OK it seems that the hacking in 4th Ed is very much like the matrix stuff in Ghost in the Shell. Which is ok, heck it's even great. After almost 20 years finally SR's decking (I'm an old fashion girl, it's decking damn it!) is finally fixed.

So in that vein, is there a cannonical item (or can we create it) where you can jamb the AR VR system? In the 2nd season of the TV show the government AWAC jams the net over a certain area. there are references in mange to there being barriers that that can block the net. SO can we do this in SR? Think of it as a great secutrity system. Modern runners are so use to their wireless nets and suddenly that corp facility is jaming them and the sec bots are hardwired.
"Quick hack the cameras"
"How??"
"What do you mean how??? You're our fragging decker."
"Yeah but that ain't on the net and I can't get any reading on anything!"
"Oh drek!"

Area Jammers (p 330, SR4 20th anniversary edition) have existed since the beginning of SR4, certainly. Runners that depend on their commlink network, however, are dead runners. It's more likely to be a liability for the corps and cops than the runners, if the runners are clever.

And the Matrix stuff in SR4 is NOT fixed. It's far worse than you can ever imagine. The concepts are solid, but the execution is terrible. Be prepared to house rule a lot of things.

In this kind of situation, where there is no signal or you are being jammed, what can you do? Are there any work-arounds?

My Technomancer uses a Skinlink Echo, which evades this entirely by touching the device. Theoretically, for most hardware devices, you can do a Logic + Hardware test to remove the case and access the internals directly. Or you can make a Perception check to look for a standardized Datajack port (Corps don't like to throw anything away... I'm guessing Datajack ports will continue to live as long as USB has). Also, when you are flying blind, your opposition is also flying blind with the area jammer. So you won't run into wireless drones (although tracked and cable-connected drones can still get you).

EDIT: I should say Wireless Drones that are jumped in by a Rigger. Drones by themselves with a final instruction of "Keel teh Shadowrunnerz!" are quite dangerous, but without a Rigger controlling them, they are limited in their dice pools due to Pilot, Sensor, and Autosoft hard caps, and they can be fairly easy to take down with Stick and Shock rounds.

*starts taking notes*

Unless they are using selective jamming.

Ick, Smart Jammers (Arsenal, p58). Still, they have to succeed in a Rating x 2 (4) test to even find your hidden nodes (your nodes are hidden, right? RIGHT?), and they have to make it for each and every single node they want to jam. Even with the highest rated Area Smart Jammer (6), it isn't likely you'll get all of the runners' commlinks. Of course, it will always be the decker who is jammed... you've played SR before, right? *grin* You can probably get around this by just bringing multiple commlinks, and use the one that actually works. Heck, you can bring a lot of crappy commlinks, then directly wire your good commlink to the crappy one that isn't being jammed by the Smart Jammer (copy over a Scan program to each and every one of them, then use the one that works), hoping that the law of averages plays out. It looks a bit silly, but so is the Smart Jammer.

Can't you also just get around the whole Jamming problem with an ECCM program? Also, simply brute-forcing the Signal (make sure all of your devices run at an uber-high signal rating) could solve it.

I think there was a mod in Unwired for unusual-frequency commlinks. Also, if they use partial jamming to protect their own frequency - you just find that frequency then with Scan.

As for wired cameras, as soon as you get hardware access to one, you can likely tap into their grid and take down a lot of other security. Because no one puts every camera on a separate network..

But jamming can be very useful to buy a few rounds of time. It disorganizes stupid enemies (who don't have a plan for this), and it separates them from drones and tacnets for a while. Use the advantage, because they'll find a workaround in a few rounds.

Most of my heavy security tends to run on hardwired fiber optics that run through the walls. You would be surprised how few runners know how to do an optical tap anymore. Combination locks also REALLY screw them up too. Passkeys, autopickers and sequencers tend to get relied on a little too heavily by most players.

A real hacker can do more than hack wireless. Of course, I'm still trying to figure out how to pay for that in BP

I kind of like the idea though, that the hacker would also be the player who has a clue on how to handle these sorts of things. Takes some reading of the books, and some creativity and knowledge of security tactics not particularly limited to SR rulebooks. But you get to be the cool clever guy who figures out how to get things done.

Any device with a Signal + ECCM less than the effective rating of the jammer loses wireless connectivity. The effects of a jammer are reduced by distance [1 per 5m for the area, 1 per 20m for the directional]. So if you're at the ground zero of a Rating 10 jammer, you need Signal + ECCM of 11+, total, to have any connectivity.

One other way to get around jamming is just to avoid that whole portion of the electromagnetic spectrum: use a microwave or laser link. These have their own limitations on range and line-of-sight, but cannot be jammed with conventional jammers/ECM.


