God damn it. Epic fail on my part. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/frown.gif)

I've always played it the other way around. You have to raise your link stats the same way you raise yours with karma: one by one. This way my players aren't all carrying a maxed-out metalink.

I handle it like in real life: Anyone who buys a new processor offers the old one to the circle of friends, at a bargain price. Or keeps it. Pretty close to the RAW this time, which has a 10% base rate for resale (30% - "Used" mod). Yes, I permit my players to buy used gear.

Sorry to necro this thread but I had another question/thought, but first: Blade, RAW disagrees with you. They don't say anything about having to buy up each point of Response/Signal. Now if you're house ruling it, then that's up to you, but RAW says that you can take a meta link and soft max it at Charactergen for 5000 (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nuyen.gif)

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Anyways, my question for everyone: Can you cluster together commlinks? Unwired said about "low powered devices", but I was thinking about a hacker concept called "Nexi-Man" =^.^= Anyways, the idea is that you have multiple cyber hands/feet and put a commlink in each of those. Max out the Response on all of those, but forget the Signal... that's handled by the Commlink in the head. That's 5 Commlinks to cluster together. All of them maxed out Response, and the one in the head has maxed out Signal and you are a walking Nexus. Want to run ALL of your programs at once? No problem with Nexi-Man!

Now please tell me what's the problem with this setup (other than money)... if there is one. I'm thinking with the setup I threw together that you can run 12 Rating 5 programs at the same time, but maybe I'm mis-reading the rules.

Thanks in advance

Only problem is: You won´t really need that kind of processing power, unless you want to run a group of agents. Plus, that´s a small number (say four) of very high-powered devices, so I think I would prefer slaving. These are after all devices you own for the purpose of running programs, not nodes you simply need to defend.

My question is why are you bothering with hands and feet? Just get one leg and you have more capacity, more concealability, more style, and everything's in one easy-to-maintain spot for convenience. Plus you can get the other perks such as an improved Physical Tract. It also gives you space for ten commlinks if, for whatever reason, you really wanted to go wild with that concept.

Because I thought you could only get one of any item in a cyber limb.

No. It's just usually there's no need to get multiple, such as having two hand blades. But you can put multiple commlinks into an arm or leg.

If you want to cluster them, you can do so with no problem. That won't give you a nexus, however. Your System will still be restricted by your Response, as will be your processor limit and persona limits (although those will be increased). The only way to get around that is to find a reasonable Capacity cost for a nexus, then have one installed. I'd say that the capacity requirement would be fairly hefty, though.

Yes it's still limited by response... but the cluster gains several nexus-like properties.

1. Process limit goes up (response degrades more slowly).
2. Personas increase linearly
3. Subscriptions increase linearly (2x System per persona).
4. All subnodes are a single node for defense purposes.


A cluster of 4 response 6 chips would give you a process limit of 12 (w/ 48 subscriptions), So your response only degrades to 5 when running up to 23 programs (while still maintaining 40 subscriptions)!

Also remember a nexus still has it's response degrade. Response still limits your running programs on a nexus. So the only difference I see is that a nexus won't see it's System rating degrade as it loads down (reducing number of subscriptions). So really, once you get 3 or more clustered together, you effectively have a nexus.

Importantly it's not obvious.
IMO: a small nexus is about the same to me as an old school portable decking unit.

No. System does. And System does not degrade when Response does.

Okay Rotbart... how do you read any meaning into the following then.

p50: ..."They (nexi) have a higher processor limit, allowing for more active programs (with the exception of agents, IC, AIs, sprites, and e-ghosts, which are limited by Response per standard rules--see Response p212 SR4). Their configuration and design also means that System rating is not capped by Response. Nexi are designed to run multiple personas; their persona limit equals System X 3."... Min Proclimit 10, Max 50.

How do you read this.

Why bother delinking System and Response... only to turn around and say specifically that these items are limited by response per standard rules?

Reading that makes me think for those Response limits System normally, as well as severely limiting the number of agents you can run concurrently w/o degrading response. (proclimit of 50 w/ rating 3 system means 3rd agent degrades response IMO).
What happens when process limit is exceeded on a nexus? None of the running programs degrade? The nexus runs 'normally' until response hits zero and the whole thing comes crashing down?

IMO: the biggest reason you want a large proc limit is so that you can run agents heavily laden w/ their own sub programs. Please correct me as I'm unsure on this, but aren't sub-programs used by an agent limited to the agent's rating?

They are limited. It's just the limit is extremely more generous, to the point of being a non-issue.

Falconer: You said it yourself: "They (nexi) have a higher processor limit, allowing for more active programs (with the exception of agents, IC, AIs, sprites, and e-ghosts, which are limited by Response per standard rules--see Response p212 SR4). Their configuration and design also means that System rating is not capped by Response."

So, System is not capped by Response. You might face Response degradation by exceeding your processor limit, but it won't affect your System rating. What I find to be bizarre is that the Persona limit is different than the number of E-Ghosts, AI's, Agent's, IC, and Sprites permitted.

Cain:
I'm not arguing that I made a mistake. Normal programs at least as stated. In posting, I realized I had made a mistake when pointed out. I'm learning fast here thanks to peoples help.

No, the response section of SR4 which it specifically references states in the sentence you so kindly typed again. Response degrades by 1 for every System number process run. I think it's clearly stating that for Agents, IC, etc. which we'll call the "special programs" in which System (not process limit) limits response. I believe they're trying to limit the number of agents that can be run on the nexus. (Persona is unrelated... System x 3 is just the max personas, w/ the min of 1 when you custom build the things).

