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Posted by: Smash Oct 8 2013, 01:11 AM

The matrix is clearly now the biggest issue with 5th Ed. Not from my point of view but rather the point of view of players who just can't seem to let go of realism for the sake of the game. One could argue that the argument of realism is fairly redundant in a game with magic and dragons, but I digress.

People seem forever stuck on this idea that a) it's dumb that shower curtains work better when their wireless is turned on but b) they then become susceptable to hackers. The problem with this view is that it relies too much on real world knowledge that's not necessary or required to be transferable to a PnP roleplaying game. Yes, the writers are somewhat at fault for this. They have relied on using real world knowledge to sell their concepts and not anticipated how literally a lot of people would take it.

Here's an example: Real world employers employ magicians to read their employees thoughts to ensure that they are not plotting against said employer. Because you know that this is a fact of life you wear tin-foil hats to work which are proven (through lots of studies to numerous to list here) that tin foil blocks mind reading. However, let's imagine a world where the average joe doesn't believe in magic, nor realise that his thoughts are being read by afore mentioned magicians. does this incredibly naieve individual wear a tin-foil hat to work? No, they don't. Ok now for arguments sake, let's translate this outlandish individual to the Shadowrun universe. If they don't know that hackers exist, or at least don't really understand the true extent of what they are capable of doing, do they turn their wireless showercurtain off? The answer remains no.

Here's the assumptions that a lot of people are making in regard to wireless that don't really need to translate to the game:

• The matrix is a 3D representation of todays internet
• Everyone knows about hackers and what they can do and this is much worse than the benefits of wireless
• Hacking relies on wireless as we understand it and is limited in the same way as it is limited today (TCP/IP)

Are people unfounded in thinking like this. Of-course not, the rulebook is written in such a way that it explains itself in comparison to the real world. This was done I think to lend weight to the concepts presented but it seems to have had the opposite effect.

There are so many ways that this could have been approached to not caused so much heartache and that players would have accepted it. If it was me I'd have simply removed the benfits of wireless mode unless they were really obvious and just given hackers some new technology that allows them to hack devices through some kind of meta-wireless that I can't even comprehend that doesn't require TCP/IP. If they had just gotten rid of hackers and just made Deckers all Technomancers this would have been very achievable. Of-course this would have annoyed a different cohort of players and so Deckers still need to exist, but who can argue with Technomancers hacking devices with Magic? Anyone ever see 'The Lawnmower Man'? There's your hacking mechanics right there.

I think one of the reasons that the writers have gone the way they did with wireless is that it gives non-hackers some way to counter attack. Get a good comlink, use the wireless defence action, turn your wireless off, etc. All these things are merely options and options give you more strategic and tactical depth. We should just embrace them. Yes you can be cynical and just say "pftt! Everyone will just turn wireless off" but as soon as you face that elite operative who has all his linked cyber turned on and is shielded by a competent decker then you'll probably wish that you had done the same. There's also probably going to be 5 runs where Deckers are not a threat to every one where there is. Are you going to just forego your bonuses against the 80/20 rule? Personally, I'd put more faith in my Decker.

Yes there are some scenarios where your trauma patch probably shouldn't work better with wireless in the middle of a jungle with no available wireless. My advice is just be happy and confident that you're getting the bonus without any chance that a decker will brick your patch..........

Posted by: Erik Baird Oct 8 2013, 01:23 AM

Your argument is that people should just hit the "I believe" button? I dislike what I've heard about the wireless bonus because it's an unacceptable security risk for most of the stuff it's been applied to and has no reason other than gameplay! for the application. Plus, I don't think computers, even in 20xx, could be that fast when you introduce a communication link and a second computer to the application.


Psst, wireless depends on radio, not TCP/IP.

Posted by: NeVeRLiFt Oct 8 2013, 01:28 AM

The current campaign I'm playing in, the GM does not use any of the wireless bonus stuff and just uses the Matrix like it was back in 3rd edition with the ability to hack certain wireless things only.
But again hacking and the matrix really take a back seat and is just brushed over.

I would just talk about it with your group and make house rules.

People are so paranoid about all their stuff being hacked and bricked it sorta just ruins the games if you go by how they have it in the rule book currently.

Posted by: Dolanar Oct 8 2013, 01:34 AM

very well put, however there are a few details that should be mentioned.

1. for many pieces of gear that have wireless bonus functionality it is a pointless mechanic, I want the bonus dice to my Autopicker? I turn the wireless on, open the door, then turn it off, unless a Decker is watching me waiting for me to turn on something to wireless its more or less just stating to your GM "When I use this I am turning the wireless on then off, each time I use it".

2. The Bonuses you get from turning wireless on are kinda bleh. There is very little incentive to turn the wireless on.

3. your example about mages reading minds is a little bit off. We are shadowrunners, we either run with or hire people regularly who hack people's devices regularly, why would we, as paranoid lawbreakers, not expect that the people we are hacking wouldn't hire people to hack us back? to use your example, its like Joe Average works with a Coven on his days off, & talks to the mages about how they read people's minds, why wouldn't he assume people are trying to read his mind too.

4. Assuming you choose to have a back-up plan rather than relying on the team Decker. You have to ensure that you always have the best possible commlink, because anything else puts you in danger of getting bricked or worse if you do set things to wireless on & slave to your Commlink. If the point was to allow the Decker's to do more things, then relegating them to Commlink Defender seems a little silly.

Choosing to take a DR3 or so commlink when now the only difference between them is how well they defend you against being hacked makes little sense to me. Yes you could play the purely story based character who is a street level runner who has never been hacked. But I think at that point you're trying to play a slightly blinded character. We break the law as part of our jobs, hacking into secure facilities & stealing their prized data, its only Reasonable sometimes they might come back with Decker's to try to get it back.

Posted by: KCKitsune Oct 8 2013, 01:53 AM

I also think the writers were not thinking when they put in the ability to brick cyberware. If you can have some punk Decker trash your 100,000 wired reflexes with his cobbled together deck (we know those rules are coming in the decking splat book), then why use wired reflexes when you can get synaptic booster for a hell of a lot less Essence. Sure you don't get the Wireless bonus crap, but then again you can put more stuff in.

Posted by: Epicedion Oct 8 2013, 03:05 AM

Of course there's a hacker around every corner just waiting for you to turn on your wireless.

--

The danger to your gear is vastly overstated on this forum. Deckers just aren't an omnipresent threat.

1) Security forces don't exist solely to deal with runners. Standard thieves, gangs, citizen mobs, and disgruntled former employees are far more common than shadowrunners. Most of these people aren't elite black-ops hackers. Running with your gear in throwback mode 100% of the time to counter a threat that only exists 5% of the time is like running your car with the airbag shut off all the time because you heard that in a tiny percentage of accidents the airbag can be more dangerous than the wreck itself.

2) Breaking someone's stuff isn't the same thing as eliminating them as a threat. Deckers risk a lot of exposure in open territory in order to attack someone's gear -- they don't get to sit comfortably in a friendly host and hide behind walls of IC. If they go out and run AR or cold-sim, they're alone and at a disadvantage. If they run hot-sim, they might get fried. And the best they can accomplish for this risk is shutting off someone's gear. Security deckers are too valuable for host-protection to be risking death in Matrix slapfights over someone's wired reflexes.

3) If a decker is attacking a group protected by another decker, his first concern will be the other decker.

4) Embedded combat deckers should be rare as hell -- maybe in an elite unit, or hanging out with an HTR team's rigger in the t-bird/van. Apart from runners, these should be the only guys running Sleaze 8 to hide their unit, blitzing riggers and enemy deckers in the open Matrix, and trashing gear. Everyone else should be comfortable that their ass is sufficiently covered day-to-day, and that the chance of running into anyone who'd threaten that is very, very low.

Posted by: Udoshi Oct 8 2013, 03:08 AM

Your arguement falls entirely in the face of Crash 1.0, where EVERYONE IN THE WORLD lost something, someone, time, effort, money, data, with wide-spread real world economic and emotional damage beyond the purely digital frontiers.

And then Crash 2.0 made it all HAPPEN AGAIN.


Literally everyone in the world is painfully aware of the danger the matrix poses, and the risks posed when you put something online - especially when its the only copy of something.
Everyone.

You're not asking for us to hit the believe button, you're asking to brainwash the world.

Posted by: Smash Oct 8 2013, 03:27 AM

Not at all. People have short memories. Crash 2.0 was over 10 years ago. Think of 10 years in terms of IT. I think of where phones were 10 years ago and laugh at how primative they actually were.

Reality is that people just aren't as cautious as we give them credit for. The GFC was only 6 years ago and already financial institutions are starting to head down the same paths and are making the same mistakes.

What you're suggesting is that because of matrix crashes people logically stopped using the matrix. The cannon suggests that they use it more than ever. Besides that the matrix crash has some massive overall economic implications. It didn't educate people about how vulnerable their toasters are to Deckers. That's chalk and cheese.

Not only that. We're talking about how people act in a fictional universe. I don't think it's a big stretch that in a universe where I can 'con' a security schlub to let me into a secured facility because I'm wearing overalls and carrying a mop (obviously there are a few other peripherals involved) that they're not up with the latest in hacking technology and techniques.

Posted by: Smash Oct 8 2013, 03:35 AM

'I don't think' doesn't really have any gravitas in reference to fantasy roleplaying games. People can 'I don't think themselves into corners for everything. 'I don't think' dragons should physically be able to fly given the way things get 8 times heavier every time they double in length, but regardless of whether I think that or not, if I play Dungeons and Dragons the dragons can fly! Flight which is not provided by magic.




Thanks for pointing that out, but it also makes my point. It doesn't matter how it works, it just does.

Posted by: DeathStrobe Oct 8 2013, 03:36 AM

Which happens all the time. GOD just rolled out new protocols for the Matrix, probably with the tagline of "Crash 3.0 is now impossible." Which to be fair, there might be some implications that might be close to the case, with OS and the ban hammer, and such.

People have a very short memory, or just don't care enough. Take for example the real world NSA spying on American citizens. If this was a movie, and Snowden came out saying that "soylent green is people" there would be a revolution and the old government would be overthrown. But in reality, that's not the case. For some unknown reason, people don't care. They've become numb to it, its just a part of life. I'm sure people just expected Crash 2.0 is just par for the course when it comes to playing the Sixth World Championship. The only thing you can do is buy a gun, hunker down in your archaeology and hope that your corp security is enough to kill those nasty AI, Technomancers, dragons, or whatever the next monster of the week is.

Posted by: kzt Oct 8 2013, 04:57 AM

Over 10 years ago a group of fanatics killed 2,977 people one morning in NYC, Pennsylvania and Virgina. Far less then was killed by a group of fanatics in Crash 2.0. So of course everyone has forgotten about it. There is no huge goverment department of Homeland Security. The NSA isn't tapping every phone call in the entire country. It's easy to get on airplanes as nobody insists you step into a full body scanner to check you for weapons and your family and friends can accompany you to the gate. Right?

Posted by: Epicedion Oct 8 2013, 05:19 AM

It's hard to see what point you're making. People still get on airplanes and go into tall buildings, and relatively few people take extreme measures to avoid these things. Whether or not security/safety is objectively better, people by and large don't believe there's a serious enough risk to majorly alter their lifestyles anymore. And they grouse about the inconvenience of the security measures put in place.

So have people forgotten? Maybe not, but we're long past the point that the public has by and large moved on and stopped reciting it as one of the great fears of everyday life.

Posted by: Smash Oct 8 2013, 05:42 AM

Wow really.

Since then over 100,000 people have been killed by guns in America vs the 3,500 or so killed by acts of terror since time began. Yet gun control is not on the table and never will be. Crazy people can still buy guns without being oppressed by background checks or magazine restrictions.

Your one example of fanatical nationalism does not prove the rule, and I would argue that all those oppressive measures that you describe are not driven by the general population being informed but simply by the effective politics of fear.

Posted by: Fiddler Oct 8 2013, 06:50 AM

In the world of IT people go for what is most convenient. Many people use the same password on everything, they turn off security featurs for convenience, heck people even turn off security because that security has a flaw even though with that flaw it's still more secure than the other security options. I don't see that changing in the world of shadowrun even runners will run with wireless on mostly, the attitude of it can't happen to me should be there. also the fact being wirelessly offline should be strange and confusing in the world (that guy is running wireless off he must be up to something) wireless is a fact of life and everyone does it. The best way to not be noticed is to be like everyone else.

Posted by: kzt Oct 8 2013, 07:40 AM

Dude, 31,000 people a year in the US die due to chronic liver disease and cirrhosis, ie they mostly drank themselves to death. Do you see a big renaissance for the Woman's Christian Temperance Union soon?

One time spectacular events that grab attention have huge abilities to get people (voters, shareholders) to insist that the people in charge DO SOMETHING about them and as a result governments (and pseudo-governments) start to take aggressive steps to ensure that they don't happen again and also that people know they are dealing with them.

Events that kill millions and impoverish tens of millions have a really huge impact.

Which is why the idea that nobody cares of about crash 1.0 or crash 2.0 is absurd. It's like claiming that nobody remembers what Auschwitz or Treblinka was because that was over 10 years ago.

Posted by: Dolanar Oct 8 2013, 09:20 AM

Kzt is correct, huge events are remembered, many people in their 50's will recall the exact thing they were doing when they heard the news of Kennedy, most people in our Age remember what they were doing when the Towers fell, & just as much people who were around for both Crash 1.0 or 2.0 will remember, however, remembering is not the important factor IMO. In Fact, the Crash's are probably a part of basic schooling when kids learn about the Matrix.

I'm still of the opinion that discussing the impact of the population as a whole is unimportant. We are more concerned with how the new aspects of the Matrix impact the Runner's who deal with a small er portion of the world.

Posted by: mister__joshua Oct 8 2013, 10:06 AM

This discussion has taken a strange turn. I don't see how it's even related to the Crash 2.0. The Crash, like any big national/international crisis, happened at the highest level. It's not like it only affected those who were wireless enabled or heavy matrix users. It affected everyone.

No-one is arguing that people don't remember big events, but they don't let it change their lives. Using the 9/11 example as that seems to be the going thing, if they built the WTC again tomorrow on exactly the same spot, same height, the plots and offices would sell out in a flash. No-one worries that 'it might happen again'.

To use a better example - If I'd been in a horrific car accident and suffered permanent injuries, in all likelihood I'm not going to drive again or be too enamored by the idea of jumping into a car. But I've SEEN loads of accidents, flowers tied to lampposts, police screens and car wrecks that no-one is walking away from. Does it stop me driving? Of course not. Driving is a much better analogy for the Matrix because that's how ubiquitous it is nowadays, let alone in 2075.

Posted by: DireRadiant Oct 8 2013, 04:26 PM

In the same vein, bullets are 2 nuyen each, everyone has em, and guns. Are you being shot all the time?

There's the potential threat, and then the actual event.

Posted by: Sendaz Oct 8 2013, 04:50 PM

Depends on where you are.

Do you wear armor on your run going in, or wait til the shooting starts and then take the time to don it?

If you wear it going in you recognize the potential threat and try to mitigate it's potential effect accordingly.

If you wait for the shooting to start your either crazy or have hellacious agility or a mage relying on an Armor spell.

Course there is such a thing as going overboard, knew one Sammy who showered in his armor (don't ask).

Likewise the Runner Companion had a section about doing your run and specifically talked about scrubbing RFID tags off all your gear, nothing like getting busted by your underwear. But when your gear is running wireless that is even more potential ways to be detected and giving away your position.

When your running with wireless enabled, its not unlike being dual natured. You reflect on two different realms and on the electronic side Deckers and TMs are the virtual sharks you have to be aware of, because they can certainly be aware of YOU.

Are they everywhere? Nope, but they do tend to be in places we want to break into as there is where the good stuff is.

So you run silent when possible, slip in and out of the electronic realm when necessary and don't tarry less a passing Virtual Shark takes a chunk outta your gear or better yet bring your own to bite back.

Posted by: Remnar Oct 8 2013, 07:22 PM

There's also the point that (from my understanding) the Corps and GOD have told the people that the Matrix is safe now and don't worry, just use it (appropriately).

Now, of course Shadowrunners and such know better, but the vast majority of Corp owned (er, I mean "employed") citizens are going to take that at face value and get on with their lives. Masses of people like to pretend the bad stuff doesn't exist if it doesn't directly affect them (today, short memories) from what I've seen NOW, let alone in Shadowrun where the Corp that is telling you the Matrix is safe provides your job, house, food, water, entertainment, friends, family, and peace of mind. Why would they lie? The corp is family, they are all, believe.

Posted by: kzt Oct 8 2013, 07:34 PM

Most people don't carry guns all the time. However it turns out that most of the people that runners deal with in any sort of business relationship (friends, foes, etc) are part of that small percentage that do. Likewise, most of the people that runners get involved with in any sort of business relationship also don't do stupid crap with their electronics that makes them vulnerable.

Posted by: Tanegar Oct 8 2013, 08:19 PM

Realism is not the issue. The issue is that the setting be self-consistent; i.e., that it make sense according to its own rules. Wireless bonuses and the ability to brick hardware, as written, break self-consistency. The actions that people in the Sixth World are depicted taking do not make sense in the context of the setting.

Posted by: binarywraith Oct 8 2013, 09:52 PM

Exactly.

Posted by: Teulisch Oct 8 2013, 10:10 PM

whatever the issue, we wont really KNOW until we see the matrix book. the worst problems will hopefully be addressed then. probably with a new piece of gear to buy or a new program to run. the matrix rules (and thus bricking cyberware) are incomplete as yet.

Posted by: Tanegar Oct 8 2013, 10:18 PM

True though that may be, it's terrible game design. Expansion books should (duh) expand on the game; they should not be the primary avenue for fixing broken rules.

Posted by: Smash Oct 8 2013, 10:51 PM

I don't really want to get into a gun control debate but I would consider say Sandy Hook as a pretty horrific memorable event. Boston Bombings? People just dealt with it and got on with their lives.

