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SL James

Jul 5 2005, 01:24 AM

Post #126

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QUOTE (Demonseed Elite @ Jul 4 2005, 11:44 AM)

A wireless smartlink system will certainly be cheaper and more essence friendly than an implanted cybernetic system. If you use a wireless smartlink and wireless smartgoggles, there's no implantation at all. Now, you could also use an old school wired smartlink/goggle setup, which is likely also cheap and definitely essence friendly. But it also can be somewhat obvious (unless the wires are well hidden, there's a cable going from your gun to your glasses) and a bastard GM like me is going to have fun with your cables when you roll up a glitch.

I guess I must not have been clear in that I never said I was in favor of a modern cybernetic Smartlink or the cable version, but something else entirely, something which I described in (I think) my first post to this thread: non-cybernetic conductive technology. Serious, man, real life tech is already outpacing fourth edition if you're stuck seeing the only non-cyber, non-wireless option to be free-hanging cables. How stupid do you think I am? Just because I don't want cyber or wireless doesn't mean my PCs are going to look like the Borg with coaxial wires sprouting from all their gear.

Aside from that, I should mention that most of this is with regards to magical characters who aren't going to get a cybernetic Smartlink system even if the essence cost for a Smartlink routed to a radio or wireless receiver is 0.01 for both. Plus there is the whole matter of implanting a radio in your brain, which has always seemed to me to be really dumb.

mfb View Member Profile	Jul 5 2005, 01:29 AM Post #127
Immortal Elf Group: Members Posts: 11,410 Joined: 1-October 03 From: Pittsburgh Member No.: 5,670	indeed. why should you, when the brain is already fully capable of sending and recieving radio signals all by itself?

SL James View Member Profile	Jul 5 2005, 01:34 AM Post #128
Shadowrun Setting Nerd Group: Banned Posts: 3,632 Joined: 28-June 05 From: Pissing on pedestrians from my electronic ivory tower. Member No.: 7,473	Since when?

sanctusmortis View Member Profile	Jul 5 2005, 01:35 AM Post #129
Target Group: Members Posts: 98 Joined: 14-June 05 Member No.: 7,444	The line "what's the frequency, Kenneth?" suddenly comes to mind :rotfl:

DrJest View Member Profile	Jul 5 2005, 01:37 AM Post #130
Running Target Group: Members Posts: 1,133 Joined: 3-October 04 Member No.: 6,722	...is that one of those "believe it or not" factoids with a pointless twist? Like, the brain could send radio transmissions but doesn't have enough range to get outside the skull or something like that?

Demonseed Elite

Jul 5 2005, 01:36 AM

Post #131

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QUOTE

I guess I must not have been clear in that I never said I was in favor of a modern cybernetic Smartlink or the cable version, but something else entirely, something which I described in (I think) my first post to this thread: non-cybernetic conductive technology. Serious, man, real life tech is already outpacing fourth edition if you're stuck seeing the only non-cyber, non-wireless option to be free-hanging cables. How stupid do you think I am? Just because I don't want cyber or wireless doesn't mean my PCs are going to look like the Borg with coaxial wires sprouting from all their gear.

Well, what are you thinking exactly? Conductive weave clothing? Personal body EM field transmission? I mean, somehow the signals still have to get from the gun to whatever is on your eyes and vice versa.

Kagetenshi

Jul 5 2005, 03:04 AM

Post #132

Manus Celer Dei

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QUOTE (SL James)

Since when?

Since always, since the brain is capable of moving ions. Can't actually do anything useful with them, though. I suspect that if anything mfb is alluding to the rumored ability of the critters formerly known as Otaku to interface with the neo-WMI system without technological gear.

~J

mfb View Member Profile	Jul 5 2005, 03:24 AM Post #133
Immortal Elf Group: Members Posts: 11,410 Joined: 1-October 03 From: Pittsburgh Member No.: 5,670	i hope that you are not intimating facetiousness on my part, sirrah!

SL James

Jul 5 2005, 05:13 AM

Post #134

Shadowrun Setting Nerd

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QUOTE (Kagetenshi)

I suspect that if anything mfb is alluding to the rumored ability of the critters formerly known as Otaku to interface with the neo-WMI system without technological gear.

Seriously?

Raskolnikov View Member Profile	Jul 5 2005, 05:33 AM Post #135
Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 134 Joined: 26-February 02 From: Seattle Member No.: 1,525	No, no. In SR4 they just text their commands on their cellphones. They can't use their powers past age 20 due to crippling repetitive stress.

