[FastJack]

Agreed. An NPC like this is the "In case of emergency, break glass" type. It should only be used if the players are seriously abusing the game.

GM: "You're trailing your mark through the streets of Detroit. Up ahead, you see a large crowd gathering for a PR speech on the steps of Ares' Headquarters. He's heading towards the crowd to try and lose you."
Player 1: "I continue to follow him, trying to close the distance so I don't lose him."
Player 2: "I'm still watching, keeping P1 covered from my sniper's roost. Just had a thought, what's the speech about?"
GM: "Huh? Um... Some new announcement being made about a military contract." <rolls dice> "Your mark's entered the crowd, but you still see him."
Player 1: "Cool. I continue to watch, but I'm ready to move if he tries to break for it."
Player 2: "Is Damien Knight giving the speech?"
GM: <barely glances at player 2> "Sure he is." <rolls dice> "Uh-oh, the mark spots you. He starts pushing -"
Player 2: "I shoot him."
GM: "The mark?"
Player 2: "No, Damien Knight. My character's got an obsession about Ares and hates Knight. I try to take him out. And I'm using Edge"
GM: "WHAT?!?"
Player 2: <rolls obscene dice for being specialized sniper> "Sweet! Rule of Six baby! Suck 15 successes Damien!"
GM: "!!!"
Player 1: ""
Player 2: "So, did I kill him?"
GM: "No. It turns out that it was an illusion. Damien's been getting threats recently and decided to hold this stunt to trap any would-be assassins. The magical illusion drops and you see through your sites something that was once human. And it looks directly at you. Then begins to come after you."
Player 2: "DAMMIT!"

[Lord Scythican]

Perfect example FastJack! Somebody is about to be put in their place!


Also was my math right on the cyberlimb? I thought that customized & enhanced limbs added to a compacity. I just want to make sure I am not building this wrong. From the looks of it I can have a deltaware arm with a ton of stuff crammed in it for 0.3 essence right? (Never mind the missile launcher and heavy machine gun. Those were just house rules added in.)

[FastJack]

The most you can get is 12 Capacity on the arm. If you make it customized, you can have the attributes up to the natural maximum for the character, but if the attributes go above this, then you have to treat them as enhancements and they take up a lot of capacity. As long you're fine with the maximums, then you can fill it however you want.

[Lord Scythican]

Can't you get 15 normally and add +4 for bulk modification? So enhanced attributes deduct from the capacity, not add too it? Makes sense now that I look at it. I wonder though if I could justify adding more capacity to a cyberarm if the arm was a lot larger, say for a troll instead of a human? If I had a killing machine that was 10ft. tall, seems like he could hold more stuff in his arms. Or is this what the Bulk Modification is for?

[FastJack]

HA! I was only looking at Synthetic Cyberlimbs...

O_o

Maybe, in that case...

[Lord Scythican]

HA! I was only looking at Synthetic Cyberlimbs...

O_o

Maybe, in that case...

So we can fit more than what you were thinking, but not as much as what I was thinking. I guess I will have to scrap the homebrew missile launcher cybergun.

[FastJack]

Updated Cyberware (Obvious and more Capacities):

