RC p108


so...Infirm is 20BP as well

Be my guest. Quadriplegic + Infirm – Full Immersion… enjoy your extra 5 BP.

Have fun being incredibly vulnerable to any would-be captors who find your meat body.

...Because sometimes, being "locked up" in a high security deltagrade shadowclinic is worth it.

How exactly are you paying for that? I'm pretty sure the costs for that kind of extended medical care in a regular hospital as a lifestyle is staggering. Being in such a high security location with deltagrade medical professionals is probably a few bucks more.

I wonder how many extra build points you can get if your character doesn't exist at all

I would do it with Trust Fund 2.

You can fit a LOT of stuff in an automatic High lifestyle.

if you're resorting to a full immersion lifestyle, though....

Infirm(20)+Quadrapalegic(20-10) is only 30. So the extra points don't pan out.

If you can make decent Availability tests, or have a real estate agent as a contact, you can get around this by picking up your free lifestyle AFTER character creation. After all, you can buy and sell them, so you just pick yours up in play.

Steven Hawking would love the 60s and 70s. working via VR and AR ...

No. Extended Care is a unique lifestyle, and that's just for a regular type of hospital. I think its something ridiculous like 1,000 nuyen a day, or roughly three times as much as a High Lifestyle. Being in a deltaclinic and constantly tended by such medical personnel would be in excess of even a standard Luxury lifestyle.

Let's see. Comforts: Luxury (fully pampered). Entertainment: Luxury (full access to the Matrix and whatnot). Necessities: High (everything you need and more, including constant medical attention, but lowered to High to account for only having one room). Neighborhood: Luxury-AAA. Security: Luxury (actually higher than Luxury, but such a rating doesn't exist). Qualities would include Concerned Neighbors, Privacy Screen 3 x3, Quiet Neighborhood, Security Conscious, and Well Made. So that's 45 Lifestyle Points, or 475,000 nuyen a month.

While I agree that a stay in the delta clinic must be expensive, I'd argue with Entertainment: Luxury. Entertainment includes things like restaurant bills, club memberships (and for Luxury, those are some pretty expensive clubs) and so on. Nothing of these a quadriplegic character does. Matrix access is covered in Necessities, as well. Yeah, okay, sure, some entertainment is Matrix-based, so he could be spending that much, but I wouldn't say that's in any way necessary.

Anyway, Quadriplegic is a ridiculous quality. A bias against a common group, something every damn NPC in 3E was suggested to have, if I remember correctly, is worth like two thirds of its BP cost. Hell, there are allergies that cost half as much. Now think how Quadriplegic is limiting your options, and how those other qualities do - really, why would you even take that? For roleplaying reasons? You can stay in bed without being paralyzed.

Argent's Decker, Peg, was paraplegic. And a monster on the Matrix.

Sometimes, when I'm feeling my wheaties, I want to write a story with Argent in it... But then I think better and know that I don't have the true skill to do that.

Environment might as well be very bad indeed. Entertainment should also in no way be Luxury, if all you have is a matrix connection. Subscriptions optional. Call it a premium service MSP, with probably some extras. Comforts is debatable as you do get a full staff of "servants", but all you get for furniture is a massage bed, and a biomonitor, hooked up to a drip feed and some autoinjectors. And probably a few folding chairs, shared by other residents, in case you ever get visitors.

Edit:
Come to think of it, in case of having suffered brain damage or whatnot, a super-plat DocWagon contract might well set you up.

It costs 110 BP (AI in RC, p. 88).

It costs 110 BP (AI in RC, p. 88).

Since we're talking about it: what were the writers thinking? Quad says "cannot perform physical tasks of any kind", so in what universe would you get full (hell, *any*) BP for Infirm ("cost for learning or improving Physical skills is twice normal" and "represents a character with substandard physical fitness."). If you tried to combine any other qualities that so obviously shouldn't stack (fluffwise) or cancel penalties (crunchwise), the GM would murder you. But this gets explicit approval?

It's a deltaclinic. AA at the very least, AAA in many cases. That's anything but "very bad."


