You've read the topic if you opend this thread so you got the question right. While in VR modi the rigger leaves technically his body. During a car ride this should be fine.. But lets asume he rides a motorcycle with 120 mph. If I am not wrong the rigger has no control of his body while in VR, which means that his droopy body during a pursuit wouldnt stay for long on his motorcyle.

How do you play this technicality?

The bike itself can have gyroscopes in it to control it's balance. Also the Rigger most likely has the bike set up that if he is going to go VR he has hand/foot harnesses so that he stays on the bike at all time.

Just ride in the Side-Car...
Or strap yourself into the Pilot Couch of the Revolution Doble Monocycle...

If I remember the rules correctly, it is possible to control your meat body while in VR, but you suffer a -6 penalty to anything you do in the meat. I figure this means that the rigger would have enough control over their body to keep their hands gripped and their legs tucked around the bike (And whatever else you do to stay on one of those things). If I'm remembering that wrong, then perhaps you could presume that the meat body's muscles stay in the same state they were when the rigger jumps into VR. A sitting person doesn't collapse when they go into VR because their muscles are stuck in the 'sitting' position. Similarly someone riding a motorcycle would keep griping it, and so thus not fall off (Though unless there is a gyro or something, keeping the motorcycle upright could be difficult)

No you don't control your meat body... you take a penalty to your perception tests to notice anything going on outside of VR.. VR disconnects your muscles.


Yeah, the motorcycle would need a gyro (which is also +2 handling, so it's pretty good mod), and also allow it's autopilot to drive it around riderless (normally doesn't work since driver needs to take it off the kickstand and get it moving before the autopilot can do anything, also remember all motorcycles have the manual control built-in. Basically w/o the gyro the bike can't balance while stopped.

After that, again, you'd need something to keep your limp body in place.

Hmm, I still hold by there being some level of... call it muscle memory. It isn't like you relax completely and flop onto the ground every time you jump into VR, so you can obviously set your body to remain standing while you are out. I don't see why you couldn't set your body to hold onto the bike while you are out.

Also, if you can see with your meat eyes while you are in VR (Which requires the ability to move and focus your eyes among other things) then I don't see why you couldn't exert some small level of control over your muscles while in VR. Maybe not enough to coordinate walking, but just enough to keep you standing/sitting/hanging onto a bike.

No... you take the -6 penalty to everything, and your control of your body is severely curtailed....

muscle memory STILL needs nervous system (even if you're replacing conscious control w/ reflexes... if I were to apply a paralytic poison you still wouldn't argue the same thing would you... the nerves are cutoff).


I'm not saying the player couldn't rig themselves into the seat somehow. Cowboys could lash themselves into the saddle to be able to sleep and ride at the same time for example. But something similar would be in play, would you allow a sleeping player to stay planted on a maneuvering motorcycle (assuming that's the reason they're piloting it in VR) w/o some kind of restraints. I wouldn't.

If it's the Rigger's bike, then it's safe to assume he's modded it to keep him on top of it, and so I would point this out the the player the first time they tried it in one of those "I assume you extinguished that dynamite fuse when the fight ended, right?" hints. If he tried it on a stolen bike later, I might drop the hammer on him. The other possibility is to have a system built into the riding suit - it wouldn't be tough with 2070's tech to have autolocking grips and semi-rigid supports that keep a limp body in the riding position. A really good rigger bikesuit would interface with the bike's pilot to adjust posture as appropriate - if you were sitting straight up while doing 160 in a car chase, people are gonna think you're 'Weekend at Bernies'.

Gecko gripping on motorcycle suits or bike racing armor seems like a cost-effective solution to this problem. After all, sometimes you really want to stay on our bike.

I dont like the idea of side-cars, pilot couchs and gecko grips. This would mean that an unmodifed bike couldnt be rigged in VR except it had a few of this extras mentioned before. Hand/foot harnesses and autolocking grips are a reasonable solution, which I could imagine as a standard feature of every raw bike.

Thanks for those suggestions guys n gals.

