Warning, if you haven't read the new books this might have some spoilers.

Been reading through some of the newer books lately and... well, something is up with Fastjack. There are side mentions to him being a bit under the weather but things seem to be happening on Jackpoint that have me wondering. More than once he's posted something that seems out of character and then posted afterwards to the tune of "Wow I must be tired, I don't even remember posting that" Or the like. It's not constant, but it comes up once or twice a book.

Anyone know what's up with him? I haven't read every word of every book so if I've missed something can some one tell me where to find it/what it is?

Also, it seems to be spreading, or affecting others. I think Netcat had a post that she 'replied' to herself that she didn't post, and figured it must be Fastjack trying to remind her to change her password more often.

It's like someone's either personally hacking Fastjack himself, or Jackpoint and Fastjack can't figure it out. If he can't figure it out, he might keep it to himself.

Anyway, if anyone's got the 411, let me know.

I don't think anything beyond the little snippets of suggestions that something is up has been revealed so far. Anyone else know differently?

Personally, I think it would be most affecting if FastJack genuinely was just getting old. A legend of the shadows making it to old old age (incredibly rare) through his wits and mental prowess and then slipping away into senility, watching his marbles roll away... Handled correctly, it could be the saddest thing in Shadowrun lore ever.

I imagine it'll turn out to be some techno guff about the resonance however.

I'm fairly sure FJ can afford a Leonization or two.

Something in the shdowruntabletop.com Minigame hints to him becoming possessed in some way. there a line to the effect of "Jack, when he is himself" will do something. Might be the "Erase, Rewrite" thing hinted at in the Scott Schletz Jackpoint post at Shadowrun.com.

But all that really is only speculation. There will probably be something in Stormfront, though.

And yeah, there's Léonisation, which easily extends a human lifespan into several centuries, if they have the wealth necessary.

Like someone that weathered would trust any clinic enough to even let them trim his nails, let alone rearrange his genetic code.

I don't know, it's just weird, and there's enough of it in the books that it's not just a hand wave thing. -something- is going on. I mean, he messed up the CM to Inch conversion. (( Not a typo. SlammO asked what an inch was and in his explanation Fastjack missed a decimal point and it was commented on in the book itself)). Said 25cm in an inch.

Might seem small and if it was some of the others, no big deal. Ha ha. but it's Fastjack. Coupled with the other handfull of things... somethings up. I just hope it's not a bug thing. if he's turning into a bug or possessed by a bug... ugg. yuck. Thing is, the way I sporadically read, other than the Cm thing in Dirty tricks, I can't point out a list of things. I've just noticed them as I've read the past few days. lol. Like I said, it's been enough to where it's standing out.

It'd be interesting of that net ghost of Captain Chaos might be trying to talk through him, but there's nothing really to point to that.

Maybe he's just fine and the shadows are getting to you

Maybe running personafixes now for whatever reason?

I'm thinking this may be happening to Jack.

I hope not... that'd truly suck. Imagine how much damage he could do to the Runner community.

And you just know he'd start with Devgrrl. And I actually like her.

*grabs popcorn and sits down to watch the thread*

If it is Captain Chaos talking through him, do we get a hand over hand hacking scene, with some Unchained Melody playing on synthguitars?

Right.

So this is how they're going to do away with hacking via commlink - not some kind of mega security thing, just making it generally a really bad idea to go into the matrix via SimSense, without some pretty beefy protection between your brain and these ..... "e-Shedim", or whatever they wind up being called.

Instead, you're going to need to have a largely hardware filter between your brain, and the matrix - which means a larger physical device. Going Hot VR, maybe going VR at all, is going to be given some of the same risks that going Astral while unguarded: "Something Bad™ could move in while you're not at home".

...

The bugger of it is, even if I just guessed EXACTLY correct, and even if I swore up and down, 'till I was blue in the face ... folks like Bull who're "in the know", won't tell me before 5E happens. Damn you all! ;D

(NOTE: if it actually goes down that way, just remember ... I called it first. ^_^ )

If it actually goes that way, I'm going to have to vomit and scream "RUINED FOREVER!" Because that's retarded.

Kinda with Shadowdragon on this one.

Thanks for that image, Stephen...and I was all set to join Bull with the popcorn and a nice cold beverage until you trotted that one out.

Could be some Snowcrash type of lingui-hacking

So here's the thing. You and Bull clearly know the answer.

How long till --we-- know the answer? (Roughly)

Somebody had to do it...I just got here first.

Soonish. I wish I had a more definitive answer for you, but at the moment that's the best that I've got.

That's about the best I could hope for. "Soonish" is much better than "Not too soon" or "A long while off"

Thanks man.

Why ... because it makes hacking/decking more dangerous in itself, even while probing cautiously and quietly, for anyone too stubborn to buy the newly-requisite hardware? *shrug*

i don't think it has anything to do with making hacking more dangerous (incidentally, hacking is plenty dangerous if you are hacking something important enough), or suddenly needing new gear.

i suspect it has a *lot* more to do with the fact that it sounds really dumb, at least from what i've seen of it so far.

i'm hoping it's not as stupid as it is starting to look. i would really, really, really like for it to actually make sense, and be something interesting instead of something that makes me cringe every time i think about it.

but... right now, that's not what it's looking like. right now, it's looking like someone was like "hey, you know what would be awesome?!?! MATRIX GHOSTS!!!! they should totally, like, steal people's bodies, just because they can and they're super-duper-mega angry and vengeful! this totally makes sense and doesn't come off as complete BS in any way whatsoever!"... and then everyone else somehow agreed with that person.

