A Question Frank: Arent you just pushing the problem to another level?

After all, an agent is just a hacker in a box, and why stops an agent (conceptually) from getting influence as well as a hacker does?
Whats so special in a hacker that only a hackers commlink can orchestrate lots of resources, and an agents commlink can not?

If you dont want to push the escalation level arround, you will have to find a reason why an agent is not working exactly like a hacker (with maybe lesser stats).
And in most definitions I know an agent is exactly a hacker (at least in the very confined, relativley simple and artifical spaces of the matrix).

okay so it seems that people don't like the idea of confining the agent.

Actually I would like to hear why people want to keep them in the first place.

I think that Frank has a good point and we need to keep things like DoS attacks as effect based. But if we start basing our hacking on influence and things that are outside of the effect of the hacker's equipment then we end up with removing them as characters. There is little to no reason to even bother shadowrunning. They could do pure hacking and not get involved in the physical side of things. They can get what ever they want from matrix manipulation. I'm not saying that I disagree with this possibility because then they become pure NPCs.

I think a distributed model for hacking would be a very interesting system. It should be based more on skill level then money at that point I think.

But let me go back to my question: Why keep agents in the first place? As a GM what good do they do? They seem to be more trouble then they are worth.

May I propose a much simpler soloution to the Agent Smith Swarm problem?

As all Agent Smiths are just copies of Agent Smith, what works on one Smith works on all of them. So once an IC or a Security Decker has compromised one Agent Smith, he can simply take a (Whatever is the lowest division of action in a combat pass) and eradicate a Smith.

So, sure, he'll get pummeled while he's still trying to take down a Smith. But once he does, he can simply handwave away large numbers of Smiths. And worse, the whole system will know how to take down the Smiths, so IC can assist him.

So the Smiths start out as "OH MY GOD AGENTS!", but they quickly become ablative meat that can attack.


Of course, by using multiple different Agent programs, even if of the same rating, you can bypass this - Now it's not:

Hacker "Killjoy" + 11x Agent Smith

It becomes:

Hacker "Killjoy" + 3x Agent Smith +3x Agent Jones +3x Agent Johnson +2x Agent Kilroy

that's indescribably unrealistic, and doesn't really solve the problem. if you've got a hundred Smiths, knocking out two of them per pass isn't going to have any appreciable effect. besides, as you note, you can just have a bunch of different agents, and you're back to square one.

and how in the world is that simpler than just adding bonus dice?

I still don't understand why we NEED agents anyway but how about this?

The book says that the firewall can increase by +4 when an alert goes off and it can shut down outside connections. So basically the first combat sets off an alert and makes it harder for the others. THen the second and third tell the system that too much is going on and shuts down the connection. Basically using more then 1 or 2 agents makes it always fail as a hack.

Then why not create a Denial of Service attack program or action and move on? Actually using that many agents requires that many rolls. Have a program that just pings the firewall until it freaks out.

It isn't a question of is a DoS attack useful really but why allow that many agents and all the problems that come with it.

My take on the issue (I have an "open" approach of the Matrix so the mechanics described here may not be linked to any written rules):



1) Attacking
Short version : A secure configuration of a node prevents that kind of problems (just like a secure configuration of a router prevents Dos Attacks nowadays).
Long version : You have two ways to get a lot of agents :
a) Run them on commlinks, and have them linked to your persona : you're limited by the response of your commlink.
b) Run them on other nodes : they need to hack their way to the target node and then they load themselves on the node. A node set properly will have restriction to prevent overload. It can also simply refuse loading agents coming from unauthorised nodes. Of course, it can be possible for the agents to spoof their incoming adress, but if the node sends a confirmation request to the supposed source node, it will be harder... and so on.

If the hacker has got himself an admin access, nothing prevents him from modifying the server rules to load as much agents as he wants... But if the hacker has hacked an admin access, he doesn't really need a horde of agents to attack it...