Kagetenshi View Member Profile	Jul 5 2005, 05:35 AM Post #136
Manus Celer Dei Group: Dumpshocked Posts: 17,006 Joined: 30-December 02 From: Boston Member No.: 3,802	I had thought that I had read something suggesting it, but if the post I read is what I think it is (I do hate it when I forget what brought me to a particular conclusion) I may have misinterpreted. Note that this, of course, does not preclude him still referencing it in a non-serious manner (or it still being the case, but I'm going to remain optimistic on this one). ~J

mfb View Member Profile	Jul 5 2005, 05:45 AM Post #137
Immortal Elf Group: Members Posts: 11,410 Joined: 1-October 03 From: Pittsburgh Member No.: 5,670	non-serious, yeah. kinda like that scene in Boondock Saints where Rocko shoots three people while screaming "FUNNY! FUNNY! FUNNY!" at the top of his lungs.

fistandantilus4.... fistandantilus4.0 View Member Profile	Jul 5 2005, 07:54 AM Post #138
Uncle Fisty Group: Admin Posts: 13,891 Joined: 3-January 05 From: Next To Her Member No.: 6,928	Good ol' Rocko So spells have a force cap of 12? Am I reading that right? Now to me that seems wrong, because although I don't have any characters with spell force of 13+, there are things out there that should, like Great Dragons. But I may be missing something, since obviously it's gonna be pretrty hard now to roll against a 14 when you really only do get to rol 1-6 (edge not withstanding). Any got any more clarification on this?

mintcar View Member Profile	Jul 5 2005, 08:12 AM Post #139
Karma Police Group: Dumpshocked Posts: 1,358 Joined: 22-July 04 From: Gothenburg, SE Member No.: 6,505	You will get a maximum of 12 dice (+ any modifiers and edge). Any difficulty the force sets will certainly not be changable target number, because those don´t exist anymore. So will it be number of hits? Maybe someone who knows will answer.

fistandantilus4.... fistandantilus4.0 View Member Profile	Jul 5 2005, 09:01 AM Post #140
Uncle Fisty Group: Admin Posts: 13,891 Joined: 3-January 05 From: Next To Her Member No.: 6,928	BTW, is the cover that same dorky thing we've been seeing thus far?

Wireknight

Jul 5 2005, 11:46 AM

Post #141

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QUOTE (Demonseed Elite @ Jul 4 2005, 07:35 PM)

Yeah, but you need to get through the encryption too. Today's secure RFID tags use a challenge-response protocol, so you need the tag (or the smartlink) to talk back to you to complete authentication (so you need to read the tag from a distance, since the tag definitely won't have the power to reach you). You're going to need one hell of directional antenna to do that from a distance.

Yeah, but if that's sufficiently impossible (or exponentially improbable) to make widespread use of the wireless technology practical, it's also going to be similarly impossible for hackers and technomancers to do the exact same thing to electronic door systems, databases, sensor networks, and the like. There's no reason why, if you can hack things that are intended to be of vital security, and thus possessed of state-of-the-art authentication, such as secure doors, databases full of trade secrets, and the like, that you can't hack anything with wireless connectivity, smartlinks included.

Heck, unless someone has an archaic central wiring scheme connected to a datajack, most cyberware with advanced processors and I/O systems, for diagnostic and firmware upgradeability purposes, will likely possess some means of transdermal wireless interface, and thus be hackable. Turn off someone's wired reflexes by setting them into diagnostic reset, or remotely engaging a reflex trigger? Automatically engage someone's RAS-override to paralyze characters equipped with simesense-immersion-enabling augmentations (datajacks and whatever the intended wireless equivalent will be)?

If these technologies use some kind of cryptographic security scheme that makes them unhackable, you encounter the argument of why such schemes aren't present just about everywhere. Without leaping into the realm of implausibility (or breaking out the hated "it just is!" response), hackers are going to be able to do some nasty things to cyborgs, or they're going to be left out in the cold when GMs start asking (or just doing it on their own) why the unbreakable cyberware-only security isn't used elsewhere.

