 Hacker Theory, Why this is possible. |
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 Jan 31 2007, 01:13 PM
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#192
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Running Target  Group: Members Posts: 1,498 Joined: 4-August 05 From: ADL Member No.: 7,534  |
But why the hell can it acces other nodes (meaning interacting with them without being uploaded to the node) when connected to a persona, but it cant do this without a persona and must upload itself. How can agents do searches at all? They need the right to upload themselves. Who in his right mind would give others per default the right to run their programs on their host? INSANE! I think Ill have to take a break or something. |
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Jan 31 2007, 01:23 PM
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#193
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Hoppelhäschen 5000 Group: Members Posts: 5,807 Joined: 3-January 04 Member No.: 5,951 |
Actually, this has been the case in SR3, 2 and 1. |
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Jan 31 2007, 01:27 PM
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#194
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panda! Group: Members Posts: 10,331 Joined: 8-March 02 From: north of central europe Member No.: 2,242 |
because in the first instance the persona of the hacker acts as a kind of bridge? there have been suspected since as long as i have hanged around dumpshock that the persona is a small bit of program running on the host/node your accessing. also, a agent that keeps uploading itself from machine to machine is being envisioned IRL. yes its a security nightmare, but thats a different story. the best way to secure a node is to take it offline. or if your really paranoid: unplug it from network and power, encase in concrete and depleted uranium. sink it to the bottom of the ocean at its deepest spot. post very well payed naval units over said spot. maybe then can you consider the data on the node secure.
i believe that said statement have been used about SR matrix rules since the days of SR1 (but i have no empirical evidence since i got into it post VR2.0)... |
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Jan 31 2007, 01:31 PM
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#195
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Running Target Group: Members Posts: 1,498 Joined: 4-August 05 From: ADL Member No.: 7,534 |
And this makes it better? |
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Jan 31 2007, 01:35 PM
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#196
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Running Target Group: Members Posts: 1,498 Joined: 4-August 05 From: ADL Member No.: 7,534 |
And you need a sentient being for that bridge? You cant just plug in the agent AI for that? Very mystical . . .
Why isnt the persona using the hosts attributes then (like an uploaded agent), but the commlinks? Once I believed in consistency and streamlining . . . Does anybody know some good yoga or such? I have this twitching in my right arm since your first post in this thread today. |
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Jan 31 2007, 01:38 PM
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#197
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panda! Group: Members Posts: 10,331 Joined: 8-March 02 From: north of central europe Member No.: 2,242 |
never apply logic to SR rules, it will only lead to insanity.
hmm, come to think of it. chould SR rule books contain parts of the necronomicon? |
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Jan 31 2007, 01:50 PM
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#198
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 208 Joined: 15-January 07 Member No.: 10,652 |
The Agent must run on the node for the same reason your persona needs to "enter" it. Hacking the matrix is a 'server-side' not 'client-side' process, essentially.
Shadowrun computers do not work like ours. They work like thirty-decade more advanced versions of what we thought computers would look like seventy years in the future fifteen years ago. So, take 1980's computer technology (and more importantly, poplar cultures knowledge of 1980's computer technology) and "look forward" seventy years to 2050. Now, take the resulting tech, and advance it another 20-years. The Matrix isn't based on Ars Technica whitepapers, it is based on Tron, Neuromancer, and the like. |
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Jan 31 2007, 03:24 PM
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#199
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Genuine Artificial Intelligence Group: Members Posts: 4,019 Joined: 12-June 03 Member No.: 4,715 |
It's also worth mentioning that with approximately 2-3 days work from said hacker, he will have cracked the copy protection on all of those programs, including the OS. So every other member of the team only has to pay the 2-3 BP, or maybe one good run's worth of nuyen to have a commlink that's just as good. Really, with how easy it is to copy programs I think it would be easier to just have commlinks cost a little bit more and roll attribute+skill for everything. Programs are barely worth including in the game at this point. Hmmm, that idea may actually be worth some serious consideration. I'll have to think about that. It would definitely be more "streamlined". Maybe keep program names for keeping track of response degredation, but just losing rating and cost. I'm going to stop, I'm spiraling into a wild tangent. |
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Jan 31 2007, 04:09 PM
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#200