(like i said, i really hope what it looks like to me is not an accurate portrayal of what's going on... please, please, please prove me wrong. i really would love to be wrong about this one).

I'm sorta afraid of that, too.

I thought it was more about him going senile.
As far as I understand, Leonization fixes your body, but not your mind.



After Riser used phrase 'Street Rage and his crew' four times in one comment, I'm ready to accept anything as a plain typo or poor speech on jackpointers' side. After all, all these conversations they have are supposed to be voice, no?

If it weren't for Patrick being all confirmatory I would just have assumed that Bull was being his usual devious self and try to stir something up

No arguing here, something is happening to FastJack. In Dirty Tricks he is almost outright accused of not being able to get his shit together. Whether it's caused by old age or by something more menacing is yet to be seen, but my bet is that Jack would be around for some time at least. It's open secret now that in fifth there will be decks and deckers again, in one of the hidden fictions Jack mentions that he made some hardware for hackers to run the new matrix. The obvious conclusion is that decks would be hand-made, at least for the time being, and Jack is one of the guys to hand them to hackers.

There's a clear distinction between the two?

http://lmgtfy.com/?q=Psychophysical+parallelism

Of course, this question is pretty much answered in a game where your mind can leave your physical body and travel to neighboring realities made out of thoughts.

Dementia is a disease of the brain, not the aura (not even in Shadowrun).

Fastjack is - in a way - the "narrator" of SR4.
Him not being able to get his shit together is a metaphor of the way the SR4 line has gone.

Well put, Blade.

That possibility still exists. It's a game about double-crosses and drek like that. I could be lying.

Augmentation has Leonization, Lifespan Extension and Physical Vigor as three separate treatments. Leonization specifically states that it revert physical age to ~21 years (which is rather strange as physical prime is more likely around 25-27), while Physical Vigor treats 'felt age' and other 'side-effects of ages'.
Of course none of them seem to cure any diseases, which are the case of senility. I imagine a lot of old-age youths should be suffering from age diseases, especially if they underwent Leonization late in the years.

Just to prove my words, the quote from Augmentation:

Ah, thanks. So you'd need gene therapy to deal with Demenita. Has some fun implications actually.

What what? Open secret about decks and deckers again??

Better or worse than a worm named Retcon going around changing the Matrix so commlinks are no longer able to hack in it?

Although something that hilariously hamfisted might be forgiven as part of the 80's style still in the game.

oddly enough, i would prefer the worm named retcon. at least i could get a bit of a laugh out of it.

that said, there's a really easy way to justify decks.

normal person needs maybe 2-3 programs (in SR terms; eg scan and edit and maybe a virtual personality or reality filter for most people) running at a time, and doesn't care about rating that much (basically, as long as their favourite games don't slow down).

a hacker would almost certainly prefer to have at least a dozen or so just to be covered in case something nasty happens, if not more, and at the highest rating possible. joe schmoe simply doesn't have the same level of needs in terms of what their hardware and software can do, and regardless of how much computing power you can get into something the size of a commlink, you will obviously be able to get *more* into something the size of a cyberdeck.

but really, there's a very simple solution: hey, look, we can totally make programs more powerful, but they take up so many resources that we need more computing power to run them. hey, remember when everyone needed a cyberdeck? let's market them as retro, and cram it all into a framework that looks just like an old cyberdeck? the kids will think it's new and cool, and the adults will be brought in by nostalgia".

problem solved, without any ridiculous nonsense.

Basic User Suite has Analyze, Browse, Command, and Edit.

I suppose, theoretically, you could build R0 versions of those programs into every Commlink. *shrug*

With the new Matrix (2.1) you still use your commlink to browse the net, but to hack you need a deck once more

I was asking where/how it's known what's gonna be in SR5. I haven't heard about it.

The minigame on shadowruntabletop.com. A relevant thread can be found here.

actually, looking back on it, i think your IP (if it's a legal one, ie the kind that shadowrunners don't use) provides access to those features, so you don't even need them on your commlink. i'd have to re-read that section of unwired to be sure though.

What if long term use of Matrix personas eventually has them becoming kinda... independant?


-k

Whoa......

I've gotta like... sit down and digest some of that....

Now that you mention it, I do recall reading in one of the books (Unwired, I think), that all commlinks have the equivalent of a rating zero Scan program built into them automatically.

Maybe add Purge to that list, though, since that's the program that gets rid of virii and such. Maybe also swap it for Analyze, or stack it as a combo package.

Perfect response.

Back to the topic, Jack is Eliohan.

Discuss.

*blink*

Eliohan, or Cerberus?

Because with either, that would just up the silly even more.

(nvm if Celedyr is involved...)

Nope. Jack was around long before Dragonhunt.