The Decker Threat, Just how big is it? Options

[RHat]

This has been spinning around in my head since someone in one thread said something about "any teenager with a deck". Basically, the question of the day is how common deckers would actually be. A few assumptions and givens:

Assumption: The majority of the criminal element would fall under the street level runner rules if you had to build them with PC rules, notably outstripping the regular and prime runner class characters by a long shot.
Assumption: It is possible to get a pretty decent defense together with just a commlink, as defending yourself likely requires neither Sleaze nor Attack.
Assumption: It takes more than just a decent deck to actually be a decker worth worrying about.

Given: The cheapest deck is about 50k, and its highest attribute is 4.
Given: At the street level, even using bonus chargen Karma, only Resources Priorities of A or B can be used to buy a deck (C is only 25k, and you're only permitted 10k from chargen Karma). This means that a street decker would spend all of their priority B cash, or 66% of their priority A cash, on the WORST deck.
Given: Being a decker requires both attributes and skills focused around decking, suggesting the Assumption: A Street Decker is unlikely to be able to afford to be much else other than a decker.

Doesn't it seem that the number of people who could actually be a credible Matrix threat would be a good deal lower in the new wireless Matrix than the old wireless Matrix? Isn't the barrier of entry quite a lot higher? Wouldn't this impact any security analysis and prep? In the final analysis, even though the odd individual might be able to do more, isn't the overall threat LOWER?

[apple]

CorpSec would not be afraid about the teenager decker - after all they are slaughtered by GOD and as you have correctly written down, a teenager decker is no real threat. The threat are CorpSec / intelligence service / blackops espionage deckers with enough money or sponsored computer power to have the x hundred thousend nuyen for a professional cyberdeck (that and TMs of course).

Of course you can debate if incredible expensive cyberdecks is a good thing for the setting. It was the same dilemma in SR3, where you had to be a very rich man before you could become a street punk hacking his school records.
SYL

[RHat]

Resources is accumulated whatever, though, not "I've had this much cash to spend" - bit of a difference.

But my point is more that the guys who would be a threat would be rare as hell.

[Moirdryd]

Let's face it, the Old Deckers were not all That numerous in the 50's and 60's. But there were a lot of wannabes.

[Shinxy]

Not only that, but cyberdecks are explicitly illegal devices. There's no legitimate purpose for them (unless you work for GOD). Joe script kiddie can't just pick up an off-the-shelf commlink and load a stealth and exploit program anymore. I assume most shadowrunners would have to build theirs themselves. Should greatly cut down on the number of people who can cut the mustard.

[apple]

Resources is accumulated whatever, though, not "I've had this much cash to spend" - bit of a difference.

The source does not really matter. A *starter/beginner* noob-decker needs hardware and software power with an equivalent of a six figure nuyen amount. He may have received, stolen, bargained, found, scammed, extorted, stole whatever the money, but the fact remains that you need to be a rich man first before you can even hack something.

First the Rolls Royce, then the street kid can hack the toy shop. To be honest, it´s quite anti-cyberpunk and not really a good game design to make such basic starting tools so expensive.

What´s the maximum deck rating / software a starting character can have with the priority system? 5? 6?

How much is software btw? Can it be cracked and copied as in SR4?

[Moirdryd]

A good analogy would be Street Racers/Boy Racers or even modern computer game dedicated enthusiasts. There's lots of money dedicated by those individuals into their chosen "field" and many of them have fairly regular incomes. It's only as likely as all the other Cyberware and kit out there, but then that used to be in the 20 questions.

[apple]

Yes, but usually you can start way below 50-100k ¥.

I suppose to discuss further we need to know the software prices (and if they can be cracaked/copied). If they really went back to SR3, then you have to pay the same amount of money for the software as you had to pay for your deck (if not more).

SYL

[LurkerOutThere]

Software is actually pretty cheap now, but it has no rating and a fixed function, hope that helps.

[RHat]

The source does not really matter. A *starter/beginner* noob-decker needs hardware and software power with an equivalent of a six figure nuyen amount. He may have received, stolen, bargained, found, scammed, extorted, stole whatever the money, but the fact remains that you need to be a rich man first before you can even hack something

Or you take hardware/software skills and use the explanation that you built it, which really seems like the most likely thing anyways.

[DWC]

Or you take hardware/software skills and use the explanation that you built it, which really seems like the most likely thing anyways.