2) Defending
Several explanations can be used :
2.1) Response degradation : by RAW even big nodes are subjects to response degradation, so you won't run too many agents on it.
2.2) Incompatibility/Interferences : Today, running multiple antivirus software lead to a lot of complications due to interferences between them. It might go the same way for agents. If you have 1 agent, he will easily spot the lone attacker. If you have 100 of them, they will check each other, and it will be easier for the hacker to go unnoticed (and it might generate a lot of load on the node, fill the logs with useless "Agent A scanned Agent B" lines, making it harder to notice interesting events.
2.3) Security reasons : A few agents are enough to do the job properly. Allowing for more is allowing for an "agent horde" attack, so rules restrain the maximum number of simultaneously running agents.

That's all I can think of for now.

My soloution is simple, because it means that Mr. Security Hacker can set up an Anti-Agent Agent, the system's IC can act anti-Agent as well.

So let's say he takes down one of the Agent Smiths. The Black IC in the node gets a copy of the Smith-b-Gone, and then Security Hacker sets up his own Agent, Leroy.

Leroy and the IC handwave away two agents per pass. They'll be through the MAXIMUM agents that the intruding hacker can bring in three rounds, two if the Sec Hacker helps them.

ShadowDragon8685, you have ideas about simplicity that are different from the general consensus held by the rest of the world. cherish your uniqueness.

Like I said - look up Bluefrog.

Things might become... interesting... when Okopipi hits the road.

I know that all DoS attacks can't be prevented by router configuration, but the most standard DoS attack can be. And that's what I wanted to illustrate : if there's an easy and dangerous security hole, it will be known and corrected.

If someone discovers a way to have a 50/50 Hardened armor without any penalities, you'll soon have -50AP guns/ammo to deal with that.

which is why I think that we need to keep the system simple. There is always going to be an arms race going on. We can get caught up in a specific system and come up with alot of pros and cons, bonuses and penalties but I think that it moves us in the wrong direction.

Think about the overview of the system and paint it in the broad strokes. Then decide what we need to accomplish that with a minimum of system and rolling.

So far I have yet to hear a reason to keep them in the system at all. They seem to be a can of worms on the hacker side and a way to make infinite perception checks on the server side. One way of resolving seems to provide for inifinite rolling. Another says that the use of them would shut down things. Some people want to use them to bypass the hacker character altogether.

So out of game what is the benefit to having these things? Are people afraid to remove them and are just going to patch them up or are you just going to handle it out of game and say that you can't do certain things and ignore the in game issue?

So the same solution works for both. Make it where agents are a function of your OS and not independant. THey can make data searches as commlink agents or they can move the drone around as an object but there is no reason for either of them to be able to move off of those systems or hack. If we make the agent and the pilot just ways to assign actions to your systems that they are normally good at but restrict them otherwise then the whole problem goes away.

An agent becomes more like Andromeda then Agent Smith. It is jsut another way of talking to the ship, commlink, or Drone. You can't send out many copies to do your bidding. They don't need to leave your commlink to do a data search. They browse the matrix just like we browse the internet today. They become a secretary instead.

Actually maybe that would solve the problem as well. If we called them secretaries then people would not try and assume the agent smith logic for them and just have them answer calls and stuff.

I get your point Garrowolf, but what of the IC ? Do you need a hacker in every node you want to secure a little more ?

Treat IC as a local attack. If you leave the site and they feel the need they can trace you, or they can trace you while they engadge you in combat or whatever. You are already linked to their server. They don't need to send anything to you. Think of IC as a local agent on the server that uses the attack program on you. Don't think of it as something that goes to your commlink to attack you. If you are using much in the way of simsense then that simsense is sending a signal back to your meat body to feel this or that. The server is messing with that simsense signal to effect you.

There is no reason for IC, Agents, or Pilots to be able to leave their systems.

kzt the Pilot program doesn't leave it's system to drive. It is in the cars computer which think of as a specialized commlink. I'm not saying that Drones don't move. I'm saying that the pilot program doesn't leave the drone. The IC desn't leave the server. The Agent doesn't leave the commlink.

There is no reason to have multiple Agents because they can activate as many actions in the system as you. They just are a nice interface and can do somethings that you tell them to automatically. A drone defenately doesn't need several pilots fighting for control. IC can attack as many people as it wants to.