[edit]
As a sidenote, on one particular adventure I played in a month or two after Cybertechnology was released, with the advent of cyberzombies, the team managed to defeat a trio of them by having the infowarfare specialist remotely activate their datajacks' RAS-overrides and jam attempts to deactivate, automatically causing them a +8 TN# to all physical actions. The GM gave us bonus karma for that trick.
[/edit]

SL James

Jul 5 2005, 11:51 AM

Post #142

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QUOTE (Wireknight @ Jul 5 2005, 05:46 AM)

If these technologies use some kind of cryptographic security scheme that makes them unhackable, you encounter the argument of why such schemes aren't present just about everywhere.

You, sir, are my new ray of enlightenment and I wish to subscribe to your teachings.

blakkie

Jul 5 2005, 12:14 PM

Post #143

Dragon

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QUOTE (Ellery @ Jul 4 2005, 05:56 PM)

QUOTE (blakkie)

This "dumbed down" term i've found intreging. I've seen it used, by you and others here and others in very different circumstances, often to describe a situation where a established strategy that takes advantage of an aspect of the game rules is removed. With the strategy removed the strategy starts looking like it had become more of a crutch than anything since there are plenty of other strategies to be found and used. So the complaint with the "dumbing down" looks more like a complaint based on having to find another tool to leverage.

Ironic that "dumbing down" is more a description of intellectual sloth in user of the term than anything in the system or the designers they speaking ill of.

This is a pathetic debating tactic. You didn't actually address the changes to anchoring, but instead seized on a term and speculated upon it, and then speculated further upon the intellectual sloth of people who use that term.

A lecture about debating technique? How about you save it for a time when you don't just change subjects, you know to something unrelated like anchoring. The subject wasn't about how much magic changed between SR2 and SR3 overall, it was about how this change in spirits was relatively small.

I didn't really see much "debate" from you about that. So why bother respond. Instead you wander off on a tangent. *shrug*

So you get likewise.

EDIT:

QUOTE

If you don't very carefully explain that you're not intending to discredit the argument or poster with irrelevant remarks, there's little incentive for other people to read what you say.

Isn't that remarkable close to my point about tossing this "dumbing down" red word phrase about? Yes, i believe it is.

QUOTE

I just wonder if you weren't saying similar things 7 years ago. Bemoaning the dumbing down of SR2 to make way for the vastly inferior SR3. Till you actually saw SR3 and decided maybe it wasn't so bad and it'd be too much hassle to redo SR2.

I wasn't.

[edit](Of course, I had specific complaints, and I did complain about Anchoring then, but they were topical complaints, not systemic ones.)[/edit]

Well i guess SR4 is systemically screwed given your incredible analytical skills and dumbing down assessments. I would think that you would be best moving on anytime now as they obviously aren't going to switch from fixed TN at this point.

I'm really starting to look forward to 6 weeks from down when Eldrick's head implodes from what he sees as vast sweeping world changes, and there is much gnashing of teeth as the death of Shadowrun is pronounced 12-fold.

I do have a dream that all the sadsack moaning would then stop as the [edit:rabid] detractors put their money where their mouth is, not buying SR4, and then put their mouth where their gaming is, somewhere other than SR4. A naive dream you say? Yes, i suppose it is. I mean why else would you still be here if there wasn't a real possibility that you'd buy SR4? Even as systemically flawed as you believe it to be.

Demonseed Elite

Jul 5 2005, 12:55 PM

Post #144

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QUOTE

Yeah, but if that's sufficiently impossible (or exponentially improbable) to make widespread use of the wireless technology practical, it's also going to be similarly impossible for hackers and technomancers to do the exact same thing to electronic door systems, databases, sensor networks, and the like. There's no reason why, if you can hack things that are intended to be of vital security, and thus possessed of state-of-the-art authentication, such as secure doors, databases full of trade secrets, and the like, that you can't hack anything with wireless connectivity, smartlinks included.

Heck, unless someone has an archaic central wiring scheme connected to a datajack, most cyberware with advanced processors and I/O systems, for diagnostic and firmware upgradeability purposes, will likely possess some means of transdermal wireless interface, and thus be hackable. Turn off someone's wired reflexes by setting them into diagnostic reset, or remotely engaging a reflex trigger? Automatically engage someone's RAS-override to paralyze characters equipped with simesense-immersion-enabling augmentations (datajacks and whatever the intended wireless equivalent will be)?

If these technologies use some kind of cryptographic security scheme that makes them unhackable, you encounter the argument of why such schemes aren't present just about everywhere. Without leaping into the realm of implausibility (or breaking out the hated "it just is!" response), hackers are going to be able to do some nasty things to cyborgs, or they're going to be left out in the cold when GMs start asking (or just doing it on their own) why the unbreakable cyberware-only security isn't used elsewhere.

