Data Trails is out!, PDF, $25 Options

[binarywraith]

Oh, hey, cool. You wrote that. Maybe you can help with the thought process behind it? In what way, shape, or form do the people who built all this less than a decade ago have no idea how their own infrastructure works? Who maintains it? Who signs the checks for the power, cooling, and deployment budgets? To quote a post elsewhere, are there rogue AI agents running around Seattle, placing mesh-aware toasters in strategic locations?

Call me wrong if I'm wrong, but that whole passage reads to me as cargo-cult SF, something I'd expect out of Halo where advanced technology is a relic of some civilization who knew what to do with it, not one that built out and deployed an entire new Matrix paradigm in less time than it takes to get the next release of Windows.

[Sendaz]

Damnit, not able to buy the book yet due to budgeting until later in the month, but think I am going to have some fun with some of the concepts being introduced here when I get it.

Foundation sounds... interesting. And even if it does sort of sound kind of wonky and psuedomystical, I will have to read through it all to see how it all comes together.

It may totally crash and burn, I can already see some problems resulting from this.

Not least among them that the matrix is possibly being backboned by an electronic entity that they do not even really have any clue about.

Sure Foundation may be more analogous to being a metaplane, but we could also be seeing a larger entity and can totally see corps and governments stomping all over it ignorantly or not so ignorantly with the usual idea they have the right to do whatever they want to whoever they choose.

[Sengir]

So even the people who rebuilt the entire Matrix in a few months have no idea how it actually works. Great job there, book. That sure is helpful of you to just graft a Metaplanes analogue on there.

I dunno, it definitely sounds cool. It does raise unfortunate questions like "how the hell do they maintain the whole thing", let alone hack it (or write rules for those points), but in terms of initial evocativeness the idea of a matrix that works and nobody knows why has a certain something.

[Backgammon]

Oh, hey, cool. You wrote that. Maybe you can help with the thought process behind it? In what way, shape, or form do the people who built all this less than a decade ago have no idea how their own infrastructure works? Who maintains it? Who signs the checks for the power, cooling, and deployment budgets? To quote a post elsewhere, are there rogue AI agents running around Seattle, placing mesh-aware toasters in strategic locations?

Call me wrong if I'm wrong, but that whole passage reads to me as cargo-cult SF, something I'd expect out of Halo where advanced technology is a relic of some civilization who knew what to do with it, not one that built out and deployed an entire new Matrix paradigm in less time than it takes to get the next release of Windows.

These questions are left intentionally unanswered. We have answers, we are just not sharing them, for now.You'll need to accept the mystery. We're leaving room for growth.

[binarywraith]

These questions are left intentionally unanswered. We have answers, we are just not sharing them, for now.You'll need to accept the mystery. We're leaving room for growth.

So you got an editorial edict to shoehorn in more The Matrix Is Magic and couldn't think of a better way to do it? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)

Edit : That was pretty rude, sorry. But that non-answer and petty gloating over 'we already got you to pay for it!' is pretty frustrating in the face of yet another splatbook that's got what read as some seriously questionable moments in writing and rules construction.

[Backgammon]

So you got an editorial edict to shoehorn in more The Matrix Is Magic and couldn't think of a better way to do it? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)

What's that's line about sufficiently advanced technology being indistinguishable from magic?

What we did NOT do is try to make sense of the matrix using modern knowledge. I'm a software engineer and Aaron is a computer science teacher, so it was very, very willful not to try to explain the technicality of it. There is internal logic to the idea, but we don't care to fully define all the details. We did not go "hey this foundation thing is awesome, players are gonna love it. Oh but wait, who maintains it? Oh you're right, let's scrap the whole thing".

This is an anology I've used before, but I write like Alien, the first one, was written. Do you realize how little is explained in that movie? You just go with it. And it's an awesome movie. And around those years, that 70s sci fi, you didn't explain, and that was fine. Somewhere around the 90s, you could no longer tell a story without explaining everything.

It's a style choice. Some Cartesian people are gonna lose their shit. I don't care. They'll either discover the beauty of the unknown, or not. I hope they close their eyes and take a leap, but I can't force them. I can prod and nudge and show the incentive to doing so, but can't hold everyone's hand.

