Precisely. If you have two guys, each with a chem seal, and they both simutaneously press the "seal" button, the guy who has the system connected to the Matrix for some reason has his activate as a Free Action while the other guy takes up a Simple Action.

This is completely independant of the method used to do the activating. If the non-Matrix connected guy uses a speed of thought DNI trigger to activate his Chemseal, and the Matrix-connected dude physically presses an actual "seal" button, the Matrix connected dude STILL has his chemseal activate faster.



-k

So what is the definition of The Matrix in SR5?

What happens in a wifi inhabitating building (your generic research facility, where a poor prototype is being held against his will)

Whats happens in areas without classic Matrix access (deserts, war zones, Z slums etc)

SYL

The Matrix is the Matrix. The definition is less important than the fact that while on the Matrix, hackers can get all up in your shit and screw your devices up nine ways to sunday. If you want to avoid hacker sodomy, you can, at the cost of not getting those Wireless Bonuses.

The answer to your other two questions is "No Wireless Bonuses For You".



-k

If the bonuses were actual bonuses and not basic functionalities in previous editions, that wouldn't even be as bad as it now is.

Sorry to call you out, but you've made this error enough times that you must think it's the actual word you're looking for.

It's "inhibiting."

Does any of the authors (Patrick, Critias etc) can comment on "online bonuses and wifi inhibitating buildings or deserted areas"? I mean that almost all items break down when the runners leave the city is surely covered somewhere in the basic book? Or has been discussed by the authors?

What is the official stance for that? Hackers and item users are screwed because no matrix for you? A satellite dish in your ars*** for your reaction enhancer?

@epicedion: thanks, too much magic discussions over certain spirit types. ^^

SYL

That sums up several pages of us all going into detail rather well, yes.


More and more, I don't think I'm spending money on this edition, simply because I won't willingly support bad game design with my limited gaming budget.

Personally, I'll wait out till the core books have been released entirely. In German. Incorporating the first row of Errata, because I trust Pegasus cares about quality like that. I'm more than willing to pay twice the price of an American book (imported and all) for that, too (and yes, Pegasus charges heavily; a splatbook costs $50, the rulebook will probably be around $120). Then I'll see if I convert and houserule or adapt some parts into my games, or just ignore the game system and stay with what I currently use.

Skinlinks are gone, btw

SYL

I wonder what, if anything, is the rationale behind this. Purposely annoying players to shoehorn in the "cool" hackability of everything? Well, houseruling ahead, barring a spark of sanity and a down-graded skinlink in some future book.

Guess ...

(hint, it starts with "hackers must be combat hacking capable, so everything must be wireless")

SYL

That's not what I meant; I just wonder whether the authors really are oblivious how much they are going against what, apparently, many players want with this.

I never particularly liked skinlinks. I'm probably in the minority on that, but they just rubbed me the wrong way for a couple of reasons. First, it seemed like they were must-haves to avoid getting data-raped; either you drop 50 nuyen for every piece of electronics on your person, or you will get hacked constantly. There's no choice, there. Second, and I may be wrong on this, but the science just seems questionable to me.

Having said that, I do agree there needs to be a non-wireless way to connect your gear. My first thought is just to rule that cables are part of your lifestyle, and sufficiently trivial that you don't need to track them individually. You just say, "My shit's wired," and that's the end of it. Having a glitched soak test sever a cable is a good idea, though.

The functionality of skinlinks was really a disaster for the SR4 idea of the hackable PAN. Combined with a nonexistent mechanic (they suggested it could be done but provided no explicit avenues to do so) and the extensive amount of time it required to hack anything, "combat hacking" ended up about as viable as a snowball fight in the Sahara. It could be done, but damn it'd be a lot of work.

Killing skinlinks is not a terrible idea. They'd gotten too good. I'm not overly familiar with them from previous editions, but the SR4 mechanic of 100% effective data transmission over skin made wireless anything, well, stupid. Or at least mostly stupid.