Reminds me of th good old days of VR2.0, and the rules for making your own software and building your own deck that meant it was cheaper to buy a chunk of pre-paid lifestyle to build it yourself rather than buy your deck and programs with character creation resources.

[apple]

Or you take hardware/software skills and use the explanation that you built it, which really seems like the most likely thing anyways.

That is as viable as "I build my own Rolls Royce". You still need the raw materials, tools etc.

And no, I really don´t want to have VR 2.0 come back with "Well, the game starts and the decker is off for one year to code his own programms and to cook up his own deck". Horrible times.

SYL

[RHat]

That is as viable as "I build my own Rolls Royce". You still need the raw materials, tools etc.

I believe one of the fictions seen in the previews has a character whose deck is put together from something like 5 commlinks? Not quite like getting all the parts for a Rolls, nor is a Facility gonna be needed for putting it together (and this could easily be the sort of thing where the "insufficient tools" penalty is an option).

[Tzeentch]

Given the way SR tech works, I imagine that it's not outside the realm of reason that you could somehow frankenstein multiple cheap commlinks together to create a workable cyberdeck. Perhaps using some open-source/shadow-source "glue" to operate them as a cluster. The way it worked in SR1-3 was a bit counter-intuitive as, as has been noted, you had to already be a rich mofo to even get the basics - and you often had to pay a LOT for maintenance because of the SOTA rules.

[apple]

Honestly, if you can take 5 cheap commlinks for some hundred bucks and make a 50 000+ ¥ commlink, then something is wrong. Either in the world or in the rule system. It would be like turning shit into gold.

...

I mean it would be wonderful. The first thing my SR5 mage gets is a high loyalty decker who just builds cyberdecks from commlinks and sell them and give the money to the mage. Bam, instant Fortune 500, and some years later my mage will buy the matrix. It would be the physical Orichalkium trick. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

SYL

[Critias]

I believe one of the fictions seen in the previews has a character whose deck is put together from something like 5 commlinks? Not quite like getting all the parts for a Rolls, nor is a Facility gonna be needed for putting it together (and this could easily be the sort of thing where the "insufficient tools" penalty is an option).

FWIW, that was an aesthetic call made to match some artwork, to allude to Gentry's skills at tinkering with stuff, to encourage folks to think outside the box in describing their hardware (in addition to Gentry's messenger bag model, there's a beltpack/fannypack type, mentioned in the Matrix chapter), and to show that the New Matrix is new, so lots of folks are running with cobbled-together stuff built around a legit base model, pirating hardware to try and stay a step ahead of GOD, and that sort of thing (and to give us room to grow in later pieces, once more customization rules and stuff like that come out). It's all off-screen stuff, though. You can't actually just buy five commlinks and tell your GM to stat it up like the $200k+ rig Gentry's using.

[apple]

So why back to the "I need to be a rich man first before I can become a schoolpunk later who is hacking into the school system to manipulate his grades"?

SYL

[RHat]

I believe the whole point there was "high Resources does not mean you ever had a bunch of money".

[Critias]

So why back to the "I need to be a rich man first before I can become a schoolpunk later who is hacking into the school system to manipulate his grades"?

SYL

The design principle, as laid out in arguments (and I try to be good and not say which side of most of these arguments I was, personally, on), was that it was important to make deckers deckers again, as a core character type that required a meaningful investment of attributes, skills, and money in order to contribute meaningfully to the team as a whole. If it took X nuyen and Y skill points to be a valid Street Samurai, and if it took Z priority and Y skill points to be a good Magician, or what-have-you, the idea was to have it require a similarly ballpark/meaningful investment to be good at hacking.

No more Mungo just tossing down a couple thousand nuyen, buying a skill to about 3, taking on a specialization (and then doing all of a team's Matrix lifting and rigging all at once, from a cool phone). The idea was to make meaningful character design decisions that had meaningful outcomes, and required meaningful choices.

[apple]

That is what I cannot quite understand.

A Hacker in SR4 was (at most) a good drone commander - for jumping in into the drones he would still need all the other piloting skills, gunnery etc. For Hacking he needs the electronics group and the cracking group (starting at 4, thats 80 BP, raising both to 6 is 110 Karma). If you add normal ware (not even alpha or beta etc) and use all, you would loose a lot of essence and nuyen for all the cyberware, genetweaks, nanosystems and bioware to boost your hacking abilities, in the region of a higher 6 figure number (as base price, considering alpha/beta ware it would perhaps go into the millions.