To your Auschwitz example. Do you seriously think that time hasn't dulled the impact of these events? There are plenty of people out there who argue that it never even happened or was exaggerated (let me clarify that I am not one of them). People still hate Jews for the exact same reasons that they were persecuted during WW2. In my own life I had to deal with someone who wouldn't accept payment to a bank deposit because of the (in his words) 'Zionist Banking system'.

Either way, Matrix crashes have almost nothing to do with device hacking vulnerability. The fact is that your trauma patch is wireless which implies that people are ok with wireless functionality.

More to the point, I don't actually care if you as a runner choose to be over-paranoid and never turn your wireless on. That's up to you. What people should realise though is that most NPCs aren't going to share your paranoia. Your Decker is standing around just waiting to protect your gear. Why not use him?

Posted by: Smash Oct 8 2013, 11:05 PM

Is that really the issue for you though? Let's look outside how wireless works for the moment. The intent is that Deckers are an archetype that can attack you through your devices and cyberware. Whether it be wireless, magic or whatever. Are you going to be ok with a system where your favourite archetype is vulnerable to this kind of manipulation?

It's clear from the writers point of view that they don't want a system like 4th ed where you can easily and simply remove yourself from being hacked. If you're approaching the issue from the point of view that as a Samurai I just want to be able to remove myself from this avenue of attack then arguments of realism are disingenuous.

So if we can approach this issue from the point of view that devices are going to be vulnerable to hacking then what needs to be done to make the pay-off worth it? Do the bonuses simply need to be better?

Posted by: Dolanar Oct 9 2013, 12:05 AM

I am not a fan of relying on someone else for my own basic security as a preset feature. I want to be able to decide "Ok, so & so can defend me in X way better than I can, so its the better option" Honestly, allow me to use some basic programs to defend myself & I will be more appeased about all of this new stuff, because then I can decide if I want to take my chances with my suped up commlink or just leave it to the Decker.

Posted by: RHat Oct 9 2013, 01:06 AM

Isn't that pretty much exactly what a Rating 7 Commlink does for you? Hell, it'll even damage the opposition for you (Failed attack actions result in damage coming back to the decker with no resistance roll - if you win by 4 hits, he eats 4 Matrix Damage). And given that the Mental Attribute used to opposed is Intuition, which a Sam already wants to have high, it's pretty easy for a Street Sam to end up with 12-13 dice to defend with.

It would be nice if there was a good "bridge" available, though - though at the very least you'd still need to pick up Cybercombat. That, and commprograms for the non-Matrix specialist would be a good thing.

Posted by: Erik Baird Oct 9 2013, 01:48 AM

Nope. I'm playing Shadowrun, not Ghost in the Shell. If said decker wants to attack something that has a legitimate reason to be connected to the Matrix or have a radio connection, then so be it. Cyberware that lets the brain talk to the leg muscles faster, interpret targeting data, or access skillsofts doesn't have such a reason. Stuff that can receive GPS signals, integrate remotely with a vehicle, or is an actual headware radio or cell phone does. So would a medkit that accesses a remote database.


So... Gameplay! The writers have (allegedly) decided that they don't want other characters to be immune to certain attacks, so everything is vulnerable by fiat, irrespective of in-game logic and consistency. I wonder how they'll make mages vulnerable to decking?


I disagree with your premise.

Posted by: binarywraith Oct 9 2013, 02:03 AM

Then they shouldn't have been published.

Posted by: RHat Oct 9 2013, 03:15 AM

It certainly doesn't look like you disagree with the premise that if gear is meant to be hackable it should get sufficient benefit from being online (as that would, per definition, constitute a legitimate reason to be connected to the Matrix). That's the only premise in the quote.

Posted by: Erik Baird Oct 9 2013, 03:46 AM

What I disagree with is the idea that stuff should connect to the Matrix just because. I think any external connections should be linked to the inherent function of the device, not as a gimmick, and there should not be special bonuses as a trade off. Either something needs to connect with other devices remotely to function, or it doesn't.

Posted by: RHat Oct 9 2013, 03:49 AM

Which is nowhere in what he said. To paraphrase, the question is "if things are going to be connected to the Matrix, what would be sufficient reason so that it's not 'just because'?".

Posted by: Erik Baird Oct 9 2013, 04:18 AM

His statement was:

There is an implicit statement in there that says that everything that has electronics will be accessible remotely. It is my opinion that this is a false premise because most devices, especially cyberware, have no reason to be accessible remotely. There should not be any bonus for connecting nor penalty for not connecting; either a device needs a connection or it does not.



Or to put it another way, assuming everything must use Matrix/wireless connections to function properly is kinda (if you squint really hard) like asking your buddy if he's stopped beating his wife (which assumes that he ever did).

Posted by: Rystefn Oct 9 2013, 04:20 AM

So you're saying that nothing should come in grades of effectiveness? Because I have about twenty things on my desk that work without being connected to the internet and work better when they are connected to the internet. Either it needs a connection or it does not is overly reductionist at best, and transparrently so if you think about it for ten seconds.

Posted by: Udoshi Oct 9 2013, 04:34 AM

I have to say I agree with this.

9/11 happened in 2001. twelve years ago, and it STILL shapes the political field of today.

Crash 2 was 2064, and its eight years is even shorter.


If anything, GOD going 'oh no the matrix is totally secure now yeah guys, let us watch over allllll your personal data and transactions forever' will be about as effective, and well recieved by the public, as the TSA.

Posted by: Epicedion Oct 9 2013, 04:55 AM

Yet we still get in airplanes and go into tall buildings.

Posted by: Smash Oct 9 2013, 04:59 AM

That we THINK most devices shouldn't need wireless is not the point. The FACT is that they do, it's the intent of the designers, it's not an oversight. So if we're going to approach the subject that we don't think it should work because of LOGIC the conclusion is that the designers (if they act at all) will just come up with some pseudo technology to make the logical arguments go away.

If you want to argue that Deckers shouldn't be able to worry Samurai then we you should approach it from that avenue, whether it be driven by concept or balance. The problem with this is that Decking, and by extension the matrix, is one of the most important aspects of the game and yet in almost all previous editions it was the most glossed over part because either a) it just took to long to hack nodes, b) the rules were too complicated or, c) people just don't want to play the nerd who hides in the van and turns off the security cameras so all the hardcore mofos played by everyone else can have all the fun.

This is why the writers have dreamed up cyberware hacking and ways of combating it. It makes Deckers more fun to play and provides more strategic and tactical depth to the game. This isn't to say that the rules are written are perfect. If the benefit of wireless is easily forgone for security reasons then perhaps the bonuses need to be improved? My solution will just be to run games that allay people's fears. If they can do 80% of runs with little threat from Deckers then the pay-off starts to balance out.

Posted by: kzt Oct 9 2013, 05:25 AM

Well, yes, is is true that that is the intent. What they want is for the hacker to be an integral part of the game, and for the action of this integral part of the game to be able to use their "special hacking stuff" in combat. This concept isn't stupid, however most people on dumpshock seem to basically think their actual approach to achieving this to be stupid. It maybe not be as bad as the Port of Bogota, or the Neo-Nazi Jewbuster adventure, but still pretty bad.

Truthfully it has never really bothered me that the best plan for a hacker in combat was to use a gun and to shoot people in the face, but it clearly does bother some people.

So if you want the hacker to do "hacker stuff" in combat and not be dumb you have to expand what this means from messing with devices after a long series of die rolls (each taking an action) to being more like what a mage does. Likely the best way to make it actually work requires something more like Frank Trollman's brain hacking stuff. At this point the hacker can actually do things directly to opposing people. He's not trying to eject a magazine from their pistol, he's trying to inject concepts into their brain or cause them to fall down in convulsions.

It would also kind of be nice if the game had a functioning framework and rules for computer hacking, but since SR never has one worth a damn I won't blame this too much on the current crop of writers.

Posted by: Epicedion Oct 9 2013, 05:49 AM

This is generally still the best option. Hacking gear is an option, but a secondary (or otherwise non-combat) goal at best. There may be situations where it's better than shooting, but shooting is still likely to be the best possible option.

Posted by: Emil Barr Oct 9 2013, 12:13 PM

If a player is having trouble being a hardcore mofo ( I assume you mean killing people) through decking, they probably have trouble thinking outside of the box in general.

Locking the doors and turning on a rooms Halon or CO2 fire suppression system for instance.

Giving elevator occupants a ride on The Tower of Terror.

Messing with autoturret/drone targetting

[Quote] This is generally still the best option. Hacking gear is an option, but a secondary (or otherwise non-combat) goal at best.[/quite]

Yeah, its probably rarely going to happen. Risk vs Reward just doesnt make it worth it most of the time. Which is why I stopped getting mad about it. Makes me wonder why they introduced the mechanic at all.

In the end, I guess it will at least be used more than a bards countersong. Hooray?

Posted by: Emil Barr Oct 9 2013, 12:13 PM

*oops double post*

Posted by: Sendaz Oct 9 2013, 12:23 PM

There are rumours of the new Wiz-Fi system coming soon.

Posted by: Tymeaus Jalynsfein Oct 9 2013, 01:34 PM

You miss the point, Smash. Even in 5th Edition, one can easily and simply remove themselves from being hacked. That is not the Issue at all. The issue is that the writer who implemented the Wireless Bonuses did not do so from a sense of reality. By his own words, he chose Cool over Realism/world consistency, and the bonuses are just stupid. And then, when those pieces of writing hit the Line Developers Desk, he just rubber stamped them without actually reading them (obviously) because that was what he wanted... His mandate was to make the Hacker more useful in combat, regardless of the fact that the Hacker often had more to do than almost any other archetype out there. Sad fact is... he chose poorly.

Posted by: Tymeaus Jalynsfein Oct 9 2013, 01:38 PM

You might.... I do not. *shrug*
More because it is not a necessity for my life, but there you go.

Posted by: mister__joshua Oct 9 2013, 02:08 PM

I think he meant *we* as a race/culture/species

Posted by: Tymeaus Jalynsfein Oct 9 2013, 02:49 PM

Probably... But People (as a whole) are stupid, while individuals may or may not be. If you can avoid (or heavily minimize) terrible things by taking precautions, why would you not? As a professional Criminal, the Shadowrunner (in SR5) who broadcasts wireless is just asking to eat a bullet, or have his equipment bricked. That is stupidity on an epic scale, but is probably why Shadowrunners life expectancy is less than a year. The stupid ones get killed quickly, and the ones who are not, get killed less quickly. Those who take the most precautions last the longest.

Posted by: mister__joshua Oct 9 2013, 02:56 PM

Why indeed. But I do believe you've, accidentally, summarized this whole thread quite well. At then end of the day it's not really about whether 'runners take precautions like turning off wireless, that's up to them. It's whether other people do. And people are stupid, careless, ignorant and apathetic.

When talking about standard security guards for example, I'd say the majority fall into one or more of those categories, and thus usually run wireless on all the time. The odd guard who's always nagging his colleagues about the dangers of wireless and why they shouldn't do it will one day be proven right, but by then it's too late for his friends.

Posted by: Tymeaus Jalynsfein Oct 9 2013, 03:09 PM

Wasn't accidental...
Point is that the Wireless Issue is not about what everyone ELSE does, they are irrelevant. What matters is what the People at Secure Facilities (and the Shadowrunners who infiltrate them) do. And as such, the Wireless Model advanced by the Current Line Developer is bad... There is absolutely no Risk vs. Reward going on here. It was simply a decision, made by developers, to advance an agenda that had no need of being advanced. And it was done Poorly to boot. There is a world of difference between having wireless communications, and having the stupidity that we have in SR5. And that is the Issue here.

Posted by: Erik Baird Oct 9 2013, 05:23 PM

Grades of effectiveness? Sure. There's a difference between a Yugo and a Cadillac.

Out of curiosity, what devices would those be? The only connected devices I use are a cell phone and a PC, and I wouldn't say that the PC works better just because it has an Internet connection.



FWIW, I thought midichlorians were stupid, too. Personally, I always thought the solution to deckers being weak in combat was an SMG and a few points in the skill or devious tricks like the ones listed above.

Posted by: Remnar Oct 9 2013, 05:35 PM

This I agree with. Wireless everything makes sense for the "every Joe" who believes GOD when they tell him/her that they can just leave their wireless on all their stuff and GOD will protect.

It does not make sense for any profession/lifestyle that deals regularily with high security or technologically advanced criminals... .i.e. everything that Shadowrun PCs are about.

Posted by: Remnar Oct 9 2013, 05:38 PM

In 3rd ed. that's pretty much what all my deckers did. Didn't take all that much extra nuyen to toss Wired 1 and Muscle Replacement 2 and grab a skill of 4 or 5 in SMGs. I never had problems cracking systems or popping security myself. 4th seemed to have made it easier even still to get good combat skills mixed with decking skills.

5th its a little trickier to get the correct priorities to make it work, so far, however.

Posted by: RHat Oct 9 2013, 05:43 PM

Yeah, you can't actually disagree with that because it isn't a premise. A statement like that defines the space for the argument, and in this case, that space is an environment where that thing is true. Any ideas that you have on what the actual truth value is or should be are not relevant. The question is, in the environment where that is true, what does it take for that to make sense? You've implied a partial answer already - a sufficient reason for being accessible remotely would have to exist for each piece of gear. That then leads to the question "What is a sufficient reason?", hence the question of whether the bonuses need to be better.



Really? A lot of the software I use loses a lot of functionality without internet access, and attempting to program without an internet connection would be a horribly frustrating task (not being able to access non-local documentation would suuuuuuck). For most tasks, the ability to jump over to Google and look something up is a very useful thing.

Posted by: Remnar Oct 9 2013, 05:46 PM

Heh, I remember those days. It did suck.

Posted by: RHat Oct 9 2013, 05:50 PM

... I will admit that I have some books sitting on the shelf for that dark and terrible day when I have no choice. Which I am absolutely certain will not cover all the libraries I'll need.

Posted by: Remnar Oct 9 2013, 06:03 PM

Mine all vanished long ago. Then again I haven't had or tried to write code in .. well, it looks like at least ten years now. Crap, where'd that time go?

Posted by: Tymeaus Jalynsfein Oct 9 2013, 06:08 PM

I have not one piece of software that requires me to be online. I do visit some online sites, to be sure (Dumpshock being one of them), but nothing requires me to do so.

And there is absolutley no need to go online to program, either (though it might indeed be a handy tool). If you need to access that [programming] information on any sort of consistent basis, why is it not Local (or in a printed format of some sort)? I would agree that being able to perform a data search on a whim is handy, but hardly a requirement or a necessity. I get along just fine with no online access other than a PC (yes, that means I do not have any type of phone that is cellular/wireless, nor any other device that would require such connections - no nook, no kindle, not even a laptop that is wireless). People can survive, work, and even play without having to have wireless communications shoved into their faces 24/7/365.

Posted by: kzt Oct 9 2013, 06:46 PM

Halon (or the various "clean agent" replacements) are not seriously harmful to people in the space. A CO2 total flooding system can be horribly lethal, particularly if the pre-discharge alarms don't go off. For example, the CO2 discharge also fills the room with opaque clouds due to condensation, which makes it hard to find your way out and the C02 concentration rapids reaches lethal levels. After the Idaho National Lab accident it's generally arranged so that CO2 gas discharge drive sirens so there is always some sort of alarm. But it doesn't have to be that way.

Posted by: Emil Barr Oct 9 2013, 07:12 PM

Halon gas itself isnt particularly harmful to people, but it displaces oxygen. The occupants would die of suffocation.

Posted by: Nath Oct 9 2013, 07:14 PM

I see an interesting contradiction here. I mean, how come the Matrix was "one of the most important aspects of the game" if it was "glossed over"?

SR authors maybe wanted the Matrix to be one the most important aspects of the game, because it was a staple of the cyberpunk genre they wanted for the game. But they failed to make it so. Sure, they made it an important aspect of the setting. They made it an important aspect of some adventures' narrative structure. But the map is not the territory and the book is not the game. Because of the rules, GM and players avoided making the Matrix a too much important aspect of their game, even when they were fans of the cyberpunk genre as well.

The difference with the 5th edition is that it was first decided what was wanted for the game, then the setting and the genre were altered to match. Having every object connected to the network wasn't the point in itself (even if it fits within our expectations for the future). It was merely a mean to achieve the goal of giving deckers things to do.

Posted by: kzt Oct 9 2013, 08:29 PM

No, it is an effective extinguishing agent at rather low concentrations. You probably don't want to do an aerobics class in there, but you can breath fine. If you actually have a fire there are some nasty compounds that get created by heat on the gas, but fires themselves do lots of those too.

CO2 both displaces air and is a poison at the kind of concentrations used for a total flooding system.

Posted by: kzt Oct 9 2013, 08:33 PM

It's really damn hard to write decent computer rules. We've seen people try it in multiple version of SR and multiple other games and they pretty much all suck. Part of it is that the rules we see tend to be written by worshipers of Mr Mechanical Typewriter, but part of it is that it's just hard.

Posted by: Emil Barr Oct 9 2013, 09:00 PM

As it would be the Deckers goal to either kill or incapacitate the occupants, I imagine they would continue flooding the room until the necessary concentration is achieved., assuming the necessary amount of gas is available.

Posted by: Smash Oct 9 2013, 09:30 PM

It's glossed over by the players, not the writers. Almost all Shadowruns realistically require a Decker but for the most part I'd say the majority of groups tend to just handwave the mechanics so no-one has to play one. That may not be true for say your or my table (although I've witnessed it at plenty of others), but it's pretty clear that that's a sentiment shared by a large proportion of players.



4th Ed certainly had every toaster and shower-curtain being wireless, so that isn't a change specific to 5th Ed.

Posted by: Smash Oct 9 2013, 09:33 PM

Tymeaus, I'm not sure that you can classify the behaviour of the masses based on the fact that you personally have not embraced the 21st century. Yes, the Shadowrun universe will include paranoid people but the exceptions don't prove the rule.