Cyber Mod	Essence	Cost
Right CyberArm [Bulk +3, Customized (maximized to B6/S6/A6), Cyberarm Gyromount, Retractable Elbow Spur, Enhancements Armor 2/B+3/S+3/A+3 (18 Capacity used, Bod 9, Str 9, Agi 9)]	.3	420,000¥
Left CyberArm [Modular, Bulk +3, Customized (max'd to B6/S6/A6), Cyberarm Gyromount, Retractable Elbow Spur, Enhancements Armor 2/B+3/S+3/A+3 (18 Capacity used, Bod 9, Str 9, Agi 9), Drone Hand, Grapple Hand]	.6	468,500¥
CyberLegs [Bulk +4, Customized (max'd to B6/S6/A6), Cyberskates, Hyrdraulic Jacks (R6), Telescoping Cyberlimb, Enhancements Armor 2/B+3/S+3/A+3 (22 Capacity used, Bod 9, Str 9, Agi 9)]	.6	1,007,000¥
CyberTorso [Bulk +3, Customized (max'd to B6/S6/A6), Enhancements Armor 2/B+3/S+3/A+3 (13 Capacity used, Bod 9, Str 9, Agi 9)]	.45	392,000¥
CyberSkull [Enhancement Armor 2 (4 Capacity used)]	.225	106,000¥
Eyeband [R3, Eye Recording Unit, Flare Compensation, Image Link, Low-Light Vision, Smartlink, Thermographic, Vision Enhancement (R2), Vision Magnification (12 Capacity used)]	.15	90,000¥
Cyberears[R4, Audio Enhancement (R3), Balance Augmenter, Damper, Ear Recording Unit, Increased Sensitivity, Select Sound Filter (R5), Sound Link, Spatial Recognizer (16 capacity used)]	.3	370,000¥
Attention Coprocessor (R3)	.09	90,000¥
Commlink (Fairlight Caliban/Novatech Navi, R4/Sig5/F3/Sys4)	.06	115,000¥
Datajack	.03	5,000¥
Encephalon (R2)	.45	750,000¥
Invoked Memory Stimulator	.06	500,000¥
Math SPU	.045	45,000¥
Olfactory Booster (R6)	.06	60,000¥
Orientation System	.06	12,500¥
Radar Sensor (R4)	.09	120,000¥
Auto-Injector (Reusable)	.03	5,000¥
Biomonitor	.09	10,000¥
Titanium Bone Lacing	.45	400,000¥
Internal Air Tank	.075	6,500¥
Magnetic System	.075	12,000¥
Wired Reflexes (R3)	1.5	1,000,000¥
Total:	5.79	5,984,500¥

Thanks LS! Now he's maxed out on his Physical Attributes and has Armor 2 all around...

[Mäx]

To me this doesn't seem right, so I think I am doing something wrong.

Yeah your doing something wrong.
Your trying to make a cyber zombie by installing deltaware in a guy who has biocompability(cyber) and adapsin.
A guy like that can allready take pretty much every compatible piece of ware in the books if you favor bioware for those thinks that come as both, especially if you make that cyber in to a suite dropping the cyber essence modifier to .2. The whole point of cybermancy is that you dont have to use expensive deltaware to build the uber sammy, really it pretty easy to get to -6 essence with used ware.

[Critias]

To me this doesn't seem right, so I think I am doing something wrong.

Yeah your doing something wrong.
Your trying to make a cyber zombie by installing deltaware in a guy who has biocompability(cyber) and adapsin.
A guy like that can allready take pretty much every compatible piece of ware in the books if you favor bioware for those thinks that come as both, especially if you make that cyber in to a suite dropping the cyber essence modifier to .2. The whole point of cybermancy is that you dont have to use expensive deltaware to build the uber sammy, really it pretty easy to get to -6 essence with used ware.

Given how expensive and complicated the cybermancy process is, why would they then cut corners by filling the guy up with used 'ware?  It's not a race to get to -6 fastest, it's a process developed to fit more and more stuff.

Now, deltaware, adapsin, biocompatability, all put together, might be a little over the top, sure...but it makes sense, at least.

[Glyph]

I would think a cyberzombie would be SOTA all the way, since they are supposed to be bleeding-edge technology.  Plus, the costs would be pretty irrelevant, since they are essentially guinea pigs.

[FastJack]

I would think a cyberzombie would be SOTA all the way, since they are supposed to be bleeding-edge technology.  Plus, the costs would be pretty irrelevant, since they are essentially guinea pigs.

Ahh, but we're talking a Megacorp that looks at the bottom line. Remember, not every operation is a success. The subject has to make a Intuition + Willpower test (threshold 3 + 1 for every point below zero essence), and if they don't succeed, they die (or something worse comes back with the spirt on a glitch). Now, even with the Deltaware example we put together, that sets the threshold at 7. Pretty high to succeed, but doable. Let's just assume three quarters of the operations are successful. 12 million nuyen is a huge lose if it doesn't work. Remember, this is all deltaware equipment made to order for the subject, so it can't be reused. So, beta- and alpha-grade might be used more often, just because it's a lot easier to re-use those grades on other subjects.