And now you just get data-raped all the time. Is that a better choice? SkinLink was the only way out of the universal hackability of everything. Now? You cannot exist without a decker babysitting you. I fail to see the improvement.


I agree that this would be a better idea than taking away basic functionality and enforcing universal hackability with the prize being "gear still works as in previous editions".


That's because the idea of a hackable PAN is so horrible for most players. That's because combat hacking in itself isn't a good idea because it means you cannot go anywhere without a hacker. Combined with the fact that apparently expensive decks are back (correct me if I'm wrong), this means the team is incapable of existing without a decker constantly babysitting them. Which just sucks.


Downgrading them - say, limiting the number of items skinlinked to a comlink to it's DR or something - is an even better idea. It's a lot less patronizing and feels a lot less like being robbed of a defense you needed out of spite that you didn't like the idea of being universally hackable.

Well. Sidestepping that it is supported by the rules by the nature of the rules, you know, supporting matrix aware cybernetics getting a bonus...

...It seems like your gripe is that in one addition something operated one way. And in another edition, it operated another.

So yeah. I get that: It's not cool that someone retconned our cheese.

But once again, that's a far cry from there being "ZOMG! NO REASON FOR THIS!! *SMASH SMASH*". That's a complaint about the edition continuity, not technical limitations. I was answering the latter.

-Wired_SR_AEGIS

It was the way out, but it was a terrible way out. That said:



That's the problem. They've stripped the skinlink and enforced online wireless.

My perfect resolution would be to strip the skinlink but only force people to go online wireless if they don't use invasive cyberware. That is, your Essence-free crap is vulnerable, but your internal stuff is damn near sacrosanct.

(also stupid stuff like your armor needing a wireless connection should just be tossed out)

This would mean that the Street Samurai with his internal everything would scoff at your hacking, but the gunslinger adept who saves Essence by using smartlink glasses might get hacked. Then you can provide a "dumb" version that isn't as good and uses stupid-looking wires that aren't as effective and make you look like a nutter.

Killing established things is very certainly a terrible idea, in my and a lot of other people's opinion.
Sure, there's an edition change. Stuff is bound to work differently.
But removing stuff 'just because' is simply lazy. There are a lot of different ways how such situations can be handled.
Dikote could have been made an option only available for melee weapons instead of adding to everyone's dog and their neighbor's damage, body and armor.
Skinlink, in the same vein could work very well as a commlink upgrade, but only for a small number of linked pieces of gear. This way it becomes a deliberate choice instead of being the no-brainer it is in SR4. This just off the top of my head.

I agree that skinlink was a problem. But why was it a problem?
People didn't like hackable gear. Combat hacking was bleh, because you had no defense against it. This took the control of such a situation away from the player.
A countermeasure was introduced and suddenly combat hacking became really difficult (wi-fi enabling nanites, skinlink echo, e.g.), because players like to minimize their risks.
The realization dawned that maybe someone went above and beyond the call of duty in handling the situation. Skinlink was too cheap and too ultimative.
Just removing it now is the extreme in the other direction. Instead of thinking about how to make it work in a useful way, it's removed, goes the way of the Dodo and is never talked about again, except in hushed whispers around the fires of SR8 players in a broken, postapocalyptic urban wilderness.

I was't a fan either. Felt like a cop-out really to having wires.

I know smartlinks were described and having palm links available, but they were obvious and visible at least.

Well there could be a reason rather than "just because." Maybe they cause cancer. Maybe the quantity of data passing over skinlinks is enough to turn a person's skin into a low-grade wireless transmitter/receiver (thereby negating the security benefit entirely), so the technology falls out of favor compared to just plain wireless. Maybe a change to the Matrix backbone's wireless frequency for better range/reliability/bandwidth has had the unintentional effect (or intentional effect!) of disrupting the ability of skinlinked devices to transmit data cleanly while in range of virtually any matrix node.