We have more answers than Data Trails provides, that is for sure. Some we don't answer cause we're holding back, and when we release more, holy shit it's gonna be even more messed up than you can imagine. Other stuff we don't explain cause it's trivial and technicality and doesn't add anything to the game, other than constraints on future authors.

[Jaid]

but how do you even build a system when you don't understand what the heck you're doing?

i mean, i don't just wander around, find a car engine, and go "oh hey, i'm just gonna build this into a helicopter without having any idea how it works", and i especially don't somehow magically keep the engine functioning without having the slightest clue how it works.

and for that matter, if this is the basis of the matrix (which supposedly nobody, not even the people who designed it, understands), how can the collective power of all the devices in the world exist *before* the matrix for you to build something on top of that?

[binarywraith]

What's that's line about sufficiently advanced technology being indistinguishable from magic?

What we did NOT do is try to make sense of the matrix using modern knowledge. I'm a software engineer and Aaron is a computer science teacher, so it was very, very willful not to try to explain the technicality of it. There is internal logic to the idea, but we don't care to fully define all the details. We did not go "hey this foundation thing is awesome, players are gonna love it. Oh but wait, who maintains it? Oh you're right, let's scrap the whole thing".

This is an anology I've used before, but I write like Alien, the first one, was written. Do you realize how little is explained in that movie? You just go with it. And it's an awesome movie. And around those years, that 70s sci fi, you didn't explain, and that was fine. Somewhere around the 90s, you could no longer tell a story without explaining everything.

It's a style choice. Some Cartesian people are gonna lose their shit. I don't care. They'll either discover the beauty of the unknown, or not. I hope they close their eyes and take a leap, but I can't force them. I can prod and nudge and show the incentive to doing so, but can't hold everyone's hand.

We have more answers than Data Trails provides, that is for sure. Some we don't answer cause we're holding back, and when we release more, holy shit it's gonna be even more messed up than you can imagine. Other stuff we don't explain cause it's trivial and technicality and doesn't add anything to the game, other than constraints on future authors.

Alien explains everything it needs to. It presents an alien organism, shows us it's life-cycle, and gives us the idea that there are more of them, all in the form of a suspense film. This is not that sort of situation, unless you're going to posit that the Matrix is an unknowable other that comes from outside human experience, despite being built, maintained, and used entirely by humans with human-developed technology for two generations by the 2070's. At that point, you've lost verisimilitude.

You're talking about a unprecedently massive, worldwide Ultraviolet system. As we've already established for the last fifteen years, UV systems require a massive amount of processing power and memory to function. Are you telling us that the megacorps are willingly paying for that much power, cooling, parts, maintenance labor, bandwidth, and GOD spiders beyond what they actually need and never demanding an accounting of what their money is going for? That they're throwing the equivalent of the resources of small nations into running the Matrix and don't have an accurate profit analysis of what that spending is getting them?

That's a little hard to swallow.

[Backgammon]

Well first of all, anything written in character is always to be challenged. The empirical evidence of one dude, while it counts for something, doesn't represent the full extent of reality. But in general, as I said, the takeaway here is the the full mechanisms of functioning are top, top, top secret. Think of it like, say, a level building Shadowrun Returns. You don't know how all the code behind it works, but you can create levels. You can see it as the creators of the foundation having built a framework (or.... dare I say... a foundation) and then distributing toolkits to organizations that build hosts on top of it. You don't need to know how the foundation works, just how to use your toolkit to build a host. There certainly ARE people that know exactly how the foundation works. And like I said, more on that later, one day.

In regards to the timeline I have no paid attention to that part or been involved in those discussion of things so cannot answer one way or another.

[Backgammon]

That's a little hard to swallow.

To you. Nobody else has brought it up. Not saying other don't share that concern, and there is certainly a tremendous fog of war over what most fans think, but we have sufficient knowledge of the fan base to say "that's not important". We're writing books for mass audience. Those books have limited word counts AND have to be interesting to *most* people. So, we focus on what *most* people are gonna care about.