No, that may be all you can access due to your crappy choice in qualities, but you'd have all the entertainment you'd want in such a luxury facility. It's not their fault your life is miserable, but it's nowhere near as miserable as it could be. They're called "negative qualities" for a reason.


See above. Your Lifestyle isn't about what you take advantage of, but what you have access to. You can't buy a mansion and try to pass it off as a Low Lifestyle just because you spend all your time either in your bedroom or office.


No it wouldn't, just a 50% discount on your "lifestyle." So hey, down to 237,000 nuyen a month plus another 100,000/year, most of which you don't get to take advantage.

Infirm is the worst quality ever as it concerns all Stealth skills and Perception as well. Which a Rigger needs for his drones

Well, there's always RC. Maybe a Technomancer. Still, yuck.

"Owned and run by a AAA" does not equate "being in the best of the best neighbourhoods". In fact, a high security facility might as well be stuck in some Barrens like area, in some rural countryside, or even out at sea somewhere. No ammount of NWA is going to change feelings of breaking into or out of the place.


See Fatum's earlier comment. You're not out there with the rich and famous, drinking Crystal from crystal glasses, while having backdoor access to the lowest level of Dante's, and permanently being on the guest list for presidential parties. Also, high-sec, with SotA medical equipment does not mean great entertainment. In fact, it tends to mean very little entertainment at all. Whatever way you look at it,

does not even come close.
Edit: In fact, leaving Entertainment out of it entirely, and treating it like living in a hotel would probably be best. Both mechanically and thematically. Adding 6 to the all-luxury hotel suite would put it at 100k a month. This seems actually seems appropriate, as it almost triples up on what I know hospitalisation to generally cost on a non-IC unit. Even for an IC unit, it's still pretty much a double-up. And really, all that's needed over a "normal" high end hospital is the high-sec element.


You can however rent a room in a shared appartment, and pass it off as a single, furnished room. Which is what you're doing. And it's a sparsely furnished room at that.

Actually there Ol' Scratch, what you would be wanting is the Full Immersion Lifestyle... Look it up in Unwired, it is exactly what you are describing, and does not require a Delta Clinic in any way, shape, or form. 30,000/Month and you enjoy all the benefits of a Hospitalized Lifestyle as well.

Anyways...

I didn't say it required a delta clinic. Someone else did (implying that by doing so, the character was completely safe). I was pointing out how you're not going to be able to afford that, and how things like Full Immersion or Hospital Care (which are pretty much the same thing) do not include being pampered and nigh invulnerable in a deltaclinic.

That point is very true... sorry if the wires got crossed there... Though a Full Immersion Lifestyle is pretty darn safe I would bet. Well, as safe as 24 hour hospitalized care can be anyways.

Note that Quadriplegic only gives you 10 BP if you have a full immersion lifestyle, so the only way to get that 40 points is to be Infirm, Quadriplegic, and not have a full immersion lifestyle. Which kind of limits your options, really.

Hospital care is safe in general but being a shadowrunning hacker complicates things a fair bit, given the way Trace works-- it's an extended test, so given a long enough timeline, someone competent will succeed unless the GM deems otherwise, and even Spoofing and Access ID trickery lets people narrow it down to an area fairly close to an access node-- well, unless you use satellites and crap and are thus willing to halve your Response. Normally, that liability is just circumvented by being a moving target. If a Hacker has any brains he'll do his most dangerous work either on-site so he can access hardwired networks or if he does so remotely he'll do it from a location he can simply leave with a minimum of fuss, like a coffin motel or while using public transit or whatever. A hospital may still be a busy node with plenty of people checking in and out with fair regularity, but even so I still wouldn't want to narrow things down like that given that it isn't beyond the means of a corporation or syndicate to skip the warrant and arrange for your Full VR Infirm Quadriplegic to be shuffled off this mortal coil in an unfortunate medical mishap. I mean, hey, at my table, such groups don't really bother with petty li'l things like vengeance very often since if nothing else it's rarely worth the effort, so it's not like I think guys would come kicking in your door the first time out. But with that said, it's still pretty ballsy to hack from where you live. I'm sure you could arrange to be transferred around, or whatever, but I'd still much prefer to make like Count Zero w/ drone helpers and be able to drop on and off the grid relatively unencumbered than do it from a legit hospital.