I'm not sure I like the skinlink from a physics perspective anyway, so I wouldn't mind it becoming a dodo. What sort of power requirements would it take to push a coherent signal with any bandwidth across a meter or so of someone's skin? How much heat would that generate? Wouldn't it basically require electrocuting the person?

You mean...like most gunfights?

Last I checked "big scary trolls" were quite the lead magnet.

And maybe, just maybel, they just want to force everyone online to be hacked without even breaking a sweat about such ... things like an ingame justification. You know, just like they did it with the online bonuses.

SYL

@Epicedion:
Making up a fluff reason for it going away is a little less lazy, but still lazy, IMO. Tweaking it, so it becomes a choice instead of a must is better in every case I can imagine.

The real problem is, that for all we know, it's also impossible to use wires. And you will quickly arrive in WTF territory for every moderately modern person (meaning: not Amish or 90) if you try to explain those away.

For the record: I am not a big proponent of skinlink. I do realize that it's (in its current incarnation) a problem. I also don't think that it was very well explained. It's basically a macguffin that works somehow, just in the same way a Heisenberg compensator works (which is "Just fine, thank you").
But it was, as a matter of fact, in the core rulebook.
I'm not saying "The stupid is in for so long now, we should just run with it". I'm saying: Reign in the stupid. It's a good time for that.

Deleting the stupid on the other hand? Sends the wrong signals.

Except that the skinlink is the PAN security equivalent of a thermonuclear hand grenade. Even if you reign in the blast radius considerably it's still poorly conceived.

Extreme hyperbole.

How so? Skinlinked everything means that all your devices are perfectly secure. A lesser version of the skinlink would mean that all of your devices are perfectly secure up to some limit, presumably leading everyone to optimize their device selection to not exceed that limit.

Likewise you'd then get into the player speculation of "what if I have 2 commlinks on different skinlink frequencies?" and "can I create an agent that will automatically initialize a new set of gear instantly as a free action whenever I want?" and "WHUT IF I WARE AN XTRA JACKET MAED OF SKIN?!"

For those who don't have the book, so people can see what the fuss is about...

From the Origins Special edition of SR5, page 421:

WIRELESS BONUSES
Because nearly every piece of gear and 'ware is wireless capable, it means nearly every piece of gear and cyberware benefits dramatically from being "meshed" into your wireless personal area network and the Matrix as a whole.

When an item has additional functionality when connected to the Matrix, it's described under the "Wireless" entry in the item's description. This functionality only applies when the device has access to the Matrix, is most of the time unless your gamemaster says otherwise, like if you've entered a wireless static zone. If there is a Noise Rating from a situation that is greater than the item's Device Rating, not including distance, the item temporarily loses it's wireless functionality.

These benefits only apply when the item's wireless mode is on. Your Ares Alpha can't adjust for the wind direction and speed if it can't download the up-to-the-second weather conditions, and your Eurocar Westwind 3000 doesn't know the status of the next three traffic lights if it's not connected to GridGuide. A wireless device is always vulnerable to subversion and control by a hacker within wireless handshake range. You can defend your gear with a good commlink and a personal area network. Even better, defending against threats from the Matrix is part of your team hacker's job. If she's not available, you might occasionally want to turn wireless off.




-k

Oh god I just want my gun to shoot bullets not connect to Weatherbug. Unless you're lining up a 300 meter outdoor sniper shot, the weather conditions don't even really matter. Much less if you're inside a warehouse.

Cripes, connecting to the weather service would be ridiculous anyway, because what's the chance that the weather service knows what the wind speed and direction is 3 feet off the ground in an unmarked alley off of 5th street in the Barrens?

or, alternately, when you get rid of skinlink, people just use cables for the stuff they once used skinlink for, and go on ignoring stupid rules that try to force them to take a mind-numbingly stupid risk.

it is possible for a shadowrunning team to infiltrate a corporate facility because, while the corporation has a lot more resources, they don't have them constantly active, they can't have them available to cover every physical location at the same time, and there are physical space limitations to consider (that is, if they have 500 security mooks in a building, and that building is the size of a house, then the entire building is essentially stuffed with security mooks including a sizable portion that will be crowd-surfing). and of course, they're trying to cut costs, and paying for the best of the best in personnel and gear for each and every installation is prohibitively expensive.