But the GREAT thing about PnP RPGs is that the game dogma police is busy elsewhere, so if you and your group are super precise people that need these answers, you can make them up. You can even share your thoughts with other like-minded gamers.

There are people that read SR and go "Orks? Trolls? Elves? Fuck this game". Does that mean we cut them out of the game? Magic? I'm not saying your objections aren't thought out. But I'm not gonna break too much of a sweat over it. Some precision is going to be the casualty of making a game thousands of people need to like.

[binarywraith]

In regards to the timeline I have no paid attention to that part or been involved in those discussion of things so cannot answer one way or another.

I feel this is one of the biggest problems with the present books. If you're writing on a splatbook, you should probably have a rough idea of the timeline of events that led to the present status quo before trying to take it off into left field. The info's a three second Google search for 'Shadowrun Timeline' away.

To you. Nobody else has brought it up. Not saying other don't share that concern, and there is certainly a tremendous fog of war over what most fans think, but we have sufficient knowledge of the fan base to say "that's not important". We're writing books for mass audience. Those books have limited word counts AND have to be interesting to *most* people. So, we focus on what *most* people are gonna care about.

But the GREAT thing about PnP RPGs is that the game dogma police is busy elsewhere, so if you and your group are super precise people that need these answers, you can make them up. You can even share your thoughts with other like-minded gamers.

There are people that read SR and go "Orks? Trolls? Elves? Fuck this game". Does that mean we cut them out of the game? Magic? I'm not saying your objections aren't thought out. But I'm not gonna break too much of a sweat over it. Some precision is going to be the casualty of making a game thousands of people need to like.

That said, Foundation has game rules that substantially confirm the fluff as written. We generally don't have a lot of immediate discussion of new books here anymore because a lot of the old players have quit buying them at least until a few reviews have come in and/or they can stop by their FLGS and page through a hardcopy, due to the continual quality control issues. I only have a copy because one of my players wanted new tricks for his Technomancer and thus bought it for me.

It is a benefit of P&P games that we can do whatever. The thing is, we're specifically playing Shadowrun as opposed to any of the dozens of other available systems in the market for a reason. God knows it isn't the consistency and editorial quality of the rules. In the vast majority, people are here for the setting. One of the only special things Shadowrun has going for it is that it is a well developed, long-running setting with a strong history and well established theme and genre. Sure, any decent GM can just wing it, but the point of bothering to pay your employers for their products is that they have theoretically competent professional staff and writers producing content that fits into the established setting, and saves us the trouble of having to extrapolate it all ourselves.

This strikes me less an issue of 'some precision', and more an issue of a writing staff who self-admittedly know their setting less well than their customer base and don't care to bother changing that.

[Backgammon]

Shrug. I said everything I was going to.

[Sendaz]

Shrug. I said everything I was going to.

Thanks for chiming on this. Certainly will be interesting to look at when I get a chance.

So will the forthcoming TM book reveal more along these lines or are we looking at just an options book for TMs and play?

[Backgammon]

I don't know what it's the TM book, sorry.

[nylanfs]

Foundation = Otherland? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[Jaid]

the people who design levels for shadowrun returns using the toolkit may not know the exact code of the main software, but i bet if you ask a competent and experienced software developer what sorts of things go into a game like shadowrun returns they could give you lots of specific answers about typical things that are used to make it work.

i mean, they couldn't reproduce the code. but if you told them "hey, i want something that has all the same functions as shadowrun returns", they could probably make something that while not identical is pretty close.

or, in other words, they may not know the specifics, but they're not going to stare at me blankly and say "i don't have any understanding for how that program does what it does".

[DeathStrobe]

Sooner or later we will run into that problem. So to make better, smaller, and more efficient microprocessors we've actually been letting computers design them for years now. People understand the concept, but the processors are beyond the ability for humans to design anymore and is just left to algorithms. Sooner or later we'll get computers to program themselves and optimize their own code, and it'll become very difficult to understand exactly what's happening.

