As far as capacity, this just isn't true. In fact, I find cyberlimbs to be even more useless in SR4.

Have you taken a look at the tables for cyberlimb capacities and accessories on page 336 and 337?

First of all, EVERY cyberlimb starts at 3 for all it's attribute ratings. It doesn't matter if it's for a human or a troll. As an Orc fresh out of chargen with an 8 Body, 4 Agility and 7 Strength...would take 10 capacity (1 for each point) out of 15 capacity just to buy them up to the rest of your meat bodies stats. Oh! That's also if you ignore the availability restriction, since it's attribute bonusX3 and a +5 body on the limb would come to 15 availability.
Wait folks, there's more!! You would also be REQUIRED to buy a cybertorso, since you can't raise an attribute on the limb higher than +3 without it.

Did I mention that you also need to buy up the physical stats on a fraggin' cybertorso if you want your attributes to even out? (Check out the cyberlimb example text on page 335)
That means...the most you should raise your attributes on all your limbs is in any combination of 10 capacity worth (the total capacity of an obvious cybertorso). Reason being, you have to average the stats together with the lower rated torso, which makes it almost pointless. Strange, since they call cybertorsos and cyberskulls 'shells' instead of true replacements (on the very same page).
Oh, btw....armor costs 2 capacity per point, so good luck fitting that in.

I haven't even got to the various accessories you can add in...
Like for example, how a Cyberarm Slide (a cyber version of the normal equipment version which lets you pop out a pistol into your hand) takes up 8 capacity...yes, more than half of the total capacity in an obvious cyberarm.
Meanwhile, a cyberarm gyromount only costs 4 capacity...half that of the slide? Mwa?

As you can see, even buying up the attributes on a cyberlimb to match your meat body will fill up most of your limb's capacity. There are also definate limits on how high you can enhance the attributes.

Don't even get me started on synthetic cyberlimbs...half capacity I can understand, but at how much room it takes to enhance a limb to comparable levels, it makes them useless. Oh, and synthetic cyberlimbs seem to have taken a swan dive in detectability. They are easily spotted, and are automatically discovered with a simple touch.

Hey, and what's with the cyberskull having an availability of 16!? That's higher than most milspec boom-boom in the book. Tell me what advantage does someone get when purchasing one, other than looking like a total freak? Umm...4 capacity (obvious) to cram in some extra headware? Whoopee.
This is just another example of stupidly high availability ratings put onto an item so it simply can't be bought in chargen, often times just because of flavor or because the writers didn't like the possible combination with other items.
Apparently, Fanpro didn't want any fully cyberbodied characters walking out of chargen, even if they were willing to be drastically ineffective compared to characters using other cyberware and bioware.

Additionally, grades of cyberware don't change how much you can fit in a limb, or how much capacity a certain piece of 'ware takes up. Plus, how often do shadowrunners in most campaigns (I know yours might be the exception) live long enough to afford (and find) deltaware? Not often, I'll betchya. Even if you did manage it, the 3.125 essence spent would still leave you with little room for other useful things like wired reflexes. What you say? Synaptic Accelerator? Oh, sorry....your whole body is cyber, that excludes you from having any bioware (pg. 335, though I guess you could get some work done on the brain). Technically, it also states you can't get any cyberware that has an essence cost but no capacity cost. That means you are out of luck for even purchasing wired reflexes.

I find it very strange that miniaturization is so rampant in 2070 (e.g.-contact lenses with built-in smartlink and other vision enhancements) and yet cyberlimbs can barely live up to an unmodified natural arm without running out of room.

This REALLY needs to be looked at in the errata.

Meanwhile with my group, I will be removing all the capacity costs for attribute enhancements (and maybe armor) to limbs. You are simple buying a more powerful limb model. Also, cyberlimbs are available that scale to your metatype (an Ork cyberarm starts with 6 body and 5 strength instead of 3 to each). A cybertorso will only be required once you have increased the limb's attribute past the normal racial maximum. I will keep most of the availability ratings, except for cybertorsos and cyberskulls, which will both be 6 (2 more than standard cyberlimb, so still a bit harder to find). Some of the capacity ratings of accessories will also be reworked, but not too much, since attribute enhancements won't be taking extra room now. Oh, and synthetic cyberlimbs are much harder to spot (depending on grade, as well). All higher grade limbs will also get slightly more capacity, as the accessories are better miniaturized (though they have to be bought at the same grade, per the rules).

