Thinking about doing straight pipes on my E36 328i. Yay or Nay?

[VTECking]

...and thus you were wrong. If you aren't adding more fuel then you can't exactly add much power. No back pressure will mean a major loss of torque [with a normally aspirated engine] as well.

What year e36? The later model 328's have a stainless header that would be preferable over the older cast version. I'd leave the cats on, add a high flow resonator, and put a magnaflow on the back...

its a 1998, and thanks for clearing that up bro.

[speedminded]

its a 1998, and thanks for clearing that up bro.

Leave the cats on just for ease of emission testing if needed and allowing the car's DME/ECU to gather the info correctly. You won't gain much, if any at all, by removing them.