Alternate Matrix Rules, Everyone is doing it Options

[WearzManySkins]

Unfortunately Frank, a radio frequency in the megahertz range or in all of the radio frequency range, have no effect upon the human brain. EEG waveforms are not in the radio frequency range at all. What mean no effect I mean produces any mental effects besides microwaving brain tissues.

"ALPHA
Alpha waves are those between 7.5 and thirteen(13) waves per second (Hz). Alpha is usually best seen in the posterior regions of the head on each side, being higher in amplitude on the dominant side. It is brought out by closing the eyes and by relaxation, and abolished by eye opening or alerting by any mechanism (thinking, calculating). It is the major rhythm seen in normal relaxed adults - it is present during most of life especially beyond the thirteenth year when it dominates the resting tracing."

"BETA
Beta activity is 'fast' activity. It has a frequency of 14 and greater Hz. It is usually seen on both sides in symmetrical distribution and is most evident frontally. It is accentuated by sedative-hypnotic drugs especially the benzodiazepines and the barbiturates. It may be absent or reduced in areas of cortical damage. It is generally regarded as a normal rhythm. It is the dominant rhythm in patients who are alert or anxious or who have their eyes open."

"THETA
Theta activity has a frequency of 3.5 to 7.5 Hz and is classed as "slow" activity. It is abnormal in awake adults but is perfectly normal in children upto 13 years and in sleep. It can be seen as a focal disturbance in focal subcortical lesions; it can be seen in generalized distribution in diffuse in diffuse disorder or metabolic encephalopathy or deep midline disorders or some instances of hydrocephalus"

"DELTA
Delta activity is 3 Hz or below. It tends to be the highest in amplitude and the slowest waves. It is quite normal and is the dominant rhythm in infants up to one year and in stages 3 and 4 of sleep. It may occur focally with subcortical lesions and in general distribution with diffuse lesions, metabolic encephalopathy hydrocephalus or deep midline lesions. It is usually most prominent frontally in adults (e.g. FIRDA - Frontal Intermittent Rhythmic Delta) and posteriorly in children e.g. OIRDA - Occipital Intermittent Rhythmic Delta)"

As you can see the frequencies range from below 3.0 to greater than 14 Hertz not kilohertz, not megahertz. Wireless communications are in the megahertz range.

As in another Thread "I will blackhammer your momma", unless there is a "GateWay" into the target's brain ie a datajack, or a trodenet, the target's brain is immune to such.

IIRC a datajack is connected to the areas of the brain that can deal with its signal and interprets it as expected.

A trodenet using ultrasound emissions and passive sensors to gain feedback on the signal being input into the brain. The placement of the ultrasound emitters and passive sensors is critical, to the proper operation of the trodenet.

The hacker brainwash ray is a farce of the first order. Maybe Frank can learn something a Med School about the mechanics of the human brain.

As for the "Cool" thingee, this is technology not magic, both are separate in the SR4 game. One can not "Cast" bullets into a target with out a gun bypassing its armor and skin, so even magic has its limitations with in SR4.

Yes electrodes can be placed by a Neurosurgeon in todays technology, and with microcurrents, can invoke responses from the subjects brain.

Other than this rather large issue, the rest looks interesting Frank.

WMS

[Simon May]

Hackers do need more to do, but giving them the power to hack a brain negates any reason for them to run in the first place. Suddenly, every hacker becomes capable of making others do what he/she wants with little to no defense. This means instead of working, they'll spend 23 hours a day doing what they want and 1 hour a day taking account information out of unsuspecting people's heads. Why work when you can control the world's finances?

[kzt]

Next someone is going to be complaining that the jammer rules are insane. And it's true they make about as much sense than the the Matrix 'history'. In which nobody could disconnect their system when under a months long devastating attack from the internet, and make no sense unless you assume that only the mentally retarded are allow to run megacorporations computer operations departments. "What's this 'off-site backup' thing?" And where completely new matrix protocols and new hardware can be mysteriously deployed everywhere at the same time after yet another giant matrix meltdown caused by yet another mysterious force where nobody can disconnect their systems and never made any backups. Again.

