#1 I don't see the big difference to a mage setting a spirit onto someone or killing him by spell (either ritually or by just looking at him). And unless your hacker makes ahabit of doing his runs in areas where people don't use commlinks and AR you can already go and make their brains explode anyway.

#2 Absotively right. The current rules don't make defense against matrix incursion available to mom and pop. And thats a problem.

#3 Bullshit. The ability to force DNI on people will not meaningfully affect amount of times you're going to roll a new character. There are sniper rifles in the game right now. There a spirits you can send on a remote service. There's highly deadly gases. Stating that a semi-new way to kill someone will make your characters die more often, makes no sense at all. Seriously, if a character gets killed by stuff he has no chance to defend against it's not a problem of the rules.

EDIT: late post, serves me right for keeping tabs open and not refreshing.

for the love of mike. the big difference is that the hacker has no limitations. if he can hook himself up to a big enough transmitter (or, hey, a series of transmitters), he can momhammer the entire planet. he doesn't have to worry about drain, he doesn't have to worry about LOS, he doesn't have to worry about anything except making his signal strong enough to reach.

i think Adarael's point wasn't that you don't get to soak, it's that you don't get to defend yourself. if someone momhammers you, you soak--and then next round, you soak again, and again, and again until you're dead. you can't dodge, you can't hide, you can't armor yourself. you just die. the fact that you get to roll willpower is basically meaningless.

So you are saying that demolitions is OMG TEH BROKEN!!1! because with enough materials (explosives), you can destroy the planet?

Sorry, I just don't follow this line of reasoning at all. With an action you can attempt to kill someone with a program. With an action you can order a drone to fire a heavy machine gun. With an action you can light off the doomsday device from the end of Dr. Strangelove.

Why is one unacceptable while the others aren't? It's just a single-target attack that kills people out to line of sight and a very generous range. There truly is extremely ample precadent for this all over the system and the real world.

-Frank

Because I like one and don't like the other, and I'm running the game.

That's a viable and reasonable answer. So what is it that you don't like?

I'll start with saying what I don't like. I don't like relegating the Matrix specialist to being an NPC. Or worse, a real live player character who can only do things at rare intervals and spends the rest of the game session playing Smash Brothers or chatting online.

I don't like it when a subsystem, and by extension a player character can be defended against completely by simply not giving him any targets in his genre. How would you feel if heavy weapons experts were not allowed to fire at targets without hardened armor? How would you feel if mages were not allowed to cast spells on mundanes?

That's what I don't like. What don't you like? Raised on old editions of Shadowrun as you are, I can totally sympathize if you simply aren't used to the idea of the Decker actually being a full and functional member of the team. But I should hope that you would be able to see that getting past that is in the best interests of everyone.

-Frank

Already you're assuming that there's one way to play and that it's right. Apologies if that's not how you meant it, but that's what you're saying.

Also, please to not patronize me as though I were not "up to speed" just because I haven't played SR4 since the day the rulebook came out. I've read The Wireless World, and it's not exactly that hard of a concept to "get used to". If you'll remember, I used to be one of the people to chime in with the "but if you'll just spend some time with the rules, deckers can be a part of your game" post from time to time, so it's not as though 4 is the drastic "OMG PEOPLE CAN PLAY HAXXORZ NOW" change that some people make it out to be.

Now, on to an answer:

I dislike a game in which specialization is watered down to the point that role is meaningless. I saw the same thing happen to D&D, with all of the various classes, feats, and prestige classes that took away anyone's ability to be "special". Want to kill things? Be a cleric, but just take these feats. What does a fighter do, then? Get upset and sit there bored as someone outclasses him in the one thing that he's supposed to be good at.

In a world where every electronic device is a way to manipulate and affect the story/game, a hacker has plenty of viable targets. To me, and in my games, hackers aren't there to kill people in the face. And if they want to kill people, they can take skill with a firearm of some sort, buy some 'ware, and go to town, and hack doors open and coffee makers into boiling over. Hackers are there to cover the matrix aspect of the game.

Magicians are there to cover the magic spectrum. Sammies are there to kill people seven ways from Sunday.

To address your specific examples, I give a heavy weapons specialist a target now and then. (Or more to the point, if I see someone making a heavy weapon specialist and I'm worried that the particular game I plan on running might not really cater well to that, I'll let them know that they might not want to focus on that quite as heavily.) Mages can cast spells on mundanes just fine, as was intended and is fully supported in the rules, but their primary role is magic and the magical world in my games.

