How to protect your devices from Hackers in 5th Edition, Or how I learned to worrying and love the GOD. Options

[Tymeaus Jalynsfe...]

It's that in 2075, the Matrix is so Awesome that if you could see it today, you'd pee your pants because you can't appreciate the improved functionality you get just from connecting to it.

-Wired_SR_AEGIS

You make some assumptions here that do not hold up all that well when applied to me. I am not all that impressed with what we have now (all that social networking going on), what makes you think that I will be so overwhelmed were I to see what is available then? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[Aaron]

Or just data spike it twice and be done, No Marks required.

True. That's why I said "in one shot" before.

[Kruger]

Did I miss the part where I insulted you? I didn't miss the part where you hijacked the thread. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

I did, however, miss the direction this thread could have gone which is why I drew attention to it: How to protect your devices in 5th Edition. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

-Wired_SR_AEGIS

Diminishing the value of my opinion because I'm "sore" is an insult. As Biggie would say, "If you don't know, now you know." If you want to steer the conversation in another direction, you could have done it without the "We get it" condescension.

[DMiller]

So all the posturing, complaining and boo-hooing aside, from what we know of the RAW SR5 universe, how does one protect oneself from being hacked other than "turn it all off"?

[Wired_SR_AEGIS]

You make some assumptions here that do not hold up all that well when applied to me. I am not all that impressed with what we have now (all that social networking going on), what makes you think that I will be so overwhelmed were I to see what is available then? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

No. I fully accept what you have said.

I, in no way, want to convey to you that I believe that you would in anyway be impressed with technology that exists in the future.

So all the posturing, complaining and boo-hooing aside, from what we know of the RAW SR5 universe, how does one protect oneself from being hacked other than "turn it all off"?

Sounds like the most practical advice is: Buy an expensive Commlink And/Or build a trust based relationship with a decker and slave your stuff to his deck (Which has advantages based on his attributes + sleaze rating).

I think it's worth repeating that paying attention to your 'check engine light' while running is probably important. And it sounds like a full zero-to-sixty hack in a single round isn't going to be common. So you may see it coming.

-Wired_SR_AEGIS

[Werewindlefr]

Don't forget that penalties apply. Throw in movement, range, cover, concealment, and recoil and you're down at least 4 or 5 dice, which puts that 18 down to a place where a limit of 5 doesn't matter. Take away those penalties and suddenly tht boost in limit matters.

Range is almost never an issue, especially for someone with a smartlink (because cybereyes and vision magnification), and cover adds to defender dice pools.

So it's just concealement and recoil. The first one is occasional, and the second more common but not systematical either. So most of the time you roll your dice pool, and sometimes 2-4 fewer dice.

[LurkerOutThere]

The person who should be running teams cyber defense is the person with the highest intuition and willpower.

[Aaron]

The person who should be running teams cyber defense is the person with the highest intuition and willpower.

And Logic if you want to run silent.

[Wired_SR_AEGIS]

If you slave your devices to the Decker's deck, is it assumed that he has root access to all your equipment/cyber?

Like, my understanding is that because he's the gateway, to get your stuff a hostile decker needs to subvert your friendly hacker's stuff first. But is there any mechanism to protect a malicious decker from tricking you into slaving your gear to her deck, and then launching an attack on your slaved gear?

I would suggest that incorporating the ability to support a zero trust model is an important part of making that architecture believable. Yes, it can operate for streamlined game purposes in a way that allows a compromise of the decker's gear to turn into a compromise of the samurai's cybernetics. HOWEVER. It's a bitter pill to swallow, in the cyberpunk world of paranoia, that you should let someone who undermines electronic systems for a living have implicit trust, and root access.

-Wired_SR_AEGIS

[DWC]

Would you trust someone who kills people for money to guard your physical body? The game hinges on finding a handful of people to trust and trusting them completely. If you want to not get hacked, you have to trust a hacker to defend your network.

[Jaid]

Would you trust someone who kills people for money to guard your physical body? The game hinges on finding a handful of people to trust and trusting them completely. If you want to not get hacked, you have to trust a hacker to defend your network.

yeah, it's not as if the street samurai who professionally breaks into corporate facilities for a variety of purposes ranging from theft to kidnapping to assisting that "untrustworthy" hacker in getting into a position to be able to perpetrate his heinous crimes is any more inherently trustworthy.

and yet, nobody seems to have a problem with the idea of the hacker or magician essentially leaving their meat body completely defenseless and under the street samurai's care. needing a hacker to defend yourself from a hacker makes sense, if you're going to have things accessible online, that is (i'm still not sold on everything having online bonuses, but that's a whole different argument).

[LurkerOutThere]

And Logic if you want to run silent.

Serious question, how does slaving affect running silent? It's not spelled out (or at least doens't seem to be) but i presume i can have a nice chain of devices running silent to one device that the hacker or whoever makes the test on.