There are probably plenty of behaviours you do that are not safety/security best practice. Yes, you are not online all the time, this makes you more secure, but do you:

Lock all your windows and doors at night or when you leave the house
Lock away your valuables in a safe if you go away for a few days
Use bank or credit cards at exposed ATMs
Use Any forms of social media
Use gmail/hotmail/yahoo mail
Shred all correspondence that include your name and address
Only put your garbage out the morning of collection
Heed all travel warnings before travelling overseas
Look up social no-nos before going overseas
Use life jackets everytime you look at the water
Have grippy things in your shower to stop slippage
get on a plane is it anything besides QANTAS?
wear a seatbelt and helmet in the car
Ride a motorcycle (helmet or not)

and that list is hardly exhaustive, but depending on how you answer each one of those you maybe taking risk that can be easily mitigated. The fact is that you either subconsciously do a risk assessment and decide that the risk is worth taking or you are simply unaware of said risk.

Shadowrun should be exactly the same. At different times you should want to do all of:

1) Have your wireless on for the bonuses
2) Have it on with Matrix overwatch
3) Have it off for the security purposes.

Campain wise option 3 should only really be necessary with prior knowledge of an elite Decker, Technomancer or AI. Otherwise you should be relatively safe using options 1 or 2.

The opposition are in exactly the same boat. The don't come accross shadowrunners every day. More often then not they are suppressing riots, kicking disgruntled employees off their premises, prevent petty theft/vandalism by go-gangers, etc. They benefit in all these scenarios from having their wireless on.

Posted by: Sendaz Oct 9 2013, 09:34 PM

Toaster

Wireless bonus: +3 to all CHA tests with NetCat


Shower Curtain

Wireless Bonus: Can change opacity at most inconvenient time, especially for NetCat.

Posted by: Tymeaus Jalynsfein Oct 9 2013, 09:54 PM

Except that I am not alone... I know a LOT of people who feel the same way. I also know a lot of people who would be effectively crippled without their everpresent WiFi too... *shrug*

You are right that the 2070's are/will be different, but in the Small Demographic that makes up the shadowrunner community, embracing the wireless idiocy (especially with regards to Cyberware) will get you killed... Who cares what the rest of humanity does, it is that small demographic that we are playing. And if the professionals in that demographic have no cares about Cyberware being online, well, then they are stupid. No other way to really say that...

Posted by: Tymeaus Jalynsfein Oct 9 2013, 09:54 PM

"I'd buy that for a dollar... "

Posted by: Smash Oct 9 2013, 10:29 PM

Have you seen how much decks cost now?

Posted by: Epicedion Oct 9 2013, 10:38 PM

.. less than they cost in SR3? Especially considering programs.

Posted by: Nath Oct 9 2013, 11:03 PM

The difference I was pointing at is the way it was designed.

I am under the impression that in the 4th edition, the fundamental idea was that we were having a growing number of wireless devices in Real Life, so they put wireless device all over the Matrix, and then wrote rules that accounted for them, which you were supposed to use. Basically, it was setting -> rules -> game. And the rules were really just accounting for the existence of wireless devices, through the Electronic Warfare skill and a handful of program and Matrix actions. The 3rd edition actually already had wireless devices, but it simply changed your I/O speed and it did not allow for proximity hacking. It's not wireless devices that made SR4 Matrix different, it's meshed networks and proximity access (though you might argue that mesh performance is sub-par without large numbers of wireless devices).

In the 5th edition, the fundamental idea was that hackers/deckers needed things to hack, then rules were written in a way that make sure or at least strongly enticed to have things to be online and hackable, and the setting will possibly be adjusted to account for it. So hackers will be a rarer breed and the common people will feel safe on the Matrix (*). So it goes the other way, game -> rules -> setting.

( * BTW, the 2064 is far from being the most recent issue people might have with the Matrix ; even if some dislike it, canon has it that the focus for the entire year 2070 was the technomancer and AI threat -with 500 deaths in a single night in Hong Kong, and a two-months long hostage situation in space with the threat of a global biological attack triggered by an AI- and in the following years technomancers sent Geneva back to the 20th Century and sparked riots in Las Vegas).

Posted by: Remnar Oct 9 2013, 11:59 PM

Exactly why I said "trickier". In 2nd or 3rd edtion, using priorities I was absolutely gonna grab the million since my tricked out deck/progs were gonna cost more than the priority B (my memory is foggy but I feel like I'd usually spend at least 600,000 of my 1,000,000 on Decking stuff). So that was settled, but I usually had enough left for enough ware to go combat and still have decent enough skills.

In 5th priority A for nuyen isn't so much of a no-brainer. You can make a pretty decent decker with B or even C and still have some left over for ware, but for what I'd want on a quasi combat Decker (around 90,000 give or take) I need to decide which, A or B will fit for skills.

Posted by: RHat Oct 10 2013, 02:27 AM

I take it, then, that you're not aware of how completely impractical that is? Am I supposed to have every single library for the language I'm working in and all of their dependencies installed, every last piece of documentation, every last piece of information on every last error, and so on locally? Even if I try to do that, the information I'll have on hand WILL be incomplete, and given my luck it will usually be missing the exact thing that I need.

Remember, TJ, the question isn't whether or not stuff can work at all without access. It's whether things can work better with access, and in this case there is absolutely no possible room to argue the point that it does.



You are not currently alone. In 2075 you would be alone. People would have to decide whether or not the benefit is sufficient to the risk, and part of that decision would be the vanishingly low incidence rate, even for runners. At that point, "reasonable precautions" does not usually mean "shut it all down", it means "defend and hide it as best as you can, just in case" - because part of determining what precaution is reasonable is considering what that precaution costs you. There might be times where you choose to go dark, as well, and depending on the reasons that might be for an entire run or it might just be until you go loud. You can have more than one footing on this - just like choosing not to use a silencer once doesn't mean you never use one in your entire career from then on.



Yes - 73% of your possible resources at Priority A or B. Leaves you with a pretty good chunk of cash. You CAN use that to build a decent pseudo-sam - but you shouldn't have to any more than the mage or rigger should have to.

Posted by: Tanegar Oct 10 2013, 02:50 AM

Why not? If the mage wants to be useful in combat, he learns Combat spells, or any number of handy buffs. If the rigger wants to be useful in combat, he buys a combat drone. If the face wants to be useful in combat, he buys a gun and learns to use it. Why does the decker need to be able to hack in the middle of a firefight? What, precisely, is wrong with telling a decker who wants to fight to pick up a gun?

Posted by: Smash Oct 10 2013, 03:16 AM

Huh? You're not telling the mage or the Rigger to pick up a gun. You're telling them to use their archetype specific skillsets in combat. Deckers now have one of these too. A Mage using powerbolt is the equivalent of a decker attacking your cyberware.

Posted by: Tanegar Oct 10 2013, 03:28 AM

It really isn't. It goes back to self-consistency: mages casting Powerbolt and riggers using combat drones make sense within the established rules of the setting. A decker suddenly being able to brick your leg doesn't.

Posted by: Epicedion Oct 10 2013, 03:52 AM

Except it does, as was less than clearly introduced in SR4. It was just really hard,had a terrible mechanic, and was laughably easy to prevent.

Posted by: kzt Oct 10 2013, 04:17 AM

It still is all that.

Posted by: Dolanar Oct 10 2013, 04:48 AM

I think the problem is that Mages were the Gods in 4a, & so to even the balance, the design team asked how they could make Deckers more like mages, & this is what we get.

Posted by: kzt Oct 10 2013, 05:18 AM

Frank's Brainhacking does it better if you want that.

Posted by: RHat Oct 10 2013, 05:34 AM

The mage gets mage stuff, the rigger gets rigger stuff, the face actually does have face stuff (Leadership is actually pretty awesome), so why shouldn't the decker get decker stuff?

Posted by: Erik Baird Oct 10 2013, 06:02 AM

Because like the face stuff, the decker stuff isn't generally directly combat effective.

(And why on Earth would someone link their cyberleg to the Matrix? I'm not seeing a purpose there.)

Posted by: RHat Oct 10 2013, 06:14 AM

Then combat effective stuff must be added, same as the addition of concrete and directly combat effective function to Leadership. That said, the greater minimum investment does mean that the decker stuff needs to be more substantial.

Posted by: Emil Barr Oct 10 2013, 09:32 AM

Except the Decker *still* has to pick up a gun and shoot things. Cant hack a Hellhound and most people dont have cyber. When a Decker tries it, most of the time itll probably make them *less* useful in combat.

Even mages have should have a shooting skill, to slow their magical drain.

Posted by: Chinane Oct 10 2013, 11:18 AM

Combat effective stuff ONLY must (or actually should) be added, if there is a reasonable explanation WHY that wireless access is giving a bonus. Reasonable as in not achievable by any other means than matrix access.

Game->rules->setting might be ONE step in the EARLY design process, but then the setting absolutely needs to be checked for consistencies, modified where necessary and for the final product, setting->rules->game must apply.

Basically what happened is: they took that early game design concept, completely omitted the quality control part and finalized their product. (Same with limits, btw.)
In effect, SR5 as a product is actually in a pre-alpha state, but was published as final version.

Posted by: Tanegar Oct 10 2013, 06:18 PM

Why? Why does absolutely every archetype need to be able to contribute directly and concretely to combat? The whole point of being a face is to resolve conflicts without fighting. The whole point of being a decker is to subvert the infrastructure to avoid combat. You're falling into a trap that I fell into myself, not that long ago. Yes, Shadowrun involves combat, but that does not mean that every character has to be about combat.

Posted by: Epicedion Oct 10 2013, 07:00 PM

So.. no hacking nearby turrets, because that would be contributing directly and concretely to combat? No attacking drones, because that would be contributing directly and concretely to combat?

Be honest. You're really only complaining about one option here: the brute force attack on individual pieces of gear.

--

Put another way:

Street Samurai: "I use my axe to intimidate the guard!"
GM: "I'm sorry, but axes and street samurai are for combat. You're not allowed to contribute directly and concretely to social situations."

Posted by: Tanegar Oct 10 2013, 07:59 PM

I admit, I hadn't thought of that. On the other hand, you've also successfully invalidated RHat's argument by demonstrating that even without the (stupid, setting-breaking, badly written) ability to brick gear, deckers still have plenty of "decking stuff" to use in combat.

Posted by: Smash Oct 10 2013, 10:01 PM

What you're advocating is that specific archetypes should suck at combat unless they approach combat in a way that's to your liking which is then ok? Why is it that as a Decker I should have to approach combat effectively in the same way as a Samurai? If the end result is they spend actions to neutralise the enemy then why does it have to be down the barrel of a gun?

If I'm in a combat situation where there's a cyber-troll with a grenade launcher and I can either shoot at him, turn some environmental system on him (which is totally at the whim of your GM putting these things in place) or I can brick the launcher, turn off his cyber-eyes, etc, what's the harm in having those extra options? It's hardly an instant success. I need to get past his comlink defences which can be quite good for minimal investment.

Then as has been pointed out, they still can't really affect critters or Mages (although bricking their optical magnification might be useful?), so the Combat goons in the group are hardly redundant.

The result of this opposition to Deckers getting these extra abilities is essentially pushing to put them back in the box to never be used. This might be fine at your tables but I'm personally sick of Deckers being the clerics of shadowrun (i.e. Completely necessary, but not that fun to play).

Posted by: RHat Oct 10 2013, 10:07 PM

Actually, no. If no sufficient explanation presently exists for the bonus, the explanation and/or the bonus needs to change until that sufficiency exists. Setting is no excuse for bad design, and it does not have primacy over having good mechanics. Fortunately, changes can happen within a setting - in this case, massive changes occurred with the Matrix that alter a lot of security considerations.

And if you think this is pre-alpha, you don't know what pre-alpha looks like.



I've explained before, at length, why environmentals aren't sufficient. The short version is that that works only while those things are there, and in a wide variety of cases they wouldn't be - and certainly hacking a turret is a superior option than going after someone's 'ware, when the option is available. Environmentals modifying your options is a good ting to have, but if you need those to have options than that is not sufficient.

Posted by: Tymeaus Jalynsfein Oct 10 2013, 11:15 PM

Which has been the contention from the start. There was never a lack of things for the Hacker to do. Adding in the ability to "brick" hardware and cyberware was just ludicrous.

Posted by: Emil Barr Oct 10 2013, 11:15 PM

Im still not getting it. Its a choice, but... its almost a non-choice.

Its going to take 2 or 3 turns to hack and brick just about any piece of equipment. By that point, the Decker has no doubt already been shot, stabbed, blown up, shoved in a locker, given a wedgie, whatever.

And if they do manage to brick something, its not anything important. Anything worth bricking (eyes, limbs) have no reason to have their wireless on because they have no bonus.

And lets not forget, they can just turn their wireless off and on as a free action, setting the Decker back to square one.

So yeah, you have the choice, but... why would you? Still just seems better to shoot enemies.

Posted by: Tanegar Oct 10 2013, 11:26 PM

Do try not to put words in my mouth. I'm advocating that everyone should suck at combat unless they approach combat in a way that makes sense. If you go into combat with your grenade launcher and cybereyes broadcasting to everyone within a block's radius, you are an idiot and you deserve to have those things bricked. That is a feature of the setting. Any approach to combat which disregards that feature will and should get you killed.

The wireless bonuses, not merely the specific bonuses listed but the very concept of the bonuses, rests on an assumption that is patently absurd; namely, that teams of engineers with multi-billion-nuyen R&D budgets could not find a way to replicate the "bonus" functionality without exposing the device to Matrix attack. This is what I mean when I say that it breaks the Sixth World's self-consistency: the world has been established as populated by people who are smart and good at their jobs, and this mechanic assumes that the world is populated by people who are stupid and suck at their jobs.

Posted by: RHat Oct 10 2013, 11:35 PM

That is not at all absurd.

Posted by: Tymeaus Jalynsfein Oct 10 2013, 11:35 PM

The problem is with the definitions being used and the ludicrous assumption that someone would even HAVE their cyber on the Matrix.

Go back and read the Author's actual descriptions of what Bricking does (along with the Definition and effects thereof, as well as the examples)... Then try to reconcile that with having the effect happen inside of someone's body (1/2 Million Nuyen cyberware is a valid target after all). And then, when the ignorance of what was actually written was pointed out, the response was "well, we did not really mean that." Which is tripe. It is exactly what they meant, because that is exactly what they describe in the setting. And then, somehow, with all that melted metal and plastic within the body, they say that all it takes is an hour and waving your hands about, and viola, you are repaired (because you do not have to go to a specialist to have your body cracked open to remove all the burned and damaged hardware, along with all the cooked steak/hamburger surrounding it). Which is again tripe. The issue is with a Line Developer who forced something into the system, with absolutely no idea how that would affect the verisimilitude of the world (I don't even think he really cares, honestly). It was done solely to patch a hole ("Hackers have nothing to do in Combat") that never even existed in the first place.

The result of this opposition to Deckers and the addition of the ludicrous Wireless bonuses is that a large group of players are pointing out that that those rules as they stand are idiotic, and that no sane professional [shadowrunner or professional Security/Military] would EVER operate the way, even while the Developers are still insisting that they do. And then, turning off any of the stupid things that were added because they were "Cool" (in the writers own words and with no thought to actual usefulness or technology limitations - since there is still no explanation that you (generic) can give to explain how a direct wire of 3-4 meters or less is less efficient than some trumped up wireless remote mass computing two-way communication is). The verisimilitude of any such explanations falls flat (even though some have tried). And a lot of people are simply disgusted with it.

Simple and easy fix... Go dark (that is what my characters will do in SR5 - no need to ever put Cyber on the grid, or even 99% of one's electronics), or Just play SR4A, where that insanity never got a foothold.

Posted by: Tymeaus Jalynsfein Oct 10 2013, 11:38 PM

It is ENTIRELY absurd...

Posted by: Nath Oct 10 2013, 11:38 PM

As far as the rules go, the street samurai would still need to roll Intimidation+Charisma, which are specifically social skill and attribute, only adding some modifier for the axe (though the Face could get the same modifier with a pocket knife) and possibly for being more physically imposing than other characters. And that merely allows him to contribute to specific social situation in which intimidation can be used.

In this regard, a cyberdeck is equally useful in close-quarter combat as an improvised club, allowing the hacker to deal more damage than he would with his bare hands. This may require the hacker to spend points in Agility and the Clubs skill that are not part of his core abilities, just like the example above may require the street samurai to spend points in Charisma and Intimidation to work.

The relationship between combat archetype and the other archetype fields is asymmetrical. To contribute to social situations, you need Charisma and social skills, or mental manipulation spells. To contribute to astral recon, you need to be a projection-capable awakened character. To contribute to Matrix action, you need a cyberdeck or being a technomancer. To contribute to combat on the other hand, you may use weapons, or combat spells, or spirits, or drones, or cyberdeck, or Leadership (even though how someone could enjoy making the same exact roll every combat turn is beyond my understanding of the game).
The rules are intended to allow all archetypes to contribute to combat. But the other aspect of the game remain more or less exclusive (the price of cyberdecks typically makes the Matrix more exclusive than it previously was).

Now, the issue people may have with wireless hacking of individual equipment is that it's not different in their mind from allowing street samurai to use their wired reflexes for fast-talking, rigger to tail mage in an astral quest with a drone, or hacker to use their cyberdeck as an improved throwing weapon accurate up to 300 meters that return to their hand, in that they view it as something silly that makes no sense.
There really are two different problems here. I mean, maybe allowing riggers to fly drones inside the astral planes (because mana level rise or new technology or whatever) would make the game experience better, entice people to play more riggers, balance things out and allow for quicker resolution. That's a different question from knowing if it makes sense.

Posted by: Tanegar Oct 10 2013, 11:38 PM

Sorry, do you have an actual argument to make? I mean, apart from sticking your fingers in your ears and yelling, "Nuh-uh nuh-uh nuh-uh!" at the top of your lungs?