But you're telling me that a hacker doesn't have anything to do? In a game where arguably one-third of the game world is his domain? Nothing to do and I'm robbing them of enjoyment because I won't let them ray-gun somebody with their walkman? Pish-tosh.

In my opinion, if your hacker-player is bored because he can't go around killing people as a primary function, then that player has chosen the wrong kind of character to play.

I have never had a person with any knowledge of the game choose a decker because killing a bunch of mooks really floated their boat. They choose deckers because that aspect of the game and the game world interests them.

I have never had a player choose a street samurai and then get mad that they couldn't kill people with magic. I've never had a player choose a mage and then be upset that they couldn't really get titanium bone lacing and wired reflexes 3.

All that said, I just don't like it. It's outside the realm of what hackers are and do in my games.

To clarify: I am defending the DNI shortcut as something the rules currently allow. I am not saying it's good.

Just that everyone needs to be on the same page in regard to what the rules actually allow for, before we can start to discuss how to solve any problems. I'm personally leaning towards the "momhammers for everyone" concept, but that is preference and unlike the rules issues not something anyone can be right or wrong about.

I happen prefer the model of matrix where people have fortify themselves by jamming filters and firewalls into their brains, instead of flipping the off switch.

the limit there is the amount of physical material you'd need. eventually, you will run out of explosives. the only limit on the momhammer is electrical power and range, both of which are effectively limitless. you're setting up a situation where any half-ass decker with a deathwish could end almost all advanced life on the planet with a day's work. and then, you're complaining about how the current Matrix doesn't consider the ramifications of its technology.

moreover, you still haven't addressed the fact that having a commlink is not actually a defense against the momhammer. a commlink doesn't manage your brain, it merely interacts with it. it only protects your brain inasmuch as it can help filter attacks routed through the commlink itself. there is nothing that keeps anyone from just whacking you with an ASIST deathray (aside from the fact that such a thing can't possibly exist), no matter how many awesome commlinks you're wearing.

Alrighty, then. Let me ask you a few things.

1) How do you address the fact that the DNI exploit is both allowed and explicitly disallowed? Given 214's rules, the DNI should not be targetable. I figure those rules trump ordinary device manipulation. How do you rationalize otherwise?

2) If you lean towards momhammers for everyone, how do you feel about the fact that IF the DNI exploit is allowable, the jamming filters and firewalls you mention a preference for (I like 'em, too) won't stop the momhammer? Since the momhammer bypasses such things?

I fucking hate classes and class based system all the crap that goes with them. I despise systems in which (for example) nobody but the "thief" can pick locks. If you want that why not just play D20 shadowrun? Then you can also have levels and hit points sufficient that you can swan dive off the Aztechnology pyramid and get up out of the crater in the sidewalk and hail a taxi.

This is the biggest realization for why it won't work. The sim module is outside the trodes range. In order to subscribe their trodes to your HOT modified sim module, you have to get that sim module inside the trodes signal range. Which is 0. You might as well just take a needle of cyanide to them at that point.

The point that FTM was making though, was why can't trodes have a greater signal strength. And that is the first assumption he makes in order for any of this to work at range...that a trode could get a better signal...

If you take that away, then the hypothetical discussion boils down to exactly that...having to get within 3m of your target.

From the point of view of how radios work that doesn't make any sense. The range is based on using unmodified gear, with the micro antennas that come standard. If you use a big enough antenna on the guy trying to read the trods signal and have line of sight you can receive signals from everything, be it near or far. If you amplify (or directionalize) your outbound signals enough they can have a nice clear connection to you despite being "out of range". That's how the pringles antenna trick works and how you can read a passive RFID chip that has a "range of 2 millimeters" at 10 meters.

I don't see how the rules saying Simlinks are available as accessories to commlinks, overrides the rules on p213 saying that everything is a device and the general rules for connecting and hacking devices.

To shoot off the hip:
A DNI should come with the option of biofeedback filters and/or firewall installed inside the device, These should be beefy enough for you to call in the cavalry.

