We all know the basic things that hackers and previously, deckers, have been doing for years. Things like opening locked doors, fighting IC and stealing files.

But in some respects, SR4 has left us to be creative with what hackers can do. They've given us the system, and warned us a little about connectivity, but I'm not sure they even suggested what specifically we can and can't do. And so I suppose it's up to us.

I'm interested in how much leeway hackers in your experience of games, either as GM, PC, or witness to another PC.

Can a good hacker (say, 14-16 DP) turn off a sammy's cyber-eyes? Can he delete himself from a video feed in real-time?

Discuss how powerful hackers are. Rules can be referenced, of course, but this thread is also about personal choice and rulings that I'm curious about.

I attempted to challenge my group's hacker early on, but that really bogged down the game and really only took longer for him to do what he wanted to do. So, at this point, I kinda give him the run of the show, barring he hacks a node without flagging an alert.

I let him get whatever data he wants, delete any traces of himself and the team (i.e. video feed, logs, etc, but not in real-time) and pretty much search for about anything he can. So, I really leave it up to the player to get as creative as he wants. We don't do much with attacking cyberware, mainly because the hacker is pretty handy with his pistols and shooting is a lot more fun!

I think matrix systems are modeled like physical or astral systems. You have numbers and equipment for watcher or cops, you have values and rules for breaking through a ward or manipulating a camera system, for combat against a spirit or a SWAT-Trooper, but you don´t have rules for "making a complete run" like the old SR3-sytem with the security tally. I think SR4-Matrix is built with the idea of making it much more similar to the interaction of the player with the physical/astral world. You don´t design a matrix system like a anonymous Orange-8(12) with 6 security steps every 3 points, you design it like a house, a street, a social interaction, a tracing/shadowing through a dark street etc.



If the Sam is stupid enough to be online with his eyes, then yes.



If he has hacked the security system and modified it with the usual programs, then yes.



They are very powerful. Information gathering, direct and indirect tracking, ID/Access-Manipulation, shut down and manipulation of every kind of security system, hardware manipulation, drone rigging, discovering, intercepting, decrypting and manipulation of radio transmission (from commlink call to produce false trap data for enemy tactical networks), combined with an essence-friendly and not extremly expensive equipment, which leaves much room for improvement in the area of physical combat, rigging, sciene/support or social interaction.

A good combat-hacker played by a smart player who knows the rules, the roleplay and the world is a godsend for every playerteam (and sometimes a nightmare for the game master )

SYL

This intrigues me. If the sam is not stupid, then what would he change, while balancing utility?

If he has a smartlink, he'll need to have his gun connected to an image link in his eyes. This image link can also be used for AR bonuses to navigation, combat, and a number of other things a hacker can imbue some-one with. Sure, he could keep his smartlink seperated from his PAN. But would he be be safe and not "stupid" then? Or could the hacker invade his PAN and then bounce from the skinlinked commlink to the datajack, and through to the cybereyes?

Hackers are as powerful as the GM let's them be. And can be downright nasty if the GM let's them code programs and create response chips above rating 6.

I generally run stuff like real time video camera editing as follows: The hacker hacks in with an admin account. He uploads an agent with Admin access and an Edit and Stealth program. The Agent does the real time editing. If the hacker wants to do it I let him but it needs to be done every IP (this being real time and all). If he just wants to loop the camera thats just an edit test.

As for the sammie's eyeballs, only if the sammy was stupid enough to wirelessly enable them.

Again, wirelessly enable? Isn't that being connected to a commlink? Isn't that AR?

Not really. In our game, professional combatants are often in hidden mode or are using skinlink/commlink for personal data transmission and a second system for communication with the team/world. The strength of a hacker is not really combat-hacking the enemy weapon in one second (sure, some non professional enemies or enemies who have to follow a very strange/buerocratic way of handling things could be online with their smartlink/weapon/commlink) but in conducting electronic reconnaissance and preparing electronic traps ( for example hacking their communication system and planting wrong orders some minutes in advance before moving in). Hacking take some time ingame, up to several minutes if you have to find hidden networks and hack the right nodes, so it is not something which is extremly useful in a 3 second combat sequence. But give a hacker some minutes and he can make or break a plot.