Then there is the minor detail that breaking strong encryption requires and releases several megatons worth of energy. There are also the explosive rules, which are linear, which makes no sense as blast effects are governed by the inverse cube law. Which is very similar to the issue with the jammer rules, hence closing the circle of SR rules that violate reality and plausibility.

If you have a better fix for the totally worthless SR4 matrix rules I'd love to see them. I'm not necessarily thrilled with Franks, but it looks playable, which the RAW isn't.

[kzt]

[Simon May]

Because none of the mages have taken that spell (though several NPCs have, and the PCs have taken them down, when they weren't under their influence).

If hacking a brain were limited to some hackers instead of all, it wouldn't be an issue, but under this set of rules, it's easy for any asshole to do.

[PH3NOmenon]

Just to chime in on a truly epic thread: Nice Work.


Changing the Matrix rules to be more in-line with the Magic rules certainly makes sense. Less rules to memorize is a good thing. Rules that make a ton more sense are also a good thing.



The brain lazers thing though... scary... And i think that if you take a step back and look at this for a second you'd agree this is a bit too absurd (almost as much as the BBB matrix rules ;) ). Basically, what's to stop anyone from walking into a poor third world country and controlling half the population there? Feeling a bit malicious? Fry some newborn babies! Abortion never was this easy, just fuse out the unprotected infant brain! Or are expectant mothers and babystrollers encased in big Faraday cages nowadays?

::: quick edit to touch on a point made in the posts above me. Yes, mages can do this too. But there's a whoooooole lot more techkiddies around than there are mages. and ALL of the techkids can do it... :::


I always figured that to 'have' a PAN, you need to be able to interact with the Matrix. After all, if this is not the case can i create a PAN for my cat? A tree? A garbagecan? And no PAN = no brainlasers! But then again... people without a PAN own nothing more technologically advanced than a 2007 cellphone. And that would be so old-skool... amirite?

[Seven-7]

[Blade]

Interesting. Not sure I'd want that, though.

[FrankTrollman]

If you can wrap your mind around a magician channelling a mana bolt into a mundane man who cannot channel mana, but you cannot or will not wrap your mind around a hacker inducing changes in distant brains and microchips which do not come with antennae attached, then these rules are not for you. I honestly don't "know" how it works to project information into microchips and brains that are across the room.

I also don't care. This ability is actually a cornerstone of what makes this system works. The fact that you can choose to shut out the Matrix is one of the cornerstones of the rules in the basic book. Go ahead and use them to the best of your ability if you like that.

-Frank

[Rotbart van Dain...]

The point is that said mana bolt has certain limitations in reaching the target, the most important being LoS.
The matrix rules you are proposing are essentially the magical equivalent of teleport... which is, unsurprisingly, not allowed for magic, either.

Those limitations serve as an important part of game balance.

Bottom line:
These rules turn Shadowrun into Hackerrun.

[Ryu]

First read-through (sans technomancers)!

- Put down one more vote against brain hacking an orphan brain please. This should be limited to touch-range tech. You did say that orphan brains are very uncommon, so no great deal.

- I like "Forge credentials" as a new option for playing in the matrix. Much better than creating false accounts on a whim.

- Boot/Reboot times make non-lethal options much more interesting in matrix combat. I will need to look into pressing a power button as a ways of lowering system defense for a short time.

- Veracity is a "belief" rating. Maybe this should be split into tech. veracity against scanners and metahuman veracity for, well, metahumans. A runner might well decide that information diseminated from the corp. court is LESS likely to be true than some internet blog.

- If you write this up for download, could you include the signal range table? I´d basically like to never look at the "Wireless World" section while we test this rules.



"Denial is a river in Egypt..." LOL!

[Ol' Scratch]

So, basically, the premise is that you can't leave home unless you have a commlink. Hell, you can't even be at home without a commlink. You can't sleep without a commlink. You can't do anything without a commlink. Because the moment you're without a commlink, you're effectively dead. God help you if you drop your commlink or the batteries die out on you.

Yeah. Not a fan of that premise at all.

