Hi all,

I just want to make sure I'm not overlooking something in the rules regarding cyberlimbs. When using cyberlimb hands/feet or lower arms/leg, per the cyberlimb rules, you do not use the STR/AGI of that cyberlimb for things like shooting, melee attacks, etc. Instead you use whatever your base character's STR/AGI is.

It seems to me that using cyberhands/feet is a great way to get a lot of armor dice and you don't need to worry about the STR/AGI ratings of the limbs. Let's look at the essence and nuyen cost of 4 cyberlimbs vs. dermal plating.

Item Armor Essence Nuyen
--------------------------------------------------------------
Cyberhands/feet (x4) 12 1.0 56,000Y
Dermal Plating-2 2 1.0 6,000Y

Looking at the numbers above, for the same essence cost, you are getting 6X more armor. If you scale up the cost of Dermal Plating linearly to what it hypothetically would cost to get 12 armor, it would cost 36,000Y, so cyberhands/limbs do cost 56% more per point of armor but at a fraction of the essence.

Do cyberhands/feet really work this way? It seems very powerful to get 12 points of stackable armor for those costs. It also seems a little strange that having armored hands and feet is really making a character that much more survivable since any shots would likely target the torso anyway.

Thoughts?

Thanks!
j2klbs

Yes, that is intended.
No, this is not new.
It's one of the few things that actually makes cyber-limbs worth taking.

What? You DON'T catch bullets with your cyberhand or kick them out of the air with your cyberfeet?

Tsk tsk..... we expect to see YOU down at the CyberDojo this weekend then.

Woe is the Strength 10 troll with a Strength 3 armored cyberhand...

It doesn't make sense to me either. I made up some house rules (in my sig) to 'fix' it.

Yeah, that's the first thing everybody does:
nerf cyberware, especially armor, because . . reasons . .

Could always go back to the SR3 way of handling Essence & Cyber Armor. IIRC you got an Essence discount on certain types of implants based on how many cyberlimbs you had, and Cyber Armor was averaged between all locations before being applied.

which made cyber-limb-armor useless . .

Could be worse. As I understand it, Hero Labs once ruled that Cyber Armor didn't apply at all unless it was a called shot to that specific location.

Yeah, that's a bit worse, not much though . .
Under SR3, you had, depending on reading of the rules, either 6 points of Armor from 1 Arm.
Or you had 1 point of Armor from the same Arm, because it was averaged over the whole Body.
At 5 Points of Armor in that one Arm, you had 0 Armor when averaged over the whole Body.
Because it would be 5 divided by 6. So less than 0 which goes down to 0.

sanest thing seems to be to use the extra condition monitor box conditions to limit this crap. half a cyberlimb? half the armor bonus (round DOWN). a cyberhand? go fuck yourself, that's your armor bonus.

I don't wanna nerf 'em, really! I want them to be awesome. But my tastes run more towards simulationism, so I have a problem saying, "The most armor you can fit on a cyberarm is 3, while the most armor you can fit on just a cyberhand is... also 3." Meanwhile, I'm totally fine with saying, "because reasons" for other things, like using your Pilot Ground Craft skill while jumped in rather than requiring a completely different skill for 'being' a car.

So, how would you strike a balance between verisimilitude and awesomeness for cyberlimbs?

No, that isn't intended.
No, it isn't no.
Sadly, it wasn't corrected. I think it was a "slip through the cracks" problem.

It was one of the things done to make Cyber-Limb-Replacement a more viable choice as far as i know.
And Partial Limbs got a Nerf in this regard under SR4 i think?
Maximum Capacity you could use for Armor was X in a Full-Limb and in a partial Limb it was X/2 (x for whatever that number was, no idea)

I'd personally do it as the 'Full limbs give you full armor, as it's written now. Get a Limb with +2 armor, you get +2 armor. No averaging, you get the armor. You pay nuyen and Capacity, you should get it.'

Half limbs I would say give half. So 4 points of armor on a forearm would give +2. If you want to waste essence and nuyen on 4 partial limbs and stuff them with ONLY armor...who am I to stop you, you could be using that nuyen for something useful and powerful.

Hands/Feet don't give any normal armor. If you got a hand or foot armored, I'd say the armor would count *only* for called shots or situations involving said digit. So if your hand got slammed in a car door, I'd let the Armor count for that, for example.

I wanted to clarify. Is it everyone's interpretation that a hand's (or lower arm's) attributes are not used when making ranged or melee attacks. It is my understanding that their attributes are only used if the test involves only that part of the body and no other parts. In other words, since shooting a gun or swinging a sword also involves one's shoulder, elbow, etc. the hand/lower arm attributes are not used at all.

Is that your understanding as well?

~j2klbs

Pretty much, yes.

Thanks everyone for this spirited discussion. I think it is very abusive to have 4 hands/feet and get +12 armor. What I would suggest to the game designers is to put in the errata that partial limbs (i.e. lower arm/legs) can only have +2 armor, and hands/feet can only have +1 armor. I think this would be well balanced as if someone wanted +12 armor, they would have to devote a LOT of essence. If they only wanted hands/feet they only get +4 armor which doesn't seem so abusive.

~j2klbs

Any sane GM will make you use the partial limb's stats for firing a gun since at the very least the Agility in your finger is used to pull the trigger.

The rules really need clarification.

Anyway, to solve the cyber armor problem: Full limbs can have up to 3 points, partial limbs up to 2, hand/feet up to 1.

The availability of cyberlimb armor already restricts that somewhat.

The rules are sadly nonspecific. I would either say that shooting a gun or making a melee attack doesn't use partial limb/hand attributes, or it "requires the careful coordination of several limbs" -- i.e. coordination of your upper arm with your lower arm -- and uses the lower of your natural or cyberlimb attributes.

The passage you quoted above seems to be talking about whole limbs. Partial limbs are then discussed in the next passage: "The attributes of partial limbs (including cyberhands and –feet) may be enhanced, but their attributes only apply for tests directly involving those limbs (such as a Strength Test when gripping something with an enhanced cyberhand)."

Moral of the story: If the joygirl has a cyberhand, check the rating before asking for the specials.

if she has agility enhancements, tip well. if she has strength enhancements, tip very very well...