Okay so I had a crazy idea. Is it possible to make an UV node by making a type of server from a lets say a 100 comlinks hard wired together each with a response and system of 4.

The reason i asked was I have a player who wants to make a Temporary UV that the team can use to run simmulations on Liberating funds mission from a big faceless corp.

One is this even possible I have skimmed through unwired and saw it maybe possible if you try to slave the machines together.

I am unsure if it can be done so I turn to you for your advice.

Thanks

The Jolly Skull

No. Commlinks do not stack like that. Sorry, can't give you the page where the rules regarding this are located, but there are rules for stacking commlinks.

UV hosts are a myth. Even amongst hackers there are not many that believe something like that is even possible.

I see but I want give him something to think he can try and make a system to have it be possible. he is playing the insane hacker who is all about finding the next step and believes that uv exist and he want to be the first with commercial uv.

So he can sell the idea for more money and more gear to make an even better version of uv. he is runner because he figures they see some of the weirdest crap. perfect for hin to find fabled uv.

I assume you have 'Unwired', so he would probably be buying/building a Nexus and then upgrade the living hell out of it. As far as I understand you can pump a LOT of money into something like that

Why not just make a Nexus and then ask your GM what specialized simulation software would cost. Regular softs should be able to have parameters set for VR simulation. No way that the army doesn't have training programs like that. They might even use them as a recruitment tool.

Indeed. It would'nt of course have UV quality, but UV hosts are said to be so ultrarealistic that they might even be at low BTL level. So this wouldn't be needed for simple training exercises.

Maybe I would rule that in addition to 100 (1000) comlinks you need a AI to support this UV node. This 100 comlinks do not have a better response than the single ones but the AI could upgrade this combined response.
I always had the idea of a resonance based AI in mind. An AI with CFs and the ability to register sprites. Or maybe a powerful free sprite to enhance the comlink-net.

This idea would explain why not everyone have UV nodes everywhere.

The explanation behind not everyone having UV nodes is that you need ridiculous amounts of money to build up a serverfarm that rivals skynet. Only with this you can bring the amount of computingpower neccessary to bring something as real as a UV node up in realtime. Only a few mega(!)cons have the ressources to pull a stunt like that and the only other assumed UV node is the shadowland info storage system (and that is the backbone of a global community of elite hackers and technomancers).

heck, UV seems to be as much a emergent phenomena as a planned design. But that seems to be a trend in much of the early SR matrix stuff. Basically, they seems to operate with the assumption that if one have enough data flowing around, sooner or later it will assume shapes never foreseen by man. This then gives rise to UV hosts/nodes, AI/resonance and otaku/technomancers.

this would however indicate a more analog matrix, as i doubt digital signals have such a capacity (unless there is some crazy A/D conversion going on in the simsense/asist layer).

The errata says Sprites arent limited by response I thiiiiink but that aside even a Nexus cant be stocked with agents.
The way to have a bunch of defenders in a node is Clustering and then of course half of the programs whether aboard an agent or not can be ergonomic.



The key part is bolded. It means how many hackers can be present (persona limit) and how many programs/bonus subscriptions can be present (processor limit) and incidentally, half the commlinks can have Response 5 and the other half Response 6 so it'll round up to 6 but save some cash.

Have the cluster be in a armored case hidden in a building so they can mix physical intrusion with matrix intrusion. If the building denizens dont know the 'game' is being played even better.

Use combinations of Cryptesesia Modules on the clustered commlinks so if they dont have matching systems its not navigable unless they have the whole combination that matches.
Use IC tricked out with programs options like Home Ground (6) which gives 6 extra dice to detect an enemy.

Give the runners biomonitors so the agents inside with the Limitation (Wont attack unconcious people using a subscribed biomonitor) can get hit by blackout programs and still have a way for the punches to get pulled before their is a real issue with death. Blackic changes things. DONT USE TAR BABY DATA BOMBS. The errata has raised Data Bomb damage exponentially.

