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> I just don't "get" the Matrix
Sweaty Hippo
post Jul 12 2008, 11:07 PM
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I have a Hack/Drone cheat sheet from somewhere else (the site of another member that posts here), but whenever I read threads about Hackers and Technomancers, the technobabble just goes over my head; I looked at some parts of Frank's Ends of the Matrix, and I am still none the wiser.

Is there a "quick and dirty" guide to the Matrix? All the use of words like "tasking, resonance," and such make me feel like a 70 year old whose never used a computer confronted with installing 2008 software.
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nezumi
post Jul 13 2008, 01:22 AM
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Are you trying to understand the process or the paradigm?
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Cadmus
post Jul 13 2008, 06:23 AM
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Unfortunately, no one can be told what the Matrix is. You have to see it for yourself.


(don't judge me you where thinking of posting it too! admit it))

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hermit
post Jul 13 2008, 06:41 AM
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QUOTE (Sweaty Hippo @ Jul 13 2008, 01:07 AM) *
I have a Hack/Drone cheat sheet from somewhere else (the site of another member that posts here), but whenever I read threads about Hackers and Technomancers, the technobabble just goes over my head; I looked at some parts of Frank's Ends of the Matrix, and I am still none the wiser.

Is there a "quick and dirty" guide to the Matrix? All the use of words like "tasking, resonance," and such make me feel like a 70 year old whose never used a computer confronted with installing 2008 software.

The unwired pdf is your friend (it has a 'quick guide to the matrix' chapter). Of course, both tasking and resonance are technomancer stuff, so you'll have to read the mancer chapter too (I recommend the one in the BBB, it's only 3 pages).
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CanRay
post Jul 13 2008, 01:02 PM
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The Medium is the Message.

There, a more refined quote.
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Prime Mover
post Jul 13 2008, 01:13 PM
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Read the matrix section in BBB. No matter how long you've played I find it very useful to take day and go back and reread full sections from intro fluff to the say ..ohh the matrix chapter. When playing and you run into a problem, fix it on the fly and make a note. When have some downtime try and go back to the books and see if you can answer the questions in your notes. If its terminology issue might as simple as going back for a reread of sections in BBB.
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Sweaty Hippo
post Jul 13 2008, 02:35 PM
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Thanks everyone for your help!
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Heath Robinson
post Jul 13 2008, 07:30 PM
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I was considering airing my greivances with the Matrix here, it seemed not to be a good idea but, now that Sweaty Hippo has either signalled his discontent with the current crop of responses or has had his answers, I'm unlikely to hijack the thread from its purpose.

The Matrix is insane. I find the assumptions about how the Matrix runs to be incoherent and untenable. Primarily this is because there's no canon universal and fundamental interaction method that is shared between everything. I'll try to explain why.

When you go into VR you achieve everything through the interface of your persona and its somatic metaphors and shortcuts. You can download a file by putting it into your pocket, for example. You might look through a spyglass to Analyse things.

In AR you interact through the medium of conventional computer metaphors; windows and iconography which describe data to you. It's never explained how you can retrieve things from a server somewhere else using AR. Any attempt to understand what happens when you try to retrieve the gig times for those Speed Coma tickets you bought off someone is based entirely on your own personal assumptions of how the Matrix works. Actually knowing this is not just a fluff detail, because the interaction method defines how one is vulnerable when doing these things.

For example; your commlink could spawn a Persona that connects to the node containing the information and retrieves it automatically before displaying it. This way you avoid using a fundamentally different method of interaction from the VR matrix. You could also, equally, argue that it runs more along conventional computing routes and subscribes to a program that's running on the node and gets given it by this program. These two methods might both be in use at the same time.

If that first method can be used then there's nothing to stop the argument that an Agent can pilot a commlink persona and avoid using its inbuilt AccessID (if a commlink Persona can act without the user being jacked in, then an Agent can duplicate the actions needed to control it this way), leading to Agent Smith being an "I win" button. The second method implies that there's no need to hack by visiting the node in your Persona, you can interact with programs on a node without a Persona present and you can hack these programs to achieve your intentions. Needless to say, this contradicts assumptiosn implicit in fluff.

The fact that the two viable choices I can think of for retrieving data from the Matrix when you're using AR both allow you to render VR obsolete to your character implies, to me, that nobody considered how AR and VR fit together. The easiest way (for everyone) to consider this is to define the underlying model explicitly and describe how all facets of your system relate to this model, SR does not define this model as far as I can see.