Posted by: RHat Oct 11 2013, 12:16 AM

Do you? Saying that it is absurd does not make it so. If doing some particular thing depends on something as insanely powerful as the Matrix, it's entirely conceivable that it could not be replicated without it, or at the very least not replicated within the constraints of something that can actually be produced, sold, and used. Throwning R&D money and engineers at a problem doesn't automatically mean it can be solved.

Posted by: Emil Barr Oct 11 2013, 12:38 AM

It takes near limitless computing power to make a collapsable baton extend as a free action?

Posted by: Tanegar Oct 11 2013, 12:44 AM

This. Smash, RHat, are you paying attention? This! THIS! IN GREAT CTHULHU'S UNHOLY NAME, THIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIS!!!
The bonuses given absolutely do not "depend" on the Matrix. This was gone over in detail in several earlier threads; feel free to search the forum for "wireless bonus." 90% of the bonuses could easily be gained by simply getting two pieces of gear to talk directly to each other, or by some other easily feasible workaround. They don't need the Matrix.

Posted by: Smash Oct 11 2013, 01:26 AM

But what if going into combat with your eyes and grenade launcher broadcasting gives you the edge to take out your opponents that bit quicker so they end up shooting at you less? Less bullets vs slight chance of being hacked seems like a no-brainer to me. If the bonuses don't achieve this then we're in agreement, it is a no brainer to have your wireless off, but I'd just like to see it tackled so that the tradeoff is genuine. There's my problem with the way you are tackling this problem right there. You can't logic yourself to a conclusion that wireless is 'dumb' when based on the way the game works you consider nerds occasionally attempting to hack you stuff much more of a threat that grizzled veterans firing fully-automatic machine guns at you.



On this point all I can do is disagree. There's no reason for the game to use today's real world internet constraints to restrict it's fantastical nature of an alternative future with dragons and magic. Can't we just assume that it's like wireless but you know, different?

Posted by: Smash Oct 11 2013, 01:57 AM

Is this really a great example of why wireless is stupid? My baton has wireless so that I can potentially use a simple mental or voice command to extend the baton as opposed to using the ready weapon command?. Makes sense to me. Admittedly the way that is achieved could possible be more complicated than that (do I need a a direct link to the comlink, trodes to make this work?). We could have 15 rules and micro-managed cyber/device interactions to achieve this or we could just suspend disbelief and and say wireless on equals free action.

Posted by: Dolanar Oct 11 2013, 02:00 AM

I attach my gun to the Matrix, I have 18 dice to shoot you, first combat of a long run. IS that 2 extra dice worth possibly losing your primary weapon for the rest of the run. Sure, you can TRY to buy another one in a hurry, or you can find someone who is willing to try to fix your weapon. But really, you could avoid all of that by sacrificing 2 dice.

There are literally only 3-4 pieces I can think of that benefit from being on the Matrix permanently, Optical devices to get the +4 or so dice to perception tests (though you can still log them in specifically for "Observe in detail" uses) & the Reaction boosting Cyberware which give their full benefits only when connected to each other & to the Matrix.

Posted by: binarywraith Oct 11 2013, 02:33 AM

Twenty years ago, in-game, you could already mentally trigger weapon functions. Via a smartlink system, and induction pads.


Which were not hackable.


And were a free action.



The wireless changes fail at a simple glance because they actually force the setting to regress technologically to fit today's idea of what is workable, rather than staying plausible to the setting's established technologies.

Posted by: kzt Oct 11 2013, 03:12 AM

Oh, have you ever heard of this thing called "backups"? It's what is used by competent computer operations personnel so that some sort a accident that results in corrupting of your on-line computer system can be fairly easily repaired. Like say some sort of crazed fanatics who intend to bring down the world? For the second time?

No, it's pretty clear that in Shadowrun governments and mega-corporations only hire morons and fools to run their computer operations. Who then spent the backup tape budget on hookers and blow. Which is what you had this enormous data loss across the entire world.

Posted by: kzt Oct 11 2013, 03:15 AM

Dude, if you are broadcasting I can spot you at the radio line of sight. Radio waves go through walls, floors and doors. So you'll be DEAD before you ever see me. I doubt that increase the chance that you'll win the fight.

Posted by: binarywraith Oct 11 2013, 03:44 AM

Especially since one of the important points on the Shadowrun time line was when they perfected optical chips that were not effected by EMP for storage.

You know, in 2002, of that timeline.

Some 62 years before Winternight's BS.

Don't worry, we're used to the dev team not knowing their own setting.

Posted by: RHat Oct 11 2013, 03:45 AM

I've never suggested that the present bonuses are great implementation. They're not. They don't present as much of a benefit as they should, and they don't provide anything approaching a sufficient explanation. A poor implementation, however, tells you absolutely nothing about the concept behind it.



And if you run silent behind something with a Sleaze attribute, detecting you gets a lot harder (And there really need to be other ways to get harder to spot). Additionally, you can only do that at 100m out, which is a closer range than a lot of firefights might be occurring at.

Posted by: Epicedion Oct 11 2013, 05:40 AM

Tape backups? Don't be absurd. The cost of disk vs tape in the real world has been shifting vastly in favor of disk. In the Shadowrun future, where Megapulses are an aggregate of nonlinear storage, memory, and distributed processing, the whole concept of tape backups has to break down.

You cannot overlay the real world on top of Shadowrun and decide what is reasonable and what is unreasonable, because the technology is vastly different than what we can expect in the future of the real world.

Posted by: kzt Oct 11 2013, 07:08 AM

In your future nobody ever makes mistakes or has hardware fail?
Wow, must make games kind of tough for the players having to deal with perfectly designed defenses run by completely competent people (because HR is perfect too) who are always fully alert and never make mistakes.

Posted by: Sendaz Oct 11 2013, 07:45 AM

Ok tape may have been a bad choice as a storage medium, but there would be some sort of backup of essential systems on either optical storage or hard drives that are then stored in a secure/shielded area for going back to if there was a problem.

Would you have everything? Probably not, like you said there is a huge amount out there, but certainly some form and level of back up for key components continues to be used.

Posted by: Sendaz Oct 11 2013, 07:47 AM

If you are invoking the Big C, it's better in Green

Posted by: RHat Oct 11 2013, 08:30 AM

Wasn't part of the issue catastrophic hardware failure? And for that matter, what happens if the Crash virus lay dormant for a while, and was thus in the backups?

Posted by: Tanegar Oct 11 2013, 01:03 PM

Two points:

1) If you're running silent, you're not connected to the Matrix. That's what "running silent" means: no transmissions.

2) Been in many firefights, have you? 100 meters is just over 109 yards. At that range, what you have isn't a firefight so much as two groups of guys trying to suppress each other. Unless you have a sniper, 100m is beyond the effective engagement range for small arms.

Posted by: Emil Barr Oct 11 2013, 01:07 PM

Pretty sure they meant hidden mode.

Posted by: binarywraith Oct 11 2013, 01:18 PM

The hell are you talking about? 100 meters is barely a third of the qualification ranges used for the M4 carbine. It's well within easy iron sight range, even, because a human sized target at that range is twice the width of the front sight post.

It's out of effective engagement range for most pistols (~50m), maybe, but anything carbine length can reach out to 300m, and that's what the Army trains for.

Hell, 5.56 NATO is still -rising- out to 175 meters out of an M4. Any true battle rifle firing a full rifle cartridge instead of an intermediate one like an AR is going to have a hell of a lot more effective range than that.


Edit : Using Shadowrun's own range tables (SR5) 100m is only Medium range for assault rifles!

Posted by: Chinane Oct 11 2013, 01:36 PM

And yet for most 'normal' shadowruns that will be way out of engagement range.

Posted by: Tanegar Oct 11 2013, 02:37 PM

There's a big difference between shooting targets on a range and shooting at actual people who take cover and shoot back. At a hundred meters, are you actually shooting to hit somebody, or are you shooting to keep their heads down?

Posted by: Tymeaus Jalynsfein Oct 11 2013, 02:57 PM

In the Corps, at that Range, I was shooting to hit people.

Posted by: RHat Oct 11 2013, 05:09 PM

1) As it applies to SR5, that is not what that means - in SR5, a different definition is provided for "running silent". Instead, let's call what you refer to as "running dark".

2) In matters like these, I rely on information I get from people who ARE in a position to know.

Posted by: Dolanar Oct 11 2013, 05:17 PM

I would agree in most cases Runners will be using shorter ranges, but that is more because there is not often a football field between buildings unless you're on the street. But as well, if you have the shot at 100M you take it. Besides, realistically I'm sure most of us are using some form of optics which will make that shot much easier.

Posted by: Erik Baird Oct 11 2013, 05:56 PM

If someone can't hit a human target at 100 meters using iron sights on a rifle, they either aren't trying or need to zero.

Posted by: Remnar Oct 11 2013, 06:04 PM

I've taken running deer, standing unsupported, at 100 yards on several occasions with iron sights. I tend to like to stay inside 70 with irons, but 100 isn't some massive, wonderous shot. Heck even at that if I miss the 8-12 inch "kill zone" on a broadside target I get pretty ornery at myself.

BTW running deer through woods in fall is pretty darned good camoflague as well, probably pretty similar.

'course, now-a-days I gotta wear glasses to do it, stupid eyes.

Posted by: Emil Barr Oct 11 2013, 07:05 PM

I dont need to use sights. I dont even need to use my eyes. I just sense things through the force.

Posted by: Remnar Oct 11 2013, 07:20 PM

I've seen many action heroes apparently with that skill considering their eyes are closed when the shoot...

Posted by: Tymeaus Jalynsfein Oct 11 2013, 07:36 PM

It is a tried and true technique for Action Heroes.

Posted by: Epicedion Oct 11 2013, 08:01 PM

There's something about the setting that precludes applying the standard idea of "backups" and it's pretty well always been that way. What that is exactly, I'm not sure, but I imagine that the risk vs cost ratio is balanced heavily toward "cost." Data loss in Shadowrun is almost totally unheard of outside of a total matrix crash, so backups for the sake of data loss prevention would be all cost vs minimal to no risk (and even in a total matrix crash, data loss is still actually pretty low, otherwise the SIN database would've been trashed even harder than it was those couple times).

Let's ignore the fact that you need to versioned many of your files in real life, and assume that a "file" in Shadowrun contains its own complete version history.

So the only reason to store backups is to protect against corporate shenanigans and runners.

This leads us to the following:

A host (or node, or whatever version we're looking at) is its own digital vault, with its own high (even deadly) security, its own entry points, and so on. A physical backup would require a physical structure with a physical vault with its own physical security.

If random data loss is out of the picture, is it more secure to house things in two locations, or just one location?

In the case of data theft, two locations is the less secure option (the cost of protecting a piece of data has to be paid twice). In the case of data destruction, two locations is the more secure option (if something happens to one, there's another to fall back on).

Honestly, I can't tell which one of these is better. Maybe it should be different based on the sensitivity of the information. Maybe some hosts should have mirror copies (though then you get back into the question of having to maintain double or triple security).

Personally I'm going to run under the assumption that intricate virtual and physical backups are largely impractical for (reasons).



1) "Running silent" essentially means "not automatically handshaking everything within 100m" -- you're still on the matrix, you're just not advertising. You can turn everything off, at which point you're simply offline.

2) Personally, I've never been in a firefight, nor in any military or police force, or had anything other than backyard training. But I've gone out many times to plink targets from 100 yards, and it's not especially difficult to shoot something like a clay pigeon or a soda can at that range if you're using a rifle. Handguns are slightly different, since there's more inherent randomness to the precise path along which rounds travel after exiting the barrel. Shorter barrel, lighter round, slower muzzle velocity -- all adds up to the handgun round ending up somewhere other than the exact aim point each time, exacerbated by distance.

Posted by: KarmaInferno Oct 11 2013, 09:21 PM

Just to clarify, you do realize the Wireless Bonus rules REQUIRE a full on Matrix connection to function, yes? Not merely a wireless link from trodes to device?


-k

Posted by: Epicedion Oct 11 2013, 09:34 PM

Sort of. Connection to the Matrix is part and parcel with having wireless active -- you don't get one without the other. Generally speaking, you can get "tortoise mode" benefits by plugging wires into everything and your skull, which approximates the Skinlink of SR4 in terms of security, but in this edition there's a penalty for operating that far below the radar. SR4 should've had its own non-wireless penalty, by introducing some balancing factor like a limit to the amount of devices you can have working together without wireless enabled.

Where the system needs to be cleaned up is around the edges -- ie, what happens when there's no Matrix around to connect to but nothing preventing your wireless from working. This is of course a really rare situation, since blocking the Matrix is more often than not a crappy way of securing something, since it hinders the day-to-day workers and security forces far more than the rare crack shadowrunner team.

Posted by: KCKitsune Oct 11 2013, 10:00 PM

If you're running more than 3 or 4 external devices on you PAN at the same time, you're really, IMO, running too many.

External Devices on PAN (commlink doesn't count because it is your PAN hub):

1. Primary gun
2. secondary gun (if you're a dual wielding gun slinger)
3. optical enhancement
4. audio enhancement

If I missed something in my list, please let me know.
Also a lot of this can be done away with by going cyber... it is cyberpunk you know.

Posted by: binarywraith Oct 12 2013, 04:56 AM

Or instead SR4 wasn't utterly retarded and understood that a direct wired fiber optic connection is never going to be slower than bouncing a radio signal out to a remote server and back.



Yeah, except the bit where per SR5, even implanted systems don't communicate properly without wireless active.

Because somehow, cyberdocs got brain damaged and forgot how to run neural linkages.

Posted by: Epicedion Oct 12 2013, 06:30 AM

No, SR4 was utterly retarded and understood nothing. It introduced a system of wireless hacking with no give and take. Why even implement wireless hacking at all if you can't actually wirelessly hack anything of importance? It was basically just wired hacking with easier to get to jackpoints. And, I suppose, a harsh counter to already wireless rigging. Of course, it was combined with money-based hacking, where the daisy-chain of agent-run commlinks was vastly superior to the effort any individual could ever bring to bear.



Sorry, but by asking for wireless you must necessarily take some the negative with the positive. You can't on one hand ask for wireless functionality while on the other hand deny the implications of such.

You could answer the new systems with a host of explanations, but the one consistent response y'all seem to be giving is just straight-up bitching. Frankly it's getting fucking tiring.

Posted by: binarywraith Oct 12 2013, 06:36 AM

Preaching to the choir here, but at the same time the above makes sense. Hacking is a threat. Megacorps, who build and design the Matrix infrastructure, have a vested interest in securing it. Perfect security is of course impossible because a perfectly secure system is one no one can log into at all, which isn't useful for doing work. Confining access to those places where valid users will need to access a system, however, allows useful work to be done while still keeping out the vast majority of possible hostiles.

Security 101 here, man.



My heart bleeds for your poor, tired self. My brain, on the other hand, bleeds because I'm trying to work around a set of rules written by devs not concerned with having an internally consistent system.

Good thing I never ashed for wireless, though. It is, frankly, idiotic beyond belief to expect that professional criminals whose main stock in trade is their anonymity would willingly use the gear as presented.

Posted by: Epicedion Oct 12 2013, 07:05 AM

My largest issue with the SR4 Matrix was that no one in their right mind would ever connect anything to the wireless Matrix, with the rules as presented. You could have a Matrix site completely off-grid with no penalty, and require any hackers to be both on-site and physically plugged in. This pretty much ruined the whole concept of wireless anything, making it all confusing window-dressing to a badly-optimized system.

Further, and I can never stress this enough, the connection limits were pants-on-head. A conservative 1000 employees at a site would necessitate over 150 nodes -- and don't get me started on nexuses. Even the most remotely quasi-realistic Matrix security couldn't possibly cover the number of nodes an actual functional site would require to operate.



Generally speaking, the gear rules work, so long as you don't buy into the idea that evil gear-smashing deckers are lurking around every Matrix street corner. Putting yourself out in the Wild West of the unhosted Matrix can be extremely painful or deadly. You can't reasonably expect that hackers are as common as they were in SR4, where the damage they could do was laughably minimal (and at the rough cost of 5 nuyen and a candy bar).

Going out into a street fight Matrix-guns-blazing might get you dumped, burnt, or killed, so you've got to expect anyone worth their salt to be a little reticent to engage in open-Matrix warfare willy-nilly. Security deckers will stick to their relatively safe hosts, and not go busting into the middle of firefights to break things. Matrix combat outside of hosts has to require some sort of major incentive, or at least some sort of guarantee that resistance will be a joke. Risking brain-burning dumpshock just so that a street samurai can't stack wired reflexes and reaction enhancers is pretty pants-on-head itself.

Posted by: DuckEggBlue Omega Oct 12 2013, 07:29 AM

Everytime I see something about how something in the new systems is idiotic and unrealistic because you would never wireless this for security reason that, I go to agree, and then remember wireless credit cards are a real thing people use now and think maybe the idiocy is realistic.

Posted by: binarywraith Oct 12 2013, 09:06 AM

Wireless credit cards are a reality... but RFID readers aren't omnipresent they way they are in SR. Even then, you might note that the more security conscious folks tend to keep chipped cards in shielded cases to avoid wardrivers with an RFID reader.

Posted by: DuckEggBlue Omega Oct 12 2013, 10:25 AM

They don't need to be omnipresent for the one in the crooks pocket he bought off ebay for $50 to steal your creditcard info. And keeping them in a sheilded case, whilst probably sensible, is not conducive to the premise of convieniance that the technology is sold to the average person on, where you just wave your purse/wallet by the scanner (Wave and Go), as you're not saving anytime taking it out and waving it by the scanner as opposed to taking it out and swiping it, so if you do have a shielded case, why do you even have a wireless card in the first place? It is no less ridiculous a situation than the things criticised in the rules, and I don't think anyone could make the case in good faith that most people aren't incredibly uneducated or lax about their electronic/online/wireless security.