This begs an important question: are the standard jammers - and thus, by extension, vehicle ECM - completely indiscriminate? In other words, do they block your own frequencies, as well? Doing so would make no sense at all, but I'm not finding a reference in Arsenal, SR4a, or Unwired. All the devices on your network should frequency-hop together in step with the jammer/ECM.

My recollection was that Nonstandard Wireless Link [Unwired, p196] helped guard against jamming, but all it does is raise the Threshold needed to find your node if it's hidden.


The rules aren't any different, really, except those effected by the connectivity issues of wireless communications. Hacking is still done the same way whether you're plugged in with a datajack, connected with a skinlink, or part of a wireless mesh. Even using a satellite uplink has the same mechanics, although you pay a penalty in lag. No build point cost required.

AR and VR are ways people manipulate the Matrix; they're not things that can be jammed. In many circumstances, people use AR and VR over wireless links, and those can indeed be jammed, in the same way any kind of radio wave can be jammed today. [Wireless links are simply radio transceivers of varying sizes and ranges.] To put it in today's terms, I don't jam your keyboard and monitor, I jam your wireless card.

Jammers are found on page 330, SR4a. Smart Jammers, Arsenal, p58. Expendable Jammers, Arsenal, p57. All come in area and directional versions. Vehicle ECM is simply the same devices, with the same mechanics [but unfortunately, no Capacity].


Wi-fi negation is discussed in SR4a, page 264. Various options for Wireless Negation are provided in Unwired, p62, including Faraday cages and wireless negating wallpaper and paint.

It's very easy to imagine Shadowrun's wireless infrastructure, because it's using the same principles as our own, simply extended. It uses radio [usually] to connect electronic devices. So anything that effects radio [at the appropriate frequencies] will also effect SR's wireless devices, including metal barriers, water, even foliage under the right circumstances. There's nothing about the wireless system - thankfully! - that would run counter to anyone's intuition. [edit: By which I mean the physics of the thing; many mechanics are counter-intuitive, usually because they're not accurate or realistic. But the physics are the same as today's.]

Most likely they do. The difference is that you've planned for that; you have ECCM or an alternate medium of communication prepared (laser link, magic, heck even courier drones..), to create an asymmetry in communications.

AR and VR are ways people visualise data and interact with things that they may be accessed over the Matrix. That data may concern things about the Matrix, but it can also be a taco recipe from a datasoft cookbook in their local storage. Without horrendous access to their machine, you cannot jam their use of these visualisation/interaction mechanisms, but you can jam the data paths that they are using to retrieve data if it's not local. That will not shut off their AR/VR, though.

I can't jam your windowing system (easily), I can jam your internet connection (doable even on wired links).


NB: Assuming that you're not doing your AR Dennou Coil style. If your AR is totally cloud-based (as it is in Dennou Coil), then being jammed can shut it off. On the other hand, you don't even need a Commlink for cloud-based AR - you just have glasses and AR gloves.

3287- I know that the net are people access it from their own little machines but if you can blanket jam an area so they can't reach out to the net, like a modern vell phone in a concreat tunnel lined with rebar, the phone still works but it can't get out to contact anything.

I definitely don't disagree with that; I was simply pointing out that what is being jammed isn't "the AR VR system," but rather the commlink [and vehicle sensors and so on]. AR and VR are methods of controlling and observing data presented by that commlink; set up a jammer, and you don't just jam "the AR VR system," you also jam, say, using the keyboard and monitor.

For shutting off someone's AR/VR (essentially targetting their commlink/datajack/trodes)
you do have other options available that are in general much more offensive than ECM such as EMP grenades, HERF guns jack plugs and so on.

It is worth noting that in SR4 You can automatically exclude any nodes you desire from a Jam Signal action (p.231, SR4A) that you initiate and can modify that list with another Jam signal action. So you can blanket an area with Jamming but leave your drones and allies unaffected.

Smart Jammers (p.58, Arsenal) are more selective. Smart Jammers only Jam signals that you specify, which usually is more trouble than it's worth in my experience unless you are trying to be covert.

Headjammers (p.329, SR4A) are single target ECM that when attached, jams that persons head.

SR4A has a table listing Elec Warfare references on p. 247 if you are looking for more toys/tactics.

If you are trying to hack someones eyes like they do in GITS, a stealthy hack into someones cybereyes or commlink combined with fast edits can net you the same effect.

You should probably be a S-class Hacker like the Major if you want to do this to multiple people on the fly.

A combination of hacking and elec warfare can give you control of a situation.

That's what I was looking for! Thanks, McCummhail.

My pleasure.

Also, not to be overlooked but spam attacks (p.225, SR4A) can be pretty obnoxious and distracting when you need to be paying attention. Heck you can have a jingle virus (p.122, unwired) do it for you.

Does anyone know if overlapping jammers stack? Could I use a smart jammer on a hacker who has bested my blanket jamming to shut him down?