The VR Matrix operates as it does because it's designed with the intent of making hacking intuitive (if not by FASA, then by Gibson) and doesn't actually lend itself to easily doing anything that we take for granted now. It tries to make Hackers a viable concept by giving them something to do without considering the other side of things; how to make non-Hackers think of the Matrix as something useful to their purposes. If non-Hackers think the Matrix is not useful, then there's nothing to support the need for Hackers as no data gets put onto Matrix accessable machines. (The best security against network hacking is to restrict access to the network.)

AR has to be designed to be useful in order to fit the intent of its introduction; something cool and useful for everybody as well as making Hackers relevant in the game (by making more individuals hacking targets). Because the VR portions of the Matrix weren't designed in a way that makes this goal attainable, AR has to ignore the way that the VR Matrix works and just say "works by magic" in order to perform its function. Unfortunately, ignoring the VR Matrix also ignores the interaction between the two views of the Matrix and leaves everyone wondering just how to affect one from the other. How can one hack an AR-originated request for some data from the currently accessed node when you're in VR?

One could almost argue that the Matrix actually has two different and completely independant modes of usage; AR can't affect VR and VR can't affect AR. It'd certainly shut up all the whiners complaining about how someone spending hundreds of thousands of nuyen and losing most of their Essence can nearly compete with a VR Hacker without the risk of braindeath. Unfortunately it doesn't seem to be the intended interpretation.

I'm now going to wait for someone to respond telling me that the Matrix is actually totally coherent and easy to understand.

tl;dr - There is nothing to "understand" because the Matrix is not a coherent system, it's a bunch of rules and fluff designed to fulfil the purpose of making Hackers relevant, instead of being a tool that you would be able to imagine people using in their day-to-day life. It almost entirely has to work along "it's fucking magic" ad hocery for anything not explicitly detailed in the rules, because nobody knows how things operate under the hood.
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Sweaty Hippo
post Jul 13 2008, 07:38 PM
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One more question:

What is the in-game rationale for Technomancers losing Resonance for installing Cyberware?
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CanRay
post Jul 13 2008, 07:56 PM
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Why don't you have the Technomancer in the group ask the nice Scientists that researched the situation extensively. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/devil.gif)
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Stahlseele
post Jul 13 2008, 08:04 PM
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QUOTE (Sweaty Hippo @ Jul 13 2008, 09:38 PM) *
One more question:

What is the in-game rationale for Technomancers losing Resonance for installing Cyberware?

same as for anyone esle:"because it disturbs the hollistic complete image the essence has of the body and the essence does not agree with that and basically says:'fuck this shit, i'm outta here!'"

as for the topic . . do technomancers actually GET the matrix? O.o
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CanRay
post Jul 13 2008, 08:10 PM
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Well, each one think they do, and they get into major flame wars over it.

The damage to simple nodes (Like traffic cameras, fire hydrants, ect.) are extensive when you have Technomancer Flame Wars!
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Stahlseele
post Jul 13 2008, 08:17 PM
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that actually sounds kinda cool *g*
i imagine something like hacking the gibson in Hackers 1 *g*
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Dashifen
post Jul 13 2008, 10:53 PM
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@Heath Robinson

I disagree that AR and VR work differently. Sure, the interaction would be different (as you've described) but I don't see why they are mutually exclusive, as you seem to indicate when you say:

QUOTE
One could almost argue that the Matrix actually has two different and completely independant modes of usage; AR can't affect VR and VR can't affect AR. It'd certainly shut up all the whiners complaining about how someone spending hundreds of thousands of nuyen and losing most of their Essence can nearly compete with a VR Hacker without the risk of braindeath. Unfortunately it doesn't seem to be the intended interpretation.


Although, on a second reading, I notice that you, too, indicate that this interpretation isn't intended.

I've always pictured AR as a window into the metaphor that you experience when you're in VR. If the system displays a metaphor of a giant tree with birds flying in and out as data transfers and squirrels as IC constructs defending the system, then in VR you'd be able to move about the tree and feel like it were solid. In AR, you'd still see the tree, but it would be a 3d representation of the system in a window somewhere in your field of vision. You could interact with it, but barring specific technology (e.g., AR Gloves) you'd have to do so through the limitations of AR.