Keeping the availability limit on attribute enhancements (+4 max, at 12 avail), this should make things much more reasonable and still fair.
A full cyborg still won't come close to competing with a min-maxed cyber/bio sammie out of chargen (or an adept, for that matter), but the possibility to later make up the difference in upgrades is there if you have a lot of nuyen and connections to a high-class doctor/clinic. Also, this is one more small step to 'GitS' cyborgs, which I was hoping for in this edition.

I really don't understand FASA/Fanpro's fear and loathing of full cyborgs, which IMHO are an integral part of a proper cyberpunk setting, but it is definitely there.
In fact, they seem to be trying to phase cyberlimbs completely out of the picture.
Check out this quote from the first paragraph on cyberlimbs...

I know that some cyberpunk games take the powerlevel of cyborgs a little too far, but in a setting like Shadowrun... I really don't see that being a problem. We have powerful mojo-slingers, adepts, trolls, and bioware.
In fact, I think a full cyborg would make an interesting and playable 'archetype' of it's own. *shrug*

Anyway, that's my 2 , and then some.
Sorry for the rant, but it's really been on my mind lately. Please don't take it personally... it's not a flame by any means. Your comment just set me in motion!

-Ravennus

Even in SR4, there is always YAUS (yet another useful skill) to stuff karma into - especially when trying to get the one 7 afterwards... Attributes are quite a karma sink, too.

Even when starting with 500 BP and distributing about 700 Karma, there is still room, as well as 'need' to grow.

After reading the description for the Cyberarm Slide it says it has "total concealment". If that is the case then it is basically a cyberholster with a built in slide since a gun is usually attached to it, and that explains the capacity cost.

I was thinking the same thing, but the wording is so vague that I'm not sure that it's talking about total concealment of the weapon or just concealment of the slide itself.

As far as it being possible to make a total borg out of chargen, yes...it's finally possible, though you have to fudge the rules a bit on the availability of the cyberskull.
However, I still honestly believe that a 'borg out of chargen is at a total disadvantage compared to other sammies and combat adepts. Especially when it comes to reflexes. Also, it's still ridiculous that it costs 9 capacity just to bring a limb up to the normal racial max on all three physical attributes. Heck, there's not even enough room in some synthetic cyberlimbs to do that. We aren't even talking about the modified max yet, of which other sammies can easily (and cheaply) push using other cyberware and bioware.

That's a whole lot of work, essence, and nuyen just to make a cyborg body that's comparable to a well-built natural (meta)human body. Sure, it's possible now, and those of us that just want the chance to RP a full conversion borg will do it... but in my mind, the cost is just too high.

-Ravennus

The thing you're not looking at is what fraction of your starting resources you have to give up in order to get the max amount of cash... In SR4 it's 1/8th, in SR3 it's 1/4th. (in the point buy system, anyway - in priority, 1,000,000 is worth as much as 30 attribute points or being a full magician...)

Though the lack of metatype-specific cyberlimbs really does bite.

Well let's add the points we have to use for contacs, those were covered by ones resources in SR3. In SR4 they can become pretty expensive after a few contacts. Let's say 5 points apiece, that's the equivalent of 25K for each contact.

So are you now talking about building Robo-Face?

Nope, I was commenting about the above text in response to how much cyberlimbs had NOT been reduced in price. In SR3 you could BUY contacts, now you cant which makes it harder to have lots of contacts since they are very expensive points wise.

So basically completely tangent and unrelated to cyberlimbs topic?

I think you misunderstand what I responded to, read what MMU1 wrote and my response to it. (see below)

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"The thing you're not looking at is what fraction of your starting resources you have to give up in order to get the max amount of cash... In SR4 it's 1/8th, in SR3 it's 1/4th. (in the point buy system, anyway - in priority, 1,000,000 is worth as much as 30 attribute points or being a full magician..."
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In SR3 your resources INCLUDED your contacts since you bought them with your money, in SR4 you use points to buy your contacts, hence the calculation of using 1/8 of SR4 Build points for resources is slightly flawed compared to SR3 since that 1/4 include a big chunk of comparable BP in character contacts for SR4.

(It DID step away a bit from cyberlimbs but i wanted it clarified)

Different kind of clientele... sometimes.

Diversified characters still are karma sinks, too... in fact, worse than ever, as there are way more skills.