THere's one really good Novel dealing with this a bit. I just can't, for the life of me, remember the english title <.<

There is a thread on this, but for the life of me can't find it.

the title of the novel is 'Dead Air' writen by Jak Koke, and it is not good. I don't expect more than mediocre writing in shadowrun novels but this was one of the worst. Definitley a step down even from his Dragon Heart Saga trilogy. Not to say I havn't read it more than once. I love the shadowrun fiction but this was almost as hard to stomach as Shadow Boxer; wich I've never been able to read all the way through.

"Dead Air" is about the LA Sabers combat biker team. The part relevent to this thread is that the bikers wear specialized armor that locks their legs a feet into the bike so they can ride hands-free to wield weapons such as macroplast whips, maces, and ranged weapons. One particular reason the story sucks is because the characters are clearly 'rigging' the bikes, (ie; recieving all the bonuses a jumped-in character would recieve in SR3), but they are not in VR under the effects of a RAS (reticular activation system) overide.

Apparently FASA writers (especialy Jak Koke) weren't held to any accurate portreyal of the rules system. And why should they be? Jumping into a bike you're actually sitting on is one big hole in the rules that gapes like a prolapsed asshole. Any one who's ever ridden two wheels should be fully aware that no matter how big your gyro is, duct taping 70Kg. of dead weight to your cycle is just unworkable.

My own rigger runs a motorcycle as his primary vehicle, and runs it in full VR. Of course, he's using a modified passenger protection system so he's fully enclosed in the bike (similar to, though not quite the same as a Tron bike), so falling off is never a concern. He doesn't dare VR rig an unmodified bike though.

It could be that since the rider uses his body on turns while riding the bike, in VR his body becomes a mechanism which the bike utilizes to control and balance the bike. Essentially his body becomes the gyrostabilizer.

the RAS override that VR makes use of its the same natural system that we use each night when we go to sleep.

but if one observe a sleeper, one will see that they do not just flop like a bag of bones. they twist and roll to change pressure areas on their body (on people unable to move their own body, say from a spinal injury, one have to do this aided to avoid whats called "bed sores").

the SR3 opening story talks about the decker not bothering to will her face into a socially acceptable shape when jacking in, leaving the troll telling the story a bit unnerved when looking at her.

Page 139 arsenal...

A credible argument can be made that you cannot rig an off the shelf motorcycle.

Manual control override lists 3 options...
Drive-by-wire: a switch to completely disconnect the autopilot from the controls and assume manual control w/o interference from enemy deckers/riggers.
Manual Control: the vehicle simply cannot be controlled at all by the autopilot/rigger it lacks the necessary servo controls
Secondary Controls: many of us have seen this in drivers class where the instructor has his own controls on the passenger side.

Last sentence... "Note that ALL motorcycles come w/ manual controls."


IE: I put forward the argument that any motorcycle which is going to be rigged REQUIRES having a rigger adaptation to control. Said rigger adaptaion probably includes things like gecko tips on the seat or the like to hold the rider in place (or flat across the top while in full VR). It makes sense... autopilot can't turn the front fork w/o some kind of special motors/hydraulics added, as represented by the rigger adaptaion. (by extension, means you couldn't offensively hack a go gangers bike if he was chasing you either, except to shut down silly stuff like gridguide).

This is very much in keeping with how I would adjudicate such a thing...

Keep the Faith

If I remember right, couldn't the level of paralysis in VR be raised and lowered?

Certainly it wouldn't take much for a person to hang on to a bike if he was also rigging it at the same time.

Two words: Power brakes.

Rigger adaption takes care of these things. Also as others have pointed out RAS override is a safety feature it would be simplicty itself to keep the leaning of the body active and tie it into the control mechanism augmenting the bikes existing gyroscopes.

Finally, it's a world with DNI, magic, sub-orbitals etc etc and yet people have a hard time believing that someone could come up with a way to stay on a bike while in full VR

Arsenal 142, rigger cacoon
basically it's a fire resistant bullet proof metal plated box instead of a seat. i don't know if it can be installed to bikes or not.

the more out there the fiction is, the more correct the mundane parts needs to be (or something like that. i know some scifi buff or other made a statement of such a nature).

While i am familiar with the thought process Hobgoblin however my point is this, there is a specific cost and addition for making something rigger compatible. I do not fathom why when the technology is already quite advanced everyone acts like they've found a glaring hole in the setitng just because it's not explicitly stated that for motorcycles full VR integration includes some way of keeping the rider mounted and the motorcycle steady.