those limitations do not apply to matrix resources, for the most part. a corporation can relatively easily send their 20 most skilled hackers with the best hardware and software, augmented to be better than humanly possible, to defend a location or to attack intruders within that location, provided the intruders are accessible via the matrix. oh, there will certainly be priorities to consider... they're not going to send that much for everything. but in general, the kinds of things shadowrunners get hired for, they're going to want to send an overwhelming force, because it is quite frankly not very difficult or expensive to guarantee you can have a matrix presence anywhere.

now, they don't do that in other editions, because generally speaking it isn't necessary. you can't send your 20 best hackers to make the team's street samurai start having epileptic seizures because his wireless just went completely haywire. you can't feed psychotropic IC into the team mage's brain, or force their sim module to turn on to VR and make every physical task more difficult or impossible. if you send your 20 best guys... well, that's just a waste of money. they'll all get there, and will be able to keep the team's hacker from hacking the corporate facility, but will not do a dramatically superior job than what a single hacker with a few (nearly-free) agents or ICs can do.

but if you let them bumrush the team's network, hack everything including cyberware, weapons, and essential equipment, and do so with the only real limit being the availability of actions, it becomes reasonable to send a small army of hackers in. because that's all you need to completely shut down any attack made by anyone stupid enough to leave all of their essential hardware open to the matrix.

in short, "get a small bonus for opening yourself to nearly unlimited matrix assault from anywhere on the planet from anyone that cares to do so" is really a monumentally stupid idea. and it's going to be impossible to persuade all of the military or security organizations or anyone even remotely concerned about security or privacy that they should need to invest in having more of the best hackers in the world on constant 24/7 alert than anyone else if they want to have any degree of security or privacy.

particularly since even if you have more of those security assets, unless you have more than 50% of the total available, (or at the very least enough to literally be constantly on full active high alert in every single matrix-enabled device you want to protect), you still aren't secure, because someone can just send 20 hackers your way and hope to break through before you can respond, at which point you get screwed over mercilessly.

Ugh, that's awful. I'm going to say this was a good idea, but only when applied to stuff that makes sense.

"Up to the second" wind speed for a handgun at 50 feet is ridiculous.

Up to the second wind speed for a Piloting test for your drone? Maaaaybe. But with sensors this seems redundant.

It's looking ever more Ghost in the Shell which, while GitS is very cool, is massively out of whack with the internal logic of the Sixth World mythos (which has been mentioned).

Certainly some things having an Online Bonus makes sense, other things certainly not so much and things like Wired Reflexes, Cyber Limbs and Reaction Enhancers, definitely not. (I can see how a Limb or Wired Ref could get hacked IF someone got in via another device, but again that's into GitS style territory). The situation is possible to work around I would imagine but it does demonstrate a shocking lack of consistency within the SixthWorld as a setting. IF they had rebooted back to 2050 instead of carrying on into 2076 it may have been made to work in a more reasonable fashion (although some of it is still bloody weird).

In a world where "Geek the mage" is a core rule?

The part I wonder about is the "You can defend your gear with a good commlink and a personal area network" bit. Does this actually mitigate the risk, or is the security it provides negligible? No one liked this Ghost In The Shell-style cyberware hacking in SR4; why cram it down everyone's throats even worse this edition? Why do hackers have to be "combat-capable", anyways? have them do things like hacking security systems, tacnets, or drones, or accessing protected data storage. Not this stupid "I turn your wired reflexes off, make your gun eject its clip, and replace your normal vision with troll-on-elf porn" crap.

The wireless bonuses didn't have to turn into a slap in the face to the players. If they had bonuses that made sense, and left basic prior functionality of things alone, there wouldn't be all this controversy. But no, they had to ensure that players have a choice between being gimped, or being hacked. I'm taking a wait-and-see attitude on SR5. Hopefully this crap will get errata-ed out or tossed into the optional rule scrap bin, like SR4A's similarly atrocious changes to direct spell Drain were.

