 Stupid Question, Again on agents |
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 Feb 9 2007, 09:39 PM
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#251
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Shooting Target  Group: Members Posts: 1,512 Joined: 26-February 02 Member No.: 392  |
An agent can run dependently or independently.
As a dependent it is loaded just like you'd load any other program that you use. The agent then subscribes (communicates) with all nodes the hacker communicates with and has identical access that the hacker has. The agent may use any programs that are loaded onto the hacker's commlink (except agent programs) which then count against response limit. As an independent it is loaded onto a node (any node) and runs from there. It subscribes (communicates) just as any other matrix user does (hacker, node, or drone) and must hack access or be given access to all nodes it enters. It can access multiple nodes at once and has its own matrix access ID. It can use any programs that it has loaded or that it can load from the node on which it runs. Whatever node it is currently active in determines it's response. IC are treated as either dependent agents (loaded onto the host node) that only runs if an alarm is triggerd or as independent agents (in which case there is only a semantic difference between them and agents). Once an agent is running it follows whatever its orders are like a drone (which may include subscribing and accessing several nodes). All IC traces back to the host node. |
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Feb 9 2007, 09:42 PM
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#252
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 916 Joined: 26-August 05 From: The land between the north , the south and the midwest. Member No.: 7,626 |
Cetiah,
The simple fact is that I believe the word "icon" means what the word "icon" means; a symbolic representation of something else, nothing more. I have not found anything in the SR4 text that gives an icon more meaning than that. Target icons in matrix combat only refer to IC, agents and Persona because they are the only "active" objects on a system other than an OS, which can be crashed but not attacked. Passive objects (data files) can be deleted but do not require attacking them to destroy. It's not D&D, you don't need to whack the chest with the sword to break it. Use Edit and wipe the whole file. |
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Feb 9 2007, 09:50 PM
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#253
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 745 Joined: 2-January 07 From: Los Angeles, CA Member No.: 10,510 |
I've made modification to the summary/conclusions above.
Thanks to kigmatzomat, I understand now that I need to EDIT the summary, not stab it with my knife. That saved me so much time. |
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Feb 9 2007, 09:57 PM
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#254
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Genuine Artificial Intelligence Group: Members Posts: 4,019 Joined: 12-June 03 Member No.: 4,715 |
Thanks for summing up both sides, guys. I, for one, appreciate it, and I'm sure others do too. I think this interpretation makes sense too. Yes, this makes agents a lot more like hackers, to the point where a good agent can actually be better than a mediocre hacker. I don't actually have a problem with that, but I certainly see how some people would. In some ways it was easier before, when we had dumb frames, smart frames, agents, SKs, and AIs. At least then every program new their place. :-) Now we have one thing, Agents, trying to take the place of, well, which, exactly? Smart frames through SKs, I think. Dumb frames are gone, they only existed because of memory management concerns. Definitely not AIs. But maybe I'm stretching the SR4 agent too far by trying to include all of that. |
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Feb 9 2007, 10:03 PM
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#255
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 745 Joined: 2-January 07 From: Los Angeles, CA Member No.: 10,510 |
I don't know what of this stuff is. My last shadowrun experience prior to SR4 was SR2 and that was years ago - I don't remember much from VR 2.0. Smart frames? Dumb frames? SKs? I think I know what an AI is. Let me just ask you... which in your opinion is the closest analogy to a dog-brain drone? The designers wrote in the book that that was their design and intent and agents were supposed to be equivilent to drones. If they wanted them to be the equivilent of NPC hackers or to function as a replacement to an absent hacker, I think they would have said that instead. |
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Feb 9 2007, 10:37 PM
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#256
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Genuine Artificial Intelligence Group: Members Posts: 4,019 Joined: 12-June 03 Member No.: 4,715 |
Most similar to a dog-brain drone? That would be a SR3 smart frame. An SR3 dumb frame is mostly about memory management, and is more or less an obsolete concept in SR4. An SR3 Agent is similar to an SR3 Robot (which is a step-up from a drone's dog brain) There is either no SR4 equivalent, or a high rated SR4 agent could be the equivalent. I'm not sure which. An SK (semiautonomous knowbot) is something just shy of an AI. This probably goes beyond the scope of an SR4 agent. |
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Feb 9 2007, 10:52 PM
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#257
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Shooting Target Group: Members Posts: 1,512 Joined: 26-February 02 Member No.: 392 |
I think it's probably more like a sliding scale.