What I'm saying is if these things are just intelligence routines attached to a system then it becomes an attribute for the system to use instead of as a bunch of robots. Treat it like a smart side of the OS. It can only do what the system can do in the first place. It doesn't need to have seperate programs or stats beyond it's rating. It becomes another rating for the computer after system instead of another set of stats to keep up with.

this strikes me as being non-simple. you basically have to rewrite the entire drone/agent system, rather than adding a limitation and a new source of dice. moreover, this solution makes agents basically useless, except as node defense and making searches easier. woo. we're looking for ways to reduce the effect of multiple agents, not castrate them completely.

It wouldn't even castrate them, or prevent them from breaking the universe. If each node can have an agent on it, and each agent can run a search or medic program, you still have node proliferation where Hackers will have copies of their icon present on several friendly nodes that will heal them and issue batch commands to hundreds of nodes that all go out and run searches.

The basic Agent Smith problem exists as long as there is a 1:1 correspondance between having a new node and having a new agent, whether the agent can leave the node or not.

-Frank

That's because decks were completly unhackable.

BTW, Frank - read the Errata, there's a little catch on the Medic trick.

Is it now?

What if said comlink is about the size of his desk and has logarythmically processing power than modern-day NASA, and the handset he uses is, while powerful, more-or-less merely a node.

His desk is capable of running a crap-ton of Agents, but his handset can only coordinate so many. And if you want his desk to be more powerful, then do it!

The rules provide very handily for expansion for numbers higher than 6 - just use numbers higher than 6.

yes, you should be using the same rules, because they are both computers which interact with the Matrix in the same manner. should the desk-sized server have bigger numbers? yes, absolutely. but saying it should use different rules because it's bigger makes no sense at all. do you use different rules for shooting at a dragon than for shooting at a dwarf?

no. but if he did, he'd use the same rules as you. and if he decides to eat you, he uses the same melee rules. more/better agents and IC != different rules. if that's what you mean by "different" rules, then we basically agree. if not--if you mean "get rid of agents except on servers", as indicated by your previous statements, then we disagree.

there's no reason to get rid of agents. they're cool, and a few patches can make them non-broken. getting rid of them will cause more problems than it will solve, because agents are a logical extension of technology that has existed in the game since SR1. getting rid of them requires ignoring the fact that any character with sufficient programming skills would invent them if they didn't already exist.

for what it's worth, i believe that Unwired will have security options that commlinks will have difficulty running. i could be mistaken; i don't have any insider information. but it seems logical.

then again, variable TNs seem logical...

Is it logical that "big" systems should be more powerful than small ones ? Not necessarily.
2070s commlinks are totally different from today's computer, and size may not be a limiting factor anymore...

That's why I feel comfortable with the idea that rating 6 is as high as you can get (generally speaking) and that the only difference between a commlink and a "host" (which I'll consider as a "node cluster") is that the host can handle much more connections at the same time (no subscription limit) and that each user connected to it can run as many programs as if he was all alone on a same rating commlink.

mfb WTF? How do you keep on going from a drone can drive itself around to an agent moving independantly in the matrix? They are not remotely (pun intented) related actions.

A drone has a pilot program which is staying in its OS (or functioning as it OS) and directing the vehicle it is in to move based on commands you are giving it or its own programming. At no point is the pilot program LEAVING the drone. It doesn't cause a problem because there a logistical and monitary issues that prevent someone from generating a thousand drones.

Agents are a completely different issue. The problem is that you can make as many copies of them as you want to and they can be sent into the matrix like a free army. This is a serious problem. In game there doesn't seem to be a need to allow this kind of thing for hacking to work. It can work just fine without it and even with the messed up RAW it ISNT necessary.

Out of game it is even worse of a problem because a player that figures this out could totally destroy the game balence. They could take down the city grids. They could blackmail large megacorps. THey could do a lot of hacking terrorism. They could bog down the game with things that are not the basis of the shadowrun setting.

The thing that you are missing is that these are normal access programs that everyone can have. If everyone could do this then it would shut down the matrix. If just those who could break the copy right coudl do this it would shut down the matrix. You can't just think about what your character wants to do with this. You have to think about the consequences that a thousand people will do with this.

