Freelancers, Dumpshockers, Admins,

How would someone go about trying to get the Matrix dicepool rules rewritten to fall in line with all the other dicepool rules for the game?

Dicepool for Matrix = Skill + Program
Dicepool for everything else = Attribute + Skill

This makes no sense and also breaks other rules, like how to default, for example. There have been many suggestions for changing it to a Attribute+Skill (number of hits limited by program rating + 1 [to allow defaulting due to lack of program]) just like how magic works... why wasnt this done in the first place? Just to be 'different'? I'd rather have a ruleset that made sense and flowed with the rest of the book than just different for just the sake of being different...

So I ask yet again, How would someone or a group of someones go about getting the core rulebook on Matrix actions rewriten?

Well, with my 8 logic, I'd certainly have loved that.

While its strange that Logic has no bearing on the skill Hacking, the fact the program is used makes sense to me.

Personally, I see it like this; The program rating IS the base stat, and without this special stat, you are unable to perform the action related to it. Its very much like a drones pilot rating, since its really weird that a physical stat like reaction is used while hopped into what is essentially a different body.

Without the proper tools, a person is essentially out of luck.

However, you could house rule some program creation rules. Some sort of Software + Logic test would likely be involved. I'm not going to touch this though, its up to you really.

If you reread the OP, you will see that programs are factored into the fix, as a limiter to the amount of hits 'just like the force of spells'

The "OP"? I must be out of the loop, I've no idea what you're talking about.

It looks alright to me. I assume the attribute that replaces all of the programs is Logic in which case, Log + Skill limited by program looks fine to me.

A brilliant person can still be badly constrained by a lack of software, realistically. But being intelligent needs to have a role in there somewhere. Heck, the way it stands right now you could use skill softs and have a pretty effective hacker with a 1 in every attribute.

The only problem that leaps out at me with your adjustment is one of balance. You can't normally get programs rated higher than 6, but you will start to see a lot of hackers with Logic 8 or 9. I don't think the mild boost to their power level is a terrible thing, though.

Caveat: I don't play with technomancers so I don't know if there are any balance issues there.

-K.

I'll throw something out there. (Edit: Now I know XD)

You could, again, keep the old system, but limit the Rating of the program by Logic (much like System). The same could be used in reverse. Either way, you're basically using the smaller of the two.

Exceptional Attr, Codeslinger, and perhaps a new Hacker edge could be used to expand this.

actually, the logic + skill, limited by program/CF model works very nicely to make technomancers not suck, imo. all of a sudden, rating 4 CFs is not the end of the world, and the TM already wanted a good logic anyways. what this does is make the TM have a similar dicepool to hackers, and the possibility to spread their points around a lot more on CFs rather than needing to have every single CF at as high a rating as possible.

of course, on the downside it means that they have to lose resonance to get their logic above their natural maximum (barring magical assistance, of course), but on the other hand anytime the program rating matters a lot they can still thread (for example, command and attack both benefit from a higher rating outside of adding to the dicepool) and really shine in those areas.

the rule also has the effect of not absolutely needing to have the highest rating programs possible to start. it makes hackers capable of becoming better than agents more easily (previously they had to have skill 6, program 6, and a reflex recorder, or a natural skill of 7 via a costly special quality. now, they can be up to 4 dice better in their dicepool, or 3 without special qualities, right out of chargen).

personally, i really like the rule.

Xenith, your fix still doesnt fix the problem that it doesnt interface with some of the rules outside of the matrix, like defaulting... What exactly do you default to, and when do you default? When you dont have the skill or when you dont have the program?
Under the current rules, you would default to your linked attribute and that could be anywhere from 1-10... But still doesnt make sense in the rules that I could have a hacker with 1 hacking skill, no program, and default to a 10 Logic that is busted down to a 9 due to defaulting. Then you add on the +2 from being in hot sim, and you have 11 dice for defaulting... that isnt right, and it's my belief that the devs screwed the pooch on this one when they deviated from the normal dicepool rules.

oh, also forgot to mention... normally, the limit to hits is actually program rating +1, so that you can theoretically default and accomplish something... just not something terribly impressive.

Ah, forgot that, will edit the OP to reflect. Thank you.

In real life, the hacker with skill 6 + program 1 will outperform the hacker with skill 1 + program 6. The rules don't take that into account, probably to simplify game play.

Similarly, in RL, Logic 6 + program 1 will outperform Logic 1 + program 6.

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Slight change of subject. From a number of posts, I get the feeling that the goal here is to create more powerful hackers "out of the box" and otherwise.

I like the idea of making Logic + Skill rolls for hacking, but I don't see why Program rating shouldn't add to skill pools in the same way Device ratings do. Programs pretty much are little virtual devices.