The proper choice is one of reprecussions. If you wire yourself (via implant, active use of trodes, or whatever else) then sure, you're opening yourself to be hacked. Have a good commlink or hacker on hand to keep you nice and safe. Speed and convenience comes at a price. But if you choose to stay unwired -- including the use of oldschool AR gloves and goggles -- or otherwise not even bother with such things at all, you should be sound as a pound. You're always being penalized by not having full access to the world aroudn you; no sense double penalizing you by making you a free target.

Well, at least until that hacker hacks into a Lone Star patrol drone, takes over your car, or otherwise attacks you through physical means with a hijacked device.

It's actually a very strong parallel to how magic works, just in reverse. A mage can affect anyone on the material plane with his powers, but if he wants to affect a purely astral target, he has to open himself up to that world and become equally vulnerable to attacks from the astral. And to render himself completely immune? Just stop astrally perceiving. Now those astral entities have to materialize in order to affect him, and they have the option to ignore everything by not materializing.

But saying that there's no defense at all against a hacker (even with a PAN and a hardcore commlink, they're still vulnerable because hackers have even more hardcore commlink and skills than Joe Average)? That's just insane, both from a design philosophy and a practical standpoint. Especially since all you need to be a good hacker is a fistfull of nuyen and a few Agent programs. [Note: Haven't read the above information in detail yet. But if, as Frank suggested later on, this brain hacking is the cornerstone of these rules, I'm going to have to pass on 'em.]

[KiwiTroll]

First reading only

While i find the modification to be very impressive I also have trouble with the brain hacking rules.

I like the concept. What i dislike is the idea that signal seems to be the only restriction. In other words it seems like with a sattelite dish a hacker can globally target and modify the peaceful people of San wherever into a bloodthirsty mob.

I'd like it to be a possibility with the right kit working on a physical LOS. to use a virtual line of site on someone who's not online feels a bit too much like targetting spells from astral to me.

If its possible then it should be similar to ritual sorcery rather than spellcasting.

I suspect i have misread something somewhere.

Frank perhaps you could set up the steps for using "Neurological Reform"

[Ryu]

A hacker SHOULD be able to affect targets worldwide. If the target can be found, that is. Same as with magic really.

[Ol' Scratch]

They can, by hacking into devices near the target once they find them with similar technology. Considering that technology can be found just about anywhere on the planet, most of which is Matrix enabled, that alone is uber powerful. Hackers don't need the ability to hack into anyone they want on a whim. And at least this way, people have a chance to survive the attack(s).

I don't know understand the constant referrals to magicians, especially since the common thought around these parts is that magic is too powerful for the very reasons the comparisons are being made.

[FrankTrollman]

Defending yourself from Brainhacking can come in many forms:

• Obscurity. If they don't know who or where you are, they can't target you. Naturally.
• Firewall. Anyone can plug themselves into a Firewall that will provide protection from brainhacking. This is generally a good idea.
• Signal Defense. If you are within signal range of a skilled Electronic Warrior, they provide protection against most forms of Brainhacking, similarly to how a magician provides defense against spells.
• Jamming. Jammers produce static zones, which severely damage Technomancers and their connection to the Deep Resonance and reduce the Signal of Hackers. This reduces the range of hacking, brain hacking included.
• Faraday Cage. If you are on different topological sides of a Faraday Cage, hacking is implausible across the boundary. Go go Wi-Fi blocking paint!
• Keeping yor head down.[/b] Most of the exciting hacking possibilities are also Line of Sight, meaning that the hacker targetting yo literally could have shot you instead.

That being said, brain hacking is a real threat. It is supposed to be. It has to be, or people won't take the Matrix seriously. Can you imagine how mch people wold care about the magician if you could keep him from affecting you by being mundane? How effective he'd be if he could only Astrally Project into areas that his enemies put a Ward on? How about Street Samurai if bullets nd spurs didn't work on unarmed men or only locked doors could be entered by cybered characters?

If simply refusing to connect yourself to the Matrix makes you safe from the Matrix, the hacker's participation in the game is over. Being an orphan brain must be a source of vulnerability or people will just throw their commlinks away and laugh.