SR4 Agent 1-3 is probably like a SR3 Smart Frame SR4 Agent 4-6 is probably like a SR3 Agent The difference in SR3 between the two was just capability. Agents were far more capable than a smart frame. @Moon-Hawk: A rating 6 agent definitely beats a hacker 3. But to me the way I presented it makes the rules for agents, hackers, drones, and IC the same so it is easier to use for me. |
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Feb 9 2007, 11:22 PM
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#258
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Technomancer Group: Retired Admins Posts: 4,638 Joined: 2-October 02 From: Champaign, IL Member No.: 3,374 |
Actually, I base my conclusion on the following quotation:
Thus, agent programs are an exception to the "normal" rules about crashing and restarting programs. What that difference means exactly is not explicitly stated other than that it means you have to defeat agent programs in cybercombat. Since we know that being defeated in cybercombat means that the icon crashes. What happens specifically to IC or an Agent when it is crashed, I think, is up to the GM; only for Persona is it explicitly stated the crashing a persona icon boots the persona, and thus the user, from the matrix. I've decided that crashing an independent agent means that the agent is trashed. I'd probably allow a hacker to track a datatrail (with appropriate modifiers for redirect actions by the agent) to the location of the cybercombat and, maybe, find the crashed agent and with some software tests reconstruct it (sort of like recovering deleted files nowadays) but that would be handled on case by case basis. I haven't decided, and it's never come up, what to do differently, if anything, when an agent is acting as part of a hacker's persona. I suspect that I would allow that agent to be re-instantiated by the hacker like any other program because said hacker has a direct link to the agent even after its crashed. It's only because the hacker isn't around to "save" the agent in the first scenario that the agent is lost. Anyway, I pretty much subscribe to the interpretation that Cetiah posted above, for what it's worth. |
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Feb 10 2007, 12:19 AM
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#259
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 745 Joined: 2-January 07 From: Los Angeles, CA Member No.: 10,510 |
There's no difference between a program or agent that is crashed independantly or a program or agent that is crashed when a persona is crashed. It works the same way. Also, when an icon is defeated in cybercombat, it crashes. This can be found under section describing the "Matrix Condition Monitor". This crash is not a different kind of crashing than the standard method of crashing programs and OSes - cybercombat just becomes a necessary prerequisite to trash the program (instead of a crash action). But the same rules apply for all crashed programs, agents, personas, and OSes, regardless of how they were crashed. As for your quote, again, these quotes must be taken in context. "Personas, IC, agents, and sprites may not be crashed -- they must be defeated in cybercombat." It's talking about the Crash action. You can't perform the Crash Action - that doesn't mean the program doesn't crash. Under the cybercombat section it mentions that they crash when their condition monitor is brought down to 0. And another section talks about rebooting crashed programs. There's no contradiction here anywhere; the agent is not deleted after being defeated in cybercombat. If you come back to hack a node an hour later, there will be just as much IC as there was before. |
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Feb 10 2007, 12:36 AM
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#260
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Technomancer Group: Retired Admins Posts: 4,638 Joined: 2-October 02 From: Champaign, IL Member No.: 3,374 |
So if a host is set to auto-restart crashed IC, does that mean that a hacker could never defeat it?
Or would crashed-then-restarted IC (and thus agents) restart in a "default" way? If yes, then I suspect the average IC is not defaulting to "Blitzkrieg" at all times and, thus, a crashed-then-restarted IC would go back to analyzing or other less active, for lack of a better term, actions. I can see that, but then how do you resolve the Schroedinger's Agent problem? I think we agree that you shouldn't be able to restart Schroedinger's Agent (regardless of our reasoning) but if Schroedinger's Agent were to be crashed, does it respawn on its "owner's" commlink? If so, how does it know where the commlink is? How does the commlink know what happened? What about the middle ground (and this also solves Schroedinger's Agent): agents crashed while operating as a part of a persona are not lost but independent agents are. A hacker can track an agent's datatrail to the node in which it was crashed to recover it, but if that datatrail is lost, deleted, spoofed, redirected, etc. and said hacker cannot find the resting place of said agent, then the agent is irrevocably lost. Clearly, if an independent agent is acting within the same node as the persona, then no tracking is necessary. |
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Feb 10 2007, 12:47 AM
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#261
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 745 Joined: 2-January 07 From: Los Angeles, CA Member No.: 10,510 |
Well... there is no respawn. That contradicts the last statement of my previous post; I know. I shouldn't have wrote that. Here's the deal. You encounter a piece of IC, you fight it in cybercombat. You defeat it, it crashes. That program now has to reboot. This takes a number of combat turns equal to the System rating of the IC's owner. Once that allotment of time has passed, the owner may load the program (using his persona) and load the IC into his persona or back into the node (if he still access to it). Without a persona to load the program, the IC can't be loaded back into the node. This process of crashing programs is the same for IC as it would be for, say, an Edit program. It renders the program useless for a short time. The difference is that crashing the Edit program requires a Crash action and crashing the IC requires you to bring its Matrix Condition Monitor down to 0. |
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Feb 10 2007, 12:50 AM
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#262
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 745 Joined: 2-January 07 From: Los Angeles, CA Member No.: 10,510 |
Technically, "Schroedinger's Agent" doesn't exist within the rules. It only came up as a result of a house rule that said the agent can function independantly without requiring the owner to maintain an active subscription link to the agent; which the rules as written require. |
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Feb 10 2007, 12:59 AM
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#263
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Prime Runner Group: Banned Posts: 3,732 Joined: 1-September 05 From: Prague, Czech Republic Member No.: 7,665 |
That's only a house rule if you believe that you can maintain an active subscription while you aren't even on line!