Just skimmed the thread, but it seems to me that it isn't much of a stretch to figure that part of the program uses the Rigger's own senses to keep him body balanced and thus outright on the cycle.

all vehicles need rigger adaptation to be rigged. there is nothing special about motorcycles in that regard.

i do agree with the rest of your point though (that in the case of a motorcycle, rigger adaptation will include something to keep you attached)

Haven't you heard? It's the future! Get your handwavium ready!

of course you can turn the RAS over ride off. Dream Chippers do it all the time. Then they walk into traffic.

So if you turn off your RAS over ride to be able to knee into turns or shift forward to keep the front wheel on the ground or perhapse keep the handle bars out of your crotch when you break could you do something like draw a pistol and shoot it with a smartlink? You have full control of your body so without the RAS over ride you should be able to take physical actions as well as matrix actions right?

Since your basically physicaly rideing the bike with a really cool AR HUD and DNI access to the throttle should you use your physical initiative or your matrix initiative?

But, isn't VR 'full sensory imersion'? even with the RAS over ride off how do you get any signals from your inner ear? If you're in VR how do you even know where your body is or what it's doing?

The gyroscope sounds like it should fix all this just fine but could the Less-Physics-Challenged-Than-OTP do a couple napkin calculations on;

A: how hugely massive the gyroscope would have to be to produce the forces that a 70Kg rider must make inorder to ride a bike?

B: how immensely fast a 10kg. gyroscope would have to accelerate to produce those same requisite forces.
(dont forget to include the 70kg. of dead weight that's moving the center of gravity up about 40cm.)
(Please also consider the extreme physical demands of the Dirt bike because in SRTheory those can be gyro'ed and rigged too.)

C: please calculate the exact amount of awesome fun the character will have when he has to lay-it-over in an intersection while his ass is geko taped to the seat and his hands and feet are clamped onto the bike.
(Scooby Snack to the first Dumpshocker to suggest the Ejection Seat as a solution to this problem. )

I would certainly rule that rigging [in full VR] a motorcycle requires Gyro Stabilization, based only on logic, not on the rules-as-written. As OneTrikPony points out, it must be a pretty serious gyro, but not impossibly so...unless you're a troll, but the rules of physics only apply to trolls on SR's best days.

Really you want to insist on a setting that has FLYING GREAT DRAGONS and a plethora of VTOL aircraft and shipping dirigables to obey physics because you don't like people in full VR riding motorbikes?

Really is this the place your going to pitch your tent for realism in this setting of all things. A setting which has never for any moment pretended to obey anything other then the rule of cool?

Neither VTOLs nor shipping dirigibles violate the laws of physics, and while flying Great Dragons violate the rules of physics as we know them, they certainly don't violate the internal consistency of the Shadowrun physics, which include magic.


I pitch my tent for realism over the whole game, keeping in mind the variations between its physics [which include magic, and certain technological breakthroughs] and ours. In my opinion, Shadowrun has always at the very least paid lip service to realism [at the very, very least, internal consistency] and for those of us who favor realistic games - not "real," but "realistic" - this conversation is an aid toward that end.

Yep.

Really.

I have pitched a tent for internal consitency.

I have pitched a tent for rules that don't contradict the setting.

I have pitched a tent for role playing. None of my characters believe that it's a great idea to ride a cycle while they're physically incapacitated.

I have pitched a tent for people who find "coolness factor" the primary draw of roleplaying in a distopian setting. (Those people are just Dead SEXY!)

As pointed out earlier, any vehicle that is going to be rigged requires a Rigger Adaptation.

That being said, I think you might be interested in the following:

when rigging, the person "becomes" the vehicle...

when riding a motorcycle, the driver and the vehicle is one to a much greater degree then when driving a car or similar, in that shifting body weight alone accounts for a lot.

in essence, it should not be difficult for the rigger control system, when used for motorcycles, to make it feel like one is running, maybe on all four but still, and so allowing the leaning signals for turning to be passed on to the body, while at the same time introducing a sense of falling if the body is close to slipping of the vehicle.

all in all, dont fret the details, but just say that the stuff is advanced enough that it works...

From what I have read, yes, when in full VR you have no control over your meat body due to safeties in the software. A hacker CAN remove these safeties, but the result would be dangerous and would almost assuredly result in falling off the bike, due to your flailing about.