If they're completely delinked... then exceeding proc limit doesn't degrade programs running as they're limited by System, which isn't related to response. Somehow, I suspect this is going to get an errata (that if response drops by 1, so does system).

Correct me if I'm wrong, but Response is primarily used for matrix initiative. Trying to think what else... so why not just run your response at 1 on the nexus if it's such a dump stat? (well 3 since that's the 'cheap' bang/buck point and gives you room to 'overclock' on programs).

The only thing the above quote says is that System is not capped by Response. That means you can have a System 6 on a Response 2 system. But every time you're running too many programs (albeit with a much larger capacity and with the rating maxed by System rather than indirectly by Response as it is in a normal node), the Response will still drop. And both Response and System have other mechanics associated with them that are not affected by this.

So if you have a System 6x5, Response 2 nexus, it can run 30 rating 6 programs without affecting the Response. Run one more, and it drops to Response 1. Likewise, all 30 of those programs are running on a Response 2 system, severely crippling your initiatve, stealth, firewall defense, and so on and so forth. So even on a nexus, you still want a high System and Response rating. You just get a multiplier on the number of programs you can run at once and can run programs with a rating higher than Response, but not System. Which, honestly, is how it should have been to begin with.

Unless I'm completely misunderstanding the basic rules again. Which wouldn't be a surprise. I'm just Matrix Dyslexic or something.

Funk:
System != Process limit. It's not 6X5. It's System6, Proclimit 30. (and you can run 29 programs safely, the 30th would degrade the response, just as a response6 system6 commlink... it's the 6th program which degrades the response).

Again:
p50: ..."They (nexi) have a higher processor limit, allowing for more active programs (with the exception of agents, IC, AIs, sprites, and e-ghosts, which are limited by Response per standard rules--see Response p212 SR4).
P212-Response
..."For every x number of programs you have actively running, where x = System Rating, Your response is reduced by 1."

I can think of only one way to interpret that sentence so it actually has meaning.

Agents, sprites, IC's, AI's, etc. obviously don't count as 'standard programs', if they did there would be no reason to single them out as subject to standard rules for response! The rating they run at is covered on p213-System which the paranthetical doesn't reference. So I don't think they degrade RAW. But I DO think RAW they degrade the response of the nexus faster than running multiple copies of browse.

Think of it this way. I bring up my list of running tasks... most of them are well behaved programs like browse, edit, and analyze. They don't hog resources. However, agents use lots of resources because they're constantly running analyzing using their 'virtual intelligence' to think (VI, to borrow the term from Mass Effect for programs which aren't quite full AI's). I can easily run 29 copies of the web browser, however I can only run 5 copies of the data search agent before the response degrades. This probably works into, running 24 browse programs, and 5 search agents at once (29 processes, 5 of which are 'special').

I suspect this is what the authors are trying to communicate.

On your other bit... What I've found for response so far.... looking for more...
Response + Intuition/pilot: Matrix Initiative
Response + Firewall: defend against cyberattack (not stealth as per errata)
Response + BlackIC: stopping someone hit by blackice from jacking out
Response + pilot: p100 agent scripts
Response + Analyze: defending against spoofed program limitation (p99)
Response + Decrypt: breaking encryption extended test
Response + System: (10, 1combat) Extended test to reboot system.
Whole bunch of drone bits.

That's easy. You open p. 212 of the main book an search for an instance of Response limiting Programs.
There just isn't any, so obviously, the author of said quote wasn't really sure what he wrote about. But that's ok, Unwired has some more of that... the finest example being DNI.

6x5 = 30.


I get it. I just think it's stupid. Why would an Agent/IC/Pilot spontaneous start requiring more resources on a nexus compared to a regular node where they take up exactly the same as any other program? And why would it vary from nexus to nexus as well? I mean, a System 5/Processor 5/Response 5 nexus could only run four out of 24 possible programs before degrading while a System 5/Processor 25/Response 5 nexus could only run four out of 125 programs? /boggle

I hate the Matrix.

I think what he means is, the processor limit could be theoretically anything, it doesn't have to be a x5. He just picked an example at random. You could have System 6, processor limit 22, if you wanted.


Well, I would say that it's to keep people from using a nexus as a super-chokepoint, loading it down with enough IC to make a glacier look like a Caribbean island. But the problem is, a cluster can load enough constructs to have your own personal Agent Smith army. So, the answer is: I'm not entirely sure, but I think some people weren't talking to each other when they wrote their rules. Oh, and I think they were allowed to playtest their own rules-- a serious error.

Oh, here's one that'll bake your noodle. What happens when you cluster a nexus with an ordinary computer?

Yeah, me to.



Yours, maybe. You get a cluster.

Yeah, but is your system still limited by response? I mean, it would if you clustered nexi, right?

Clusters follow normal matrix node rules. Doing that to a nexus earns you a discussion with your accountant.

Sorry for dragging this up, but can I get confirmation on this? If accurate, does it mean that a stock Meta Link Commlink with Vector Xim OS (System 1/Response 1) can't even run a rating 1 program without crashing?

hmm, a cybersuite built specifically to be a large cluster of comlinks...

anyone else reminded of the wiseman from chrombook2 (or was it 3?) from cp2020?

Per the German version of the RAW, you just gain a negative DP mod for all response-linked tests. So your Comlink can run programs just fine, as long as you don´t need Response for anything (Adviseable with that hardware anyway).

As our translators took some "very creative liberties", you might want to recheck with the English RAW.