If you don't think that this is an issue then let a magic user in your game create no limit high force rating spirits that don't go away every few minutes for a day. Once they have a thousand then let them go about their buisness for a while and come back and tell me there is no problem.

I hear people on this forum talk about how to get around magical security because it isnt fair for a mundane shadowrunner to have to deal with. Yet allowing such a high number of agents could result in a thousand IC standing around holding VR boards pretending to be the walls. These wall can be see to be transparent from their point of view. They all can be linked so they all know the same things. They will always see you but you only see the walls.

I'm not saying get rid of agents or pilots or IC. I just saying that if they were a function of your OS, like a combination between your browser, your help center, and a VR character then you have no problems. They should'nt be useful outside of your computer and they shouldn't be used as proxy hackers.

mfb I'm not sure if you are missing the crux of the problem or not. It isn't whether they can surf the internet. It's that they don't need to leave the commlink to do this anymore then you have to climb into the internet to find something. The matrix is not a real space. It is the effect of visualisations. It doesn't need to climb around or move from server to server to find things. It needs to access a series of data mining systems. These data mining systems have a lot of information. Your browse program sorts through these based on your preferences and wishs. At no point would you want your agent actually going into thousands of servers, ignoring it's database, and creating one of it's own for each place.

The agent doesn't need to move anywhere to do it's job. It's the idea that it does move around the matrix that is causing the problem.

If that actually were the case then there would be no problem in stopping them. All you would have to do is have the server not run that kind of file type. It will accept a file request from a browser for a web page it has or even one with a VR dialog but it won't accept anything self executable or having the file types relating to agents. Problem solved. Since there seems to be a lot of connection betwen agents and IC then the last thing that a server would allow was something that can do all the damage of a virus but can act semi intelligently in your system, especially if it can create more versions of itself.

If they can be usefully copied and actually act independantly you are talking about super viruses, not data miners.

see I think I see the problem. You are assuming that the RAW makes sense which it doesn't. You can't have a file on a system that the system can't see. There is a difference between not setting off alarms from the security programs and actually not showing up on the system. Interacting with the system is how things run. You keep on assuming that programs can have any kind of reality outside of the systems they run on. If the system can't run it then that is the end of it.

The basis for making any kind of logical arguement about a real world concept is that it is based on a real world concept. You can model all of the ideas behind the Matix in shadowrun as long as you understand that the details the game gives you are non sense. Most of it is a legacy from earlier non sense. It sometimes gives you the outward appearence of logic but then says that it is powered by turtles.

If you don't want to worry about any reality to these computer systems then there is no problem. Agents don't do this because they have a union and it is not in their contract. Pilots can fly because they were in the Air Force. IC is not a problem because the IC mutant powers don't work away from their radioactive rocks.

Wouldnt the agent smith problem be solved, if there was a way to limit the number hostile agents in (or accessing) a node?

Adiddionally: Could somebody post a list of matrix actions that benefit from agent smith?

Garrowolf, for pete's sake, read what i say. i don't think the RAW makes sense. if i did, i wouldn't be looking for ways to fix it. i didn't say the system can't see the files that the agent uses to run on that system, i said it doesn't necessarily see them for what they are. yes, the system can see the files that comprise the agent's presence on that system. no, that doesn't mean the system recognizes those files as comprising an agent. i'm not assuming that "programs can have any kind of reality outside of the systems they run on", or anything even remotely similar. i'm assuming--correctly, because it's the entire basis of hacking, both in real life and in SR--that systems can be fooled into running things that they wouldn't otherwise run. this includes, in SR, hacker icons and agents.

you're assuming that there's some sort of difference between how a user interacts with systems and how agents interact with systems. there's no difference. a system can't differentiate between an instruction sent by a user and an agent. to the system, it's just an instruction--the only thing the system can detect is if the request is legitimate or not (and if the hacker/agent does his/it's job right, the system can't even detect that.)

No, because this is

a) too restrictive, matrix cafes and databases would never work and is thus nonsense
b) not limiting enough, it still allows for enough agents to severely limit the impact of the hacker