That said I'm not now or was I ever trying to justify having rules systems be equally ridiculous. No one wants that, I would think. Like I said 'I go to agree' with those arguments and then remember how stupid reality can be. I was just pointing out a case of truth being stranger (or dumber) than fiction.

Posted by: Dolanar Oct 12 2013, 10:36 AM

no one is suggesting that people in general aren't lax in their online security, we ARE suggesting that the specific group that these rules are written for (the majority of the shadowrunning community) are SUPPOSED to be extremely protective of all forms of security, we pay Decker's to erase our Matrix Footprint on an almost daily basis afterall.

Its like saying a Security Professional would intentionally leave his car door unlocked in a neighborhood known for GTA.

Posted by: Tanegar Oct 12 2013, 11:22 AM

I don't recall anyone asking for wireless; and how, exactly, is the sudden, unexplained inability of previously hardwired gear to now use a hardwired connection implied by the existence of wireless networking?

Posted by: Emil Barr Oct 12 2013, 12:21 PM

How is that any different from the way current things work? Theres no incentive for corps to make their networks wired now either, since most of the day to day functions outside of security have no wireless enhancements that we are aware of.

Posted by: kzt Oct 12 2013, 05:43 PM

Right now, at an average large corp, the wireless is better protected than the wired network. Wireless access to the corp network requires a user name and password just about anywhere, while it is very unusual for the wired network to be configured like that. Unplug a printer or a desktop, steal their port and you are on the network. Probably won't still be true in 5-10 years, but it is now.

Posted by: Wounded Ronin Oct 12 2013, 10:15 PM

"It's Hammer Time"

*twhick*

Of course why would it need wireless connectivity instead of a simple speech recognition capability?

Hilarious to imagine putting electronics in a blunt trauma instrument. Maybe after beating in the nth head the waterproofing gets a bit compromised and the Seattle rains start to make the baton malfunction on account of the electronics.

There are actually colorful and amusing story implications to imagine that over engineered weapons have taken over the world. It's like HK took over the future of weapons manufacture.

Posted by: Wounded Ronin Oct 12 2013, 10:20 PM

Well I haven't been in a firefight, and I wasn't being suppressed, but it seemed pretty routine to me to be able to hit a plate at 100 meters with any rifle I owned...AR 15, WASR AK 47 (assembled from spare parts, was good up to yards meters or so for hitting the plates consistently), Mosin Nagant...

That's using iron sights including dinged up World War II iron sights on the Mosin.

Posted by: DuckEggBlue Omega Oct 12 2013, 11:39 PM

Question: It has occurred to me that "before" wireless, we still had radio trancievers and the like and I don't remember people being overly concerned about having their comms hacked and constantly being led into ambushes, though I'm pretty sure this was still an option for players. So what was the difference between then and now, and does a solution to these issues lie within?

Posted by: binarywraith Oct 13 2013, 03:37 AM

The concern isn't the hacking. The concern is being forced to leave things vulnerable to hacking.

'Before' wireless, we still used radio transceivers for communications... but any shadowrunning group worth hiring would buy a portable master unit and run their own encrypted comms rather than having them broadcast in the clear.

While you could make the comparison that they can do the same now by slaving their PAN to their commlink and that commlink to the Decker's Deck, it still is a matter of scale of consequences. If your radio security is compromised, the worst that the enemy can do is jam it or listen in and learn your plans.

If your cyberware's security is compromised, it can be bricked.

Period, full stop, end of story. In the case of things like Wired Reflexes, cybereyes, or the like, this has just effectively disabled the character if not killed him outright.



That is the sum total of what SR5 says about bricking a device. There are no specifications as to what happens when hardware that replaces large parts of your nervous system is bricked, however from the bit that talks about bricked devices always failing spectacularly and in physically damaging (to the device) ways, there is no answer that is an acceptable risk.

The mere possibility of this is more than enough reason for no sensible runner to even leave a path open for it to happen.

Posted by: DuckEggBlue Omega Oct 13 2013, 05:06 AM

Bricking does indeed seem over the top, especially as the default result of matrix damage. Maybe if items instead got crashed and needed to be powercycled and bricking was BlackIC bogeyman territory that would make more sense. Something like that?

That said saying the most having your comms hacked would do is let the enemy learn your plans, that's a pretty big deal. You get ambushed and die. That's certainly a big consequence, regardless of how huge the benefit being able to communicate is (there's always the drilled, run silent, clockwork style op) compared to wireless bonuses, so likelyhood of occurance has to be a factor. So just how likely is getting bricked? I won't argue that currently risk of bricking versus wireless bonuses is a worthwhile trade-off, but "the mere possibilty" is not the threshold of safety shadowrunners operate on. It is dangerous work. So what is an acceptable risk/reward threshold? Should wireless bonuses be better?

And can someone please correct me if I'm wrong on the following.

1) Running Silent does not disable wireless bonuses. Could be wrong but wireless bonuses happen aslong as you maintain a connection, and running silent doesn't disable a connection, it just imposes a penaly on matrix actions, which I would think your wireless reflexes don't care about.

2) If a decker does notice silent running icons, this requires him to be looking and then succeed, he then has to randomly pick which one he's going to look at with a perception check.

3) Everyone should pack a dozen cheap devices, anything wireless, and put them on running silent to play shell games with enemy deckers?

4) Is running silent even suspicoius? In a world FULL of icons is it unreasonable plenty of people would activate it on a number of things just so their AR didn't get bombarded when they went into the kitchen in the morning?

Posted by: nspace Oct 13 2013, 05:36 AM

I don't understand what is so hard about this.

Everything can be accessed from the matrix. A wireless bonus isn't required to hack the device. It is like this because that is just how everything is manufactured in 2075, right down the chips in batons and RFID tags on paper hats worn by Stuffershack employees. It is this way because the corps want it this way. Just like Google, Facebook, NSA, and everyone else with power want to see everything you do, even if only in aggregate. You can't just go down to the corner store and ask the clerk for the iPhone without all the corporate spyware on it. Apple doesn't care that it makes you vulnerable. Not even a little bit. Why on earth would they even give you the option to turn the spying off? If you want to talk about absurd, then the idea that you could just turn it off is the absurdity.

Wireless bonuses are just that, bonuses. They make noise rating relevant to more than just the hacker. The street samurai in the high noise zone now can't move as fast and his smartgun link isn't working as well.

Turning off devices look like a rule added by a group of authors throwing the same sort of hissy hit that players are throwing at the idea of a decker being able do something as effective as mages or combat monsters. Seriously, this is a game where a mage can just mindcontrol someone, a samurai can cut them in half with a monofilament whip, and we are talking about turning someone's legs off as being some sort of big deal? Just taking a deep breath and accepting the new decker reality will just make everything into a non-issue.


Also, with regards to the suggestion earlier in the thread that someone could program offline: No you can't. Well, technically you could, but I don't think there are very many jobs where you wouldn't get fired for it. It goes so far beyond mere documentation. The absolute biggest one is source control. Disabling your connection to source control would make you absurdly non-functional. You couldn't push or pull anything from the repository, you couldn't look at the file history to see who changed what and when. Libraries are not stored in the repository either, you specify them in dependency files and they are downloaded as needed. Furthermore, you WILL be using an issue tracking tool to coordinate what you are working on, and that issue tracking tool will be coordinating with your source control, so that when you commit changes related to a ticket in the issue tracking tool that you can see those changes from the issue in the issue tracking tool. You will also being making regular trips to places like Stackoverflow when you run into an issue to search for a discussion on the issue and to get leads on how to resolve it. Programing without being hooked up to "The Matrix" is already complete insanity or the programing is for something like a trivial Hello World application in CompSci 101.

Not only this, but surrounding the generation of the code, you likely have a Continuous Integration server running that is doing CI on all the repository pushes. Your code repository, library repository, and CI are likely in the cloud too. Not only that, when you deploy an application you likely deploy it using something like Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud. Your application is likely persisting its object model to something like an Amazon RDS in the cloud. It is likely sending messages with something like Amazon SQS. It is likely using something like Amazon SWF to coordinate workflows. Etc etc etc.

Even people doing simple physical tasks are getting notifications on their phones telling them stuff like when a printing job is done.

The point being, we are already getting to the point where just turning it off is unthinkable insanity. In 2075, it is ludicrous to think that your toaster would be anything more than a brick without accessing god knows how many APIs for applications hosted elsewhere.

Posted by: Epicedion Oct 13 2013, 06:06 AM

For starters, the Matrix in SR4 was a really anemic collection of broadcast hubs with dubious cross-connectivity, with each hub constructed out of the same off-the-rack quality commlink tech. This is vastly different from hosts.



SR5 says that the device stops working, meaning it no longer gives a mechanical benefit. The rules say nothing about people flopping around like fish, they say nothing about people taking damage from bricked cyberware.

Posted by: Epicedion Oct 13 2013, 06:17 AM

Correct. Running silent just means you have to be looked for, and no longer automatically pop up when within 100m.



Also correct.



Bad idea. Cheap device = crap attributes. When the local matrix security does a sweep and notices 30 new hidden icons, and randomly selects a Stealth Tag, he'll be able to easily run Trace User to locate you and your whole team.



Depends on what's silent, I'd guess. In some places running with your commlink silent is illegal. I imagine that running your pistol silent without a permit to carry it concealed is illegal.

Note that a lot of laws exist as secondary offenses to increase the severity of an actual crime. So you may not get hassled for running silent some days, but if you knock over a liquor store with all your gear running silent, it probably makes things worse.

Posted by: binarywraith Oct 13 2013, 06:37 AM

Yes, but you can counter this easily by having everyone know the op plan and not need to chatter about it. The only prudence you can really exercise when it comes to wireless is turning it off.

Posted by: DuckEggBlue Omega Oct 13 2013, 06:39 AM

In ShadowRun, corporations hire criminals to undermine their rivals. Going out and bricking all the new iPhones would be pretty disastrous for 2075 Apple.


People jailbreak devices now. As said, shadowrunners are criminals who want security and have access to the skills to do that sort of thing, they aren't about to stop doing it.

Otherwise you make some good, if overstated, points.


Low end goods will exsist aslong as exploited lower classes do.

Posted by: Erik Baird Oct 13 2013, 06:50 AM

Mostly, it's hard because there's no point. What's the point in having electronics in a glorified stick? RFID in a disposable paper hat? What about all those folks living on the edge of civilization who can't even get Matrix access and make do with old tech because it works and it's something they already have? While the corporate masses might be willing to trade security for perceived convenience (like the RFID wallets currently in use), those who make their living evading notice are not going to take those risks if they have more than two functioning brain cells to rub together. Tech that ends up on the black market is going to get scrubbed; not only for the benefit of the buyer, but also so it doesn't get tracked back to the seller and his sources.



What's the point of having the system use a wireless link? It is faster, more secure, and more sensible to use a direct neural connection for many systems, especially anything that needs to implanted anyways like smartgun links, wired reflexes, VCRs, chipjacks and connected skillwire implants, cybereyes and implanted subsystems, etc.



Mind control requires touch, and a monowhip requires close proximity. I know if I had cyberlegs, I would not consider some random schmuck turning my legs off inconsequential, even if it was some pathetic griefer script kiddie. Especially if it was in the middle of a job. The "hissy fit" isn't "at the idea of a decker being able do something as effective as mages or combat monsters." The complaint is that deckers are being shoehorned into a role which is not appropriate. Deckers have always been powerful in Shadowrun, just not in direct physical combat. Should mouse and rat shamans be given über combat abilities to make them combat effective too?



Ah yes. The "lie back and think of England" rationale.



At which point, Mr. Toaster becomes such a pain that it's easier to live without toast.



Because someone knocking over a liquor store is going to be so concerned about those laws. If only someone had thought to make theft illegal, liquor stores everywhere would be safer.

Posted by: DuckEggBlue Omega Oct 13 2013, 07:02 AM

So Trace Icon can find the physical location of a device, so if I got a bag of rats, glued stuff to them, and set them loose, on the otherside of the compound, that'd work, right?

I'm more wondering if noticing a silent running icon immediately triggers an alarm or if it would illicit more a 'better check, just in case' type reaction.

Posted by: Sendaz Oct 13 2013, 07:30 AM

Yes for causing a distraction, but if you were wanting a silent in and out job, having a mob of mystery icons suddenly pop up may also trigger an alarm from the spider who might think they were under attack.


Again depends on location and situation. A silent icon coming down a hallway may warrant a further check, one popping up in the ultra-secure R&D section warrants an alert.

Posted by: Smash Oct 13 2013, 07:54 AM

Sorry but this is preposterous. You can't continue to pull the logic card in ways that fly in the face of your own reasoning.

We're talking about people who go an armed missions where there is a chance they will be captured, tortured or even killed. There is nothing you can do to avoid this risk (sure, good intelligence can minimize it a bit) but to simply not go on the run.

Here's yet another example: Have you ever purchased anything online with a credit card? If you answer yes than you are an idiot, but only as much of an idiot as 80% of the rest of the population. The other 20% either can't afford credit cards or lock themselves in towers out of an irrational fear of germs. The reason is that information is not that secure, either the site might be hacked, have no encryption or you may inadvertently have some kind malware that can report your information to nefarious sorts. The reality is that the shear mass of transactions that occur on the web mean that you just have to be unlucky to be frauded. We all either consciously or unwittingly take this risk.

It's clear that the setting implies that at the end of a risk assessment there will be times where having your wireless on should be worth the risk. The problem is that the rules don't provide the right mechanism/bonuses for this to be the case. I'm happy to admit as much.

Posted by: binarywraith Oct 13 2013, 08:09 AM

Relevant parts bolded. The risk/reward calculation on this is so far skewed that there is no rational reason to use wireless. Period, end of story.

Posted by: Tanegar Oct 13 2013, 08:18 AM

Precisely. Even this mystical 20% figure (and I never have seen an explanation as to where they got that number) is unacceptably high when "bricking" is a euphemism for "dying in agony, screaming and flopping around on the ground, while your cyberware cooks you from the inside."

Posted by: Epicedion Oct 13 2013, 08:36 AM

Because the electronics are cheap as free, and because there's some benefit to be had by either the user, the manufacturer/seller, or the government.

We shove electronics into things already because it's cheap and provides a benefit. A $5 box of cold medicine at the local drugstore has an RFID tag in it to prevent theft. Now imagine the technology is 70 years further along -- that tag could provide links back to the manufacturer and local medical professionals to let them know if there's a sudden spike in cold medicine purchases, so they could adjust their efforts. It could provide an update to let the customer know if it went out of date, or if there were a recall on that specific batch, all automatically. A digestible tag in each individual pill could link up to an application on your commlink to provide biomonitor feedback to yourself and your doctor to warn you if there's some concern.

A tag on your soda can could send you an update to let you know when it reached optimum temperature for drinking -- and don't tell me this is stupid, because they're doing it with temperature-sensitive color coding on beer cans right now.

A temperature-sensitive RFID tag in your soy turkey loaf could ping you when it's done, or send a signal to automatically shut down your oven (and start the microwave for the sides, and turn on the wine chiller, and pause playback on the trid).

So why? Because it's cheap and because they can, and because Stick - Now With New and Improved Tactical Grip Assessment sells slightly better than just plain Stick.



This is where the system goes It's All Made Up, and the answer is Reasons. Maybe it's practicality, maybe it's bandwidth. Maybe it's cost. Maybe it's rejection risk. Maybe it's a lot of things. But it's how it works here.



Mind control spells require LOS, not Touch.



There are no more script kiddies. Reliably hacking someone's gear requires expensive equipment, high Logic, and professional training. You're playing the "evil deckers lurk everywhere and are just waiting for me to go online so they can brick my stuff" card. It doesn't work that way, and there's no reason to expect it to work that way unless you bought into SR4's stupid sensibilities of everyone being the equivalent of a magical hacker genius with a $20 investment and a copy of Hacking for Dummies.



What makes you think that this makes deckers powerful in direct physical combat? Turning someone's wired reflexes off isn't the same as shooting them -- an Ork with a machine gun and one fewer initiative die is still a threat. Turning off someone's eyes or gun in the middle of a firefight is probably a drag, but probably slightly less so than the sniper popping heads for 15 damage every pass.



If that's how you want to do it, live without toast. But Shadowrun has always been about trying desperately not to fall behind the curve, because behind the curve is a meat grinder.



Do you not understand how laws work? Wrap your brain around this one: owning a bulletproof vest is legal. Wearing your bulletproof vest is legal. Wearing your bulletproof vest while committing a violent felony is itself an additional felony.

Posted by: Epicedion Oct 13 2013, 08:38 AM

What's the damage code for that? Oh right, there isn't one. You don't have an argument. Period, end of story.

Posted by: Dolanar Oct 13 2013, 09:02 AM

This has been one of the biggest issues about Wireless. The Fluff & the rules are not on even footing. Some people believe that the Fluff is meaningless & that everyone should ignore it. Others believe that in a game as Fluff intensive as Shadowrun the Fluff is damn important to what a piece of gear does. I personally believe that the rules should reflect the Fluff.

Posted by: kzt Oct 13 2013, 09:35 AM

It's odd how criminals don't seem obey laws. Maybe we should make breaking the law illegal, surely then they would stop...

Posted by: kzt Oct 13 2013, 09:43 AM

You know what happens when your credit card number gets stolen? You call your bank and they cancel the charge, cancel your card and send you a new card. People use credit cards on the internet because it's essentially at zero risk to them, the risk is all on the merchant and bank side.

So no, that's a terrible analogy.

Posted by: Kyrel Oct 13 2013, 10:01 AM

Dolanar hit the nail on the head here. In the way that Bricking is described in the fluff, there is absolutely NO WAY on this planet, universe, or multiverse, that a piece of electronic equipment that's build into sensitive parts of your body, NOT cause at least extreme pain and discomfort, and more likely potential fatal systemic damage to your body and brain, when it blows up in the way described. If your eyes start throwing sparks, leaking molten plastic, and giving off smoke, that WILL be mildly put uncomfortable to you, and leave you unable to see. Having your nervous system replacement, which is distributed throughout your entire body, suddenly act in the way that's described as the consequenses of being "Bricked", there is no way that this will not have potentially fatal consequences for a person. Suddenly having one or more of your limbs and/or vital organs shut down and spit component parts in your face, while you are engaged in a life or death firefight with people trying to kill you, WILL end up being, mildly put, EXTREMELY detrimental to your continued existance.