Have you seen Jurassic Park? One of the concepts I've used to help people understand AR vs. VR is this: recall the scene where the young woman was using the park's system to try and engage the door locks while the adults held a door shut keeping dinosaurs outside. Ignore, for the moment, that she was using a full computer terminal and remember the interface. It showed her "flying" through a "cityscape" of geometric shapes (AROs) with small labels giving her information about what each shape represented (public node details). She could move throughout this space with her interface (a mouse, in the movie, but it can extend to AR Gloves or even DNI) until she found the appropriate shape she wished to interact with, and then she accessed it and locked the doors.

Now, in VR, the same metaphor of a flying through a space containing shapes would be available, but instead of seeing it through a window on the AR "screen" available in the hacker's field of vision, that hacker would actually be flying through space. There would be no window and, in fact, no "screen," just the metaphor. In this way the hacker could actually fly over the space looking for the appropriate system using DNI rather than using other interface techniques (e.g., AR Gloves, commlink keyboard, etc.) to give commands. The end result is the same (locking the doors) but the method by which it takes place is different.
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DireRadiant
post Jul 14 2008, 01:58 AM
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I find VR and AR access to be perfectly understandable since they are both simply interface methods that map to events and processes in the underlying system. The mapping isn't direct, where AR = VR, but where AR = "What's really happening" = VR. That's the simplest mapping to use, but it's clearly an implicit correlation.

Now as to what's happening when AR and VR are interacting, from the AR users perspective their system is rendering to the AR perceiver it's interpretation of event the Node is sending to the AR perceiver of what the VR user is attempting in the system. And vice versa. It's not a direct interaction, but a presentation of what the perceivers system has been told is going on elsewhere.

In terms of game mechanics you can actually think of terms of VR commands = Data Search + Browse where the Data Search + Browse is issued in the VR environment, but the node executes it, and any other perceiver, in AR for example will see their systems interpretation of that command. Every individual user has their own paradigm and view of the underlying core events.

I don't even know exactly what's happening really in the underlying node, those advanced future optical computing things are doing work, but as long as I have the interface and commands I can make it do what I need.

It's not unlike today where you already have systems that do things like this. On a windows OS machine there are often both a shell command set that can be run through command line, and a nice GUI interface that do exactly the same things on the machine, and I can view the processes from both of them at the same time. DOes the fact that I used a DOS window for one, or the properties tab gui for the computer admin interface make any difference in t he binary executable that is called? None. And It's not just in windows, the various flavors of Linux, Unix, and the major mainframe OS all offer the same kind multiple interfaces into underlying core system functions.
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Zaranthan
post Jul 14 2008, 02:08 AM
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I think there's a fairly innocuous keystone to Heath Robinson's AR vs. VR rant up there.

QUOTE
For example; your commlink could spawn a Persona that connects to the node containing the information and retrieves it automatically before displaying it.

Where did you get the idea that the Persona is exclusive to VR? Just because you don't have the five-sense interface doesn't mean that your digital representation has changed at all. Heck, I could even have a VR metaphor where everything is represented by a pure text console. Retrieving a file could require (as far as my brain can tell) typing in "get node://user/aug15/payroll.dat" and watching a quick progress bar. It'd be kinda convenient, as my AR interface could be nearly identical.

The Persona is described on BBB p.211, but the gist of it is that the Persona is simply a collective term referring to all the programs you have running on your commlink.
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Noirfatale
post Jul 14 2008, 07:34 PM
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wow... I am speachless... how can something so simple become so complicated???

oki lets put things in their right places:

1 - the user.

Usually metahuman, with a brain, a capacity to think, to adapt and self aware.

2 - the Matrix

a network of machine containing and processing information on various level. In SR the machines are so complex that the information has now reached the singularity point: a point in time were machines no longuer need external imput (read metahuman) to improve themselves. Some programs have reached a state of self awareness. ( A.I.)

Now metahumans need a way to acces the matrix. We call it interface. Basically it takes information from eitheir source and translate them in a form that the other party will understand.

so the first interface is the good old computer screen (from computer to user) and the keyboard ( user to computer) and the software in between to link the brain and the hardware.