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Running Target Group: Members Posts: 1,498 Joined: 4-August 05 From: ADL Member No.: 7,534 |
This is not about technology (!!!), this is about consistency. The persona is only interacting with the node, it is not running on the node (I know this for sure, because the persona uses the commlinks attributes, not the nodes it is interacting with). Why does the agent have to RUN on the node to interact with it? And why CAN an agent interact with a node while loaded onto a persona, but CANT when not with a persona? Consistency, not technology! Do it either this way or that, but please be consistent. Yours, Serbitar, spiraling down into madness, LUNACY, INSANITY. |
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Jan 31 2007, 05:23 PM
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#201
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 208 Joined: 15-January 07 Member No.: 10,652 |
Agent =/= Hacker
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Jan 31 2007, 05:43 PM
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#202
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Shooting Target Group: Members Posts: 1,706 Joined: 30-June 06 From: Fort Wayne, IN Member No.: 8,814 |
But there is a difference between consistency and everything being the same....I am getting the feeling, at least from this thread of posts, that you will only be satisfied with the core rules once every category of things is written out as being the same...its a noble pursuit, but I just don't see that being SR4, to me, at least. You want every node to act the same, every rating to mean the same (e.g. 6/6/6/6 coffee machine being equivalent to a 6/6/6/6 commlink), no difference between a TM and a traditional hacker, no difference between IC v. Agents v. Personas... While I agree with some of your points and efforts to introduce consistency across the board, I don't agree with all of them. I don't understand why you have a great need to have an agent run and act exactly like a persona...in this regard, I prefer the difference between the agents and personas...consistency in this, would be a bad move...again, IMO. |
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Jan 31 2007, 05:44 PM
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#203
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 941 Joined: 25-January 07 Member No.: 10,765 |
I'm going to repeat a couple of points that keep getting ignored. One, the hacker or hacker adept is not running better numbers out of the box. IF you have a permissive GM, maybe he is, but oddly, super-commlinks with 6/6/6/6 are one of the few things that actually have an availability code now, same with rating 6 software. If you aren't using those rules in your games, then sure, it's EASY to just get super hardware and software. But the rules are there, and I don't see why a brand new Runner should start with anything he can't get 'off the shelf'. Hardware has an availability 16 for each component. That's sixteen hits on an extended test. Software is gonna be a 12, with a six freaking month interval for system... how many runs can your TM run in a year? If you just randomly decide super systems are available at the stuffer shack then sure, your Technomancer has a balance issue. But then, you aren't using RAW, are you? And why, oh why, do you never rebutt on the threading issue? A Technomancer can get double his CF rating by threading. That makes up for a hell of a lot. |
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Jan 31 2007, 06:41 PM
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#204
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Running Target Group: Members Posts: 1,498 Joined: 4-August 05 From: ADL Member No.: 7,534 |
Consistency: x+x = y y+x = z => x+x+x = z x+x != z for all definitions of x Its called logic, It cant be broken, though you have the choice of what to put in for x. |
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Jan 31 2007, 06:53 PM
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#205
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Hoppelhäschen 5000 Group: Members Posts: 5,807 Joined: 3-January 04 Member No.: 5,951 |
Except 0. :vegm: |
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Jan 31 2007, 06:56 PM
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#206
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Prime Runner Group: Banned Posts: 3,732 Joined: 1-September 05 From: Prague, Czech Republic Member No.: 7,665 |
Actually, noone is talking about starting with a 6/6/6/6 Commlink. We're talking about a 5/5/6/6 Commlink. See, a Response and Signal of 6 is outside the starting availability. But getting a Rating 6 ine everything else is well within the starting availabilities. So you have a Response 5 and a Signal 5, and a Rating 6 System, Firewall, Attack, Stealth, etc. Why bother? Because it's expensive and difficult to upgrade all that crap to Rating 6 once play has begun, so you might as well have the 6 now even if it just runs at 5 until you get a better Response. Technomancers do that same thing - they start with every Complex Form they are allowed to have at Rating 6 because it's fucking expensive to buy the CFs up to 6 once play starts (6 Karma a piece, fuck that noise!) - we are talking about making characters for the long haul here. And as to inevitable question: Can you really upgrade your Commlink before play starts? Hellz yeah you can! The Sample Hacker on p. 96 of the basic book does exactly that. -Frank |
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Jan 31 2007, 07:05 PM
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#207
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 208 Joined: 15-January 07 Member No.: 10,652 |
I'm sorry, but you'll just have todeal with a certain amount of inconsistency...
