[PiXeL01]

No rules for using Cybermancy or Cyberzombies? Will that be in an expanding PDF?

[ScytheKnight]

Speaking of Digitigrade Legs and Raptor Feet... find myself really confused into how they work as they seem to not really fit into Cyberlegs...

[Sterling]

Speaking of Digitigrade Legs and Raptor Feet... find myself really confused into how they work as they seem to not really fit into Cyberlegs...

Digigrade Legs are basically a permanent change to the format of the legs - shorter thigh, vastly elongated foot, so that the legs now resemble bird's legs.  Likewise, Raptor feet are a permanent change to the foot, making them appear just like a velociraptor foot, including the claw. 

Both together you vastly change your appearance from the waist down to appear as though you are now half man, half velociraptor, and definitely qualify for Distinctive Appearance.  If you have ever read the Wolf & Raven Shadowrun novels by Michael A Stackpole the character Kid Stealth plays an important part, and is the reason behind the alternative name for the augmentations.

[ScytheKnight]

I know what they are... but it seems that it's a case of you get both of them on a cyberleg there's nothing left...

[UnLimiTeD]

?
It's Capacity, or apparently +0.25 Essence lost per leg, but only 4 Capacity.
A Cyberleg has 20, so there's plenty of space left.
Not everything is a slot-in item.

As for the structure: Goddamnit, get a grip.
Finding out what some of the geneware stuff does takes some serious amount of searching.
What happened to the clear structure of older books?
The fluff is fine, though I skipped straight over the CFD chapter, but at some point I wondered if you weren't overdoing it. A ToC could have fixed that, as I'm sure I'll eventually read most of it ( - the CFD chapter).
The only thing this has over Augmentation is that it's full colour. 
Here's hoping there's be an errata'd pdf for download, and not just an appendix including the Index.

[ScytheKnight]

Well, 8 if you count the feet as well.. but I see your point.. was probably reading the wrong line of something again.

[Darzil]

Now, what about the crunch chapters? There's a lot of fluff in those as well ... is the balance closer to what you'd like to see? Is there too much fluff in, say, teh Cybernetic chapter? Not enough in the Bioware? About right?

A fluff-free book of nothing but lines of stats is never gonna happen, but getting the right *balance* is important.

For me (not having read this one yet), there is definitely a balance issue in some books, but between crunch and crunch as well as fluff and crunch.

For example, Run Faster has 23 races, covered by 12 pages of text for both fluff and crunch. Much of the crunch on how these races can work in a game (Pixie equipment, Sasquatch communication - can't communicate verbally, but act as ambassadors? Best combat stats in the game, but only balanced by fluff?) is missing. Races are massively important, people base entire character concepts on them, whereas the rest of the book represents small bits of their character. But it manages to fit 24 pages of equipment packs, which don't seem to add much at all to the game (caveat - I think it's an interesting idea, and a forum for community created ones is a good way to do it). Some sections were very fleshed out, others less so (Life modules looked like no one had tried to create different character archetypes (or Trolls) with it - and certainly not to see if it was balanced with other systems - which it can't be, you can't balance flat points systems with exponential points systems).

Errata/clarification is a major issue, though. The lack of it is meaning that we are forced to look to these books for it, which isn't really what they are for. We shouldn't be hoping for Technomancer fixes in an expansion book to make Complex Forms as useful to a Technomancer as Spells are to a Mage. We shouldn't be hoping for a book to alter rules so that learning First Aid and using a Medkit is better than not learning First Aid and using a Medkit. These books would be looked upon with greater happiness if there was errata for the issues with existing ones, as they'd be judged on their own merits, rather than failing to fix previous books.

My impression so far is that the writers love the fluff, and aren't too bothered by whether the rules work. That may be unfair, or that may be how it is (after all, people have motivations), but I'd certainly recommend a rules first person was involved in the books, and if a section doesn't have space for the rules to make it work, it can't be in the book at all. I love the fluff, but I also like to play the game, and having just arrived in 5th, can't rely on 4 editions of back knowledge to understand. I suspect, though, that the balance is imposed from above, rather than the people writing the books.

