game mechanics that dictate how you should play your character. I mean, they've done Mentor spirits and Addiction, but those are all player-selected qualities and fairly restrained. Forxing different behavior for low Essence would impact almost all characters. Behavior-mechanics are rather controversial in RP design, and an objection often voiced against White Wolf. I think they just didn't want to do that.

The game rules don't contradict psychological issues from low Essence, they're just quiet about them. In the absence of a mechanical contradiction, I think the fluff stands.

I think it's a good thing: it doesn't burden anyone with a particular viewpoint about it just because the rules say so. If a GM/group likes cyberpsychosis, they've got fluff to support them. If they don't like it, there's no rules forcing them to act crazy, and they can just say "that's just an exaggeration by the IC reactionary media".



I'm not advocating any house rules here. Also, just because Essence could be a measure of dehumanization, doesn't mean it's the only measure of dehumanization.

Personally I preferred the whole "essence loss is caused by you deviating from your soul I mean aura" explanation rather some sort of "it's how impacted your central nervous system" techno-babble from third edition. Essence loss makes more sense that way (datajacks are essence lite despite requiring a lot of interference with the CNS) and it makes it easier to justify whatever value you need. That's more useful since Essence is a game balance concern and a way to "close off" stuff to mages.

In older editions, there was some optional rules about penalties on social rules due to essence loss, but for the most part if essence >= 0, you were good to go. I would be for making low essence people be more resistant to magic in general. Something like Essence Loss / 2 (round down) bonus dice to resist all spells (like the magical resistance quality) would be my idea. Let's not kid ourselves that 1-2 extra dice to resist the mage's stunball really is going to matter, but it still feels nice.

And Lurker, all PCs are unfeeling sociopaths regardless of their essence score.

So.. any nice solutions for making cybereyes and ears competitive with glasses/buds?

What about making flare/noise compensation in the implants total, and only partial in externals (like they are now)? Full cybernetic replacement allows us to remove the vulnerability, instead of trying to shield it.

There ARE rules for having psych issues with lots of cyber.

It's just they don't show up until you drop below zero Essence and have to have warped binding rituals done to you to keep your spirit from leaving your body.



As for Task spirits, well, they are the answer to why my Possession character has a commlink with a Braille output and an actual honest to god keyboard.




-k

All commlinks have keyboards.

The braille output is rather unique though, and I'd honestly be very surprised to find something like that actually exists because of how cheap cybereyes are, and how little corps are likely to care about making handicapable stuff.

Well... There are Qualities you can take for those Psychological Issues that Cyberware imposes, Should you choose to take them (without the need for Negative Essence even). Hell, you can take them whenever you like, too. So no need to worry about any Essence Thresholds to qualify.

Easy Peasy...

Huh? Are you trying to hack with it?

No, spirits have trouble with screens, AR and VR.

For first: Actually there are rules even for low essence characters there's a disadvantage specificly in augmentation.

Building a new character this last week made me think about how much essence seems to nickle and dime you to death, especially on things that can be duplicated with gear.

In my mind almost any headware, especially the comlink should come with a datajack without additional essence boost, in fact internal comlink (.2 essence) should really come with a datajack and sim module.

THe psychological problems with augmentations flaws is the exception to the rule, not the rule to the exception though . .

doesn't EVERY (internal) comlink come with a cold sim module?

I think not having a datajack is a feature, probably. Still, you can just skinlink it.

Nope, unfortunately not. SR4A even explicitly states, that the internal commlink 'ware does not include a Sim Module. Interestingly it does not say that it is only the housing and does not include an actual commlink. Hah, Fairlight Caliban for ¥2000.

Except that the cost is very clearly listed as 2,000¥ + Commlink Cost

woops, didn't look on the next page

You can summon a Task Spirit with the Hacking skill. The problem is, spirits cannot use DNI or trodes, and can't read screens.

So a physical input and output are needed, thus the Braille display and keyboard.



As for psych issues, you can take them for low essence if you CHOOSE to, but they are not by default part of having low Essence. By default a 0.01 Essence guy can be cheerful and well adjusted.



-k

Cheerful while his cybernetic weapons are slicing and dicing through people, as he sings a happy song and dances around in the rain of blood, a massive grin on his face and happiness in his heart!

...

Oh, wait, that's almost every character with cybernetic weaponry, no matter the remaining essence, never mind.

How do you skinlink something inside your skull with no external access points?

I feel that the games fluff has over and over and over portrayed people with low essence as grim and borderline scoiopathic, while there isn't a mandatory necessty it was clearly intended to be the norm. It's utter bullshit but there ya go.

Skinlink doesn't actually use your skin.

Actually yes it does. It's wonder tech but it does have limitations, if you want your intental ware on skinlink logically you need a datajack.

Shouldn't a taser fry a skinlink? Just like a taser or fireball ought to fry trodes?

*Headdesk* I can be silent no longer.

Skinlink sounds like a great idea, but the only way I can see this working is having the skin work as a Hub. Yes, it allows for communication, but Datastorms would be rife! There should be some kind of limiter, or perhaps a cybernetic system that allows the skin to function better as a Switch or Router instead.

Rant over.

SR3 had Cyber-Ware-Router and Ports.
You could and usually had to cascade routers, if you wanted all of your active implants to be connected to each other . .
Yes, you could actually make a Network Overview Chart of your characters internal parts . .
Of course, nobody really used that, because all they did were take up essence and money without providing ANY benefit . .

Well, useful now. Prevent combat hacking a person's wireless PAN and taking over their cybernetic systems.

Well, the Datajack had 3 ports plus the jack for the cable.
And as of SR4, the comlink should have these ports included . .

True enough. Means you don't need to have your head cracked for that Vintage Ares Predator II and it's Smartgun Link which uses a datacable instead of wireless. Just plug it into your CommLink and there you go.

Comlink doesn't have an external port for the plug though . . *trollface* Problem CanRay? *snickers*

You know, the more I hear about CommLinks, the more I think Bull has the right idea about how to do things...

Yep, he certainly seems to be on to something there . . *trollface* umadbro? *snickers* ^^

Nah, LurkerOutThere. We know that skinlink isn't quite limited to touch, from Unwired. It's not blocked by clothing, so I don't see it being blocked by being under the skin. I suppose you could technically rule against that… if you didn't finish reading that same paragraph in Unwired. It says that implants can always be skinlinked.

I'm with himn on this one.

Commlink in my head equals a celphone or, more approriately, the old Pocket Secretary.

I cannot in good conscience see Fastjack whippin' out a Verizon flip-phone and hacking into an MCT mainframe.

I just *can't*.

Of course Fastjack wouldn't use a flip phone... His "deck" is a custom built Nexus with the Response and Signal jacked so high, military people are going: "Uh, sir... can we buy that?"

Now back to cyber commlinks... can you put a sim module into a cyber commlink without it taking up any extra capacity or Essence. It is just part of the commlink... just like the other commlink add-ons in Unwired.

Don't forget the Apple CPU from a Mac Firestorm.

I provided my paragraph, care to provide yours? Even if it is out of the stupid that is unwired i want to see if before I believe it.

Lazy, *and* untrusting! Besides, I didn't want yours.