...

Man, I really must be bored tonight, because god knows it's not like anyone takes Full Immersion or the Quadriplegic/Infirm type stuff for the point costs even discounting all that text I just spewed.

Hmm...

Wonder what the long term costs are of living in a mana-shielded secret Valkyrie unit?




-k

Which is why a hacker in that situation (Hospitalized and Full Immersion) would use a Proxy Service. Traces stop at the service, not at the hacker...

It certainly could work as a character concept, given the right setting/campaign/players. However, it would work even better as an NPC. Think of a 'Charlie's Angels' sorta situation - the team gets help/jobs/etc from a hacker-type that they've never met. Eventually that hacker's location might get compromised and the team needs to bail them out of wherever they are. A public hospital? A high-security, but otherwise empty mansion? A bunker in the barrens guarded by vicious gangs? Interestingness abounds.

If you're using Full Immersion, as we know, the whole thing's a wash (and rightly so). I still say trying to stack Infirm on should give nothing but spit in your eye, RAW or not.

Yeah, Since Quadrapalegic implies Infirm, and Full Immersion is not (Normally) the choice for the person that actually has the ability to move around, I would have to agree with you on that one.

Though on the RAW side of things, I would have to imagine that Roxborough(?) is/was the Poster Child for both Infirm and Full Immersion; which may be what was being imagined for taking both. Though he was also on the insides of what I would consider both a Zero Zone and a Delta Clinic Simultaneously.

I think I've just found a character concept. But I'll change the "living in a tank" part to "living in a psychiatric hospital" and choose a TM basis. I could combine this with the compulsive idea of being an AI trapped somehow in a human body.

Would the Shadowteam have to break him/her out every time they have a 'Run to go on, only to sneak him/her back afterward?

And would he/she go under the street name of "Howling Mad"?

which is no problem because the pornomancer can seduce any doctor/nurse or make use of his Knowledge Skill "101 ways to break someone out of a hospital"

Would the team have an Ork Rigger afraid of flying? A Pornomancer with a penchant for sports cars? A former military officer who is an expert at disguises?

Just as long as you realise that according to the Running List, you are no longer allowed to have a black van with a red speed line.

since the topic is through anyway...

I think they've been stated out before
the Rigger could be a troll as well, with lot's of Distinctive Style and Jurryrigger.
and the team leader needs the Thrill Seeker flaw and tones of Edge. Trustworthy (Leadership) ofc
all of them have Wanted and Enemy, now I'm back ontopic

troll rigger:
Jurryrigger+Gearhead(black van with a red speed line)+Martial arts Boxing +martial arts Wrestling=35Bp
Wanted 10 +Distinctive Style (jewelry) 5 +serious phobia(flying) 15 +Enemy (incidence 6/ connection 5) 11 = 41BP, breaking the limit again...

A proxy service is just a delaying tactic unless the GM decides to be nice to you and figures that the threshold has become high enough to justify invoking the limitation on attempts for an Extended Test. Otherwise rerouting through a proxy just adds +4 to the threshold for Tracing a User, which makes it take longer but is hardly impossible. Using a proxy service for clandestine messages is presumably more effective since the communication can be made to be very nearly one-way.

Maybe.



I've already created a similar team, but I couldn't bring myself to translating it into English yet. I have all rulebooks in English but it's still a hell of a lot work. The team (German version) members are:

Specter: Unagumented human, spotter, sniper, rigger and tech
Shine: Human female, TM and Face
Sergent: Elf, cybered KI-Ad
Sledge: Fomori, combat mage
Steel: Dwarf with cyberlegs (plane crash), rigger, tech, heavy combat support
Sphinx: Human female, hacker

All of them served several years in the MET2K and have combat skills. Now they offer security services in Hamburg, AGS and work as runners under this cover.