In theory it is possible. PANs, however, have a signal range of just some meteres, so the hacker has to extremly near to the sam to get into his PAN .. 1 to 3 meters IIRC.

SYL

No. It *can* mean that it is connected to the commlink because the link is a very importat device in SR4, but first and only it means that a device sends data with radio signals and can receive radio signals. AR is something different and described in the basic book.

SYL

As I read the rules (and admittedly they seem vague to me) a hacker can hack your commlink, which has an active radio. Given that access, the hacker can then follow the skinlinks to the guns, eyes, datajacks, etc.

Seems like you really need to have a good firewall on the commlink, with good Response / System.
And probably analysis to detect intrusions, and IC with attack (or an Agent? They are the same price) to at least slow down the hacker.

Yours,
Joel Halpern

Indeed. A maxed out commlink with some security/stealth software and a good data research agent is very valuable tool for every kind of runner, for mages, hacker, faces, sams etc.

A mage may be the master of personal power, a face the master of social manipulation power, but a hacker is the master of the infrastructure which keeps the modern world running.

SYL

Or a Burner CommLink that's obvious, and a good one that's got lots of stealthiness!

Or, like a few people's suggestions, a series of CommLinks with Bottleneck Software, but that'll slow down the processes you want at times.

IMO, IC are just specialized agents and I allow them to be used interchangeably.

Hackers are great. They are not going to be able to pwn all of humanity. Without them, a team can be royally screwed like our GM who had us go on a run with our payment being fenced loot and we got it all stolen by a hacker who spoofed our Fixer's/Fence's comm...we all laughed about that one, but mostly because it was a oneshot (though our GM can be downright evil and our SR games tend to be us vs. him, which is how we like them). When I run them, I let them get away with whatever they can concieve, sort of. Pretty much anything they would be vulnerable to, I use against them as good as they gave. Makes them think twice about hacking stuff.

Only if your GM let's you though. I mean hackers can do some really wicked stuff but a lot of GM's don't allow it.

Like hacking the beat cops comlink and uploading a nice little agent that monitors all traffic and dumps all data on the link to an off site database of the hackers. Need to run a person's SIN? Just call up the cops comlink, the agent intercepts it so that the cop has no idea you called, takes the SIN, runs it, sends the data back, and thats that. Or you need to make sure that Mr. Cop doesn't get the message that a robbery is going on at X location.

Basically, on your off time just go around hacking random ComLink (bartenders, bouncers, cops, judges, lawyers, etc) and uploading little watcher programs. Upload them in every database you hack as well.

And remember, to be able to check a database over the matrix it has to be connected to the matrix. So start hacking into all of the databases you can find.

GridGuide is another good target, its in every road so you can hack into it from practically anywhere, and once your in you add your nice little stealth agent which ensures that no record of your vehicles ever shows up doing anything incriminating and that traffic is altered so that you have an easier time driving. And when someone starts chasing you you call up the agent and the other cars start blocking the pursuit. And if they really need to crashing into said pursuer.

Aren't hackers (not TM) going to cap out at a 12 dice pool in SR4 since skills and commlink ratings cap out at 6? Most hacking ends up being a skill + program, or commlink attribute + skill test.

But technically yes, you could turn of any cyberwear if you defeat the firewall if my understanding is correct.

specialisation, various kinds of 'ware, and the hotsim bonus would all enable you to go beyond that. so would the aptitude positive quality or any kind of skill-increasing ability.

as far as turning off cyberware, in general i would say no. you could probably reboot cyberware imo (that would be a necessary function to include i would think), but i can't imagine why there would be an actual switch to turn it off that would be accessible by anything other than DNI.