This covers more ground for combinations of Logic, Skill, and Program too.

might have to change systems to use: Response + System + Program for opposed tests though.

Again, each program is in actuality a very focused special stat, like pilot or sensor. First time I ran I had never even looked at the matrix rules other than flipping through the pages really quickly. Once. I still used the Program + Hacking thing and it made sense to me.

A person should not be allowed to default if they don't have the program. Period. Thats my answer. Without the correct tools (even crappy basic ones) the task is not possible. Again, perhaps a Software + Logic test could change this.

Making a program act very much like a spell seems silly to me, but if you want to use it that way no ones stopping you. I'm just here to give you suggestions and perhaps offer inspiration.

*And TMs are powerful for those who know how to use them. Threading allows a Technomancer to exceed his Resonance (as System does not limit Complex Form ratings, Resonance does) to up to double the stat. Its not a complex form its a threaded complex form. Heh.

Sorry. I disagree due to experience as a GM. Made a combat hacker. The technomancer, with an attack program of 1, took him down via threading and his edge (the hacker also used his group edge.. all of it..). And the combat hacker was basically at Runner skill level and the technomancer was a little less than that.

Yes, they pay in that they usually lack cyber. Oh well. Its all in how you use them.

Hackers are by no means underpowered, frankly the drawbacks and karma cost of a technomancer balance them out with the hacker.

There are alot of threads about this. Different people have their house rules from place to place. Personally I go with treating matrix actions just like any other action and roll atribute + skill. Then treat the programs as devices.

Keep in mind that a real hacker can and does hack without these specialty programs. They just make the job faster. I just say that a hacker can't fast hack without a program. Personally I think that hackers should have to write their own programs which would get rid of this sillyness about everyone getting hacking programs on the black market. THen it will be a function of skill not money.

I would limit the usable program rating as equal to the skill rating that is using it. This means that you should not be able to default on hacking, or at least not allow fast hacking without the skill. I would also not allow someone to take hacking group skills without Computer and Software at least at 3.

Now having the programs as devices doesn't necessarilly mean that you are going to end up with large dice pools. You can use the ratings in other ways. Have exploit negate it's rating in Firewalls. Have decrypt negate a certain level of encrypt. Try and find ways to make them static ratings instead of dice and you can use alot of programs in the course of 1 roll and make hacking much faster.

Making changes like this to a game without unexpectedly changing a whole bunch of stuff is really hard.

A lot of people seem to be assuming that you can just drop in the spell mechanic in place of the current hacking mechanic and everything will work fine - this is blatantly false. There are two huge changes this makes in the game:

- You can no longer get a bunch of hits at once. It becomes actually impossible to hack into admin access on the fly [in a single action] - even if you spend karma.
- Low program ratings suddenly really, really suck. With the official rules, the difference between rating 3 and rating 6 is three dice on the test. With the "like magic" rules, a rating 3 program is really unusable - you can no longer get exceptional rolls at all. We have program ratings from 1 - 6, making half of those possibilities utterly useless is lame.

I've been suggesting "Cap effective program rating at logic" as a potential house rule. It has most of the beneficial properties of the other suggestion without the disadvantages.

But... I'm probably not going to use that either myself. What I'm more likely to use is some Software SOTA rules. If software ratings degrade but can be maintained with Logic + Software rolls and time - then both hackers and script kiddies both have their niches.

[edit] clarify my point [/edit]

The max # of CFs you can have a CharGen is Logic*2, which I understand and thought about during my last post.

1-3 I have no arguments, but one correction. Willpower is Firewall which is used for defense in cybercombat.

4 - you have to remember signal range is based solely on Resonance, Resonance/2 = Signal. So at 4 resonance you are only looking at a 100m range for your TM power, unless you do something smart like buy a Commlink with a Signal 4 and just use it as a repeater...

Overall, you post some good reasons to go to the new system, just on the TM side. Thank you.

Ah, my bad... Sorry. Miss-read what you wrote.

seriously, if 7 hits is limiting you that badly, then it's time to talk to your GM about getting a response 7 commlink and some rating 7 programs... (note, it's program rating +1, not program rating).

honestly, the dice pool is not likely to change that much. i don't see how this new dice mechanic is going to screw everything up.