Totally with you there Glyph. That's why i still live in SR3 and the 2050-60's

Yeah ... well ... no. JH has proven to be immune to feedback and does not care for quality work. All the other authors seem to love to idea of forced matrix precense, so no, don´t have ANY hope that this will be changed before SR6 (and then only with a new crew/line dev).

SYL

Yup that would have been my preferred solution, the cost/benefit of cyber should be the essence, not being hackable, its like double stacking the penalties but you get only 1 benefit. But the gear versions go ahead make them hackable, give people a reason to take implanted versions again, and besides I always hated skin link.

And I'm totally on board with this.
I've never been a fan of hackable cyberware.

Wait we agreed, one of us must be wrong.

Not being the best with names--it took me six months to figure out who Cain was and that the pair of us saw eye to eye on nothing--so I'll take your word for it.
(I still don't think he's figured out that I've ignored his posts)

It was mostly a joke, we've agreed quite a bit, its just everyone seems so contentious with a new edition coming out I had to make a joke.

I received a Karma earlier for this topic. I don't know what the rules for awarding karma are, but I'd like to pass it on if I can't award one out of whole cloth. What you said, a thousand times.

I think that's my solution too. Sad, I really wanted to like Sr5, but that paragraph right there is mindbogglingly dumb.

well considering that the no.1 complain of people that did not like SR4 was along the line of "I don't want to get strangled by my own Cyberarm!!!!" I really think forcing hackable Gear is the worst possible way to go. I had countless discussions with SR3 players that did not like the idea of SR4, the thing that most of them complained the most about was "hackable Ware".

So now we have gear that pretty much gets shitty as soon as you enter a R&D lab...

I've thought about the wireless paradygm and if I belonged to the dev team, I would have advocated for a redux in essence or penalty in essence if it was DNI. Say your reaction enhancer+Wired reflexs in DNI costs 0,2 essence more than wireless interaction. Let's be honest, there's a real decision to take now. It makes sense fluffwise (more things implemented in your body when nonwired=more essence lost), it gives a true edge to hackers (I guess most street sam would pick on wireless) and still allows the most carefull runners to opt for non wireless equipment.

It's like the devs came away from SR4 with exactly the wrong take-away lesson or something.

It's like taking the data that more people die in car crashes than gunfights, and deciding that instead of making cars safer, obviously they need to make gunfights deadlier.

You really think that was the number one complaint people had about SR4?

Critias please tell me this lazy bullshit wasn't your contribution to the SR5.

You guys've already read my (official) contribution to SR5's core book (everything I, personally, wrote has been released in previews, my other contributions were all from brainstorming, rough drafts, etc, to chapters other folks were assigned). Please note, I'm not even saying anything about the prevalence of hackable objects right now. I'm just saying, I certainly don't remember "oh no, someone hacked my cyberarm!" is/was the biggest complaint folks had about SR4.

Not from people who knew the rules, but from SR3 players that where reluctant to change to SR4. I was on many different Cons and had this discussion countless times: No 1 complain was that they hate the wireless Matrix because they don't want to get their Ware hacked.

Everybody who read the rules knew that this was not true, because preventing it was very easy: skinlink and disable wireless access - done.

The thing is, people have a problem with getting hacked, it was the main reason for them to dislike SR4. So forcing this for no good reason will piss many people off.

Not the biggest but certainly the first. Just search any SR forum and you will find plenty examples of new players going "WTF, they can just hack my arm?!".

The reason it's not the biggest complaint is sorely because people soon find out that wireless can simply be kept off and re-enabled with a simple mental command when the odd situation arises where it would actually be useful...or the whole thing just gets ignored altogether. If the playerbase votes with their feet, maybe the correct course of action is not to forcefully shove the reason for that vote down their throats...