I didn't say it was safe. I don't think it should be. I think it should be the cheap and convenient alternative. I personally think it should be the kind of smartlink system you pick up off a back-alley table in the Bronx with a pair of imitation-Rayban wireless smartgoggles made in the Canton Confederation. Popular with gangers, pirates, and third world paramilitary thugs who just got them off a ship from the black markets in Greece.

I don't know if that's the way they are doing it, but it's the way I would do it.

blakkie

Jul 5 2005, 12:59 PM

Post #145

Dragon

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QUOTE (FrostyNSO @ Jul 4 2005, 06:57 PM)

I don't even read his stuff anymore, personally.

I'm not entirely convinced you ever did. :D

P.S. I'd also would have to question your scoring credentials given your lack of reading. ;)

Bull View Member Profile	Jul 5 2005, 01:14 PM Post #146
Grumpy Old Ork Decker Group: Admin Posts: 3,794 Joined: 26-February 02 From: Orwell, Ohio Member No.: 50	Ok kids, back to your corners... Baiting's as bad as flaming. I will be so glad when this damn book is finally out! :) Bull

blakkie

Jul 5 2005, 01:34 PM

Post #147

Dragon

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QUOTE (Bull)

I will be so glad when this damn book is finally out! :)

So you share the dream too?

:love: ;)

tisoz

Jul 5 2005, 02:44 PM

Post #148

Free Spirit

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QUOTE (blakkie)

So the setting changed going from SR2 to SR3? Because grounding AoE spells through active foci was a bigger deal than Magic loss. In my mind there is a more pressing reason to avoid taking a "Deadly" wound (or whatever the equivalent would be). The ultimate Magic loss. Dead men cast no spells. :dead:

And then:

QUOTE (blakkie)

A lecture about debating technique? How about you save it for a time when you don't just change subjects, you know to something unrelated like anchoring. The subject wasn't about how much magic changed between SR2 and SR3 overall, it was about how this change in spirits was relatively small.

Who changed subjects? I thought you did, but I'm probably wrong.

You made a poor comparison. The comparison was elaborated on to demonstrate why it was a shoddy comparison. Then you try to blame the person for bringing up something you initiated? Then things get even wackier.

Yes,

Ellery 1 - blakkie 0

I don't think the bound/unbound is the real drastic change though, it is all traditions using the same spirits. And to tie it into the subject you broached about the changes from SR2 to SR3, those changes seemed more to the mechanics. This change seems more like a setting change. Just like hackers seems like a setting change.

blakkie

Jul 5 2005, 02:57 PM

Post #149

Dragon

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QUOTE (tisoz)

Who changed subjects? I thought you did, but I'm probably wrong.

I was comparing to the grounding change. :P She switched away from that.

But yes it is my bad that i gave her the openning to go off bitching an moaning about how SR2 to SR3 was bad and it dumbed down something or other (that apparently others had balance issues with?)....and then go on to explain that adding a metamagics fixed up her existing PC issues [with background story?]. So i guess the "huge" setting changes really were something that could be overcome with a little creative thought?

Which is why i really laugh at this SR3 to SR4 bitching and moaning about there being such deep changes to the Shadowrun world when the mechanics change a bit. :)

tisoz View Member Profile	Jul 5 2005, 03:27 PM Post #150
Free Spirit Group: Dumpshocked Posts: 3,944 Joined: 26-February 02 From: Bloomington, IN UCAS Member No.: 1,920	It seems you were overlooking or trivializing the majority of changes and Ellery pointed out that error. Just like you are trivializing the changes between 3 and 4. No, they don't seem huge in the grand scheme of the setting. But, I didn't need to retire my characters between 1 and 2. I retired all but 1 character between 2 and 3. With the changes being made for 4th edition (and I have to agree, it should probably get a new name like Shadowrun 2070), I anticipate having to retire all my characters yet again. It effects things like fan fiction. If the writer needs to have their story updated or it becomes incompatable, it is a huge hassle. I was writing a piece where the plot hinged on the shapechange spell. When the mechanics of that spell changed, the plot seemed unrealistic as the character had little to no chance of completing the new version of the spell. Ellery explained how it affected the backstory of a character and how it was patched. I am sure many long time players, also known as the customer base, have similar stories. Our characters becoming incompatable is a reason many of us dread a new rule system. And then there are people like you that seem to relish rubbing our noses in it.

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