Though I'll conceed that people generally speaking are willing to accept some level of risk to get access to a given set of benefits, that kind of evaluation ALWAYS comes down to a subjective estimate of the risk and reward. But at the end of the day, there has to be a balance between the perceived risk of the bad consequences happening, and the value of the attained benefit. For the average person, the risk of having your credit card hacked and your account emptied, if you use it to pay for something online, is perceived as being small enough to accept it. Even though having your bank account emptied can have severe negative consequences. However, there is a difference between the consequence of "loosing some/all of your money, if a hacker picks you out from a crowd of millions of people world wide" and "potentially having (parts of) your body shut down during critical moments of performing your already potentially fatal job" is fairly significant. Especially when you know that the odds of becoming the target of a hacker, who can shut down vital parts of your anatomy is a LOT more substantial, than the odds of being picked out by a hacker that's choosing between millions of potential victims. If the perceived risk of being the victim of a hacking attack, that can kill you is easily in the range of i.e. 35+%, then this is a risk a professional individual with any sort of brains, will do whatever he or she can, in order to eliminate. Especially if there's an easy fix.

Here's what I believe is the core of this argument though. The RULES of the game do not create the situation that the FLUFF describes in vivid details. No, according to the rules, having your eyes blow up doesn't mean that you suddenly can't see anything, no rather it means that you just can't use any of the possible extra build-in features that your eyeware might include. Having your limbs blow up and cease working doesn't mean that you can't use them like regular limbs. And having various forms of wires distributed throughout your body melt, throw sparks, and cause electricity to leak into sensitive parts of your anatomy doesn't do any damage to you, and can, in fact, be fixed by a local mechanic with a hammer and a screwdriver (Ok, the hammer and screwdriver thing is probably an overstatement, but you get my point I trust).

As Dolanar points out, the consistancy between the fluff and the rules are in this respect completely and utterly out of sync with each other. To some people, this kind of discrepency doesn't matter, only the rules. To people like me, this is a SERIOUS cock-up by the developers. ESPECIALLY in a game where the setting descriptions are so prevalent and integrated a part of the game, as they are in Shadowrun.

In this case, the designers have decided that they wanted hackers to be able to criple cyberware by hacking it, but rather than allowing hackers to be able to kill and utterly cripple players outright (something that would probably very quickly have resulted in players no longer using cyberware at all), they decided to tone it down, and reduce the descriped catastrophic damage caused to the gear when bricked, to only be a limited and easily fixed de-buff of the character, which makes absolutely no form of sense within the context of the described effect of "Bricking".

From my perspective making this change to cyberware was not necessary, and does not contribute positively to the game in my perspective. Rather it feels like a crappy implementation of an idea, or a rushed or miscommunicated job between the people behind the writing of the fluff, and the people who made the rules. Or alternatively the designers decided that they would make a game that mainly caters to the kind of player who doesn't really care about fluff/rule consistancy.

/Kyrel

Posted by: KCKitsune Oct 13 2013, 12:27 PM

Funny, I bought my Motorola Atrix phone, rooted it, and then REPLACED THE OS! I'm running a version of Android WITHOUT the spyware crap that was put into the standard version of android that comes from the Wireless carriers.

If I can do that in 2012 with commonly available tools that I got off the Internet, then why can't a hacker who's forgotten more about hacking, than the common Joe will ever learn, can't do the same thing?

Posted by: Erik Baird Oct 13 2013, 05:49 PM

And yet these same megacorporations would sell their grandparents to save 0.001 per widget in manufacturing costs because it makes them money in the long run. I'll even allow that RFID tags go from passive devices that respond when interrogated to active transmitters powered by *plot*. It still doesn't make sense to stick electronics in everything.



And it still is a contradiction of the previous editions of the game.



My mistake. I had mind probe stuck in my head for some reason.



So in 207x, all software is perfect? There are no vulnerabilities whatsoever that could ever be used to gain access to or harm a device via its software and a few simple tricks? That's real science fiction.



What makes deckers powerful in direct physical combat is the ability to shut a target's body down. Even if you don't follow the given description of bricking, merely turning off a leg would affect mobility; eyes the ability to perceive and function in a sight-oriented world; wired reflexes are a major part of the owners central nervous system- think that won't have any meaningful effect?



I agree, and if you choose to put your cyberware and equipment on the Matrix for all to see (stealth mode or not), you have just given that meat grinder the advantage.



And therefore no one ever commits felonies while wearing bulletproof vests, because they were okay with having black market weapons, assaulting folks, committing armed robbery, and jaywalking, but the thought of that extra charge for wearing a bulletproof vest while in commission of a felony made the bad guys give up in despair.

Posted by: binarywraith Oct 13 2013, 06:53 PM

That's the thing. The simplest answer I can come up with here is that the writers simply didn't think about bricking cyberware. They had a neat idea about 'hey, what if Deckers could wreck someone's commlink!', and stuck it in, but then never considered the full ramifications of this in a setting where they've just mandated that cyberware be wirelessly accessible.

In either case, the rules as written are so vague on the topic that it's essentially GM fiat.

Going by the fluff, as I as a GM tend to do when a question of what a rule actually intends comes up, this shit should obviously cripple someone when applied to their cyberware. The examples in the text mention stuff like shut down vibroswords still being okay to club people with, or shut down rotor drones coming down in autorotation, both of which indicate to me that bricking something is intended to make it nonfunctional.

A cyberlimb that is nonfunctional is just a block of metal dragging on the body. A cybereye that is nonfunctional is a really expensive glass eye. A nervous system replacement that is nonfunctional... well, hopefully it doesn't paralyze your autonomic functions so you just suffocate lying in the street from being unable to tell your lungs to breath or heart to beat.

Posted by: KarmaInferno Oct 13 2013, 08:05 PM

One major thing is that the new Wireless Rules are intended to make Matrix Cowboys more attractive to play.

I contend that in this, they have failed spectacularly.

Even assuming a target is stupid enough to leave his wireless butt exposed for anyone to take advantage of, the process of hacking in and grabbing control still takes too many steps.

So far in the couple of dozen games I've been in or seen run, I have seen someone attempt to hack an opponent's gear exactly ONCE. And immediately afterwards he declared he'd never bother with that again, because it was too much trouble for the payoff.

Way, way back when there were discussions here on how the "next version of Shadowrun" should work, before anyone outside of the Devs were aware that it was in fact being worked in, we went over making Deckers feel more useful. I contended that if hackers/deckers/technomancers were to have a more active combat role, any "cyber" attack they were going to execute HAD to be as simple in game mechanics as shooting a gun or casting a spell.

Anything more would meant the players wouldn't bother. There would better more efficient uses of their actions.


-k

Posted by: Wounded Ronin Oct 13 2013, 08:26 PM

Kind of makes you wonder if the best solution all along would just been to have a simplified rule set for runs that aren't focused on matrix stuff, but reserve an "advanced" rule set a la SR2 for a session or campaign that takes place primarily in the matrix and where the special aspects of the systems in question are part of the setting.

Posted by: binarywraith Oct 13 2013, 08:32 PM

Even if it did work, with these bricking rules it just adds 'Geek the Decker' to the old standby 'Geek the Mage' in the list of Things Sally Street Sam Does First, and Deckers don't have any of the Mage's defensive options.

Posted by: DeathStrobe Oct 13 2013, 08:42 PM

I agree that's how I'd like it to work too. With Matrix Attacks working more like spells. But at the same time, the outcry over people fearing the all mighty decker as it is now would be even more exasperated if it went that way. I think the Matrix has been this minidungeon system that has been so separated from the rest of the game for so long that people are just rejecting any paradigm shift to make the Matrix more than something you can just handwave away and ignore.

Frankly, the systems do need to overlap more. The Matrix needs to be more than just a babysitting plot device or a key to the locked door. People can complain about logical consistency or whatever, when we're in a setting about dragons, the Native Americans taking back America, and corporations being recognized as pseudo-nations; wireless bonuses is the straw the broke your camel-of-disbelief's back?

Posted by: Epicedion Oct 13 2013, 09:07 PM

With the rules allowing some brute-force mid-combat crowd-control via gear hacking on the part of deckers, people seem to think that this is what deckers should be doing.

The actuality is that the rules allow for these actions because the system for attacking gear is now the same as the system for attacking anything in the Matrix. What this does is open the door for all the other stuff -- spoofing comms, editing sensors, getting security to chase digital ghosts, tracking people real-time. All sorts of subtle stuff.

Example: want to know where a security team is? Hack on the Fly three marks on one of the members and run a Trace User. Botch the roll and the jig is up, Matrix attack detected -- time to change plans.

Once you're talking about an enemy that knows what and where you are, bricking their gear isn't usually the best option. Once you successfully brick one thing, and everyone knows that Matrix security is compromised, you can expect everyone to use their free actions to take their critical systems down. So it's pretty much a one-shot deal. "Security teams one and two, move in on the targets -- they've got a hacker with them that flipped off Johnson's cybereyes, so put everything into protected mode until we can shut him down."

Until then, the benefit of online vision enhancements and smartlinks and so on outweighs the risk, because spotting an infiltrator before he shoots you or getting a hit instead of a miss is the most immediate thing that will save your ass.

Further, any security protocol is going to have an expected casualty rate, and a Matrix attack is just another factor -- just because mages and snipers can wreak havoc with a clear line of sight from long distances doesn't mean that security patrols are never going to go into the open field at the back of the complex. In Shadowrun, warm bodies make for cheap threat detection.



This is very important.

Posted by: Emil Barr Oct 13 2013, 11:32 PM

I was reading the matrix section and just noticed a couple things that Ive never seen mentioned in any of the discussions on wireless and bricking.

If the hardware test to repair a bricked piece of gear is glitched, then your gear suffers from oermanent glitches and problems, GM discretion.

If the test is CRITICALLY glitched, then its bricked for good.

Man, that would suck if your wires or cyberarm got permanently bricked.

Posted by: Smash Oct 14 2013, 01:41 AM

It would also suck to be hit by an errant comet as well but shit happens. Critical glitches are virtually impossible for anyone rolling more than about 4 dice and that's even before application of edge.

I remember the days (in shadowrun) when being shot once could put you in hospital for months and require you to get cyber-replacements. It was perfectly acceptable then.

Posted by: binarywraith Oct 14 2013, 01:43 AM

What, you mean a couple days ago? You should check out the new Missions run, there's a sniper in the third run for the season who can do just that with SR5 rules.

Something notable for this discussion as well. In the first adventure of the new set... every NPC explicitly has their wireless shut off on everything.


Even the writers know that what got published isn't workable.

Posted by: Dolanar Oct 14 2013, 01:55 AM

To be honest, I would be more ok if Decker's were able to put 3 marks on someone's Cyberarm & then take it over much like a Rigger would control a Drone. I think it would allow the Decker to mess with a group more readily much like a mage could mind control, Imagine if you will.

Runner Team is sneaking quietly through the Ares compound making good time, the Troll heavy is up front carrying an Assault Rifle. The Facility Spider is doing a securtiy sweep & notices some unusual icons in the complex, so he runs silent & goes to check them out. The Spider arrives at the matrix location & the Team Decker misses him.
The Spider decides to be sneaky & does a Hack on the fly to put 3 marks on the Troll's Cyberarm. He succeeds. Now, the Spider can take an action to force the Troll's arm to do something, be it smack the troll in the face, or swing him around to fire off a short burst at his team. After this happens the Team Decker knows something is wrong & begins to deal with the Spider, but not before the whole facility is alerted & the Spider is laughing all the way back to his Nest.

This was intended to be mostly cinematic, I did not use any dice rolls, but simply showing an example of something I would be more ok with than just making something useless.

Posted by: Tymeaus Jalynsfein Oct 14 2013, 02:06 PM

Which is why SMART people do not possess wireless enabled credit cards. Simple fix to the problem.

Posted by: Tymeaus Jalynsfein Oct 14 2013, 02:14 PM

Why? I don't suffer any consequences for never having wireless access 24/7/365. What makes that an unthinkable insanity?

Posted by: Tymeaus Jalynsfein Oct 14 2013, 02:23 PM

There does not need to be a damage code. The effects are so self evident that I am amazed you need a dissertation on anatomy and the effects on such when the described effects of bricking are applied. Equally ludicrous are the later descriptions on how such damage is fixed.

Posted by: Epicedion Oct 14 2013, 04:50 PM

If by dissertation you mean the bare minimum mechanical notation that makes damage relevant. This isn't a "we can't have a code for everything" situation like crash landing on the sun. It's a built-in, expected action. If it doesn't come attached with a damage code in addition to its described effects, it doesn't do damage.

Posted by: Tymeaus Jalynsfein Oct 14 2013, 05:53 PM

Please show me the bare minimum mechanical effect of being within 200 meters of a Thor shot impact. It is ALL FLUFF. There are effects that just do not need mechanical reinforcement.

And that, right there, is the disconnect that destroys verisimilitude in SR5. The descriptions of the effect do not match up to the mechanics. POOR Game Design at its most obvious. I don't need mechanical effects to tell you that your nervous system shuts down and you die when your Move-By-Wires are bricked, resulting in your nervous system burning and sparking, charring all the meat around it, and carbonizing your Neural pathways. That is the expected outcome from the effect described. Too bad, so sad, make a new character. If they wanted something different, then they either should describe it differently, or provide mechanics for the effect described.

And before you say that that is being a Bad GM, please remember that it isnt. The Crash wiped out Multiple Millions of databases, and yet, it is descriptive. We take it as fact. There was no mechanic for it. There was no mechanical resolution if you want to play in that era. It just happens. By the same token, Bricking has defined results. Even Thor Shots are more Descriptive than mechanical. Their effects are fact, per the fluff. To assume that they really did not mean what they wrote is ludicrous beyond compare. So, we must take it as fact. Have you ever considered that there should be no mechanical effect for what they describe (Much like there is no mechanical effect for what happens to anything within 200 meters of a Thor Shot... it just vaportizes everything in its initial radius, no saves, no rolls, no hope)? As such, per the actual rules (or fluff if you perfer) any person putting Cyberware on the Matrix is at risk of bricking, which is likely to kill them outright.

Posted by: Epicedion Oct 14 2013, 05:58 PM

Thor Shots don't have a mechanic. Bricking does. One of the things that doesn't come with the bricking mechanic is damage. Therefore, bricking causes no damage. QED.

Posted by: Tymeaus Jalynsfein Oct 14 2013, 06:20 PM

Wrong... Thor Shots DO have a Mechanical Effect beyond 200 meters. Within that radius, however, the effect is purely descriptive. Bricking has a a defined effect both in Fluff and mechanically on hardware. You cannot choose to ignore one for the other.

Posted by: Epicedion Oct 14 2013, 07:17 PM

Bricking causes no damage. You'll need to find a page reference that says otherwise.

Posted by: Tymeaus Jalynsfein Oct 14 2013, 08:31 PM

The description says otherwise.

Posted by: Dolanar Oct 14 2013, 08:44 PM

Actually, strictly by the rules Bricking is caused by Matrix Damage, & the sparking & such is likely caused by an incorrect shutdown process or whatever other method is used to disable the device, so the order of operation is as such: Unmodified Cybergear > Cybergear takes Matrix Damage > Cybergear becomes Bricked & the fluff effects happen as a result of the cyber damage the item has taken.

Posted by: Epicedion Oct 14 2013, 08:44 PM

No, the description says that it throws sparks or smokes or seizes up and stops working. It says nothing about causing damage to anyone or anything in, on, or around it. You might as well be saying that bricked guns explode and take your hand off. You have no mechanical basis for saying that cyberware necessarily causes damage when bricked, and the only plausible reason you'd ever think this is because you're looking for reasons to hate it more.

Posted by: RHat Oct 14 2013, 08:48 PM

Thor shots do have a mechanical effect inside 200 metres. That effect is to destroy everything. That is the mechanic, not merely descriptive. Brivking, however, has no mechanic for csusing damage.

Posted by: Dolanar Oct 14 2013, 08:53 PM

personally IMO if you ignore one portion of the fluff then you're looking to make something look better than it actually is, the most reasonable thing we can say right now is until the writer (or a proxy for him) comes onto the boards & says something to the extent of "Oops, I f'd up" or"No, my description is meant to have a mechanical effect, talk to the rule writer" no one in these 2 camps will agree on this point.

Posted by: Tymeaus Jalynsfein Oct 14 2013, 08:56 PM

This is very true indeed...

Posted by: Epicedion Oct 14 2013, 08:59 PM

The point here is that extra deleterious effects have to be spelled out. Otherwise, you should have to expect worse-than-listed effects of everything. Like a gunshot wound for less-than-incapacitating damage perforating the digestive tract, causing the victim to go into shock and later die of sepsis. Or the swing of a broom handle shattering a kneecap and making it so the character can no longer walk.

Bricked devices "fail spectacularly" but don't cause any extra damage. Whether it's sparks shooting out of your eyes, or lightning coursing over your skin from wired reflexes shorting out, or your implanted commlink smoking and singing your hair and dribbling melting plastic out of your ear, these things don't cause mechanical effects beyond just being bricked. Those effects would necessarily have to be spelled out to be included in a game.

Posted by: Tymeaus Jalynsfein Oct 14 2013, 09:03 PM

And I disagree with you on that premise. Some things are just common sense, and fire shooting from your eyes because your Cybereyes just got bricked, resulting in it blinding you, and possibly killing you, is one of them (at a minimum, you will need new eyes). Brick someone's Wired Reflexes and that is death, plain and simple.

Posted by: Nath Oct 14 2013, 09:10 PM

If your cyberware starts emitting smoke and sparks glaringly, especially eyes, you should suffer from Visibility and Glare Environmental Modifier as defined on page 175.