Agents aren't Hackers. I prefer to look at it as a distinguishing factor, because imho it follows quite logically from the fluff and mechanics of the setting. But more importantly, it keeps the players the stars rather than their equipment. An Agent can not interact remotly with a node because it cannot. I don't know why, and I don't care why. The thing that distinguishes a Hacker from an Agent - and makes the Hacker better - is that the Hacker can use his cyberdeck's ratings, and the Agent is limited to the power of the node. If the Agent is operating alongside its Hacker, then it can work with the commlinks ratings... but the hacker has to be there. Agents aren't Hackers. Hackers can do things Agents can't. Because the hackers are players and the agents are numbers on a sheet. Sometimes we need to do things that distinguish the stars of the story from the background players. Why does Captain Kirk prove immune to the alien mind control, but not Red Shirt #456? Because Kirk is the Big Damn Hero. Why does the Enterprise fly from Venus to Mars in an hour in Episode 12, but take four days in Episode 47? Because the ship moves "at the speed of plot." Why hire a Hacker, instead of buying an Agent? Because your freind Bob's street sammy bought it last game session, and he rolled up a new hacker character. Agents aren't Hackers. Players get to do cool stuff, NPCs don't. |
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Jan 31 2007, 07:39 PM
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#208
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 941 Joined: 25-January 07 Member No.: 10,765 |
Using the prefigured archetypes to reflect character generation has a long history of not working. I recall that you couldn't make the archetypes in 1st edition using the rules without cheating... a reward for taking a premade character as I recall. Like I've said before, part of your complaint is that TM's spend Karma to upgrade and Hacker's don't. JUST LIKE Mages/Adepts vs. StreetSams... in a debate as old as the game. This doesn't reflect that the hacking rules alone are broken, only that character improvement isn't level between the money geeks and the mana geeks (now resonance geeks...). If you play with a GM who is stingy with the nuyen, making runners fight for beer money, then the karma crowd has an advantage when it comes to improvement. If the GM hands out the cash rewards like candy then it's the gadget freaks who get ahead... Yes, a TM winds up more of a specialist, having to make a few more hard calls in creating his character,but he can compete with even your Hacker Adept with threading and sprites, even out of the box. And if you are talking 'long haul', then you'll prefer the TM, who is uncapped, to the hacker or hacker adept who can start with a maximum dice pool at character creation and never get any better. Damn the karma costs. And if six karma is a lot to you to improve something, I have to wonder what 'improvement' table you've been reading??? To take a skill to level three costs six karma. To take a skill to level 6 costs 18! That's for a single point increase. |
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Jan 31 2007, 08:49 PM
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#209
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Prime Runner Group: Banned Posts: 3,732 Joined: 1-September 05 From: Prague, Czech Republic Member No.: 7,665 |
No. I'm aghast that the Technomancers spends ONE THOUSAND KARMA to equal a Hacker Adept shortly after chargen. We aren't talking the arcane mysteries of whether 1.5 million :nuyen: is worth 200 Karma (some games it is, some games it isn't). We're asking ourselves whether ONE THOUSAND KARMA is worth 11k. Righty-o. That's slightly more than one month's rent at high lifestyle vs. ONE THOUSAND KARMA. OK, now are we on the same page? The uncapped nature of the Technomancer does not come into being unto he has amassed a thousand Karma points. I have never heard of any character in any edition ever amassing that many Karma points to rub together. --- So yeah, in the "long run" eventually the Hacker Adept will be good at more things, and the Technomancer will be more of a specialist. That is, the Technomancer will have a dice pool of 16 whle hacking and the Hacker Adept will have a dicepool of only 15. And the Hacker Adept will have spent one thousand Karma on other things. He'll be, for example, a Master Face, because it only costs 170 Karma to go from a Charisma of 1 and no social skills to a Charisma of 6 and an Influence Group of 6. Heck, he'll be a full scale Pornomancer now, because getting himself 3 ranks of Kinesics and a few levels of Improved Ability: Ettiquette only sets him back another 33 Karma. The Technomancer's bulge is:
Really. Stop waving your hands and put up some math. This is grotesquely stacked against the Technomancer at every level of play. Beginning characters, advanced characters, it don't matter - the only good Technomancer is a Technomancer Rigger who doesn't Hack at all and just lets Machine Sprites pilot Steel Lynxes.
Six Karma is a metric ass tonne when you realize that there are 20 Complex Forms. Just to equal the Program Ratings that a Hacker Adept begins play with, you're talking about shilling out 120 Karma - assuming for the moment that you could start play with all 20 CFs. Which you can't. In reality you're only allowed to start with 10 with the TM you put forward - which in turn means that you're actually going to be spending 280 Karma just to equal the Program Ratings that the Hacker began play with - and as previously noted that is more Karma than the Hacker Adept needs to go from a zero start to world-class mastery in a single field. -Frank |
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Jan 31 2007, 09:22 PM
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#210
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 941 Joined: 25-January 07 Member No.: 10,765 |
Frank...