[Wakshaani]

Some writers are also stronger in fiction than mechanics, while others are stronger in mechanics than fiction. In a perfect world, we'd have The Rules Guy, who'd handle all the mechanics, while everyone else fluffs it up, to insure that every rule lines up since they were all made by the same person, BUT, I don't think we have anybody who's flawlessly able to churn out guns, cars, spells, cybernetics, and so on.

With that not being possible, we try to kick ideas around and help one another out, but it isn't a perfect system. I know I'm utter pants when it comes to making spells, for instance. Playtesting catches some bugs, but there's orders of magnitude involved ... say you have five writers, fifty playtesters, and five thousand players who buy the book ... you can probably guess who'll catch more flaws. This is why we try and harvest things and make errata, or at least see if things are operating as intended.

For instance, in a video review, a couple of Aussies started combining LImnal Body with DIgigrade Legs with Skimmers, to see how fast they could go (The answer is 288 KPH, by the by) ... while not what was intended, I'm personally not inclined to ruin the fun of someone who wants to be a hovering panther-legged Centaur-man who wooshes down highways while sounding like a Pod Racer from the Phantom Menace. It's an exploit combination that I didn't plan for, but that comes with a host of drawbacks.

At any rate, keep the errors rolling, and we'll try and get to them ASAP. (I wouldn't expect an official FAQ/Errata until after GenCon, however. Pretty much the next month is all about that. As Xmas is to video games, GenCon is to RPGs, for both good and ill.)

[UnLimiTeD]

Well, technically, a liminal body like that of a centaur also has a legtype even more efficient than digigrade cyberlegs, so there is an argument to be made it shouldn't get any further bonus.
The same way, I have to ask why those legs improve the speed of skimmers. That's probably neither here nor there, though, and hard for you to answer.
More important stuff:
What the hell happened to weapon arms? You can't just ditch them! 

[PiXeL01]

They didn't. You can replace my hand with s chainsaw if you like.

[UnLimiTeD]

That's not a weapon arm, that's a weapon on an arm. There's no option to screw a fully articulated weapon arm to the back of your torso to look over your shoulder anymore.
Or gyrostabilized weapon cages on your forearms for more dakka.

[Wakshaani]

Weapon arms are most certainly there! I combined the rules for chainsaws, buzzsaws, and vices into a single Extreme thing, however. I figure that while they look different, they're all essetially the same thing: Giant, oversized death-things in place of a hand.

(But you can make 'em modular, if you want to avoid Razor Fist problems!)

(( Also, more Rigger-like gear, like the remote-controlled modular cyberhand, I ifgured would be better slotted into the Rigger book. It's not gone, it's just chillin' with it's cousins. ))

(Edit)
ah HAH! Yeah, okay, granted, I didn't go with extra limbs, other than tails (Mind you, you *can* attach a cybergun to your tail, so there's that! And you can also take a Tank! upgrade and fill the massive pile of Capacity with gunsgunsguns) but you're right in that this is something that could be added.

If we do the "Cyberzombis and more" expansion, I'll see about adding Skull 2.0 and Toros 2.0, each with more capacity, and some wilder stuff like extra arms, gun waldos, and so forth.

[UnLimiTeD]

Please do!
Btw, does creating a new Cybergun actually modify the gun, in the classes sense? As in, it doesn't work on guns that normally can't accept more modifications?
And what are "Exotic Pistols" for this purpose?
I definitely appreciate the Rigger Stuff. Now we only need useful Drones.

[SichoPhiend]

More capacity in synthetic skulls would be nice if only for taking improved synth skin at a level higher than 1

[prionic6]

Wakshaani, in my opinion it's not a big problem that there are errors in the books. It is unfortunate for buyers of the hard copies but understandable. It's the lack of a good errata process. I do care about updated PDFs and corrected print runs, but I know that these take a long time and are very work intensive. I don't care one iota about those fancy designed errata documents that have the same look as the books.

My preference would be a way to quickly address rule inconsistencies, gaps and errors. I've noticed that there seems to be people like you around here in the forums when new publications are released that answer questions and give info about, for example, how a printing mistake was really meant. Awesome! Why not compile that stuff into some preliminary errata list posted here in the forums? We always hear about FAQs and errata being "in the pipeline". That just doesn't cut it. Post the damn lists and add a disclaimer that these are not final and subject to change.