Basically the more advanced and sofisticated the interface can speed up the acces to the information, make it more intuitive etc.

but now forget the technobable a second and try to visualise this:

the matrix is like a big library with a bunch of clerk doing different task, several index and lots of room, some connected and some independant with loked door and limited acces. Also you have several secret passages and hidden shortcuts and elevators to acces certain parts of the library.

To acces the information you can ask the reception information and acces. If you got clearence and the service is available they will send a cleak do the searching and bring the info to you. The more specific the request and the more chance you can gat an answer. But a lot of outside factor and much restriction down to the mood of the people answering your request will impact in your succes.

like seaching a info with google with a keybord on any computer. you will never get acces to the hot info (unless a glitch happen) and you will get lots of junk, not very specific or will take lots of time but require a minimum of material, access and skill.

but the you can acces the net trhough AR using a reality filter wich is a program that make thing simple for you. Basically it makes the work easier, faster and more intuitive ( like DOS VS Windows - command strings compare to user friendly icons). Your commlink software can be ajusted to compensate for your shortcommings in skill or in time. You can also use agents by giving them specific instruction to complete tasks for you.

But AR is AUGMENTED REALITY: it goes over real life world and adds lots of information that you can customize. It gives you time of day, the temperature, the latest news, gps directions but you still have to deal with real world info and are limited to real-time information transfer. You still need to read the infos to acces it. You can send agents in different places than you but your brain stays with your meat body. You can walk in a mall with white walls but for you its filled with adds customized to your preference while the guys next to you will see his own adds. But you still have to exit physically the mall to get outside.

VR dont have to exist in real world, they can be as big or as small as the node designer wants. they can do whatever they want and you can travel from one point to another in the speed of light. While you can make a call to acces a faraway site in AR, your acces and reaction speed are limited by your ability to absorb information trough certain senses (sight, sound ect) and with the advent of btl you can even feel and touch but are still limited by your senses (the hand faster than the eyes shtick) while VR is a DIRECT link to your brain, bypassing your senses ( like in the Matrix movie) where you are no longer limited by your meat body in your ability to access, manipulate and process information. Also a much greater amount of info can be taken in and in far greater number by remove the in between your brain and the infos.

the problem being the speed and the power at witch malware can access your brain as well. Downloding a virus with a 26k modem and a broadband modem is quite a different matter.

also putting a finger in a power outlet and actually plugging you brain with wire to the outlet is something else.

try to see past the rule and the mechanics and focus on the effect instead. Bring everything to the simplest expression and get to the point of what you want to do in game. Dont try to fit your vision or idea to the system but try instead to figure what you want then use the system as a set of tool to acheave your goal.
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Heath Robinson
post Jul 15 2008, 02:21 AM
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I'm a technical guy; I program computers for fun (unfortunately I'm lazy and in university, so no profit yet). I understand how computers and networks work. I don't need any visualisations or explanations. Now, Sweaty Hippo might, but I'm not sure you're doing it for his benefit.

Let me rephrase my requests in terms of vaguely antagonistic questions. When I try to grab the gig times for some tickets using AR, what do VR users see happening? Why does Reality Filter make an opposed roll against the node I'm accessing if it's all my OS interpretting information sent over the network?

It's that fucking simple, all the rest of my post was merely explaining why these questions are so important and how there is no information in the fluff (from what I recall) that gives answers to them. These answers determine in what way VR hacking becomes obsolete, at least in terms of what you should be able to do. There is no information on how AR and VR interact, because the issue was not even considered. If it was, you'd be able to give me a page number.

Now, what I say is that there is no fundamental model; VR and AR are purely rules systems, and exist as they do purely for metagame reasons. Everything about them works the way it does because IJD, and no deeper answer can be given as to why.

(As an aside, why did I ever stop taking caffeine? It feels great to finally be back on the stuff.)
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Zaranthan
post Jul 15 2008, 02:34 AM
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QUOTE
When I try to grab the gig times for some tickets using AR, what do VR users see happening?

They either see the node's metaphor for a file transfer, or their own if their Reality Filter is running.

QUOTE
Why does Reality Filter make an opposed roll against the node I'm accessing if it's all my OS interpretting information sent over the network?

Because when you're actually in someone else's node, you accept their presentation of what's going on. If you want to override that with your own, you need to run a utility suite to re-interpret all that information. The node doesn't want you to do that because, for whatever reason, the way it's already set up works better for the person who owns it. Thus, the node resists, because some network designer spent a week evaluating traffic patterns to set that up and who are you to say you know any better?