This is why i suggested using Trust Fund 2 to meet your hospitalized lifestyle costs(it needs to be at least High).

Between Fung Shui and Privacy Screen: matrix 3 you should have no problem making your Stealth and Spoof Trace checks.

If you're getting Trust Fund, how many points are you actually gaining? The point was breaking the 35 BP limit, which you're not doing if you have to take a positive quality just to enable it.

Except Trust Fund 2 won't cover even the most basic Hospitalized/Immersive lifestyle, which is 30,000 nuyen a month -- that's the equivalence of three High lifestyles. And it certainly doesn't cover living in a deltaclinic.

Instead of Full Immersion Lifestyle, I suggest getting a storage unit for your stuff and then get one genetic treatment at a time. Being in a nutrient tank at a common hospital and getting Mircogravity Adaption costs 30k and takes 3 months. That's one third of the lifestyle plus you can be an astronaut afterwards! Which btw fits your disability to move any of your limbs very well.

And again, Full Immersion isn't an option for the '40 BP' premise.

Can you actually… do anything while undergoing treatment? And does the list cost really include all the hospital time (nevermind at a nice/secure enough place)?

you can access the matrix and yes, hospitalization is included

Seriously, Feng Shui and Privacy Screen? I guess making Full Immersion even more expensive isn't that odd of a notion, given that it already costs enough money a month to own a couple of very nice homes without qualities-- in for a penny, in for a pound, I suppose. Although really in this case you'd want Free Access instead of Privacy Screen on your digs. Even then, the best case scenario with outright thwarting a trace is that you either confront and crash whoever's trying to trace you to begin with or you jack up the Threshold on the Extended Test so high that they cannot really help but eventually roll a critical glitch thanks to the combination of the Stealth penalty and sheer number of rolls needed. That's doable, but it can end up eating a fair number of complex actions and so ideally you'd at least want to be on your way out of the node rather than in the middle of snatching the paydata when the drek hits the fan. So, yes, it's entirely possible that a hospital bound hacker who chooses his targets well and is very good at what he does could take these risks and live to tell the tale. But I also still stand by the notion that it's a touch ballsy even if you do have High Lifestyle grade security.

Makki, that's not really what I was asking. I feel like the hospital won't necessarily have the setup you want/need, and I strongly feel like they wouldn't enjoy you doing Matrix runs in their hospital. Abuse of the rules works both ways.

but what's gonna stop me? Why would the nurse care? I friendly ask them to hook me up to my own commlink, because I have this nice customized interface. Now I can use my own shadow MSPs and as many proxies as I feel necessary. Hell, I tell them I'm a programmer and want to get them work done in the meanwhile, that's why I brought my Nexus with me.

But can you really? The fluff piece on the Metatype reassignment therapy gioven in Augmentation indicates that the subject was UNCONSCIOUS for the entire 3 month time period. Can't really perform any hacks when you are unconscious. Having undergone major surgeries in thepast, I can assure you that your mental faculties are rarely all there.

Now, Full Immersion, I can agree with, that is the entire point of the Quality, but you will not be able to claim Genetic Treatments as Full Immersion, they ARE NOT the same thing, which is what Yerameyahu is indicating, I think.

There is a Huge difference between Hospitalization for Treatments, and Hospitalization for a Full Immersion Lifestyle.

*shrug* My point is that, even if the clever munchkinry *works* 100% as you'd like (a massive if), the hospital isn't necessarily a secure, super-custom-lifestyle hack base. Instead, it's a place where you're a guest (and probably not even an important one), and illegal activity would annoy them. It is possible that you could be very sneaky and not get noticed right away; other results are also possible. It's no skin off my nose.

In the end, all these convoluted ways of dealing with the magic 40BP trick are massively less effective or convenient than just getting 35BP through the existing lax rules.

Absolutely no doubt about that.

Illegal activity would not only annoy them, but they'd be obligated to help whoever is tracking you down (especially corporations and law enforcement) or report you to them. And there wouldn't be much you could do about it, being a worthless cripple of a human being dependent entirely upon those same people just to keep you barely functional.