The thing with this list is that

A) He kills people with cool toys

B) He kills people with lightning bolts

C) He kills peoples with drones

D) <-- Jury is out

E) He kills people by diving across tables dual firing pistols with supernatural accuracy and reflexes or punching them in the face with mystic flaming fists of concentrated chi or whatever.

I think the point is why not let the hacker run around and kill things with his main shtick as well, because everyone else can do that.

So letting hackers dump people into hot sim then fry them with black hammer is just a frighteningly convoluted way of shooting them.

I just don't see why when someone uses a complex action to hack their Link to Hot the victim doesn't just use a DNI Simple action to click it back over to Cold and still has one simple left to turn the Link off completely.

Because it has no ammo limit. And because it can be handed off to a nigh-infinite number of agents as long as you have commlinks. And when those agents fail, they get rebooted and started again. The commlink it is hosted on is expendable enough even if is tracked or damaged. Finally spoofing is so rediculously easy there is no risk to it.

And yes, you can destroy Earth with enough explosives. But it is hard to get that much plutonium. However it is much easier to acquire this non-LOS, single target with no collateral damage weapon. Lots of them.

i didn't even see this gem. what you have described, it's not single-target at all. you would actually have to work to make it single-target, by using a directional transmitter instead of an omnidirectional one. what you're talking about is a broadcast--not a beam, there's nothing inherent in the technology you described that makes it a beam--that makes peoples' brains think death-thoughts. there's no way to receive information from the target's brain, with what you're describing, so it's not like you can say you need some sort of two-way communication to make the death-thoughts happen. you just shoot the signal out, brains receive it, and people die. it is, by its nature, a multi-target (or, maybe more accurately, omni-target) weapon.

hell, this is a weapon that would see most of its use in wars. to hell with bombing cities to the ground--just drop two or three of these to fire off ten deathray pulses a second for ten minutes, just to make good and sure. et voila, an entire city cleared of all inhabitants, with the physical infrastructure still perfectly intact. it's like the perfect weapon.

Could you just go ahead and Hammer the planet already... and Hammer this thread while you're at it?

This is as pointless as pointless can be.

Fine, it can be done.

Will all the people think it can be done just do it in their games already and all the people who think it's crap just not do it and we can move on to something with substance instead of this trite crap sandwich? This whole “I’m right! No, I’m right!� game is getting tiresome to the point where no one has original argument anymore. I’m reading things that have already been said just phrased differently.

Let it go already. It was interesting to read at first and now it’s just degenerated to the point of ‘Who gives a shit?’

I pledge my vast financial support for those fighting the good fight against the Mono-mental Stoopidâ„¢ found in the above quote. Yes, that even includes you mfb. So please check your regular data droppoints for the bank account number and password.

...she already can through Matrix terrorism. With so many systems tied into computers in 2070, from air traffic control, to surface traffic control, to local power generation/delivery systems, etc, a Matrix Terrorist can cause a great deal of death and destruction without having to melt people's brains.

Thank you for pointing that out.

Most Hackers are into it for a thrill, a power trip. Much like a majority of this thread they are very into "See how smart I am! I PWNJ00!" A good majority are egomaniacs.

What's the point in Hacking the planet, kickin matrix bootay 24/7 and building up your rep if there is no one around to pat you on the back and tell you how cool you are?

Jizzheads who go around Blackhammering people 'cuz they can' will most likely find themselves on the very short end of the Matrix Etiquette Blacklist after the very first time they do it.

And don't say 'know one will ever know' cuz this is Shadowrun and someone always knows...

i actually don't think it can. nothing i've seen in the books or in this thread has convinced me that trodes can act on brains at a distance. i'm giving reasons why it's a bad idea, from a game perspective, to try and allow them to do so.

Well said, KK. This is exactly what I was getting at earlier. It's not as though a hacker has some empty vacuum to look forward in the "things to do" department.

Shhhh, don't mention the fundamental flaw in 90% of the discussions that we have! If people just played the game the way that made them happy, we'd have nothing to talk about.

That was then. Now they aren't. They are into it for the money, not fame. As a full-time job. They don't want anyone to know they did it, because they won't enjoy their money if they are in jail or dead. Sound like someone in a game you might be familiar with?


Attackers Choose Fortune Over Fame

Attackers are developing portfolios of techniques for making money with cybercrime.