SOTA rules about upkeeping your program would be all well and good, but... it just leads to either the hacker spending months of not running so he can rewrite all his stuff, or just buying it all over again every so often. i don't see how that improves anything either.

seriously, the new system really just makes it more likely to have people take low or mid rating programs, i can't see why it would cause more to go straight for the top. the suggested mechanic means that people who don't have massive dice pools are going to be perfectly fine with midlevel programs, because being capped at 4 hits is not going to be a problem for many of them.

take a look at it... the hacker will now likely be throwing around 13 dice for hacking at chargen (7 attribute + 5 skill + reflex recorder) or more in their specialisation. the most probable result is 4-5 hits. 7 hits would be a very lucky roll, and won't come up nearly as often as the extra hits generated by any extra dice. comparing this to a probable starting hacker's pool of (5 program + 5 skill + reflex recorder) means the hacker just gained 2 dice (although it was likely only going to be 3-5 runs before the hacker had a response chip to handle all his starting rating 6 programs, and thus be within one die). and it's not as if the hacker gets no synergy from logic either, since they likely have the full electronics skill group anyways.

i really can't see why you're making such a big deal out of this suggested houserule. i mean, if you could show how it is a problem, i might agree, "don't use the houserule". if you just want to say you disagree with the flavor, then that's fine too... you're entitled to your own idea of how your game should be flavored, after all.

but unless you can come up with something solid to show how this is breaking the system horribly (on a side note, iirc Frank has been using this system for a while and hasn't indicated any huge problems), i'm gonna stick with my feeling that this is a better rule than the core book's rule. this is, of course, just my opinion, which i am entitled to in the same manner as yours...

point being, if you just don't like it, then just say you don't like it... but don't bash it unless you've got something to actually show it doesn't work.

Jaid -

I think my comments describe my specific issues with this proposed system rather than being mindless "bashing". It's important that the people who are considering this system for their game (and, if Konsaki gets his extremely unlikely hope - the core book) realize that using the spell system to replace the hacking system is a huge change that has noticeable side effects.

This isnt just to help technomancers, this is to revise the matrix dicepool system to realign itself to the way every other dicepool in the game works... I guess they thought it would be cool to change up the way matrix pools work, but it jacks with some basic rules and makes it where everyone is a script kiddie who cant operate if they dont have a stupid program, but if you DO have the programs, they will always be 5 or 6, nothing lower...

Okay I don't like using the program rating as a limiter for several reasons. One it doesn't match reality at all. I know that doesn't seem to be an important point when it comes to shadowrun matrix systems. A hacker can hack with little or no programs. That is the most important thing to remember! If you limit the hacker to his programs you have defeated the whole concept of hackers who are pitting themselves and their greater then normal understanding of software against the establishment.

Programs are not spells that they are throwing. They can do any of those actions without the programs but it will take time. The programs are automations of actions that they want to do faster. They are their bag of tricks and shortcuts - not the action itself.

Programs are like smart links, not like guns.

Start from that point of view and things will make more sense.

Actually I was thinking that maybe the SOTA rules should be based on each system. Basically think of it as an environmental penalty.

How about this: If you are writing your own programs and are using them on a run then you get to make an upkeep test of Logic + Software or Logic + Hacking vs a threshold step by the gm based on how up to date the system is. Now the threshold may be high if they have an on site spyder or very low if it is a purchased system without monitoring.

If you do your leg work you can find out more about the system from other hackers you could lower this before even rolling. If you do a slow hack first then you could eliminate it altogether by adjusting your programs to deal with the customizations.

Roll to see if you have a penalty in that system. If you don't get higher then the threshold then whatever you didn't get is a penalty to all your actions.

People who bought their programs from someone else would be able to get this roll and would just take the penalty.

BTW real hacking is always slow and doesn't need programs like this. Skilled ones will hamper themselves further to make it more of a challenge, like using a TRS 80, which someone I know did. They don't need a bunch of programs and it never costs them money.

I think that hackers should write all their code with a rating limit of their skill rating but not pay for it. And I think that the craft code table times are bad.

Well, the that you spend your BP on for resources arn't actually money. They're symbolic money that represents work you've done in the past as much as anything else. The programs you're buying when starting up a hacker are, more than likely, all things your hacker has already made unless he's got a seriously low software active skill rating. To just purchase the hacking programs would bring shame upon most hackers and put them in the most hated classification of 'wanna-be'.

More importantly, theres the risk of backdoors and trojans written into the programs.

Also it raises the ceiling for hackers so that there is still room to grow after char gen. In the RAW, programs are effectively attributes, which means a hacker can buy a 6 in all the attributes he cares about for around 90,000 .

I haven't made up my mind about this new system, but it does seem to offer advantages and aesthetically, it is nice to have hackers be brilliant individuals rather than script kiddies.

Well, I wouldn't but if you are hellbent on doing it...

I've been blatantly ignoring the existence of technomancers in this discussion, but I just realized something... Why would technomancer powers have anything to do with Logic at all?