Posted by: Epicedion Oct 14 2013, 09:24 PM

Then otherwise minor gunshots should potentially sever arteries or puncture lungs, short falls should twist ankles hampering movement, and eating all that soy junk food should have a random chance of causing a character to have a heart attack. It's just common sense.



Well if your cybereyes are bricked, you're not too worried about visibility modifiers.

Posted by: DeathStrobe Oct 14 2013, 09:31 PM

But wired reflexes isn't a replacement of your nervous system. Its a bunch of wires overlaying your nerves that just so happen to also transmit data faster to boot. You can actually turn off your wired reflexes and a character doesn't just immediately die. You just want bricking ware to be so incredibly powerful and game breaking to help reinforce your dislike of the mechanic, but there is nothing to support that it is that way. Personally, I'd prefer it to work that way, because that sounds really cool. But currently the mechanics don't support your interpretation.

Posted by: RHat Oct 14 2013, 09:38 PM

Fluff does not get to create new mechanics. Thr fluff on bricking should not say what it says (as it presently creates a false implication),
but that does not in any way change the bricking mechanics.

Posted by: Tymeaus Jalynsfein Oct 14 2013, 09:56 PM

Except that you are wrong here because both you and I can cite chapter and verse where that would not apply.
Please talk to any 1st year Medical Student, though, and have them describe to you, in detail, what the outcome would be if your nervous system were to suddenly combust. I can guarantee you that it would not be pretty, and you would not survive it.

Posted by: KarmaInferno Oct 14 2013, 10:05 PM

Gamist versus Simulationist, anyone?


-k

Posted by: Tymeaus Jalynsfein Oct 14 2013, 10:10 PM

Fluff vs. Mecahnics...
If the Mechanics were never intended to simulate the Fluff, then the Fluff should never have been written the way it was. *shrug*

Again, it falls back on the Developers and the Haphazard way the book was put together.

Posted by: Epicedion Oct 14 2013, 10:16 PM

You're in favor of an undocumented penalty in one case, and against an undocumented penalty in a different case. This is only evidence that you don't like the first case, not evidence that the undocumented penalty is in any way valid, much less your stated opinion of it being somehow required by the rules.

Posted by: DeathStrobe Oct 14 2013, 10:18 PM

I think it has more to do with the Hollywood film effect. Just because a terminal explodes in front of the Hollywood Hacker, doesn't mean the Hacker dies. It just looks cool. And just because your head commlink just exploded doesn't mean your now brain dead, but it does mean you can't use that ware anymore. In the case of a bricked device, it is merely a cinematic way to display that you will not be using that piece of tech.

Shadowrun has always leaned more on the Hollywood side of reality. Why should bricking be any different?

Posted by: KCKitsune Oct 14 2013, 10:48 PM

OK, DeathStrobe, Wired Reflexes doesn't replace your nervous system, but the mechanical description of bricking (What the Devs WANT TO HAPPEN) shows that when a piece of gear gets bricked it throws off sparks and MELTS!

The melting point of plastic is about 100 to 130 C. Now you know water boils at 100 C, so you now have something that is as hot as boiling water NEXT TO YOUR NERVOUS SYSTEM! I'm sorry, unless you're a mutant from Marvel comics who has some super power to prevent that from harming you, then you are dead.

Posted by: RHat Oct 14 2013, 11:03 PM

And what 'ware are you asserting that would even be the case with? Certainly not wired reflexes, which exist in addition to your nervous system...

Posted by: Tymeaus Jalynsfein Oct 14 2013, 11:12 PM

Because of the way they describe the Bricking Effect. I have no issues with your Cyberdeck exploding in a spray of melted bits and whatnot. BUT WHEN THOSE MELTED BITS COMPRISE YOUR NERVOUS SYSTEM or 'ware within your SKULL, well, then I take issue with it.

And you get me wrong again Epicedion... it is not what I want (I am in fact arguing against that)... I am parroting back EXACTLY what the DEVELOPERS WANT to happen. As DESCRIBED IN THEIR OWN WORDS. If you want to take exception, take it up with them. See, the world works one way. And the only way to see the world is through the lens of the Fluff (and not the mechanics)... And the FLUFF says that if your Cyberware is bricked, well, they you are screwed six ways from Sunday. There is no other way to interpret what they wrote but in the worst light. Your Hardware MELTS, SHORTS OUT, OR OUTRIGHT EXPLODES. Having that happen in your body is lethal to the point of ludicrousness. And you telling me that mechanically it has no effect is just as ludicrous.

As I pointed out earlier. Being in the initial blast radius of a Thor Shot has no effect. The fluff tells you that you die (and everything else is vaporized), but absolutely no mechanics are presented. It is descriptive only. Other wise some enterprising player would point to the damage mechanics and say they could survive it through some questionable shenanigans. I see the same thing here.

Posted by: Tymeaus Jalynsfein Oct 14 2013, 11:16 PM

You mean the Wired Reflexes that are Mapped along your nervous system, in parallel, augmenting the signals travelling along those paths, and which MELTS due to the heat and fire caused by the bricking. Tell me how you plan to survive that. How do you plan on actually doing anything with your nervous system now a literal cinder? Not to mention the Well Done steak that is now most of your insides?

Or maybe you are talking about the Cranial Cyberdeck that melts your Brain when it bricks... Or the Cybereyes, for that matter, which likely do the same thing. ANY Cyber will be ludicrously lethal when bricked, with the possible exception of limbs, which I contend will still be pretty damned damaging to the body. And let us not even speak about a bricked Air Tank in your body cavity... Tell me how you plan to survive an internal explosion at 2000 psi.

Posted by: RHat Oct 14 2013, 11:28 PM

Just pointing out that it isn't happening to your CNS, just in proximity to it. In any case, that bit of fluff has no connection to the rules and should never have been written, and it's existence does not influence mechanics.

Posted by: Epicedion Oct 14 2013, 11:34 PM

Actually what it says is: "Smoke, sparks, pops, bangs, sizzles, nasty smells, and occasionally even small fires are common features of a device in the process of becoming a brick."

Turning this into "explodes violently and spews shrapnel and hot metal throughout the inside of your body" is quite the stretch. You're reading it in the worst light because you want to.



So death isn't a mechanic? Interesting.



The description of Wired Reflexes doesn't mention anything about that. It does mention "adrenaline stimulators" and "neural boosters," whatever those are. You could easily say that the actual vulnerable part of the system is the controller -- the Reflex Trigger. At any rate, you're implying that the damage somehow makes wires explode, which is silly.



Because you say so, contrary to any rules on the matter. Because no cyberware is designed to fail in a non-fatal way. Again, because you say so.



And now you're saying that matrix damage can not only make wires explode, it can make steel or titanium alloy spontaneously rupture. You know, instead of destroying the tiny controller chip. Because that makes sense.

Man, common sense apparently suggests that everything with a wireless receiver is capable of blasting holes through everything and melting to the center of the earth. Amazing!

Posted by: Tymeaus Jalynsfein Oct 14 2013, 11:35 PM

I agree it should never have been written. I do not agree that it should not have a say in what happens when an item is bricked, since what was written was EXACTLY what was intended to happen when an item is bricked. Its very existence informs the mechanics. And some things do not need mechanics. The effect of melting and burning Cyberware is one of them, since it WILL kill the person so afflicted.

Posted by: Tymeaus Jalynsfein Oct 14 2013, 11:47 PM

Read your own Quote... Small fires are COMMON. Not never, not rarely, note even once in a while, but COMMON.



So, you tell me what happens when an oxygen tank burns. I bet you say that it explodes. One of the biggest reasons you are not supposed to put compressed containers into a fire. Sounds like "Violently Explodes" to me. *shrug*




Death is a descriptive. Nothing More.




You should read it again... Important Parts highlighted.



Neural Boosters throughout the body. What happens when all your Neural Boosters, throughout your body and tied into your CNS, all of a sudden combust? Oh wait... Death.




No, not because I say so, because the DEVELOPERS SAY SO. Again, read what they wrote...



So, regardless of how they were designed, devices that are bricked NEVER Fail in a non-spectacular way. So, no, cyberware does not fail non-spectacularly, PER THE DEVELOPERS OWN WORDS.



And again your statements are ludicrous. Never did I say such things. What I did say is that when hardware in your body burns, you burn along with it. NEVER will it be non-damaging, as you contend. Simple Common Sense.

Posted by: Epicedion Oct 15 2013, 12:15 AM

So is "smells bad." How do you decide if the cyberware violently explodes, or just smells bad? Oh wait, there's no mechanic for it.



Yes, if you throw it into a blast furnace. Not if a chip that turns it on and off shorts out.



"Your character.. dies."
"But death is only a descriptive, so I'm going to keep doing stuff!"



And we're back to every bit of every piece of cyberware being made out of C4.. because you say so.



You know what they don't say? That bricked cyberware explodes in your body and turns you into a fine paste.



How many of those words say that cyberware explodes and kills you? None? Hmm.



Except there's no hint of a system to determine how much damage or any side-effects, which must mean you're overreacting.

Posted by: Tanegar Oct 15 2013, 12:26 AM

How many of those words say that cyberware reaches temperatures high enough to cook you alive? All of them? Hmm.

Face it, you haven't got a leg to stand on. A chip in your head melts, your brain broils in its own fluids, you die. A-B-C.

Posted by: Smash Oct 15 2013, 12:30 AM

100% agree. Your device ceases to function and you know that it has.

There are no rules besides essence holes to account for destroyed or removed cyberware. For example, if we take the nervous system fluff completely literally then you probably couldn't replace standard wired reflexed with delta-ware wired reflexes because the sections that are removed are probably of different size to the sections removed by the deltaware equivalent.

Why does a deltaware cyberarm cost less essence than a standardware cyberarm? It still replaces your whole arm! Then again, if I really wanted to I can justify it a multitude of ways. The point is that fluff is fluff, it just gives guideance for the roleplaying side of the game. That's why using realism to debate most points is mostly pointless.

Posted by: RHat Oct 15 2013, 01:15 AM

First, it doesn't get to change the mechanics, PERIOD. Second, that is what happens when SOME items are bricked. Not when ALL times are bricked. What makes you so certain that 'ware fails in that manner? Any reasonable design for something like Wired Reflexes would include something to protect the user in case of catastrophic failure, similar in principle to a surge protector or to the shear pin on a boat motor - a part that needs to be replaced before you can use the item again, but that prevents a far, far, far more serious failure. It might smell like burnt silicon (which is not a good smell, let me tell you), you might feel the pop or hear the bang (and it would certainly be UNCOMFORTABLE) and so on, but more catastrophic failure like a freaking fire has been prevented. Hell, depending on how the failure occurs, this might be localized to a specific site that is near the skin, allowing for easy access and repair without requiring full surgery. Likely in the same place as a physical on/off switch and possible a physical wireless toggle might be.

Posted by: Tymeaus Jalynsfein Oct 15 2013, 01:33 AM

Laughable... Would not a Cyberdeck also employ such a surge protection device? Again, the Mechanics you are so proud of do not synch with the Fluff. THIS IS THE PROBLEM. When all else fails, the Fluff is more true to the world than the mechanics are, and indicate what the world actually looks like. And where, pray tell, is this physical wireless switch located? And WHY is it near the skin? Looks to me like you are inventing things of your own, things that even the Fluff does not describe. You cannot have your cake and eat it too... Either the fluff is meaningless and should be ignored, or it informs the way the world works and should be paramount. It cannot be both.

As someone asked earlier... Do you argue from a Simulationist or a Gamist perspective? One is Fluff and the Other is Mechanics. You cannot tell me that having burning bits of electronics in your body cavity is a non-damaging effect. That is so completely ludicrous a position that I assume that even you do not believe it.

So, it comes down to how you read the book. On one hand, it burns, sparks, pops, smells funny and whatnot (per the developers description), and there is absolutely no effect whatsoever other than that. Or it has the listed descriptive effects, and has a commensurate deleterious effect on the structure to which it is attached. For most hardware, this is of very little consequence. For Cyberware, however, this deleterious effect causes harm to the organism to which it is attached. In many cases, this effect would result in death or serious bodily harm.

Posted by: Tanegar Oct 15 2013, 01:41 AM

Are... are you trolling, now? You must be trolling. Your point flies squarely in the face of the given description, which states (as if it hasn't been quoted enough that we all know it by heart):
It doesn't say, "some devices," or "a few devices," or anything else along those lines. It says, "devices;" implicitly, all devices. What makes us so certain that 'ware fails in this manner? The book says so. It says so explicitly: Your postulation of reasonable design features shows you have a good handle on basic design philosophy... and is flatly contradicted by the book: All devices, when bricked, fail in the manner described, precluding the existence of any of those perfectly reasonable precautions. Once again, bricking cyberware relies on the assumption that the Sixth World is populated exclusively by people who are stupid and bad at their jobs, which in turn directly contradicts 20+ years of prior characterization.

This does not make sense. There is no rationalization you can apply which will cause it to make sense.

Posted by: DMiller Oct 15 2013, 01:48 AM

As a House Rule, we changed the fluff. We removed the popping, smoking and burning and replaced it with a firmware damage. This falls in line with the mechanical description and also explains why it doesn't cost money in replacement parts to repair. You have to correct or rebuild the damaged firmware (thus using Hardware rather than Software skill, though software skill would be more appropriate we didn't want to change the mechanics of the game in this respect).

Posted by: RHat Oct 15 2013, 02:19 AM

A cyberdeck might just have that (any time the combination of likelihood of such failure and severity of such failure is high enough, such a thing should be there). Fluff does not create mechanics, PERIOD. Physical switches were a thing in SR4, and they would HAVE to be near the skin because you're supposed to hit them with your damn hand.

In any case, I'm disappointed that you can't see the false dichotomy you're presenting. It's not "either fluff is meaningless or it informs the way the world works" - simply put, fluff informs the way the world works but it does not have primacy over mechanics, and thus where they conflict mechanics take precedent (and a mistake has been made).

In any case, I'm telling you that burning bits of electronics may happen for things outside of the body, but it doesn't happen for things inside the body.

And no, it doesn't come down to how you read the book - it comes down to reading a passage to say something it doesn't. That passage says that those things are possible, not that they are what happens in all cases. Why MUST 'ware be a case where things like burning happen?

Posted by: Dolanar Oct 15 2013, 03:25 AM

No one is suggesting it is only ware, its just that a bricked gun that sizzles can be dropped as a basic necessity, the passage in question says that it ALWAYS fails spectacularly, I expect guns to sizzle & crackle, minor explosions here & there depending on what is bricked. I guess it depends on what a Spectacular fail is to each person.

Posted by: mrslamm0 Oct 15 2013, 04:10 AM

Yeah that's how I will run it if my group goes the 5th ed route. I was listening to the critical glitch pod cast on the matrix the other day and they were talking about hacking cyberware. Pretty much from what I understand as they explain it its the Decker going in and messing with the firmware/OS of the system and turning off the bonuses so it doesn't know how to properly operate. As this has been thrown around I think it comes down to poor wording and such, they could of left out the small fires and sparks bit.

Posted by: RHat Oct 15 2013, 04:32 AM

But to be clear, what it doesn't say is that all of those things happen all of the time. That the more problematic things don't happen for ware is reasonable to say, and in the fact that there are no rules for such things points to that as well.

Posted by: Dolanar Oct 15 2013, 05:01 AM

with no concrete rules there is NO WAY to to determine what happens, just that ANY & ALL devices that get bricked, fail spectacularly, this is ultimately GM Fiat. No one is wrong, no one is right, hence why I said upthread that until the writer or a proxy for that writer tells us their intent it is more or less pointless to argue or discuss it, everyone should do what they want, whatever makes their game run best for their table. I just personally think with such a glaring contradiction someone should come & Dispel this problem (even an unofficial, official errata by the writer would be nice)

Posted by: RHat Oct 15 2013, 05:19 AM

Fair, but I'll just say that intentionally resolving a grey area in a way you think is terrible makes absolutely no sense.

Posted by: mister__joshua Oct 15 2013, 08:06 AM

I just wanted to pick up on this post because it has been quoted as 'small fires are common', where as in context it actually says smoke, sparks, pops, bangs, sizzles and nasty smells are common, while small fires are occasional. The quote should be read as "These effects (Smoke, sparks, pops, bangs, sizzles, nasty smells, and occasionally even small fires) are common features of a device in the process of becoming a brick."


Also, common sense has been mentioned a lot in this thread, but not a lot has been applied. As someone who works in IT I have seen more than my fair share of bricked devices. Laptops, desktops, projectors, phones. I have a bunch in my office right now. In all my life I've only ever seen one device that had the risk of a small fire, and that was when the power controller on a motherboard broke and cooked the GPU. THAT smoked, smelled and would have started to burn if we hadn't switched it off. Most bricked computers just plain don't turn on anymore, or don't put out a picture. Projectors (devices that run hot, and require a lot of cooling) almost always start to smell but are designed to turn off if they overheat. I'd imagine internal cyberware doesn't run hot, as their isn't a lot of cooling available.

Needless to say, no device I have worked with has ever exploded.

Posted by: Chinane Oct 15 2013, 09:59 AM

Thanks for putting a bit of reason back into this thread.

I'm definitely NOT happy with the bricking rules and personally would prefer the default outcome a number of fuses needing replacement (which could even be an incentive to learn cybertechnology in order to self repair in the field) and RARELY serious hardware damage (basically for stuff where a surge protection is not reasonable, be it due to cost or miniaturization requirements). The 'spectacular effect' for my wired reflexes shutting down could be a blinky system alert in my image link, similar to what my car does when it demands i take it to maintenance.

The life threatening consequences projected here are IMO way too far reaching, EVEN for the poor implementation in RAW. Unless of course, the piece of 'ware being bricked is specifically keeping you alive, for example a pacemaker.

EDIT:
Regardless of the question if bricking could be salvaged into a workable rule, I still maintain that the vast majority of wireless bonuses/requirements are absolute crap, especially for cyberware.