I know you have to be smoking serious crap with that thousand karma. I know, because I'm a game geek who has sat down and made 'thousand karma characters' for shits and giggles. At a thousand karma you are talking a runner who's got every stat at max, has bought up a few fun advantages and has his top use skills maxed out and is starting to work on other skills just floating in the background. I mean, in the 2k karma challenge on this forum I goofed off and when I hit about 1600 karma I ran out of things to spend it on.. until I made an adept who was initiating.. and I'm not even one of those efficiency nazi's that figure the bp cost of attributes makes them a better buy than skills for Karma.... Never mind the fact that.. and I'm starting to sound like a broken record but you haven't deigned to respond yet, the Threading ability... which is FREE, allows the Technomancer to keep up even with your broke ass adept idea. Never mind the fact that the TM does not NEED 20 Complex forms. Right now your argument is not to dissimilar from someone bitching that adepts are weak compared to sammy's because the sammy can have straight nine in his physical stats at the start and the Adept needs to spend 500 karma to initiate that level of magic to keep up. Never mind what the adept can do that the sammy can only imagine... like doubling his skill pool or multitasking or... Technomancers shouldn't be trying to compete on raw numbers across the board. It's not their strength. They can specialize much better, and if they don't have, they can improvise much better. |
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Jan 31 2007, 09:57 PM
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#211
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Runner Group: Members Posts: 2,526 Joined: 9-April 06 From: McGuire AFB, NJ Member No.: 8,445 |
Sweet, so I can Thread as a TM for free? So that means all those CF that I would have to buy up with Karma for huge costs I could just raise up when I need them? But wait, what is that you say? I have to resist fading each and every time I do this?
What, there's more? The fading could do physical damage if my CF is threaded above to a rating above my Resonance? So what someone would normally pay for in cash I have to pay with in pain and blood... Oh well, I guess the only good thing about it is the fact that CF's can go above rank 6, even though I have a -2 on all other dicepools for each CF I have threaded... |
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Jan 31 2007, 09:58 PM
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#212
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Prime Runner Group: Banned Posts: 3,732 Joined: 1-September 05 From: Prague, Czech Republic Member No.: 7,665 |
Did you read the assessment of the characters involved? Let's consider your suggested Technomancer: All 5s in all of his Mental Stats. Resonance 6. 10 Complex Forms at 6. That's about maximized for a starting character. But he's got to compete with a Hacker Adept who is going to have Improved Ability, which is worth 3 dice. And all Programs at 6. For the Technomacer to match that dicepool (15), he needs to raise his Complex Forms to 9. That costs 7+8+9 = 24 Karma on each of the 10 CFs he already has (240 Karma), and 2+2+3+4+5+6+7+8+9 = 46 Karma on eahc of the CFs he doesn't already have (460 Karma). And he needs to raise his Mental Stats to 6 at 18 Karma a piece (72 Karma), and he needs to buy his Resonance up to 9, costing 21+24+27 (72) Karma for the Attribute, and 13 + 16 + 19 (48) Karma for the Submergence. And he has to purchase his Electronics and Cracking Groups up to 6 (they start at 4), which costs 55 Karma a piece (for another 110 Karma). That's 240 + 460 + 72 + 72 + 48 + 110 = 1002 Karma Really. I'm not fucking kidding about the 1000 Karma you need to spend just to equal the Hacker Adept. You haven't even taken a single step into the "uncapped" territory that you keep bringing up. --- And yes, I am aware how completely ridiculous it is for any character to spend one thousand Karma on anything. It's just not going to happen. No campaign is going to maintain interest long enough to do that. -Frank |
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Jan 31 2007, 10:02 PM
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#213
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Hoppelhäschen 5000 Group: Members Posts: 5,807 Joined: 3-January 04 Member No.: 5,951 |
Campaings may not. |
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Jan 31 2007, 10:11 PM
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#214
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 745 Joined: 2-January 07 From: Los Angeles, CA Member No.: 10,510 |
You know what he meant. |
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Jan 31 2007, 10:13 PM
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#215
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Uncle Fisty Group: Admin Posts: 13,891 Joined: 3-January 05 From: Next To Her Member No.: 6,928 |
I've seen a few campaigns that have. One of the characters that did was from second edition, and "evolved" into 4th. The other two that lasted that long were from 3rd edition. The campaigns weren't continuos. The characters have been through a number of campaigns/GMs/One Nighters. But it does happen sometimes.
And then of course there's Cash for Karma. I've seen plenty of characters, mostly shaman types taht will take everything from the run except their medium life style costs and throw it in to karma. I don't allwo that in my game ,although I do allow some, because it throws of the balance very quickly. but it does happen. |
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Jan 31 2007, 10:14 PM
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#216
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Hoppelhäschen 5000 Group: Members Posts: 5,807 Joined: 3-January 04 Member No.: 5,951 |
Honestly, no - I don't. |
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