Thought experiment in simsense, Is there a point to this? Options

[Moon-Hawk]

Okay, here's the setup:
Get a simrig, implanted or external doesn't matter, but you're recording your own sensorium.
Go full-hot VR, but disable the RAS override so you can still move, just like they do with some BTLs.
Feed your own sensorium back into yourself in real-time at hot-sim levels.

There would be some lag, but given the way things work in SR4 it seems like the lag would be small enough that it just doesn't matter. Basically, it seems pointless, since you're just substituting your senses with your own senses in real-time, except you crank it up to more-real-than-real hot sim levels.

Any reason you couldn't do this? Any reason you'd want to? Would this be the way to walk around for a hot-sim junkie? I could see giving +1 reaction in exchange for low pain tolerance and susceptability to hot-sim attacks.
Thoughts?

[James McMurray]

I could see this being like a drug, with everything more real then everything else. BTL addicts could live their own lives as a BTL.

[Lord Ben]

Yeah, if I were the DM on a purely houserule basis I'd let it be equal in power to one of the street drugs. +1 to a few things isn't out of line for living your own life "more real". It has it's own built in downsides... :)

[Moon-Hawk]

So what would it take, hot-sim module (250), trodes (50), and a simrig (1000). So 1300Y, right?
Benefits comparable to a street drug, but any suggestions on what, exactly?

[djinni]

personally I'd leave modifiers "as is" due to the lag issue (even though there isn't one).
but you can reason that there would be a drop in willpower due to sensory stimuli overloading the brain, in addition Perception would be higher due to the little sound of the mouse walking around is now BTL level. Reactions wouldn't be faster but you would be in a heightened state of adrenaline if you are paranoid, which most BTL users are I think. so a sudden sound or movement might make you jump lethally, as in you quickdraw and fire...perform a hardblock on someone who accidentaly snuck up on you, things like that.

[Eryk the Red]

Interestingly, this would probably result in any injuries you suffer causing biofeedback, which would then hurt you more. That'd be another ill effect. Sort of like you're rigging your own body.

[ShadowDragon8685]

[Moon-Hawk]

I don't believe you take actual stun damage if you're watching a sim of someone who takes stun damage. I think you'd only take it the one time.

Although I do see a strong argument for slapping the low pain tolerance quality on as an effect.

[Lord Ben]

Off the top of my head: -1 charisma, -1 willpower, +1 reaction +1 intuition, 1 stun damage per hour, normal BTL addiction rules.

Alternately you could rationalize +1 initiative pass because you're hyper aware and giving your body commands much faster. Probably then you'd make it an additional 4S when used in combat to gain init passes.

[2bit]

[RunnerPaul]

[2bit]

[Moon-Hawk]

Mana illusions can't be recorded by simsense, so this would make you immune to mana illusions, right?
Also, it would seem, that physical illusions would have to overcome the object resistance of the simsense recording, but then no resistance roll would be allowed, since you don't get to resist recorded illusions.

At least, that's the way it seems, but considering the circumstances I'm not exactly sure.

[Demerzel]

My first thought, "Wouldn't that cause a feedback loop that would make your brain explode?"

[RunnerPaul]

I seem to recall something about how they record commercial sim -- when they need to use computer-generated special effects or they want to use a stunt double to keep their big name simstar safe, they'll take the initial recording, and play it back for the simstar, and record the sensations of the simstar as they experience the playback. They do this to smooth out the final recording: the computer-generated effects don't come off as being quite as-computer generated the second time through the sensorium, and any differences between simstar and stunt double become blurred when they're actually played back through the simstar.

Point I'm trying to make here though, is that there's a fluff precedent that if you hook a simrig up to someone who's getting sim pumped into their brain, you don't get a recording of what their body is actually experiencing, you get a recording of how their brain perceives the playback.

So the setup described in the original post would be a great way to set up the simsense equivalent of feedback loop, just like the squeal of audio when you point your microphone at your speakers, or the bright fractal shapes that you get when you point your video camera at the screen it's hooked up to.

Especially if you're throwing hot sim and the lack of RAS Feedback. I wouldn't be surprised if this kind of setup didn't make your head just explode like that pensioner from the Blipvert episode of Max Headroom.

Edit: Upon typing all that and posting, then seeing what was posted a few minutes before, I just have to say: "what Demerzel said."

This post has been edited by RunnerPaul: Dec 13 2006, 07:42 PM

[ShadowDragon8685]

[James McMurray]

I thought there wreen't any L wounds in SR4. There you go, you're safe. :)

[2bit]

[Moon-Hawk]

Hmmmm, RunnerPaul may have a point here. This may just not work.If it's constantly recording what you're seeing through the playback, rather than what your nerves are taking in, then it would be like being trapped in a frozen moment of time.
Good for torture, maybe, but not much else.

What if, instead of using a simrig to record your sensorium, you were using a touch link, cybereyes, cyberears, etc? Those would still be getting raw data from your nerves, which could then be converted to hot sim and played back to you.
That would eliminate the feedback loop, but at that point it's so much work that it's also eliminating the point. :-)

[Eryk the Red]

Not sure where I stand on the feedback loop. (The real pain gets recorded and played back as sim pain, but does that sim pain get recorded and replayed, thus creating the loop? Not sure.)

As for the mana illusions, I'd say it doesn't affect it. The illusion doesn't get recorded, but if you don't resist, you see it anyway. Mana illusions trick the mind, not the optic nerve. You believe you are seeing it. Regardless of where your sensory data is coming from.

[Demerzel]

[Backgammon]

Not really, MBW puts you in a constant sate of "controlled" seizure. It doesn't do anything about enhancing your sensorial inputs.

I think it would be just much simpler though if you just had a brain implant that just jacked whatever sensorial experience you felt. I'm sure that in SR they are sufficiently knowledgeable about brainwaves to be able to identify and jack up brain waves associated to touch, smell, taste. No need to record anything.

I think "sense junkies" are a great social trend ideas for youth gangs. They'd be like today's emos, but like, times 100. Hey, in fact, you could couple sensorial boosting with emotionnal boosting. You'd be on one hell of a ride, allright. Annoying as hell to anyone around you though. Perfect for teenagers. Perfect for teenagers the runners are hired to extract. Muahah. Evil.

[Moon-Hawk]

Emotional boosting? But....teenagers already have that. :-)

Maybe this is the sort of thing that could just be accomplished with a correctly designed BTL chip?

I agree that "sense junkies" or whatever you call them would be a neat bit of flavor in the setting.

[2bit]

[ixombie]

Tripchips already do exactly what this thread propses: jack up your senses to hot sim levels. Now, some of them add psychadelics and suchnot, but the basic ones are just like digital e.

And I think the real problem is that, in full VR, your senses are disabled. See p.228. You wouldn't sense anything, so the simrig would have no data to feed back to you.

Now, in AR, you can still sense things while recieving hot-sim level data if you have a BTL modified sim module. However, the problem is that, with this idea, you have to sense them before they can be recorded and fed back to you. So the hyper real data would be like a vivid after-image trailing after everything you see and echoing everything you hear, etc... Might be fun, but it would give you about as much of a bonus as being in a strobe light.

I think that the thing to do is, if you feel like it would add to the game, allow BTL trip chips to give bonuses. It's not hard at all to envision a BTL making everything super clear and sharp, giving you extra perception dice. I wouldn't say reaction, because reaction is how fast your body responds. BTLs affect enhance your mind, so perception seems more appropriate.