I was thinking of hacking cyberware in terms of jacking into the device itself. I imagine these things have to get firmware updates from time to time. Not so much in the sense of "OOh a street sami, lemme hack his cyberarm from a few kilometers away because my signal rating is awesome." Though I thought I read somewhere that anything broadcasting wireless signals could be hacked. i figured most ware wired into the body is essentially skinlinked, to avoid hackers playing with your pacemaker.

Though I must say it's fun to hack a sammie's smartlink and cause the safety to jam in the on position.

...yah, I've actually been a bit concerned about this. Violet can pretty much can own any system she gets into. Now we use the Logic + Skill rule with hits capped by programme rating which does make for more extended tests (and a better chance at being noticed) as well as brought back the old IC suppression rule. However, she still pretty much can romp through a system with little challenge (I still miss the old "colour-n" ratings).

Our GM is a little more savvy in that he does use isolated systems for storing critical data as well as passive defenses (like Wireless blocking materials so we still need to break into a facility and find the node). Vi has done a bit of cybercombat, both with IC and other Deckers (sorry ). We also don't deal much with hacking ware, though Vi isn't above flooding someone's CL with spam as a diversion.

I really hope that Unwired clears several of the hazy areas up and deals with matrix security design.

On hacking cyberware/guns:

At the moment, I'm of the thought that most people who rate as professional Shadowrunners or corporate troubleshooters probably don't keep things hooked up to wireless without a good reason, and those that are online are at the least probably running in Hidden mode, with some manner of redundant safeguards.

On the other hand, many 'regular' security personal, soldiers outside of special operations units, personal in sensitive areas and the like (as well as general schmoes) will have reasons (perhaps corporately mandated) to keep equipment and cyberware at least locally online; even for relatively elite security purposes, the benefits of having information feeds from the entire security team run through dedicated friend-or-foe, threat analysis, and tactical systems on a real time level probably greatly outweighs the possibility of a skilled cyberintrusion (a possibility that they probably have a contingency plan for.)

I will say, to keep with the abstract-ness of SR4, I wouldn't normally allow a hacker to specifically target or control a function of the cyberware. Similar to how the called shots work (i.e. can bypass armor or do extra damage, but you can't choose a headshot), I would let a hacker hack someone's cyberware, but the only effect they are getting is a -1 to -4 DP modifier, unless there is a special case that more detail is needed.

With that being said, most hackers would rather take a couple simple actions to fire a couple bullets/bursts than to just put a negative mod on an enemy...

Just quick question. Isn't it possible to have one street sam's PAN to be in part of their group hacker's PAN? If so, shadowruning hacker have to hack the opposition hacker's commlink/PAN, then, hack street sam's PAN again and into the specific system which will give the opposing hacker plenty of time to attack the hacker?

PAN is just for ease of use, if you have wireless communication then they can be intercepted.

I think the (a decent) idea for PAN is the devices signal is limited to the distance to the hub device. Therefore, anything on your PAN can only be hacked via your commlink or if someone is closer to the device than your commlink. This is the first I've used this thought, but I think its probably a good measure for PAN's

Two things...

One, most personal ware has a signal of 0, so you have to have a hacker, or some sort of drone relay device, within 3m of the target...most of the time, that is going to be pretty obvious.

Second, I thought I read something last week about Unwired introducing a type of blanketing access. It sounded like there would be a method where a whole team would be covered under, say the hacker's comm. So, it would not be possible to hack directly to the sam's cybereye, they would have to go through the team hacker's comm, which is usually heavily defended. Granted, if an enemy hacker gained access, then he could really mess with the whole team that was connected...

The devs are on record as saying that unwired will have guidelines for hacking ware.

Hackers are powerful, in part because dicepools are heavily gear-based on offense and defense so that even ignoring skills hackers pools win, but equally because real people don't top of the line security. More than a few people are running Xim or Nix because its significantly cheaper and no stock system has firewall > 3. Hackers are 1 step ahead of everyone else when it comes to security and it shows. In no other area of expertise is a non-specialist target's stat to defend capped at 3. Its like saying only sams and adepts are allowed reactions 4 or higher and the base damage of the gun is used instead iof the attacker's combat skill.. Still, hackers can't throw rating 12 prog just out of chargen which is a small mercy.