---

That being said, being a Hacker in this system is much less about Equipment and much more about your skills. Agents do not even exist. The ability to do any real brain hacking is no something that comes cheap - it is a genuine character investment. The rules are intended to encourage combat hackers to be a distinct character who runs around with the team and hacks things. Not for characters and corporations to throw money at the Matrix until it solves itself.

Still, these rules epend upon three pieces of speculation:

You cannot win the Matrix without playing. Having less invested in the Matrix in terms of equipment, forethought, and skills makes you more vulnerable to Matrix attack. This goes all the way down, so if you're a bunch of guys in the mud with sticks who don't know what a computer is you are the most vulnerable to Matrix attack.

Hacking requires active participation. Sending commands across the Matrix does almost nothing. If you want to brain hack people or even just steal important files you have to roll up your sleeves and run into the line of fire.

Brains do hacking, machines just ASIST. No matter how many commlinks you have in a pile, if you don't have a metahuman plugged in to each one orchestrating the hack attack, you aren't attacking shit.

These are game balance and playability directed demands, and the entire system collapses like a house of wet cards if you remove any one of them. If you can not or will not accept them, these rules are not for you and you should go try to make the rules in the basic book work to the best of your ability. I wish you luck in that endeavor. I fully predicted, and containue to maintain that the Matrix rules are a core sticking point and source of divergence among Shadowrun players. I stated months ago that I believe the ultimate number of competing and frequently sited Matrix rules in use by players of the game was going to be about seven. I hold to that assessment.

Many people want a Hacker in Shadowrun to operate like a hacker in the real modern world. Guessing passwords, logging in from remote terminals, stealing the computers of influential people in order to make purchase orders, blah blah blah. That's fine, but real-world hackers don't run around doin two fisted facility intrusions as part of Team Impossible in order to break into high security systems in real time. Seriously, they don't do that at all.

Some people want hackers to be forced to deal with computers alone. This is even more restrictive than forcing all Awakened characters to play Astral Adepts and it leads to fundamental questions as to why anyone anywhere allows themselves to be hacked when Net BSD has been around for a century.

This system is not the only answer to the basic questions of how hackers operate, and what they do as player characters, and what corporations do to defend themselves. But it's an answer to those questions, and like any other system of delicately stacked assumptions it comes crashing down if you pull the legs off. I predicted the existence of at least 4 more competing Matrix systems. Unwired is going to come out eventually, which means that there's room for 3 more Fan creations. If you don't like my system, make one of your own with assumptions you do like. All you need to do is explain:

• Why Hackers are valued members of the team.
• Why corporations defend themselves from Hackers with IC instead of shutting off antennas.
• Why rogue computer code doesn't DDOS your ass into the 19th century.
• Why Hackers participate in the actual run rather than just the legwork.
• Why the Hacker has anything to do on runs where the objective is something other than "stealing the paydata."

Answer those questions with a coherent system and then come and talk to me about how you don't like my system of brain hacking. Then we'll put you up as one of the competing systems of Matrix use that people use.

-Frank

[Blade]

So you introduced this whole brain hacking part because you wanted to prevent hacker becoming useless just because people could switch off their connection?

I don't think it's the way to go. I prefer to have players realize that switching off the connection is something that nobody sane in his mind would think about in 2070. The Matrix is as ubiquitous as electricity today: would you refuse to have electricity just because someone (or something) can destroy your appliances with a sudden surge?
Even mobile phones are nearly the same now: there's a risk that they cause brain cancers yet people use them daily, using hands free kit when they're really cautious about it...

According to your rules, it'd look like people use commlinks because they want to be safe from brain hackers rather than because they can't do anything without it.

[Ryu]

I do not follow on the brain hacking reasoning. A hacker that forces the opposition to shut down all modern technology has a "objective accomplished" report to do. No communication, no tactical orientation system, no nothing. The hacker is still responsible for meddling with the omnipresent hardware.

The similarity of matrix and magic rules does not make hackers the same as mages. Because hackers need less karma to improve (no initiations, no buying spells - even if programs work the same way), they should be able to aquire some meat skills at chargen, some later. Especially since they do not have to buy a "hacker" positive quality.

