Drones as opposition/security, How common are they in YOUR games? Options

[Manunancy]

Now for the next problem: Police drone networks. I'm thinking the cops have two problems: They are notoriously spread thin, but they still need to be able to run up a profit.
So... they have to cover entire cities with drone networks or security cams. Cams will be wired - the trouble is they will be prone to destruction in troubled neighbourhoods. A high-flying drone network is harder to destroy, but has the usual problems of being sensitve to hacking. I would simply give it a straight 6s system, but when that fails, tough luck.

A possible solution for surveillance drone would be to have them communicate with their 'base' through tight-beam radio and/or laser setups, with the non-directional wireless used only as a backup if the normal communication fails. Add some ruthenium coating and radar-absorbent materials to make the drone hard to spot. For extra fun, have several transmitting stations in different locations (say one on each precinct) and jump between them at random intervals or as soon as there's a hint of someone is messing with the signal.

It means that to hack the drone you'll have to spot it, figure out where it is transmitting and intercept the directional transmission without tripping the alarm and having to intercept in another direction.

that's not as good as a wired control but it comes close.

[Brainpiercing7.6...]

A possible solution for surveillance drone would be to have them communicate with their 'base' through tight-beam radio and/or laser setups, with the non-directional wireless used only as a backup if the normal communication fails. Add some ruthenium coating and radar-absorbent materials to make the drone hard to spot. For extra fun, have several transmitting stations in different locations (say one on each precinct) and jump between them at random intervals or as soon as there's a hint of someone is messing with the signal.

It means that to hack the drone you'll have to spot it, figure out where it is transmitting and intercept the directional transmission without tripping the alarm and having to intercept in another direction.

that's not as good as a wired control but it comes close.

Great ideas. Problem, though: It seems if all those things were common, then common off-the-shelf drones would have at least some of them, right? And then suddenly they aren't so cheap anymore. If most police drones had Ruthenium, laser comm and whatever else, then these would eventually turn up on the black market.

What you're basically suggesting is that regular off the shelf drones don't cut it. That was sort of my thought, too, but...

[Udoshi]

Honestly, you guys are forgetting the basics.

Police already use non-standard radio frequencies, and people still buy police band radios and things for their cars every now and then.

Basically, any non-consumer drone doing essential tasks is *probably* going to be carrying a Nonstandard Wireless Link instead of its usual Signal. Its a really simple precaution, and pretty much makes sense. Real world does it already.

Threshold 5 Detect Hidden Node tests pretty much keep all the riffraff out. Your average hacker is just probably not going to be able to FIND the drone's network in order to hack it. Even, or especially, while its shooting him.

Also laser links, microwave links, and directional antennae are all excellent, and sometimes even cheap.

[Stahlseele]

Not very.
We usually don't have anything that can so much as scratch vehicle/hardened armor . .
And we don't use them ourselves, beause we don't have a dedicated rigger . .
much less someone who really understands the shadowrun third edition drone rules . .

[Brainpiercing7.6...]

Not very.
We usually don't have anything that can so much as scratch vehicle/hardened armor . .
And we don't use them ourselves, beause we don't have a dedicated rigger . .
much less someone who really understands the shadowrun third edition drone rules . .

I'll grant you in SR3 there weren't that many drones in the world, and when there were, they were usually EXPENSIVE already. The drone rigger had the problem that he was paying a metric crapton of cash for a super-specialised piece of equipment, which then got basically binary damage: Either it wasn't scratched, or it blew up. Taking over a hostile drone network was a really, really complicated affair, we did it a few times, and it took forever.

I think SR4 isn't as bad, in SR4 there is the problem of what you can get for how much money, and you could literally get tons of cheap drones. Here the problem is the network: Even with 100 cheap drones, all you need is hack the network and you get ALL of them - for a while.

@Udoshi:
You're probably right. I keep forgetting it's actually hard (in a general sense) to detect hidden nodes (because we don't use the iteratively depleting DP rules from 4A at our table for extended tests.) So basically that takes care of a lot of basic problems, and doesn't cost much at all.

[Udoshi]

Detect Hidden Node isn't an extended test anyway, unless you are doing the REALLY LONG one.

If you assume that most security drones are running Basic Cost-Effective Security packages, you can basically just throw Analyze+Encrypt 6, optimized 3, ergonomic on most drones. With a good Firewall, its gives them decent odds to spot a hacker, and call their remote rigger's e-support for antiviral backup.

If I was adjusting that for The Full Unwired Experience, while still keeping it mostly sane, I would probably throw Purge 6 in there as well as the Homeground autosoft, which gives the pilot actually decent analyze test dice. (remember, automatic non-action Analyze tests on page 228 are everyone's friend). I'd add a Reality Filter as well, because it gives +1 response, and running a bunch of programs gives you -1 response, so its a good way to not lose dice (drones use response for a lot of things) if you are running a lot of Autosofts, or need to boot up an IC.

If i was feeling generous, maybe purge 4 or 5, since some corps don't always have the best software due to budget constraints, licensing issues, or management doing cost-benefit analysis.

That should pretty much be enough to cockblock casual hackers and virus spam from 'secure' drone networks while still being fairly simple.

[Manunancy]

Great ideas. Problem, though: It seems if all those things were common, then common off-the-shelf drones would have at least some of them, right? And then suddenly they aren't so cheap anymore. If most police drones had Ruthenium, laser comm and whatever else, then these would eventually turn up on the black market.

What you're basically suggesting is that regular off the shelf drones don't cut it. That was sort of my thought, too, but...

If you compare the price of one such drone to the cost of equiping says ten city blocks with fixed cameras and their own links, it doesn't sounds as high. Such a drone won't be very common : most corp watching one or a few buildings won't have use ofr it. Only the cops or extensive installations (say military base or industrial zone sized) will use it.

But directional links are rather cheap and you can use them on fixed cams too - since they're usually placed on high spot, odds are you can draw a line of sight to several transmiters.