In fact, when converting, most characters will end up needing way more karma.

The only system that uses this sort of hard-caps that comes immediately to mind is NWoD; by some amazing coincidence, much of that system is pretty close to what happens in SR4. At any event, once you've maxed out your skills and attributes (5 for mundane humans) the only way you can get better is to add qualities or supernatural powers. Depending on your supernatural selection (Mage, Werewolf, or Vampire) you get new limits and purchase costs on certain traits.

I could almost be swayed to agree with dumping the cap on Skills, but I would definitely keep Attributes capped.

Yeah, but they also don't pay a Point cost for their negative stats at chargen, other than as a maximum limit.

There's actualy a few systems out there. But yes the new WoD is one of them, and probably the most recognizable one.

I'll go with Robert on this one though...mostly different clientel.

Well if you look at things they start just as far from their racial max as humans. If you look at things you'll also see that if you start a character with just the baseline stats for his race that a troll will reach 6 in their big attributes much faster than a human. Also if you give the troll as much karma as the human to get to level 6 in say str, the troll will be 3 karma away from getting 8. 8 sir. Thats super human levels of strength.

Lets look at the buildpoint costs. To get a human to even 6 strength it costs 75 BP. Whereas it costs a troll 10. You spend 75 to max one stat at 6 and with a troll you can spend 5 points more and have two stats at 9. I think really in the end it all ballances out.

Well at 300 karma you've earend 30 points of street cred. And since we want our PA to be down lower than 3 we're going to need a total of no more than 8. Which means the runner would have had to commit 11 seperate and wholy distinct acts worthy of noteriety atleast. Not a easy thing to do considering you should never be given a noteriety point for the same thing more than once unless you do it in a new interesting and completely different way.

Its harder to stay dead even than you might think. Especialy when you can get extra street cred just for having a unbelievable escape or being on a epic run.

Never said it's easy - but it's fun.

I don't see it stated anywhere that you cannot have a negative Noteriety. It isn't particularly helpful doing an Intimidation check, but it still helps you (to a lesser degree than the Street Cred spent) when earning someone's trust...assuming that you handle all the signs and subtract the negative Noteriety (giving you a higher number of bonus dice than Street Cred alone).

This also helps your Public Awareness stay low. With negative Noteriety you can even carry a Street Cred into the double digits and theoretically remain a Nobody.

Allowing a negative Notoriety also gives meaning to this otherwise near pointless line at the top left of page 258 (there doesn't seem to be any canon way to have a negative Street Cred).

Absolutely not. Also note that the text explicitly states that you can not drop Street Cred below 0 with mods, and that result from the calculation of Public Awareness never drops below 0. But there is no such stipulation given for not dropping Notoriety below 0. Not when it says you can lower it with Street Cred, nor when calculating the starting Notoriety based on Qualitiies.

No, what makes it so interesting is that the system actually begins to make longterm sense once you see that the Notoriety range extends into the negative.

That's a bit of a stretch, considering that it turns long term runners into ultimate boyscouts.

Of course, that makes them the walking equivalent of Aztechnology - they can get away with genocide.

Not ultimate boyscouts, because boyscouts stick out. More like the janitor at the plant that has been there 40 years but nobody knows his name, nobody ever thinks that it is odd that they don't know his name, nobody knows how long he has worked there, and nobody cares.

The ultimate unused, unnoticed furniture.

No, you act so "professionally" that you are a ghost. Your shadow exploits are a whisper of a rumour. Yup, it does makes it harder to intimidate. But it also makes it easier to get someone to trust you. That's how the math works out.

Well mark on the wall.

The book probabaly should have made it clearer though, as it is a mental barrier that many aren't going to break through....until perhaps they make a character with the only Notoriety modifying Quality as Blandness or some such.

The hints of it being able to go negative aren't particularly obvious by just reading the rules, and there are no examples of negative notoriety given.

You know after looking back I think blakkie is right here.

Course with anyone who knows your rep you're going to get a big pile o dice to add...afterall street cred - - noteriety (double negatives cancel out to make notieriety positive and adding both). So this is a interesting way of keeping your face out of the public eye, as long as you don't do things that wind up on the news. If you do, then your PA will still go up (depending on the GM ofcourse).

Yeah, and that would mark the True Professional - unknown, unseen, but almost worshipped by those 'in the know'.