Whether this means that he can keep his balance while out is a question for your GM, though I would say no... you probably couldn't hold yourself up on the handlebars any more than you could hold onto the steering wheel while out in a different sort of vehicle.

One option might be a bike with a different design. Rather than leaning forward, it could be designed so the rider can rest his chest on the machine, tron style, with his elbows tucked into the machine.

Though personally I kind of like the sidecar idea.

or how about recumbent?

http://www.suzukicycles.org/Concept-Suzuki/G-Strider.shtml

http://matus1976.com/akira_bike/welcome.htm

http://www.ubergizmo.com/15/archives/2009/...ctric_form.html

Or think the Akira Bike here.

It mentions in the book (4th ed, not 4a) that you can turn off the "limp body override thing" and flail about in VR. It also says that you can "Shift" your perception back to the real world whilst in VR, but you take massive penalties. Both of these combined would, I would say, allow you to control and rig your bike.

Alternatly, just have a special thing that turns off your "limp body thing" (RAS I think it's called) and have your VR setup so that you are riding a VR bike just like the real one. That way your body will lean at the appropriate times and you'll be fine.

my second link is to someone building a real life version

btw, here are leaning trikes

http://thekneeslider.com/archives/2007/06/...nt-application/

http://hellforleathermagazine.com/2008/09/...4l-leaning.html

and there is even a crazy brit working a leaning quad:

http://www.gizmag.com/4mc-test-ride/12095/ (site may have problems)

What about treating motorcycle and body as one integrated unit? Basically not just rigging the morotcycle, but your own body as well? I'd use something like the following rules:

* You need to have skillwires
* Special software; maybe a Pilot for your own body
* You use skillsofts for every test your body makes, not your normal skills (because you're essentially treating your body as something foreign)
* You need sensors; either stuff like cybereyes or a cam on your bike (likely both), because you ignore normal physical imput
* You treat the bike and your body as a single drone (with stats derived somehow)

Treating your own body as a drone should seriously scare any wizard friends you still have

meh, go jarhead and be the bike

hey, can one give the bike arms and walker, and make it transformable?

edit: bah, never mind. Its a full drive replacement, not a addon

Yes, it really is like that.



The whole concept of VR is that the DNI intercepts & interprets the normal signals your brain sends to your body and muscles and uses them to drive software instead. You do stuff in VR by being your icon and interacting "physically" with your virtual surroundings. You CAN turn off the RAS which is blocking your brain's signals to the rest of your body, but that means that whenever your icon moves its hand (or whatever translates to its hand) to touch something in VR, your meatspace body is also moving its hand. Unless ALL you're doing is driving that motorcycle, and taking no other actions in VR, turning off the RAS will cause problems. Imagine trying to engage in cybercombat while riding a motorcycle with RAS disabled....

Of course to be fair, rigging a car while engaging in cybercombat or other "deckerish things" doesn't really sound all that safe either.

True enough, but you're unlikely to fall out of the car if you disable RAS while you're doing it

At least until you manage to hit the manual drive switch and swerve into a powerpole or building.

I stopped following the thread after posting this, but this was a poor word choice on my part. Not rigging, but controlling it via VR in any way (command, jumping into... etc.)

Motorcycles have manual control override ONLY. Hence, no servos for the computer to drive the vehicle like say a westwind eurocar. If the autopilot can't drive it... someone in VR couldn't either. VR != rigging necessarily... he could be using a command program.


Also while people talk about disconnecting the safeties and controlling their bodies normally. (no your body does not count as a drone... excluding some technomancer wierdness in a grey area of the rules). It's a -6 penalty just to sense what's happening in the real world... what's the distraction penalty for trying to control both real world AND VR at the same time... it'd probably wipe out any bonuses whatsoever you'd get from hotsim and a rigging module.

Not to mention the other problems others have raised of... how exactly do you control your icon w/ your RAS off... you lose the benefit of going full VR in the first place (more natural control of your virtual presence).

Yep. What falconer said.

People should just be happy with having an AR connection to the bike while actually rideing It's a very physical skill that would benefit little from VR control. The easiest way to get the benefits of a control rig on a motorcycle is to get WIRED REFLEXES.