If you're looking at inter-node traffic, you get your own metaphor without any resistance, because transmission protocols require that sort of openness.
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Heath Robinson
post Jul 15 2008, 03:57 AM
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QUOTE (Zaranthan @ Jul 15 2008, 03:34 AM) *
They either see the node's metaphor for a file transfer, or their own if their Reality Filter is running.


Because when you're actually in someone else's node, you accept their presentation of what's going on. If you want to override that with your own, you need to run a utility suite to re-interpret all that information. The node doesn't want you to do that because, for whatever reason, the way it's already set up works better for the person who owns it. Thus, the node resists, because some network designer spent a week evaluating traffic patterns to set that up and who are you to say you know any better?

If you're looking at inter-node traffic, you get your own metaphor without any resistance, because transmission protocols require that sort of openness.

I really shouldn't have tried even the least bit of subtlety in my first question. I was trying to provide context that'd help folk understand what I wanted, but given that the Matrix is a pure gamist system I should have expected a useless answer because it's all operating on the IJD principle. You covered one part of the seqence of events that lead to acquiring the information.

Okay, let me provide you with a description of what I think the VR user would see. A Persona accesses the node and its icon appears in the node metaphor, the new Persona teleports the icon representing the information to itself, metaphor actions for downloading a copy of the information occurs, the new Persona logs off the node. Is this the sequence of events you would anticipate?


As for the second question; this answer does not reason about any deeper system, you are simply saying that this stuff happens because it just does. What kind of data is being transferred to the user? Nothing vague like "a metaphor" because that's not the actual data content. Describe the nature of the information about objects and personas that is transferred to connected users and explain why this information supports the necessity for an opposed roll.
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Noirfatale
post Jul 15 2008, 07:11 AM
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wow youre dense and complicating things because you want to so there is absolutly no point in arguing with you. Yeah I play with computer too and I know about networking so what? No reason to go stephen hawkins on us ITS A GAME.

to hack in AR you need to be at the node physcally or to acces it with remote access with a agent, you analyse the node to find the index, browse the content , spoof or exploit your way in or let the agent do all the work, take the info and download on your pan leaving a nice datatrail if you dont erase it.

the way you see it depend on your reality filter or the node filter if you dont contest, you may get a -1 or -2 dice penality if the reality filter is very different or weird.

why should we complicate matthers beyond that? Geez 99% of the human race dont even get what your babling. And besides it has no interest in a roleplaying game with magic, orks and elf.

if you want a super realistic system well knock yourself out and make it up... good luck finding people to play it.

might as well make it in FORTRAN while youre at it lol
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hobgoblin
post Jul 15 2008, 08:17 AM
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QUOTE (Heath Robinson @ Jul 15 2008, 05:57 AM) *
Matrix is a pure gamist system


someone hand me a flamethrower, there is forge taint to banish...
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Synner
post Jul 15 2008, 09:08 AM
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For everyone's enlightenment let's work through this and see if we can help solve some of the conceptual problems here.

Whether you're operating in AR and VR your Persona is actually Multisensory User Interface (an upgrade of Graphic User Interface) - though it's significant to note that most people using AR limit themselves to using it as a GUI projecting it on some visual display system and maybe a sound system.

When you access a node, the system you are pinging automatically sends your Persona all the sensory data you need to "visualize" and manipulate the node (this is akin to opening a webpage in your browser). The data sent includes both AR and VR cues. If you access a node in VR, your commlink/Persona will turn that data into a full 3D sculpted full-sensory rendering of the node with more or less obvious integral cues for the actions that may be performed. If you access it through AR you get something like a 2D web page projected on your chosen AR device (or directly inyto your mind via trodes). What's happening is exactly the same - the node is "broadcasting" its representation and your commlink is translating it into representations compatible with either a AR GUI or a VR MUI.

All a reality filter does is (try to) replace the default MUI/GUI cues your commlink/Persona is recieving from the node into a preprogrammed metaphor/MUI cues that you are more familiar and comfortable with - ultimately all a reality filter does is affect how icons are displayed (on your commlink) not what they are and not their default representation. Think of it as a glorified program "skin."

So to use the aforementioned grabbing tickets for a gig example.