Hell, the same thing is true with high level computer languages. I be damned if I know how machine code works, but I know Javascript. I understand how Javascript as an abstraction works, but I don't understand how it gets turned into 0's and 1's, I don't understand how my Intel processor is able to crunch those 0's and 1's and give me the variables i need. The entire concept of the Matrix is that the code is so complex they need a full sensory 3D visual metaphor to make sense of it. Like a web site. The web is a 2D representation of HTML, CSS, and Javascript. Below that is we got back end servers written in .NET, Java, Ruby, NodeJS, or whatever. Below that we got the operating system; Windows or Linux. Below that we got the machine code, which almost no one understands that but machines.

With the Matrix, the only thing people see is the 3D Virtual Reality. They probably won't even write in "high level" languages as we know it. They probably have an even HIGHER level language. Hell, they probably just talk to a program with native English, and it writes everything for them. Its actually not that unfeasible for technology to be that advance in 60 years that our current paradigms in programing are completely obsolete.

So the idea that the Matrix itself works but no one really knows how is very plausible.

[Sengir]

You're talking about a unprecedently massive, worldwide Ultraviolet system. As we've already established for the last fifteen years, UV systems require a massive amount of processing power and memory to function. Are you telling us that the megacorps are willingly paying for that much power, cooling, parts, maintenance labor, bandwidth, and GOD spiders beyond what they actually need and never demanding an accounting of what their money is going for?

If I'm understanding Blackjaw correctly (yay, playing telephone with books), the worldwide UV system exists from clustering every matrix device together. That's already how data transmission works, now they have press-ganged your spare CPU cycles as well (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

But the stuff about the "foundation" really sounds (from our telephone game) a bit like discussing alien technology: There are these weird objects of unfathomable technological spohistication and we figured out that if we press on the button with those eldrich runes, it does what we want 99% of the time.


@Deathstrobe: What those algorithms do for processor design is basically the equivalent of finding the most efficient way to stack all your stuff into a box. The output isn't some mysterious alien device, it's still a box holding your stuff in an arrangement you could as well have arrived at, only you would have spend years packing and unpacking the box.

[Jaid]

Sooner or later we will run into that problem. So to make better, smaller, and more efficient microprocessors we've actually been letting computers design them for years now. People understand the concept, but the processors are beyond the ability for humans to design anymore and is just left to algorithms. Sooner or later we'll get computers to program themselves and optimize their own code, and it'll become very difficult to understand exactly what's happening.

Hell, the same thing is true with high level computer languages. I be damned if I know how machine code works, but I know Javascript. I understand how Javascript as an abstraction works, but I don't understand how it gets turned into 0's and 1's, I don't understand how my Intel processor is able to crunch those 0's and 1's and give me the variables i need. The entire concept of the Matrix is that the code is so complex they need a full sensory 3D visual metaphor to make sense of it. Like a web site. The web is a 2D representation of HTML, CSS, and Javascript. Below that is we got back end servers written in .NET, Java, Ruby, NodeJS, or whatever. Below that we got the operating system; Windows or Linux. Below that we got the machine code, which almost no one understands that but machines.

With the Matrix, the only thing people see is the 3D Virtual Reality. They probably won't even write in "high level" languages as we know it. They probably have an even HIGHER level language. Hell, they probably just talk to a program with native English, and it writes everything for them. Its actually not that unfeasible for technology to be that advance in 60 years that our current paradigms in programing are completely obsolete.

So the idea that the Matrix itself works but no one really knows how is very plausible.

you or i may not understand all that stuff, but someone with the right training does. do i understand machine code? not really. i mean, i've done some coding for microprocessors (very simple stuff only), but practically speaking, no i don't. but if i studied it, no problem. even without that in-depth study, i understand some of the principles behind it.

the problem is not some random character not knowing how it works. the problem is that apparently *nobody* knows how it works. not the designers, not the techs, not the hackers, nobody. and not just "we don't know the specific code", but basically "we don't have the slightest clue about the basic principles on which this system functions, we just know it reacts in certain ways to certain stimuli".

and while that may not be a huge jump for 60 years from our tech, the problem there is that in-setting, there were only a few months of technological progression, and at the start of those months, (meta)humans were the ones doing all the coding and designing for the most part.