Ok, I got that. But most commlinks have more than just few meters for the signal range. If everyone in the group's commlinks (which they have their own PAN) are connected to the larger PAN (the hacker), this would at least give a group hacker to have some head up. I'm thinking more of counterspelling type in technology (ECCM, I would guess).

I see no issue with this, outside of the fact that the subscription list would be bogged down by the set up.

Not having your image link/smartlink and PAN connected to the matrix at all seems a little counter-intuitive. Sure, it's "secure", but it's also like pre-emptive amputation of an arm, so that it doesn't get cancer.

I think there's ways to get pretty solid network security without just having things not connected to other gear, and through the PAN, the matrix. You have two commlinks, an active fake, and a hidden beefed comlink. You don't use the active com for anything but calls and purchases related to it's fake sin. The hidden commlink is hardwired to have only an admin account, it has a R6 Firewall, a R4 IC running Analyze, Trace/Attack, and everything in your PAN has wireless turned off, but is still connected via your hidden commlink bottleneck. That's pretty secure, but you are still eligible for AR bonuses for things like Hackers sending you triangulated opposition positions to reduce blind fire mods, etc. Not to mention that a hacker can ride a team-mates commlink, and watch through the team-mates cyber-eyes, or maybe even a sim module. Then the hacker might also be able to make perception tests, or one of my favourites, use another team member as a relay.

But I wouldn't isolate my display link and smartlink from my PAN, I think that the loss of utility is greater than the security gained.

There is no reason why you cannot run two separate PANs. One could use Skinlink, and connect various things like your datajack/'trodes, smartlink, eyes or contacts, etc.

The second could be wireless, connecting a commlink to an image link in the glasses. No need for DNI or anything, as you can still manipulate the commlink manually. Your smartlink and other skinlinked accessories are more secure while still maintaining wireless interaction with the rest of the world.

We once had a hacker hack onto a hostile's PAN and blast Queen's "Bicycle" at full volume. The GM imposed a -2 penalty to everyone on the PAN for distraction...so that was effectively a force 2 chaos spell targeting only the baddies. And, yes, I think the next step was to hack the troll's cybereyes.

But we've quit the whole matrix thing...takes soooooo looooooong. We have a hacker NPC. We ask if he can do something, and the GM says yes or no.

Sounds like SR 1 and 2 era. SR3... I dunno, haven't played enough of it to get a feel for it, but it seems to be about the same.

While I haven't yet played SR4 at all (yet), I get the feeling that SR4's Matrix rules are an improvement over previous editions. That doesn't mean they're smooth, seamless, and/or speedy, but it looks quick enough that the rest of the group won't feel obligated to go on a snackrun or take a smoke break while you're doing your matrix thing.

As to what a Hacker or Technomancer can do? Well, like magicians, that's kind of up to the GM. If the GM wants to let them run roughshod... well... I guess that's their thing.

Personally, I plan on making a clear distinction between the rare hacker god, the script kiddies, and Joe Pedestrian when my campaign (finally) gets under way.

If you use SR4 matrix rules with no mods (even with a couple popular house rules) they are in fact smooth, seemless and speedy, IMO. But, you still have an issue when the hacker wants to "explore" an unknown node. Even if you just have an entire corporations network as one node, there are so many things a hacker could possible due or get information on. And let's just say he spends 12 seconds in there. At 3IP, that's a total of 12 passes the hacker is rolling. That could easily be 10-15 minutes of game time where the GM is one-on-one with the hacker...

Same thing happens with Astral Recon or anything that moves the game into combat turns. Unless everyone else is in combat turns as well, the table gets bogged down...

In my game, they're just as powerful as I need them to be

Seriously, the team's technomancer is a wiz and as we learn the rules better the character will only get better. The player has learned quickly that the most important thing I watch is the number of subscriptions the techno has available/in use. In fact, it astounds me to think about someone with one of the bottom-end commlinks trying to access a node that is halfway around the world. It must be slower than dirt