When an AR user accesses the ticket seller's node, his AR interface displays the customer services/ticket sales site/node and maybe a friendly talking head that walks him through the process of buying tickets. This is pretty much a matter of filing in your basic data (SIN) and confirming transfer of e-money from your account. Once that is accomplished the system/agent sends him a file (either transfering it directly to the users inbox or emailing it later) with the relevant e-ticket code (linked to the SIN provided). This file is "formatted" to look like a big golden concert ticket which you can actually upload to your persona's public profile to display at the entrance of the venue.

What an VR user accessing the node sees upon arriving is a dolled-up virtual ticketcounter/quiosk that represents the customer service node/ticket sales node in VR (same node as in AR only visualized in VR). There's either an agent or simply an automated script (in the form of a nice-looking attendant) behind the ticketcounter selling you the ticket. In VR you buy the ticket just like you would in real life, offering your information and transfering the amount due. Once the payment is confirmed the agent/script transfers/emails you the e-ticket file as above (which looks like that big golden concert ticket in VR too). This file is transfered to the inbox on your Persona and you can upload it to your public profile to display at the entrance of the venue.

Using an Angelic Reality Filter simply transforms the whole node into the Heavenly Gates and the attendant into Saint Peter. Pretty much everything else works the same. When he gives you (transfers/emails the file) the key to the gates (ticket to the concert) it's actually the same golden e-ticket file as before though your Persona is overwriting the sensory cues to make it look like a key.

Note no actual hacking is involved in the above transaction.
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Chrysalis
post Jul 15 2008, 10:36 AM
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QUOTE (Heath Robinson @ Jul 15 2008, 05:21 AM) *
Let me rephrase my requests in terms of vaguely antagonistic questions. When I try to grab the gig times for some tickets using AR, what do VR users see happening? Why does Reality Filter make an opposed roll against the node I'm accessing if it's all my OS interpretting information sent over the network?


First of all yes the Matrix does not work. There are so many basic assumptions that if one was to use hand waving would look like you are trying to imitate a bird taking off. I have issues in how the Matrix can be played because it is such a highly sensory assistive environment. This is me saying fuck the system and let me try to explain it as I see it is built.

I see the world in Shadowrun being composed of three layers: First is the real world, you get it warts and all. Second is the Assistive Reality (AR) where with the power of handwavium processing power you can smooth over all the warts. Third is virtual reality which has nothing to do with reality.

You're in a club, you're using AR and you see an AR sign for your fave band playing in that club. The AR logo asks if you would like to buy tickets. The rest of the punters in the club don't see if you buy tickets unless the AR is set up so that it shows an image of you buying tickets.

VR is where you log into the node of your club which has a ticket counter. In VR you are informed with a times square marquee on who logged in and what is going on - the node also asks if you would like to have an AR presence in the club. If you say no you go for the ticket counter menu and get your concert tickets.The rest of the punters in the club don't see if you buy tickets unless the VR or AR is set up so that it shows an image of you buying tickets.

With AR presence you get the whole AR experience of everyone in the club as if you were actually there (how the hell this works is another handwavium issue) except without much of the reality. The AR logo asks if you would like to buy tickets. The rest of the punters in the club don't see if you buy tickets unless the AR is set up so that it shows an image of you buying tickets.

Most places have VR which is old tech. New equipment such as the club's new ticket counter has AR.

Reality Filters are what lamers use when they want everything to have that Wild West look. Most of the time reality filters are run by clubs to make sure that the preppy teen cheerleader outfit actually fits the goth club. Most of the time it informs you are dressed wrong and either you go with their selection of AR choices or then get kicked out.

For me AR ultimately is sparkle for reality and VR is just the web in 3D.

Hacking AR is mostly cheap laughs like changing the link to their webpage to a porn site or copy pasting Arnold's Body on all the women with all muscle moves.

You could hack the ticket counter in AR same way as you would in VR. But with VR it's easier since you have all kinds of other access points instead of just AR.
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Sir_Psycho
post Jul 15 2008, 02:44 PM
Post #25


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QUOTE (Heath Rob)
Why does Reality Filter make an opposed roll against the node I'm accessing if it's all my OS interpretting information sent over the network?


Because you're trying to see this, but it wants you to see this.

So,.wouldyouliketobuysome. tickets
toConcretedr.
eams r.
evival tour?.
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