furthermore, there is massive paranoia in the setting about not understanding matrix phenomena. the only reason the corps are afraid of technomancers is that they don't understand what they can do. the matrix was specifically designed for security against this kind of semi-mystical crap happening. it has been designed in the aftermath of super-AIs repeatedly screwing the world over through the matrix, with the specific goal of preventing that from happening, and yet the entire thing can only plausibly (and i use that term loosely) be explained if the very basis of the matrix is essentially a super-powerful AI using human meat-puppets to do its bidding, and nobody seems to have a problem with this. or alternately, everyone is dumb enough to believe that the foundation of the matrix, upon which the entire thing is built, and thus had to exist before the matrix was built, is an amalgamation of all the devices in the world which could not have communicated effectively until *after* the matrix was built.

though to be fair, the wireless matrix does appear to be capable of time travel if the wireless bonus system is any indication, so hey, maybe it actually is a gigantic temporal paradox. the matrix was actually built and is currently maintained by people from 2170 who have perfect stealth technology and who literally send commands back through time, but can only do so wirelessly. maybe most of the matrix traffic actually is from 2170, who knows?

[Beta]

Already expert systems and robots are starting to have a simulated 'childhood' to learn their own optimal way of doing things. I.E. one recent poker program which is doing well (http://poker.srv.ualberta.ca/), started off with ridiculous numbers of simulated hands. The program played against copies of itself, starting with no strategy at all, only with the built in rewards of winning. The program itself gradually developed winning strategies, including bluffing and calling bluffs. Likewise software for robots has been put in a simulator and encouraged to find all sorts of ways to do things, which it can then use to adapt to real world challenges (listen about it here: http://www.cbc.ca/radio/quirks/quirks-quar...pped-1.3093136) For example, when they were going to do one of the first demonstrations, cleaning staff had come in the night before and waxed and polished the floor in order to make things look good for the guests. When they started up the robot is was slipping too much to walk properly....but based on its 'childhood memories' it soon found a gait that worked on the slippery surface.

Are there people who understand these pieces of software? Yes. Do they know what that software will do in all situations? No, and nobody easily can, because although all the data is available, the only way to really understand what the software will do with all that data is to run the software. As more and more software does more and more learning, in order to become more robust and adaptable, we are going to be farther and farther from really understanding it. Heck, if this process creates something that creates huge effeciences, but seems hostile to being meddled with, who is to say it won't get implemented and copied?

[Jaid]

yes, but in the shadowrun setting, it went from everything being fully understood and nothing being designed by machines, to the humans just standing there with no clue what happened, in a few months.

and nobody is worried about that at all in a setting where the whole damn point of the new matrix was supposed to be keeping the super-powerful AIs from screwing over humanity. again. for, like, the 10th time. the immediate response to "we're not sure how it works, it seems to have been designed by something we can't even understand" should have been to kill it with fire, then burn it to ashes, then burn the ashes, then subject the ashes to repeated EMPs, then hurl the ashes into the sun's core just in case that whole process somehow results in it developing mutant powers or something like that.

and then start from scratch with tech that they CAN understand, and which hasn't clearly been designed by the very thing they most desperately want to have excluded from the very beginning.

[Sendaz]

and nobody is worried about that at all in a setting where the whole damn point of the new matrix was supposed to be keeping the super-powerful AIs from screwing over humanity. again. for, like, the 10th time. the immediate response to "we're not sure how it works, it seems to have been designed by something we can't even understand" should have been to kill it with fire, then burn it to ashes, then burn the ashes, then subject the ashes to repeated EMPs, then hurl the ashes into the sun's core just in case that whole process somehow results in it developing mutant powers or something like that.

I agree You and I as reasonably normal folk would be in favour of the burn it with fire option, but the corps just don't think that way.

Somewhere a board of corp heads will decide they can somehow control it, even though they can't even explain or understand it, but will have some powerpoint to back up the idea that this is somehow a good thing for the bottom line and there we go down that rabbit hole again.