Use a series of nodes. Start with a honeypot with hidden nodes hardwired off that initial node and ic scanning using analyze to see them then have the ic allow only the first runner through to the second node to seperate the team. Have the ic in the second node use Crash Program to make the runner vulnerable while other ic is attacking.

Have the IC use one IC to gather matrix id's using track and another to just spoof commands to agents so they are mind controlled. Rawr. mind Control, every runners nightmare.

Lastly, three musketeers IC gives the most mileage because it counts as a single program for load but gets three actions for each of 3 passes per combat turn.

Hope that helps you make a nice deathtrap. The only way to really ramp that up is to invite other runner teams to compete at the same time...

;-)

An UV host simply is a node with ratings off the scale and an accordingly high resolution of the VR metaphor, hardly anything magic. More like deltaware, it has a quasi-mythical status but essentially is just a highly refined version of what you can buy at every corner.

not the impression i'm left with over the years. To me it sounded like something that came out of stacking on more and more data capacity, but not something that one could plan for. Basically, you could build a triple digit red host and not see it go UV, while a single digit around the corner could transition over night.

Maybe a setup with clustered nexus's with the sole purpose of making a UV style presentation. Could go so far as to have it as good as can be made but never set off the effect until something special happens. Maybe even have custom programs just to simulate the real world in the machine so on one Nexus you can find the gravity program that handles the simulations gravity. Could be fun the the program is accessable and can be damaged / edited.

I would imagine a UV host to be:

Nexus
Response: 8
Signal: 0 (it's hardwired to the matrix, no wireless access)
System: 8
Firewall: 8
Processor Limit: 200
Persona Limit: 50-60

It's running Reality Filter 8 software.

There needs to be the concept of multi-slot software in this game. Things that can only realistically run on large nodes. Because they take up multiple processor limits. (much like mod slots)

Reminds me of a game (in another game system) where one of the other players did just build a UV level training sim.

We actually ran a (slightly modified) D&D game inside it (ok, only one session,* and it was Greyhawk).

*That particular game group had this nasty habit of running on a day and time that was inconvenient for the guy who was actually running the subgame. Rant follows.

Meh, rating 8 stuff isn't that high. Züricher Orbital is Rating 12 stuff and no UV (The open sections, i mean). And Runners can run rating 8 stuff (optimized) on their comlinks.

I would say UV needs a server room. (Or it wouldn't be impressive) Maybe 6 programs running like reality filters per person, depending on senses emulated. High level agents for physics, prediction, simulation etc. Every Programm rating 15... (Pretty much the highest realistical rating)

And if you are IN... you can NEVER, EVER know that it isn't real... except if you have access to the astral realm. Maybe one could even simulate that... in the far off future.

I had a character that once "appropriated" a UV node from his university (they didn't know it was UV and let him have it when he asked) and made it the center of his magical lodge, because it was through that node that he awakened his magical potential.

It never came up in the game, so it doesn't matter if its even possible* (maybe the character just thinks it is). Though I did spent a BP or two on owning a nexus (it was the el cheapo one, but I said that the UV node he found was an older university nexus which is why they let him have it).

*Though if mechanically you want it to, then its possible that the nexus was upgraded from a standard low-end server node into a UV node by some sprite/resonance action and because of its UV nature it mimiced real life...including magic (its not magic, per say, it only emulates it, but at a real enough level to be indistinguishable**) and having interacted with this node and "trying it out for real" the character found he could do magic, even though the node (resonance) wasn't actually involved (e.g. no magic/matrix crossover, just the inception of the idea).

**Chaos magic, of course! What other tradition would have similar rules to computers?

1. Doesn't creating a resonance well (for technomancer emergence) create UV node? I think having an AI in residence does as well.
2. Wanting a UV node to run simulations is a bit like saying you need 16 gigs of RAM to run Word. A simsense simulation will feel like the real thing, particularly if you run it in hot sim.