Why is that not considered and investment deep enough?

I mean yes, you could find a middle ground (as in previous editions) between, for example, combat skills and decking. But if you really wanted to push the limit for being a hacker I always had the feeling that this was a big investment, both in BP, Karma and nuyen. Why does that differ so much from the authors opinion?

I mean, just a quick look at the possible ware in SR4:

Cerebral Booster 30k
Simsense Booster 65k
Nano hive 10k
Nano neo cortical nanites 15
Encephalon 2 75k
Trauma damper 40k
Sleep regulator / mnemonic enhancer 23k (not specialised ware for the hacker, but still helping with side areas of being a computer wizard)
Pushed 15k
Synch 30k
Math SPU 4k
Reception enhancer 60k
--------------------------------------
367k basic mods (and from there you could go much higher, depending on your essence, grades etc)

You can add another 6 figure for tricked out link rating 6 with rating 6 software (common, hacking, sensor, know/datasofts, agents). And if you want to start rigging, you have to invest Karma in piloting skills and nuyen in drones and additional cyberware (like the control rig or the rig booster)

Mungo just tossing down a couple thousand nuyen, buying a skill to about 3, taking on a specialization

With that kind of investment, someone who gets pistol 3, a Pred and a smartlink is considered a hardcore streetsam too? I mean yes, you could invest 1000¥ and get a link rating 2 with rating 2 software, invest 20 Karma and get 1-2 basic skills. But that would barely enable you to hack the door in a low level appartment, and it would kill you if you try to sneak into any system considered of interest for a run (corp facilities, R/D buildings, secured networks etc).?

What is considered "an investment"?

80 BP out of 400BP? Half a million basic cyberware/bioware (with grades it would be somewhere near a seven number figure)? The investment of 15-20 runs or more for the increase of central skills? That is not considered an investment, because on the other side of the extreme someone could buy a link for a thousand ¥ and get killed while he tries to hack a maglock rating 1?

SYL

[Moirdryd]

For everyone going down the "rich kid costs" route. Pause for a moment...

As has been said "Resources" doesn't always (or even often) mean you've gone out and spent that cash, that's why starting Money used to be 10% of what was leftover from chargen (don't know if it still is).

In the old Twenty Questions you used to have to put some thought into Where and How your character got kit that is "worth" hundreds of thousands of nuyen if you went out and bought it. You also have to give reason Why they are a Shadowrunner instead of working for a Corp wage slave style etc.

Now to bring that point into further relief look at the numbers for Shadowrunners and Shadow community in the Shadow Population thread. The consensus from multiple approache puts the number if Active "full time" Runners in Seattle at probabley less than 500. How that breaks down is up to you but assuming teams of 5 (standard game size it seems, or there abouts) with a basic spread of archetypes that's 100 Shadowrunner Deckers in Seattle Metrople and some of them will really be Technomancers. Shadow Community wide? You're probabley double that number and adding in so that's an extra 200 Deckers in the shadows of Seattle. So even at 300 Deckers in Seattle (using the 2060 figures) that's 0.01% of the population of the Sprawl are decking in the shadows without being Megacorp payrolled.

A lot of the names for kit in Shadowrun are functionally nice ways of saying (Gear) Type 1, (Gear) Type 2 and so forth and continue the setting concept of Corporate Branding as (as once mentioned in Cannon Companion fir the guns) there will be dozens of variations that are functionally the same model. So just because you paid for a MCT-Avatar on your character sheet it could be an Aztech Red Couatl or your custom home & hand made 'Trix Raider (just like your Ares Predator doesn't actually have to be an Ares Predator). We do often stick with the names because it makes it easy to find in the books and keeps things identified between game and fluff.

[Critias]

Apple, please be aware that you're not actually arguing with anyone right now (or, at the very least, certainly not with me).

[apple]

For everyone going down the "rich kid costs" route. Pause for a moment...

As it was said before: it does not matter if you have received the money, spend it, stole it, build it, received it from your grandfather etc: you still have at a bare minimum the equivalent of an upper class car in your hands, not considering the software costs. You, regardless on how you get the deck, are a rich man.

SYL

[RHat]

Which is different than a street sam having the same resources tied up in augmentation... How?

[apple]

You can start killing people with the next holdout for 200¥. You would simply suck at it.

You cannot even start to deck into the most basic security system without the cheapest deck, or?

SYL