[Sengir]

and while that may not be a huge jump for 60 years from our tech, the problem there is that in-setting, there were only a few months of technological progression, and at the start of those months, (meta)humans were the ones doing all the coding and designing for the most part.

"They have designed new matrix protocols" is always merely a justification tacked on a redesign -- but what do you want instead? Three matrix versions concurrently, each with individual skills and ramshackle compatibility layers? Plot hooks like "extract the last person on earth who knows how to maintain this software" or "you need to move this server across town, if its ancient magnetic storage disks spin down we don't know if they'll ever start up again" (true story, we had to move an OS/2 server across campus under the same constraints, in 2010 or so) sound interesting, until it becomes a daily occurrence...

And yes, they had some time to test it before the public roll out. Which we know, because there is the story of Dodger testing it. So obviously some internal system to run the new matrix on existed before making it a worldwide cluster.

furthermore, there is massive paranoia in the setting about not understanding matrix phenomena. the only reason the corps are afraid of technomancers is that they don't understand what they can do. the matrix was specifically designed for security against this kind of semi-mystical crap happening.

Agreed here. It's not like decisions done in the name of "security!!!!!" are always rational, but this sounds a bit occult.

if the very basis of the matrix is essentially a super-powerful AI using human meat-puppets to do its bidding

Huh?


PS: Then again, this discussion got me even more anxious to finally read the book myself. From a marketing standpoint, Backgammon obviously did a great job (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)

[binarywraith]

"They have designed new matrix protocols" is always merely a justification tacked on a redesign -- but what do you want instead? Three matrix versions concurrently, each with individual skills and ramshackle compatibility layers? Plot hooks like "extract the last person on earth who knows how to maintain this software" or "you need to move this server across town, if its ancient magnetic storage disks spin down we don't know if they'll ever start up again" (true story, we had to move an OS/2 server across campus under the same constraints, in 2010 or so) sound interesting, until it becomes a daily occurrence...

Actually, yes, that sounds a hell of a lot more interesting than just making the Matrix an analogue of Astral space circa SR3 and handwaving any idea that the setting needs to be internally consistent.

Heck, perfect spot to reinforce the strict class boundaries that make Cyberpunk work. Corps get the shiny, ever so locked down Matrix they'be always wanted for the consumer class of wageslaves. The wild and strange remnants of the pre Crash Matrix still chug along in places, patched together by necessity and hard work by the underclass and the console cowboys. Then there's the dark net, where the corps keep all their dirty secrets under glaciers worth of IC.

A lot more interesting opportunities for runs there too, rather than using the Foundation to create cookie cutter dungeon crawls lifted from Inception. Where every 'real' action is an analogue of programming, yet in order to make them remotely appealing at the table you are suggested to have your non-decker friends hitch along for Reasons.

[DeathStrobe]

yes, but in the shadowrun setting, it went from everything being fully understood and nothing being designed by machines, to the humans just standing there with no clue what happened, in a few months.

and nobody is worried about that at all in a setting where the whole damn point of the new matrix was supposed to be keeping the super-powerful AIs from screwing over humanity. again. for, like, the 10th time. the immediate response to "we're not sure how it works, it seems to have been designed by something we can't even understand" should have been to kill it with fire, then burn it to ashes, then burn the ashes, then subject the ashes to repeated EMPs, then hurl the ashes into the sun's core just in case that whole process somehow results in it developing mutant powers or something like that.

and then start from scratch with tech that they CAN understand, and which hasn't clearly been designed by the very thing they most desperately want to have excluded from the very beginning.

I don't think anyone actually understood how SR4's Matrix worked either. I remember in one of the fluff where Fastjack attacks a Horizon Nexus and was saying how these kids didn't understand the code they were working with, but old Fastjack knew, because he had to program from command line back in the day. Which I find slightly silly, because I can't imagine typing commands is going to be very relevant to code as complex as what theoretically the Matrix is.

The mechanics even reinforce it. You need a computer program and the computer skill to make Matrix Perception test. Not a software test. In fact your knowledge of software is pretty pointless for the most part, aside from disarming data bombs and coding your own programs.