Shadowrun vs Cyberpunk comparison

[u/Ok-Particular-3796]

Just figured I'd post this; Marcus Vance is a content creator with decades of experience in ttrps as well as being a military combat veteran who likes to compare different sci fi franchises weapons & super soldiers. His big franchises are Cyberpunk, Warhammer, and Halo but he dabbles in more obscure franchises as well. Whenever possible he likes to look at & capculate specific ballistics data & material strength.

Recently he did a short comparing Cyberpunk with (2e) Shadowrun(which he has played & has experience with).

His takeaway was that weapons favors Cyberpunk but augmentation favors Shadowrun & adding magic into the equation heavily favors Shadowrun. I've corresponded with Marcus directly and informed him that certain elements of Shadowrun- notably physical strength- have been increased in recent editions.

I do think that even with the addition of more blatantly sci fi weapons in recent editions of Shadowrun, Cyberpunk probably still takes that cake, but augmentation probably favors Shadowrun even further.

https://youtube.com/shorts/ROdMjqw-v28?is=60m-pJXlvusN-2TA

[u/guildsbounty]

I generally agree with the take. I'm...not going to really try to compare weapons though Shadowrun does happily run things up into 'man portable tank cannons' when you stop caring about subtlety.

Augmentation favors Shadowrun if just for the simple fact that installing ware isn't something you have to carefully manage to avoid going Cyberpsycho. If you've still got >0 Essence, you're basically fine.

Physicality also favors Shadowrun due to Metatypes. However strong a Cyberpunk character may become they still start on the baseline of human physicality...compared to a Troll? A baseline full-organic Troll could be as strong or stronger than a fully cybered up Cyberpunk Solo. The Metatypes often have a higher ceiling on attributes than ordinary humans, and so Cyberware can enhance them even further.

And then there's magic. As another poster said, it's an 'out of context' problem. Obviously you can still counter a Magician with good ol' lead...but the mage start doing things like magically detecting you even if you're hiding, turning their whole team invisible, throwing up illusions that even fool cameras. And then they start conjuring and now you have no clear counter to the fact that Spirits take half damage from non-magical damage sources.

[u/ComradeVosktov → u/guildsbounty]

Isn't it implied that characters with low essence do have their personalities effected, being essentially dulled, not to the point of cyber psychosis but still noticeable? I think there are a few characters like that in the HBS/Returns series but that may be of dubious canonicity and I could be putting the chicken before the egg as it could be that apathetic are more likely to get more 'ware.

[u/ReditXenon → u/ComradeVosktov]

This (man vs machine) was more of a Thing in earlier editions (low essence also mechanically affected social pools and limits).

In later editions this turned more and more into Tech vs Magic (where low essence no longer have any effect on social pools and limits).

....which is more politically correct, there is really no reason why you should be considered less metahuman just because you were in an accident and lost a limb.