All a UV does is creating an extremely realistic simsense sculpting, which is the result of throwing a lot of CPU cycles at rendering the scenery. Why should this need something akin to an AI's x-factor?

Nope... You do realize that there are rules already laid out for the bare minimums of a UV Node don't you?
See Unwired, Page 171-172. it details what is required...
As an absolute minimum, you need Response and System ratings of AT LEAST 10 each...

Just sayin'

unless the description changed in SR4, it did more then that. Your programs, your matrix stats, all vanished, for all intents, you where in the real world.

Jupp, stil does this.

and thats my point, this goes beyond ramping the resolution to n+1, as you would still have access to your persona and its programs. It seems to cross some kind of threshold that one may know the general location of, but not the details.

Exactly. Maybe even Resonance factors in somewhere. Or Resonance is just another sideeffect. Phenomenoms created by an amount of available computing power unimaginable even back in 2050.

Maybe UV systems aren't really UV systems?
They're actually Resonance Realms?

Regular hackers can get into resonance realms via 'gateways' and by being lead there by free sprites.

So, a hacker thinks he's entering some node, and bam he's in a UV system. when really he entered a resonance realm.

Low to high BTL though some apparently can simulate magic properly or decently...

A simulation with realistic parameters isn't entirely mystical.

There were a set of stat subs, and you could use your real skills, but you can still use half your hacking skill for any skill test. It's a simulation that's so good it has psychosomatic effects and it draws its parameters from the user's RL skills.

I see you get my drift

They don't vanish, they get integrated into the host's metaphor, which is precisely what a reality filter does. The difference is that this reality filter is so perfect that wielding your sword-shaped attack program feel just like the real thing. And of course the user's brain gets pumped full of hot sim signals cranked up to 11, which is why UV hosts can become quite unpleasant.

I don't think btl is anything like a uv node other than they both seem real. It is the deforence between playing a cg DVD movie on your computer and running at full speed the program that rendered it.

But in both cases the output is the same, computer-generated images in the one case and high-power simsense signals in the other

I think there even was a line somewhere that BTLs can be used to fuel an UV addiction and vice versa

Except that BTL isn't computer generated. It's made by playing back signals picked up from recording a real person.

Adiction yes, out put is in some ways the same but BTL is just a recording on a little chip. It is not a whole simulated reality. A sim sense seems real because it is recorded from an acurate model: reality. A Matrix style uv node doing all its simulated reality wizadry in real time is orders of magnitude more dificult.

Like I said it is the diforence between watching an HD recording of a speed run and playing the actual game with max settings.

That said, who else is adicted to BTGs? You know better than gaming videos on YouTube where you whatch someone else play a computer game and it is like YOU ARE REALLY THERE man.

You mean Let's Plays?

The Sixth World has many more electronic vices than just snuff recordings, there also are descriptions of chips which have an effect akin to conventional drugs (probably just a signal which stimulates certain brain regions on infinite loop)


@Badmoon: No contest (and the comparison is not bad).

Thank you all for your input on helping me build the node. So I have three nexi put to together acting similar to a game. Where the mage has a similar options but a bit limited in that they do not have full access to the metaplanes and spirits.

So it is hardwired to the matrix and has a nexus running a physics engine one running a 3d model of the area of attack. the third runs my firewalls.


What are your thoughts on this.

Sounds reasonable, without a crapload of cash it's not going to be 100% realistic but a RL exercise doesn't do that, either.
But why do you connect the whole thing to the matrix if it's just a training ground for the team?

Otherwise the Iris Orb Update Wizard will be bugging them all the time.
"The Quick Orb Media Player has not been updated for over 3 hours. Please connect to the Matrix so that we can search for the latest Matrix Vulnerability security patches for Quick Orb Media Player."

Heheh... Isn't that the truth... I always hate those update messages cropping up in my real-time simulation...