SOTA: 2064 Magic, Technology and Beauty, NIP Tuck 2060's Options

[Kanada Ten]

None that I know of. My only argument is processed material and personal flavor. I'm not talking about sperm frozen in a tube and then inseminated, I'm talking vat grown humans.

Does genetic manipulation before birth cause Bio Index or Essence loss?

[toturi]

Bio loss

[Kagetenshi]

Bio index, which means a maximum of 5 points of prenatal magic loss.

As far as I can tell, the main difference magically between a clone and a natural human would be that you couldn't harvest the former for virgin telesma.

~J

[Cray74]

[mfb]

the brain itself may be a normal organ, but there's nothing that says the 'spark of intelligence', or whatever, is based in the meat. cloned bodies may lack something on the astral side that keeps them non-viable.

[Cray74]

[toturi]

The basis of magic ability may be genetic in nature, but a large part of the science is still unexplained. Perhaps being grown in a lab lacked the astral shadow of being nutured in a womb, perhaps Awakening requires the baby to be immersed in a metahuman aura?

[Cray74]

[kryton]

Wasn't Alice one of the deckers who sought to hunt down the virus crash of 29. Something nasty happened and her consciouness was "mirrored" or "transfered" to the matrix where she roamed about here and there. So there was a "digital" personality created. I don't know how close it was to the original but the personality was derrived from a human mind. (It was mentioned I think in Stranger Souls by Jak Koke) Deus (Renraku AI I think it's name was Deus) projected parts of itself in the minds of hundreds of folks creating a wetware P2P type of network. Possibly it might be possible to transmit digital personalities into minds. Although they might have some nasty cyberware installed running and taking advantage of the brain using it as wetware processor. As I understand it though you can alter memories making false memories ect. or hiding memories and reprogramming folks in a way. As I understand it the reprogramming isn't nessacarily simsense but the modification of memories which is a complex structure.

Theoretically with simsense you could create worlds where a brain lives in a virual educational environment learning all they need to know. Interacting with virtual teachers ect. Although the AI isn't there so the individual might figure out something isn't right. But the question is wether you can create memories in the brain or just stream simsense in like a movie? I don't know if they were very explicit on that aspect. In terms of black ops and slavery though clones would take they're place. Complacent workers who don't question, but follow they're masters....Something like a THX1138 scenerio. Cloned workers would have some excellent advantages but may be on the costly side. What would happen though if all your middle managers were clones bred, educated, and socialized by the corporation to run operations efficiently or you get the ax. Cloned super mages are a possibility but I think logistically the possibility for slavery and agents of the corporation would be more insidious. Hell why not breed them with genes resisting atrophy so they can manage all space assets and orbital labs and processing. Hell you could have a instant genetically created harem or prostitution house with barely literate females who have the intellect of a 8 year old. (human depravity has no bounds) I think the mage this one thing but the social implications are far more reaching. With increases in robotics and expert systems you might see a move toward reduced labor in manufacturing. Now you don't need a disloyal employee you grow your techs and in ten years of extensive education you've got tech experts who are totally dependent on the corporatation.

The next step would be vat grown babies for Dr. Haberstam's experimentation. As long as your labs are in far off places and the right people are paid you could perform all sorts of unspeakable horrors.

Getting back to the main topic though I wonder what people would give of themselves to be in the beautiful elite? How could shadowrunners take advantage of that? Beautifical woman doing dasterdly things to corporate executives once all they're pieces are in place. What would a runner do to be one of the "in" crowd.

[Kanada Ten]

[Guest_Crimsondude 2.0_*]

[Clyde]

Robotic surgeons? Teleoperated surgical drones? Sounds like a great way to bump off a vain corporate exec and make it look like an accident to the public. Plausible deniability, come on over!

[BishopMcQ]

On a related note, try looking into the Takeshi Kovacs series by Richard Morgan. Starts with Altered Carbon--non-magical, but it deals with the concepts of resheathing personalities in cloned bodies et al.

[SirBedevere]

Surely the ultimate in getting a new ID would be to kidnap someone with a similar tissue type to you, remove their brain and implant yours. As far as fingerprints, retinal pattern and DNA (apart from the brain) you ARE the original person.

This was done by the organlegger Anubis in Larry Niven's Gil the ARM book to avoid detection (and collect an inheritance).

[snowRaven]

My take on magic ability and vat-growth/genetic manipulation.

Given the lower magic attribute of the wiz-kid mage (previous editions though, so not sure if it'll be the same in MrJLBB if there's such a contact there) and other mentions about awakening etc, I think it's fairly reasonable to take the approach that magic ability is more sensitive the younger (and more untrained) you are. So if you're newly awakened and have a magic attribute of 1, losing 1 point would mean you're back to mundane again. Since In Vitro genetic alteration causes bio-loss it's not a far cry to say that it makes the subject a mundane, or at least severely reduces it's potential to awaken.
I think any severe manipulation at embryo-level would cause tests for magic loss, and that growing in a vat would require chemicals and such that damage the magical ability in ways similar to stim patches, again causing the subject to roll for magic loss.

[Link]

A reoccurring issue in topics like this is the question of clones in the SR canon.

3 things I recall:
The main rulebook in all editions ruled clones non viable - were these forced growth clones?
Shadowtech hinted (not subtly) that cloning was more advanced than was generally known and I think this is repeated in SOTA63.
Finally I recall mad clones on the loose in a SR novel(?)

Is there a consensus on this issue amongst the scions of shadowrun?

[Herald of Verjig...]

It works when the GM wants it to, not when the PCs want it to.

[Pelaka]

Hmm, a few sick questions that come to mind based on this thread:

1. If you force grow an adult body could you just put in a personality chip (like those used in the bakaru parlors) to get a functioning human drone?

2. If you give someone a personality chip, an internal radio and some modified simsense/rigger cyber could you essentially make a human drone?

3. OK, you have a medical factory that force-grows clones fetuses to twisted semi-adult sizes then kills them just so you can harvest an organ. This factory has done this tens of thousands of times in their persuit of manufacturing efficiency and nuyen. Just what sort of background count would this site have?

Pel

[Kagetenshi]

Unless there was some sort of emotional response from the clones, I’d say 2 at absolute maximum. A slaughterhouse ought to have more background count than something like this.

~J

[Kanada Ten]

A corporate office sterilized of emotion, hope and humanity has a background of 2 to 4, according to MitS I believe. I would put the background count at 4 to 5 if the process was painless.

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