By J. Nicholas Hoover
InformationWeek
September 19, 2005 05:00 PM

Widespread attacks by hackers seeking notoriety are becoming less popular, as cybercriminals instead focus on targeted attacks for profit, Symantec (SYMC) Corp. reported Monday in its biannual Internet Security Threat Report.

Some attackers are earning fees each time a piece of malware is downloaded onto a computer. Others are demonstrating functionality before sale of malware. Hackers also are offering bot networks for hire, allowing attackers to extort money from E-commerce sites by threatening denial-of-service attacks.
[snip]



Malware authors producing stealthier creations
By Dennis Fisher, Executive Editor
19 Oct 2006 | SearchSecurity.com

As security researchers become more adept at detecting various forms of malware, attackers are beginning to develop techniques to prevent the detection and analysis of their creations.

In the past, the hackers who wrote viruses and worms spent little or no time trying to make their malware stealthy. They were far more concerned with finding effective techniques for spreading their viruses and causing the maximum amount of damage than with preventing security managers from finding the viruses. They figured, and rightly so, that by the time anyone found the virus or worm, it would have done its damage.

But as the focus of malware authors has shifted from digital vandalism to penetrating high-value networks for profit, evading detection has become a top priority. Their goal now is to drop a rootkit, bot or other piece of malware onto a target machine without being noticed and have the program stay in place for weeks or months while it gathers passwords, customer records or other valuable data, said Lenny Zeltser, a speaker at the Information Security Decisions conference here this week.
[snip]

OMG!!! WTFBBQROFLCOPTER! I've been hit with RL info pertaining to a fictional game on the interweb! I'm blushing, really.

See, the problem is that I keep my fiction separate from reality. While you were taking the time to look that up and quote it, I was prolly getting laid.

In my opinion, I got the better deal.

Now, Cpt Obvious, I know they do it for money! Full time, they make it their life. However that logic is like saying that all CorpSec does is walk around in his armor all day, showering in it, eating in it, sleeping in it. He doesn't. The Corp gives him days off, like anyone else. He is not his job.

Hackers make their money (hell, if most were any good they wouldn't be living Low Lifestyles) and ply thier trade of course, but what do you think they do when not working? Considering the standard is about one or two shadowruns a month what do you think they do with the rest of their time?

They tweak proggies, they fool around on the Matrix, and they HACK, for money? Prolly not. Do they find a few morsels of pay data here and there? Sure, most likely but they do it mostly to hone their skillz and cause mischief (I don't care how credible the hacker they all love a little mischief). Remember, 99% of Hackers are Hackers simply because someone told them "You can't/shouldn't be doing that." They are rebels by nature, and curious to a fault. Mischief only comes with the territory.

The best part is, you can't prove me wrong. Why? Because I'm talking about fictional hackers in a fictional world. They dance to my tune like innocent puppets on the strings of my tennis shoes. They are what I say they are and no RL snippet of info will change that.

the thing i really love about the "i was getting laid" card is, you know they're lying. every time. it's the Canadian girlfriend of the internet.

Ha! You caught me! When I was writing it my girlfriend was still at work. I wouldn't mind a Canadian GF... is Bianca Beauchamp seeing anybody?

I'm going to touch base with one of the main problems I have with letting people do all that cool stuff. It's very cool I agree, but none of it actually requires the hacker to go anywhere near the actual run.

I'm also going to point out that if the hacker can hack into the air traffic control system and crash an aircraft into a building in a relatively untraceable manner, why is black hammering someone's mom even a problem? One is a disaster that will resonate with the world, one is kinda trivial.

Anyway, the objective here is to get the hacker and the team to do shit in an integrated fashion. We want the hacker to be haxoring the mainframe while the team holds of the guards or whatever cause thats cool. But, really, why would the hacker ever go along with the team?

Either he is going to be able to get the systems externally in which case he does all his work while everyone else plays super smash bros, or he cannot, in which case HE plays super smash bro until the team gets past the security perimeter for long enough to connect a wireless node as a relay, or hell even throw a wireless node in the window, then they all play super smash bros while he owns the system, then he goes back to super smash bros while the team runs around and does their thing.

How do we stop that, but still give the feel that could generate the crash - even the 2065 crash! I'm all for something.

Edit: I kinda think SR4 is a huge improvement over things like Cp2020 in this respect by making hacking a kinda cheap BP package so you can slot in other things to do, but the point still kinda stands.