If you believe that you can maintain subscribers while you aren't connected to the Matrix - then maybe you have a point. I find that assertion to be inane however. -Frank |
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Feb 10 2007, 01:33 AM
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#264
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 163 Joined: 1-February 07 Member No.: 10,861 |
Howabout this: When "Schroedinger's Agent" is on a node, and that node is disconnected, the agent carries out whatever it's instructions were, and then waits around for a reconnect. The hacker who loaded the Agent gets a choice, when the agent goes offline, to either keep that subscription link "open" and unused, or to use it for something else. If he uses it for something else, then the Agent loses it's connection with him and becomes unrecoverable. If matrix access is later reopened, the agent may begin roaming about the matrix, as a "free agent"
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Feb 10 2007, 01:52 AM
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#265
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Prime Runner Group: Banned Posts: 3,732 Joined: 1-September 05 From: Prague, Czech Republic Member No.: 7,665 |
How about this: that's exactly the Agent Smith debacle, except with extra paper work to keep track of. Since you can just keep popping out these "Free Agents" that you just made up ad infinitum, the goal is simply to give your infinity army advance commands such that they'll be useful for whatever it is you need them for. Examples:
In short, your plan is dumb. -Frank |
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Feb 10 2007, 02:06 AM
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#266
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 745 Joined: 2-January 07 From: Los Angeles, CA Member No.: 10,510 |
Yes, you can maintain subscribers when you aren't connected to the Matrix (logged into a node). At this point, you don't have a persona because you are not using the Matrix - there's no interface. That doesn't mean you can't do things like make and recieve comcalls, send instructions to drones, keep subscription nodes open, or yes, access the Matrix if you want to. It's also possible to maintain a subscription with the Matrix when you aren't accessing it. You keep taking words like access and connection way too literally. And as I pointed out way back in the early portions of this thread, YOUR PERSONA IS NOT YOUR COMLINK. Just because your persona is offline doesn't mean your comlink is dead or completely cut off from the Matrix. Even when your persona is crashed, you are "disconnected from the Matrix" but that doesn't mean you can't immediately log back in again or that anything bizzare has happened to any of your subscriptions to other nodes, comlinks, drones, or agents. As someone pointed out earlier, this just means that you are simultaenously disconnected from all nodes and have no active persona icons anywhere. So long as you have a valid signal, wireless activity is possible, your hardware is on and functioning properly, you have the right subscriptions open, and you aren't being jammed, you're fine as far as controlling your agents. |
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Feb 10 2007, 02:19 AM
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#267
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Prime Runner Group: Banned Posts: 3,732 Joined: 1-September 05 From: Prague, Czech Republic Member No.: 7,665 |
Huh. Cetiah, we have nothing more to talk about. This conversation has gone on way too long, and has had way too many tangents. But if you seriously have gotten to the point where your perspective requires us to believe that you can access the Matrix while disconnected from the Matrix... I'm just going to declare victory and walk away. I just beat you in the Platonic dialogue. Your position has revealed its fatal flaw: you have been forced to accept A and ~A to make your argument. I win, you lose. Good bye. -Frank |
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Feb 10 2007, 02:24 AM
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#268
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 745 Joined: 2-January 07 From: Los Angeles, CA Member No.: 10,510 |
Frank, I am officially requesting that, as a matter of courtesy, you refrain from making any insulting personal judgements or evaluations (either stated or implied) about the people posting in this thread or their intellectual capacities. Feel free to insult people who want to argue with your posts directly or overtly disagree with you (because only an idiot would do that, right?) but do not insult people anymore for trying to come up with general ideas and express them for the community. |
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Feb 10 2007, 02:34 AM
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#269
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 745 Joined: 2-January 07 From: Los Angeles, CA Member No.: 10,510 |
It's really not my fault you use different definitions of terms than what's listed in RAW. Here's how this conversation* breaks down from my perspective: Cetiah: A is true because B is true. Frank: No, B is actually this. Therefore B is not true, so A is not true. Cetiah: Wait, that's not B though. A is still true. Frank: We can therefore go on to say that B is actually A. Cetiah: Wait, but lets get back to that B thing. B is true. Frank: That's rediculous. B is this and therefore not true. Cetiah: Not your B. Of course your B isn't true. The original B is true. Frank: Since we've established that B is A, and B is not true, therefore A is not true. Cetiah: Wait. The original B is true and therefore the original A is true before you changed B to make it not true and therefore A is true when B is true. Frank: A is true when B is true? Rediluous. You're an idiot. Cetiah: No, not your B! I meant the original A is true when the new non-original B is not true because the orignal B is still true. Frank: You're talking crazy now. You're an idiot. I won. * By this conversation, I mean between me and Frank. Some of the posts arguing against my point of view have been actually fairly accurate to RAW and logical.