[Shinobi Killfist]

yeah, it's not as if the street samurai who professionally breaks into corporate facilities for a variety of purposes ranging from theft to kidnapping to assisting that "untrustworthy" hacker in getting into a position to be able to perpetrate his heinous crimes is any more inherently trustworthy.

and yet, nobody seems to have a problem with the idea of the hacker or magician essentially leaving their meat body completely defenseless and under the street samurai's care. needing a hacker to defend yourself from a hacker makes sense, if you're going to have things accessible online, that is (i'm still not sold on everything having online bonuses, but that's a whole different argument).

This is one of those in my experience things.

Probably based on the detail that people who play deckers F with players far more often than pretty much every archetype. Its like the thief class in D&D for some reason people think its cool to steal from the party because Thief is in the name of their class. Way to many deckers basically screw the party just as much under the I'm a acker that is what I do excuse.

[DireRadiant]

Serious question, how does slaving affect running silent? It's not spelled out (or at least doens't seem to be) but i presume i can have a nice chain of devices running silent to one device that the hacker or whoever makes the test on.

Given that you'd need to see someone Running Silent before you could do anything to them, you would first need to do a Matrix Perception Test to spot anybody Running Silent.

Matrix Perception
Computer + Intuition [Data Processing] (v. Logic + Sleaze)

The higher your logic the harder you are to spot while Running Silent.

[Tymeaus Jalynsfe...]

Given that you'd need to see someone Running Silent before you could do anything to them, you would first need to do a Matrix Perception Test to spot anybody Running Silent.

Matrix Perception
Computer + Intuition [Data Processing] (v. Logic + Sleaze)

The higher your logic the harder you are to spot while Running Silent.

Is that a contested roll, or is it a Threshold?

[LurkerOutThere]

Contested. I have the book i'm just trying to suss out writer intent. Seems like the best way to protect the team is build a slave chain, have them all run silent, and then hand the master device to the person that hits that sweetspot of high logic, intuition, and willpower as well as a powerful link. That person might very well be the team mage or something. In many ways it could actually be to the benefit of the team to not have the hacker be the run supervising things, because then he won't have to take the running silent penalty on his cyberdeck.

I've said it over an over again, I really like the 5th ed matrix rules, but the way defense is handled just dosn't sit very well.

[DireRadiant]

So the design goal of making more Attributes "useful" was met?

[DireRadiant]

Another way LurkeroutThere is to use a WAN and a high end Host as your Master Device. I am not sure if that option was mentioned yet.

[Shinobi Killfist]

So the design goal of making more Attributes "useful" was met?

Attributes were the most insanely important thin to a character in SR4, they were far far far too important. You design goal should have been to make attributes far less important overall with maybe strength getting a nundge to be more useful incomparison. Even in the context you mean, none of those stats were dump stats why did they need to become more useful than they already were?

[DWC]

Attributes were the most insanely important thin to a character in SR4, they were far far far too important. You design goal should have been to make attributes far less important overall with maybe strength getting a nundge to be more useful incomparison. Even in the context you mean, none of those stats were dump stats why did they need to become more useful than they already were?

One of your stats mattered to hackers, and that stat only mattered to cybercombat, which good hackers avoided like the plague. Beyond that, hacking was entire gear and skill driven. I could make a hacker wit 1s in all his Mental stats and he would be a vrituso hacker. A Mage with the same array would be worthless. A trigger puller with 1s inall his physical stats is a sad joke. But a hacker could be just shy of a vegetable and still hack his way through anything.

[RHat]

Attributes were the most insanely important thin to a character in SR4, they were far far far too important. You design goal should have been to make attributes far less important overall with maybe strength getting a nundge to be more useful incomparison. Even in the context you mean, none of those stats were dump stats why did they need to become more useful than they already were?

The design goal he was referencing was making Attributes more important for Matrix characters, for whom they were pretty much completely irrelevant.

[LurkerOutThere]

So the design goal of making more Attributes "useful" was met?

And exceeded, but the baby went out with the bath water and now skills don't matter as much. I'm really curious why it whould my be attribute + skill capped by matrix attribute like elsewhere rather then matrix attribute plus attribute.

It like having someone taking a certain type of shooting action with accuracy plus agility. It seems odd within the framework.

[RHat]

And exceeded, but the baby went out with the bath water and now skills don't matter as much. I'm really curious why it whould my be attribute + skill capped by matrix attribute like elsewhere rather then matrix attribute plus attribute.

It like having someone taking a certain type of shooting action with accuracy plus agility. It seems odd within the framework.

It may be that they decided that putting it into a skill may have made little sense or overvalued that one skill in comparison to the other Matrix skills.

[Shinobi Killfist]

The design goal he was referencing was making Attributes more important for Matrix characters, for whom they were pretty much completely irrelevant.

Sure, but that design goal was met by making it skill+attribute. Intuition handled matrix perception which is damn useful, willpower has always just been a useful stat. How many ways do these stats need to be made useful.

[Wired_SR_AEGIS]

Another way LurkeroutThere is to use a WAN and a high end Host as your Master Device. I am not sure if that option was mentioned yet.

What are the rules for doing that, DireRadiant?

-Wired_SR_AEGIS