Posted by: binarywraith Oct 15 2013, 12:44 PM

You're being a very selective literalist.

Those -are- the mechanics. That is literally every single word written about bricking in SR5. 'Preventing a more catastrophic failure' is purely against the express intent of the written rules, which state that all such failures -are- catastrophic.

In short, it's a terribly written bit of rule, but those are the rules as written.

Posted by: RHat Oct 15 2013, 02:08 PM

False. The rules are silent on the subject, and the rules state that all failures are spectacular, which is not remotely the same as catastrophic. See: They don't say fires happen in all cases, but that they are part of a list that covers most cases.

That bit of fluff should not exist, but it doesn't mean that you're suddenly taking damage when no rules for such a thing occurring, and for that matter that isn't even the only possibility the fluff creates, because the "spectacular failure" can happen in other ways.

Posted by: Kyrel Oct 15 2013, 04:48 PM

As I indicated earlier, this entire issue is a debate between the importance of the fluff vs. the rules. The way the Bricking crap has been written in the official texts, the fluff description lists a variety of common forms of catastrophic failure that result from the given mechanical item falling victim to "Bricking". As described, no level of regular logical thought on the matter should be able to conclude that it shouldn't most likely be AT LEAST VERY uncomfortable to someone, if they happen inside of that individual's body. Having any serious level of Voltage and Amps run rampant throughout your body is neither healthy nor comfortable in the real world. Try holding your hand inside a flame, or dip any part of your body in molten plastic and tell me that it isn't going to cause you any form of damage, and then imagine that this shit is happening INSIDE your body, or even your brain, and tell me that your regular common sense doesn't tell you that something like that happening inside your body will not cause at least severe discomfort, and that death couldn't be at least a possible consequence.

In terms of the rules, however, there are no descriptions of what happens at the Game Mechanical level to a victim of Bricking. Or rather, there is, but the thing is that the consequences of potentially having i.e. a commlink inside your brain cease to function, and give off sparks, leak electricity into your brain, along with smoke from overheated components and melted plastic, simply doesn't make sense on any level of common sense, as all it will take to fix this damage, is a couple of hours with a "mechanic", who won't even need to crack open your skull to get direct access to the blown fuses and whatever other damage has happened to the ruined 'ware. Also, as the mechanical rules go, having molten plastic run around inside your body/brain apparently isn't harmful or even unpleasant enough to cause any level of distraction in the mechanical sense.

Now, I'm willing to accept that we can come up with a variety of alternative descriptions that will make the fluff and the mechanics line up. But as the official rules are written for the moment, this simply isn't the case.

And so we are back to the fluff vs. mechanics argument. Having played a variety of roleplaying and tabletop games since around 1989, I'll put my head on the block and claim that:
A) Many players care more about having the fluff and the rules line up, than the designers/writers.
B) Game balance is less important than being able to make the product sell.
C) In terms of the game, the described mechanical rules trumphs the describing fluff. Especially if you argue based on the RAW point of view.

As much as I generally respect people on these boards, I have to say that based on RAW, it's pretty damned difficult argue that Bricking causes damage to a character, even if I too agree that based on the fluff description, Bricking implanted electronics should at least impose some level of negative modifiers to the character (and not just cause the elimination of the bonusses from the bricked gear), and in some cases they should cause a fatality. But as much as I hate to say it, the mechanical rules do not support that interpretation, and thus we are left with the current idiotic situation where the fluff describes truely catastrophic damage that typically reduce electrical equipment to non-functional pieces of hard to repair crap, and the mechanical rules that say that all you really need after having something bricked, is to "visit someone with a screwdriver" for some light repairwork...even if the bricked gear is located inside your body and really should require something comparable with open heart surgery. Now until we either get the writer and rule designer to show up on the board and clarrify what they actually intended when they wrote this stuff, we are stuck with dealing with the mechanical rules, and curse, bitch, whine, and moan about the fluff descriptions, which don't line up with the mechanics on any level. To some of us this is no big deal. To others of us, this is a god damned clusterf*ck that detracts severely from the enjoyment of the game.

/Kyrel

Posted by: Kyrel Oct 15 2013, 04:54 PM

A thought just occured to me. If the "Bricked" state happens once the gear has taken matrix damage equal to or beyond it's matrix "damage boxes", why not, as a house rule, simply let "overflow" damage done to the gear cause physical boxes of damage on a person with the gear implanted. Thus if your gear has 4 boxes of matrix damage left, and it takes 6 boxes worth of damage, the thing is bricked, and the character takes 6-4=2 boxes worth of physical damage due to whatever form the described "spectacular" damage to the equipment takes.

Posted by: RHat Oct 15 2013, 07:13 PM

Oh, it would certainly be noticed no matter what. The point of argument here, though, is that the passage to which you refer does not in any way state or imply that all of those things happen in all circumstances. Ergo, it is logical to infer that only some of those things happen in any given circumstance. It is not unreasonable to suggest that in the circumstance that the bricked item is an implant, the things that would potentially damage a person do not happen due to designed failure paths being in place to prevent that.



Because a bricked device should not directly damage the user. A bricked vehicle might, or bricking something in the presence of a gas leak might, but otherwise no.

Frankly, bricking isn't the sort of risk I'd like to see in the first place, but the system I'd prefer is a lot more complicated to balance.

Posted by: Kyrel Oct 15 2013, 07:44 PM

This is really one of those things that can be debated ad nauseam, right up until the designers tells us what the "truth" is. Arguably you are right RHat. What can be argued to suggest other wise, is that every example the writers/designers have given, would likely be pretty damned bad, if they happened inside someone's body. Also, it is, as I recall, specified that the failure always is "spectacular" in some way. My interpretation of that word would normally mean that you get some form of more or less visually impressive effect. Having an internal fuse burn out, having a few LED's shut down, and/or having a failure notice show up in your AR window, or as a text message on your Commlink, would not exactly be "spectacular".



"Because a bricked device shouldn't damage the user" is your oppinion. It's quite valid, but it's your subjective oppinion, even if RAW the designers apparently agreed with your view on that issue (even if the fluff writers possibly didn't).

As such I'm not opposed to the theoretical posibility of hacking someone's cyberware, but for me the ability for security conscious professionals to avoid that kind of hazard, is a key issue. That, and a decent correlation between the fluff and the game mechanics. If the fluff specifies that a device that is bricked "blow up" in some sort of potentially dangerous manner, I'll want that potential consequence to be present within the rules. But that's my oppinion.

/Kyrel

Posted by: Tymeaus Jalynsfein Oct 15 2013, 07:50 PM

I agree that Bricking is poorly done and not what I would like. I am curious, though. What would you LIKE to see? Complicated makes no never mind to me.

Posted by: RHat Oct 15 2013, 07:57 PM

In short, my ideal system is one where the options after compromising a device are listed after its wireless bonus, allowing for a more nuanced system overall (such that rather than simply destroying someone's eyes, you instead can explicitly send false images and the like, or if you get into their wires you can cause them to zig when they should have zagged so to speak - but given strict and defined mechanical weight), which would then allow for the severity of the effect to be modulated right alongside the strength of the bonus; this would make it rather easy to have a system where your wireless bonuses are worth it because in designing it you simply have to consider whether players will find Bonus X to be worth risking a hacker getting access to Actions A, B, and C. Wireless bonuses that are actually worth the risk and an interesting system that gives the hacker cool things to do, all at once - and it lets the hacker actually be subtle about it if he wants.

Posted by: Tymeaus Jalynsfein Oct 15 2013, 08:10 PM

Interesting... though wouldn't just throwing a few Marks on a device give you the access to screw with it in interesting ways? Which works now, from the way I read it.
And yes, I would like to see actual Wireless Bonuses that mattered.

Posted by: Wounded Ronin Oct 15 2013, 08:12 PM

What I think is kind of humorous about all this is that my gut feeling is that the spectacular failure rule was probably simply written because whoever wrote it decided that if ware fails the user should know, as opposed to the GM being like, "Oh, this guys wired reflexes failed, but he doesn't know till he moves slowly in the next firefight, ha ha ha."

And then they never thought it through to the extent that it has been argued here.

Posted by: Sendaz Oct 15 2013, 08:33 PM

And see that is the weird part, certainly this should have come up in the playtesting with the various groups during development.

Yet the impression one gets from the few comments handed down is they don't see it as an issue, or even a possible issue with one going into long detail of how it all worked, only to have to retract and backtrack when they realized that what they thought the system was wasn't what the final cut was.

Perhaps they simply invoked the TJ Fallacy and the playgroups just never brought up or were exposed to situations where this would have been relevant/noticeable.

Posted by: Tymeaus Jalynsfein Oct 15 2013, 08:35 PM

Posted by: Kyrel Oct 15 2013, 08:58 PM

>>I just realised that T.J. and not RHat posed the question my comment below is answering, and which I initially thought was meant for me *LOL* Now I know I'm getting tired<<


What would I like to see RHat >>should have read T.J.<<? Good question really, because I'm sort of divided on the issue. On the one hand, I don't mind that a skilled hacker might have the possibility to spoof/hack a piece of cyberware, if the victim haven't made sure to take steps to prevent it. But on the other hand, being able to screw up potentially lifecritical systems implanted into someone's body from affar. Especially if said equipment really shouldn't have ANY need at all of being accessible at a distance, rubs me the wrong way.

I can see the possibilities that could be in allowing a hacker to shut down a pair of cybereyes or take over a limb, or something to that effect. but I can also see a couple of challenges with such possibilities, depending on exactly how you implement those options. Things can quickly get either very fiddly on the game mechanical level, or it will end up being left very much up to the GM to decide what will be possible to get away with or not. Both paths present it's own set of challenges and criticism. Though it might make perfect sense, for a hacker to be able to utterly cripple a street sam with significant amounts of chrome, another question in this regard is also whether it is fun to be on the receiving end of, as a player. It might sound cool on paper when a hacker takes over the body of a street sam and turn him aginst his colleagues, but just as it isn't much fun to have your character be on the receiving end of a mind control spell, would it really be fun to have a security spider shut down the effects of ½mil. worth of 'ware, or take over your character and have him/her start blasting away at your fellow PC's? That I'm not so convinced of.

Then you have the issue of believability, which I find somewhat important. Though I'd like the cinematic effect of Bricking that's been described in the fluff of 5th ed., if I was watching a movie, I have to ask the question of whether I really believe that it should be possible to cause this level of damage to a given piece of gear, simply by hacking it. You could say that if you remove various software safeguards and the like, why shouldn't a particular piece of gear be able to destroy itself in a spectacular manner? The reason, IMO, is design. If you are designing a piece of gear that is going to be implanted into someone's body, I can't really envision that you will design it so that a simple software hack will be able to cause it to destroy itself. Safeguards etc. won't simply be a matter of software settings and coding, it will also be a matter of circuit design, fuses, over voltage protection, over temperature protection, short circuit protection etc. There will be safeguards and back-up systems, especially on systems where you could have potentially fatal consequences of a failure. And in a world where stuff can be hacked in a matter of seconds, regardless of which level of security you've tried to install, the importance of hardware security design that can't be bypassed or turned off, without physically getting your hand on the thing, will be even more important.

I know it might sound like a double standard, seen in light of my earlier criticism, but based on this view, if you want hackable 'ware, 5th ed. actually does it OK with it's mechanical effects, even if it screws up on the coordination of the fluff and mechanics. Effectively you get the option of turning some stuff off, or leaving it on. The gear isn't damaged as such, but it might require a hard reset or something, but it's an easy fix once you are out of combat. But again. If your character has spend ½mil. on various types of 'ware, will it really be any fun to have these abilities taken away at the drop of a hat? Would it be any more fun than it would be to take away a mage's ability to use magic, or a hacker's ability to hack anything and access the matrix at all?

In some situations it might make sense to allow a competent hacker to download diagnostics data or something, or he might be able to hack into the video feed from the sam's cybereyes, or his audio feed from the cyberears. But where do you draw the line?

If I'm going to conclude something on the above, I'll say that I wouldn't be complaining if it was possible for a competent hacker to hack cyberware, if the owner hadn't made sure to take steps to protect himself from such an act. In this respect I actually believe that 4a hit it OK. I'd probably leave the exact options on what you could do, if you managed to hack the cyberware, fairly open, allowing for player creativity and GM moderation. I'd make sure to include some examples of what could be done, in order to provide a decent picture of the "power level" of what a hacker could creadibly get away with. I'd probably want the options to be more of a short term/spoof level temporary effect, rather than causing real damage to the gear, and I'd probably also want to prevent actual sustained "remote control" of gear and thereby the owner. Dropping your gun or throwing off your aim or something is OK, but becoming a puppet is problematic for the same reason that Control Actions/Mind etc. is.

If it should be decided that it should be possible to get 'ware to fail in the spectacular manner described in 5th ed., then I'd insist on having such damage cause potentially severe damage to the owner of the 'ware. And I'd probably still insist that the fluff description be changed a bit, so as to not make it sound so clear to regular common sense, that having various forms of 'ware fail in a spectacular manner, would obviously be fatal.
Hope that makes some sense, I'm getting tired.

/Kyrel

Posted by: Smash Oct 15 2013, 09:13 PM

The great thing about fluff (unfortunately not in this case) is that it is subjective. Unless it says cyberware causes "X physical damage based on essence cost" when bricked then you're just making up whatever the effect is.

You should draw the conclusion then that if you're interpretting it a certain way and that makes you belief that the bricking rules are to harsh, then perhaps you are interpretting the fluff incorrectly.

I'd also still like to know why a deltaware cyberarm taking only 0.5 essence instead of the usual 1 doesn't destroy the fabric of the universe?

Posted by: RHat Oct 15 2013, 09:43 PM

Only insofar as you can convince your GM an existing Matrix Action covers it, which really does limit your options at the best of times (using existing Matrix Actions, I don't see what you're gonna do to wires) - and when I approach tabletop games, I take a certain design philosophy that holds that you take as much of that load as possible off the GM; it's not his job to fill the holes in your system, he's just the poor bastard who gets stuck doing it if it needs done.

In any case, giving WR something like a Sensor-based bonus to defense tests that is determined based on the sensors you have access to, possibly capped by the Data Processing of the node it's routing through (essentially using powerful and advanced predictive algorithms to process reflexive action based on more than what you can yourself perceive). IF someone was using this wireless bonus, a hacker would than be able to force a corrupted signal through to create some specific effect upon the person with the wires (such as forcing them out of cover, imposing a penalty upon all tests for a Combat turn, an effect similar to the Accident power...). At that point, you could even start to give some items more than one wireless bonus, with each one opening up different options for the hacker.

The complication entailed here is that to figure out what you can do with the device you just found, either the GM has to have those actions listed in his notes or you have to look it up. Of course, you could have a super-set of actions that covered for various types of wireless bonuses, such as a Corrupt Signal action that could apply to any Signal wireless bonus (basically, any bonus that is based on a specific signal from Points A through Y to Point Z) to make things a little simpler.

Posted by: kzt Oct 15 2013, 09:43 PM

SR playtesting has always been weak. When it was done at all. It usually wasn't done at all.

Posted by: binarywraith Oct 16 2013, 01:42 AM

We don't actually know, of course, because nowhere in the book do the writers actually talk about bricking cyberware.

The section under bricking reads as if it is specifically applying to handheld devices such as commlinks and guns. So do the repair rules, as it is absurd to assume that implanted cybernetics, many of which have components that are not accessible without cybersurgery, are fixable with a simple toolkit and an hour of fiddling.

Posted by: Erik Baird Oct 16 2013, 01:49 AM

Yeah, one gets the impression that the developers didn't think about the possibility of remotely attacking cyberware, even though they made cyberware wireless by default.

Posted by: binarywraith Oct 16 2013, 02:09 AM

Have you read the first SR5 Missons adventure?

Posted by: DeathStrobe Oct 16 2013, 02:16 AM

I actually figured that new cyber has external panels you can access to fiddle around with their insides.

Like Data from Star Trek
http://star-trek-world.info/stw/galerie/3/4/Data_brain01.jpg

This way it makes the repairs quick and easy without having to go under the knife every time your headdeck explodes.

Posted by: Smash Oct 16 2013, 02:23 AM

This doesn't prove much except that some schmoes who are writing content can have varying opinions, just like players.

Posted by: RHat Oct 16 2013, 03:10 AM

Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't that take place in the CZ, where you're pretty much never going to be able to get your bonuses due to Noise anyways? Under that circumstance, there is literally no reason to have wireless going.

Posted by: tasti man LH Oct 16 2013, 03:41 AM

Last I checked, Noise really only affects Matrix actions and tests. Not the wireless bonuses themselves.

Unless if I'm mis-remembering...

Posted by: RHat Oct 16 2013, 03:49 AM

Noise in excess of DR denies wireless bonuses.

Posted by: KarmaInferno Oct 16 2013, 03:50 AM

Personally, I would have made it EASIER to 'brick', or hijack, or otherwise mess with equipment (as in a complex action to pull it off), but have the equipment recover automatically in a few passes as it reboots and restores from backup. If the afflicted user wants his gear back online faster, he can spent actions to do so.



-k

Posted by: tasti man LH Oct 16 2013, 03:54 AM

Whoops, nvm.

That said, the Mission states that the default Noise in the CZ is always at 2. And I don't think all of the listed devices in the Mission are DR 2...

Posted by: RHat Oct 16 2013, 04:06 AM

That is a big part of what I was getting at before - actions with brief but meaningful affects that can be done without concern for setup, merely for locating a valid target.

As for the Mission, I haven't read it, but you don't hit DR 3 until stuff like alphaware, and even that's 1 point of noise from having its bonuses not work.

Posted by: RHat Oct 16 2013, 04:06 AM

That is a big part of what I was getting at before - actions with brief but meaningful affects that can be done without concern for setup, merely for locating a valid target.

As for the Mission, I haven't read it, but you don't hit DR 3 until stuff like alphaware, and even that's 1 point of noise from having its bonuses not work.