Huh. Is this just a standard default "exit response"? Because it doesn't seem to apply to this conversation. Okay, the conversation is long... but so what? It seems pretty cohesive and relatively easy to follow, especially with the summaries posted up recently. I may just be deluting myself here, but I actually think this conversation is useful to people and is progressing in a direction that will lead to a conclusive result - at least things seem to be more conclusive than they were when the topic was started. At least everyone who has taken sides on the issue has definite reasons now rather than vague interpretations and "it feels right". But too many tangents? Really, this whole conversation has stayed on-topic pretty well. Tangents have been directed to their appropriate threads. I'm very proud of it and everyone involved - it's been a good discussion on both sides. |
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Feb 10 2007, 03:36 AM
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#270
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Uncle Fisty Group: Admin Posts: 13,891 Joined: 3-January 05 From: Next To Her Member No.: 6,928 |
I like tangents as much as the next guy, as long as the original issue has been addressed and it stays on an SR topic. But let's not waste space on arguing about arguing or little post shots, 'k?
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Feb 10 2007, 04:03 AM
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#271
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Technomancer Group: Retired Admins Posts: 4,638 Joined: 2-October 02 From: Champaign, IL Member No.: 3,374 |
Alrighty, I can jive with that. I still like the concept of agents crashing means you need a new agent. I already feel like hacker's lack a limiting factor with respect to program ratings, and putting agents (and IC) at risk of destruction due to crashing in cybercombat helped hackers remain a little more conservative with their use. But SOTA house rules are for a different thread. I'm rather satisfied with the way this turned out. Without offending anyone, I feel like the concerted defense of my position, while not changing anyone else's mind, has helped me understand more intuitively the matrix as it is described. Despite the point of view of others on that interpretation, it works for me. |
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Feb 10 2007, 05:11 AM
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#272
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Uncle Fisty Group: Admin Posts: 13,891 Joined: 3-January 05 From: Next To Her Member No.: 6,928 |
Sometimes just arguing your point helps you define your own thoughts better, so that makes sense. And besides,even if you don't agree with others, different view points are always a good thing. They give you more to think about and help refind a point of view. Me, I'm just glad someone's happy after 11 pages. :)
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Feb 10 2007, 05:32 AM
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#273
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 163 Joined: 1-February 07 Member No.: 10,861 |
Except that it's not. Because Free means the Agent doesn't listen to you anymore, it wanders off and gets lost in the matrix. This is what I think should happen whenever you have more agents than your subscription limit: they just go off, get lost, and never come back. If you really wanted the agent back, for whatever reason, you could keep a subscription slot open for it. |
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Feb 10 2007, 06:16 AM
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#274
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 745 Joined: 2-January 07 From: Los Angeles, CA Member No.: 10,510 |
I could see this being a source of lots of urban legends. :) "An oppressive ganger and his girlfriend get into an intense physical martial-arts brawl and while they block eachother with weird jerky motions and do back flips for no apparent reason, their conflict takes place... on another level. They're hackers, and each of them has their agents trying to invade eachother's systems. Jaren with her blonde-haired persona sends wave after wave of IC agents invading her boyfriend's system. Jaren's agents get tracked with IC that follows her to her home node while she breaks her boyfriend's arm and shatters his wristband comlink. The connection is lost, but the IC uses its black hammer to fry Jeren's mind. And they say... ever since... it's been wandering the Matrix with its large hammer, looking for blonde haired female personas. Jumping from node to node on the hunt, systematically tracing every blonde haired persona it finds. Hey, don't believe me, babe. I'm just saying... I would pick a different icon, if I were you." |
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Feb 10 2007, 06:32 AM
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#275
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Shooting Target Group: Members Posts: 1,512 Joined: 26-February 02 Member No.: 392 |
According to the FAQs definition of Subscription versus Access I can jive with still being able to keep your subscription list, including an independent agent, when you get crashed.
A good analogy would be when subscribed to 3 nodes, an independent agent, and a drone. What happens to your subscription to the drone when you are dumped from the matrix? According to the RAW in the FAQ subscription means communication. So you still communicate with the drone even after being dumped because you still have a signal/connection with the drone. Crashing doesn't knock it off your list. I guess the question becomes: what exactly happens to you when you are crashed on the matrix? |
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