[Critias]

There's a world of difference between thinking corps will go for Alpha or Betaware, and thinking corps will go for used in order to more quickly "get to -6 essence."

[Mäx]

To me this doesn't seem right, so I think I am doing something wrong.

Yeah your doing something wrong.
Your trying to make a cyber zombie by installing deltaware in a guy who has biocompability(cyber) and adapsin.
A guy like that can allready take pretty much every compatible piece of ware in the books if you favor bioware for those thinks that come as both, especially if you make that cyber in to a suite dropping the cyber essence modifier to .2. The whole point of cybermancy is that you dont have to use expensive deltaware to build the uber sammy, really it pretty easy to get to -6 essence with used ware.

Given how expensive and complicated the cybermancy process is, why would they then cut corners by filling the guy up with used 'ware?  It's not a race to get to -6 fastest, it's a process developed to fit more and more stuff.
Now, deltaware, adapsin, biocompatability, all put together, might be a little over the top, sure...but it makes sense, at least.

Becouse there's nothink to fit into character that would take you to negative essence, with .2 modifier for cyber and .5 modifier for bio you can allready get all the ware that you want into a character with out going to negative essence, if going 50-50 thats effective 15 points of essence worth of cyber and 6 points of essence worth of bio, which still only gets us up to 4,5 essence lost as one of them is halved. So actually we can get 4 points of essence worth of bio and cyber, which is effectivly 20 points of cyber and 8 points of bio to get as to 0 essence.

[Critias]

Becouse there's nothink to fit into character that would take you to negative essence, with .2 modifier for cyber and .5 modifier for bio you can allready get all the ware that you want into a character with out going to negative essence, if going 50-50 thats effective 15 points of essence worth of cyber and 6 points of essence worth of bio, which still only gets us up to 4,5 essence lost as one of them is halved. So actually we can get 4 points of essence worth of bio and cyber, which is effectivly 20 points of cyber and 8 points of bio to get as to 0 essence.

Well, okay, I'll just self-quote, then:

There's a world of difference between thinking corps will go for Alpha or Betaware, and thinking corps will go for used in order to more quickly "get to -6 essence."

I can understand not going as over-the-top as for everything to be in line -- Betaware, cyberware suite (potentially!), adapsin, cybercompatability, etc, etc...you don't need all of it, I completely agree.

But to swing the pendulum back so far in the other direction, by thinking that a corporation or government would be so wildly inefficient as to go through the trouble of making a cyberzombie out of used cyberware, is just as silly (or moreso, in fact).

[Lord Scythican]

I just believe that if you are making some supercyberzombie and Nuyen is not an issue, then you would use the best of the best.

However with that said, maybe we are looking at this the wrong way though. A guy that was maxed out to -6 essence may not actually have the best cyberware. The guy that had the best would be a better subject by far and it would show in his essence rating. Fully decked out he might be at 6 essence (or under) and not be a cyberzombie because he has the best. The actual cyberzombie is "flawed" in the fact that his experiment was based on how much crap they could shove in him. The crap could actually be less than perfect and under the performance specs of something better like Deltaware.

I really just do not think it is possible to make a fully decked out cyberzombie with -6 essence and has a full suite of deltaware, adapsin, and biocompatibilty. If the guy has all of that then he isn't in danger of becoming a cyberzombie in the first place. However I still want too see how much I can fit in him.

Here is a thought though...

What if the cyberzombie got to -6 essence before getting deltaware? If this happened he would have a essence void correct? You can't get the essence back. If you remove the cyberware and replace it with something else then you will still have a essence void even if the cyberware uses less essence. If I use a standard cyberarm with biocompatibility and adapsin, the arm will cost me 0.8 essence. If I upgrade it to a Deltaware arm which would cost 0.3 essence, I don't get the difference back correct?

I am not sure how this would help though. Statistically wise, how much better is Deltaware than standard except in essence ratings?