--
Luckily, the assumption that a brain can only be added to a PAN with specialised tech that has direct contact to the body should work just fine with the rest of the rules. Maybe we will give the chance to bypass that to TMs, which should than be called Technomages.

[deek]

I've made a first pass, also sans technomancers:)

I'll have to re-read. I am open to trying this in my game, as I run a bi-weekly campaign and our hacker does more shooting than anything else. The only time he hits the matrix is for some data, or to shut off cameras and unlock doors...so, I think we would all be open to him doing more.

I came away with some things I liked, but I also thought that some areas were incomplete...but it sounds like these are supposed to be complete, so I really need to re-read it.

[eidolon]

[Moon-Hawk]

I'm definitely having some trouble with one of your core principles; that an orphan brain can be hacked from across the room. I mean, I understand it, I'm just not sure if I'm comfortable with it yet, and I haven't yet decided that it's desirable.
I understand the parallels you're making with mages, but one thing about this whole orphan brain thing that bothers me: I understand why mages mind control is limited. There are physical LOS requirements, and penalties for sustaining spells, or at the least limits on sustaining foci. But what prevents the hacker from brain hacking and enslaving millions of people in third world countries and having a zombie army? Have they already been hacked and semi-enslaved by their own governments?

I really haven't had any problem in my games with people disconnecting themselves from the matrix to be safe from it. Without a commlink you're a hobo, and while we might be doing a gang-level campaign, nobody in my group has wanted to play Hoborun so far. People can dress it up as a "neo-luddite" all they want; you're a hobo. :-D

I really, really like a lot of the stuff in here. Your explanation of IC and why you can't have armies of it is wonderful. I really love the descriptions of why they were called cyber-terminals, and how they simply don't function the same without a brain connected to them and that's where the real awesome comes from.
The veracity rules are brilliant. Bravo.

Overall, I'd say at least half of this stuff is brilliance smothered in awesome sauce. The rest of it I haven't decided yet. At the very worst it's excellent stuff based on a core conceit I'm not willing to make, but I'm really just not sure yet. I get what you're going for, but I've got some mental inertia so I'll have to ruminate and see.
In any case, it's all wonderful stuff, the fluff is great, the rules are well thought out, and with how much you trash the matrix rules I applaud you "putting your money where your mouth is" and posting an alternative. Most people just bitch. :-D
Thanks for posting this, I'm looking forward to the download.

[Moon-Hawk]

[eidolon]

[Ol' Scratch]

Personally, I think the following are better analogies for how hackers and magicians should be compared.

• John Doe is standing in the middle of a dead magic zone (for lack of a better name at the moment). A mage trying to attack him directly with magic is in the same boat as a hacker trying to directly hack into someone with no Matrix connectivity whatsoever. Instead, the mage would have to pull out his gun and shoot John Doe, just like a hacker would have to hack into nearby technology or drones to do what needs be done.
• John Doe gets a standard datajack installed and buys an off-the-shelf rating 3-across-the-board commlink. A hacker trying to hack into him directly is on par with a mage using magic on an average bloke on the street.
• John Doe has a hacker friend who's protecting his PAN. A hacker attacking this guy is similar to a mage attacking a guy protected with counterspelling.
• John Doe is a drek-hot hacker with a state-of-the-art commlink. A hacker attacking this guy is the same as a mage attacking a full magician with counterspelling up and spirits on call.

Those comparisons seem to make a lot more sense to me.

But to each their own.

This post has been edited by Doctor Funkenstein: Nov 6 2007, 04:13 PM

[Buster]

The only thing I would change in all these awesome rules is the naked brain hacking thing. And as a powergamer, the very first thing I would do with the naked brain hacking rules is brain hack every homeless person and datajack-free hippie and create an Agent Smith Army in the real world. Granted, I could still do that against every rating 3 datajack wearing wageslave, but it would take more time and there would be more security concerns.

Besides, I would say that a datajack/commlink makes you more vulnerable to brain hacking, not less vulnerable. Even ignoring realistic reasons, for game balance reasons I think you should only be able to hack someone that has a datajack installed and eliminate trodenets. That distinction wouldn't change any of your awesome rules, but would make all the rules realistic and eliminate the controversy.