A.I PCs and NPCs., any rules or guide lines out there? Options

[Dumori]

One of my PCs wishes to play as a A.I. So shall I say no or just homebrew somthing?

[Fortune]

If you can wait a couple of months, rules for just that very thing will be included in the forthcoming Unwired sourcebook.

[Dumori]

Cool. But is there any thing from past versons of SR I could use as a guide or will I just have to wait till unwired to play any good hacker/rigger ideas. It seems that any and all matrix realted questions always have an answer to wait till unwired in some form. But thanks for the info I'll start saving for the book and get ready to post a per order.

[Backgammon]

There no rules for A.I.s as PC is previous editions.

[hobgoblin]

hell, there was no rules for AI's at all. at the time, AI's where the gods of the matrix.

the closest one would come was a semi-autonomous knowbot...

and even it was more like a monster in the dark then anything playable...

[Aaron]

What Backgammon said. It wasn't until the events in Emergence that AIs weren't something huge and godlike. Emergence changed Shadowrun AIs from Neuromancer to "Ghost in the Shell."

[Dumori]

Darn. Of well A.I would have no phisical skills and would be matrix masters with computer like brains. One thing that could be fun would be hacking some ones skillwires and having your self a body. But I can see A.Is being quite hard to homebrew as they would need a lot of play testing to blance out. High Bp cost bit high max for logic and willpower and maybe reaction perma hot simed. A maybe crossed with some of the technomancer rules due it bring a part of the matrix. It dose look like an easy feat to pull off an AI would lack the ability to use a lot of costly items in SR so the Bp price for playing one be in the hundreds 50 -150 I see it as. I'm looking forward to finding out more about A.I. I can also see an easy reson why one might run, hacking more and more complex systems for the fun and maybe even aiming to make its self a body much like a jar head.

[KCKitsune]

I can also see AI's being Shadowrunner to get revenge.

Let's face it, the Corps found out about the AI's and the first thing they did was capture them and then either kill them or rip them apart, saw what made them tick (or tried to), and put them back together. I know if I that was done to me, then I would be slightly... PISSED OFF! (IMG:style_emoticons/default/mad.gif)

So <insert a megacorp> wants to frak with me... well let's hit their database and rob them blind! (IMG:style_emoticons/default/vegm.gif)

[Dumori]

yeah I can see that too but really I should get down to stating an A.I for this PC of mine.
Another thought the said A.I would have too be carried in a coustom comlink for some missions meaning that the hardwear running them would act as a limited to there power. The problem of killing an A.I could make the (race) intresting as buy copying them selves and on death sending a data packet with there knowlage in it to the copy would mean that killing a cleaver A.I could be nigh on impossable.

[hobgoblin]

in a way, AI's would be not much different from jarheads...

[Dumori]

I know but they would be jar head technomancers. But as A.I is a starting option they would have high limates on the mental stats manly logic as they area a program. I have just had an idea for an odd campine an A.I resistance group maybe helped or hireing a few runners to help with their terrorism. I do hope unwired is the answer.

[Dumori]

I know but they would be jar head technomancers. But as A.I is a starting option they would have high limates on the mental stats manly logic as they area a program. I have just had an idea for an odd campine an A.I resistance group maybe helped or hireing a few runners to help with their terrorism. I do hope unwired is the answer.

[Daier Mune]

Important things to think about: as a non-organic inteligence, the AI obviously has no essence. since it has no essence, would it have an edge attribute? would it gain karma?

[Crusher Bob]

The simplest rules patch would probably be to make the 'seed' of the AI require a specific piece of hardware (magic quantum computing box), and then treat the AI rather like a jarhead.

Another option would be to paste the free spirit rules onto a sprite, so that the character would be a free sprite.

Making rules for an AI that exists on the net at large via parasitic computing would probably be the most difficult to come up with rules for.

[MaxHunter]

I like the "free sprite" approach, it caters for less powerful AI as presented in Emergence.

Cheers

Max

[Stahlseele]

just give the AI's the Resonance/Dissonance attribute and be done with it . .

[Aaron]

What have we definitely heard about what's in Unwired?

[Aaron]

(Did you know that you don't actually have to double-click the Post button? Yeah, I thought I did, too. I blame the caffeine.)

[Stahlseele]

PC AIs will be in there

[Aaron]

PC AIs will be in there

Is that certain? I mean, it was a while ago, but there were no rules for PC free spirits in Street Magic. Why would Unwired be any different?

[WeaverMount]

Edit: Sorry I got really off track and missed that you wanted to AIs not just on stage, but a full PC. My advice to you is actually to ask the other players at your table how they feel about having a PC that "special". If they are cool yeah go with a brain in a jar or a "free Spite".
The question about what's up with AI and essence/edge/karma is a good one. IMO I think this is the dividing line between A.I. and agents. If I was being a RAW Nazi I would say that a free spirit had to get karma via packs just like a spirit, but If it's a PC I would hand wave that as pack with the part at large, and award karma per usual.

Random idea for you I got from cross pollinating some spirit and sprite rules. What if you handled AI shards the way they handled insect spirits: a set of basic forms (ie worker spirit / Machine spirit), and a bonus to make them thematically constant and a little scary (beetle have crazy armor / Daedalus shards have .. uhh .... help me out old timers (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) I don't know enough about Daedalus and Morgana to cook up a template, but I could see this working.

But for the OP, I no there is no RAW to help you out here. What that mean is that you should come up with a very clear vision of what you want from AI in your story. If you want technomancer mentor spirits or matrix great dragons wing 100% and don't look back. If you want something more "playable" than that image how you want it to kick ass and give it dice in that enable that story. Then think about how it's vulnerable and give it dice that reflect that make such an attack viable/optimal, so that you can enable that story too. Cook up what you think will be fun and make it happen. I hope you get enough ideas here to come up with something cool ... and post them when you do. Cuz I think I'll need them in a few months (IMG:style_emoticons/default/grinbig.gif)

[b1ffov3rfl0w]

Would it be possible to use a hardwired expert system like Dixie Flatline in Neuromancer? The tech in SR is more developed, so he'd be able to "appear" as a Virtual Person (to anyone with AR who wasn't blocking him), but would probably be most "at home" in VR. The lack of physical attributes (and possibly Unfit) shouldn't be used to give a huge point break either (as in "you still have up to 200 BP to spend but only on four attributes"), as it would be kind of unfair.

[WeaverMount]

Good point on the not spending BP on physicals. I'd Simply double the cost of mentals and keep everything else the same. Also IIRC VR and AR never fool people into thinking that they are real. That's what makes ultra violate nodes scary. I would think an pull off a Gaius Baltar / Six number is the domain of a full A.I. or shard at a rock bottom minimum.
On that node why wasn't Ultra Violate coding an Echo?

[b1ffov3rfl0w]

Oh, I wasn't thinking about fooling people into thinking he's real (for that you'd need something more sophisticated than Virtual Person), just a way of interacting that wasn't just a voice coming out of a little plastic box or whatever.

[Jaid]

Oh, I wasn't thinking about fooling people into thinking he's real (for that you'd need something more sophisticated than Virtual Person), just a way of interacting that wasn't just a voice coming out of a little plastic box or whatever.

invest in a holoprojector. with one of those, you *can* make people think it's real =P

on a side note, i am really not a fan of making someone pay for their race and then charging them double for mental attributes because they have no physical ones. (i am likewise not a fan of charging jarheads for their CCU, then their drone body, and then charging them double for mental attributes).

i would suggest simply factoring in the whole 'no physical attributes' part into their 'race' and then just limit them to 1/4 their total BP in attributes instead.