Sure thing sport:



Emphasis mine.

So, as the drone image you have been delivered, perhaps in real time, perhaps not, is not of an icon and the decker is not within 100m of that location, you can't look for that icon because you don't know anything about it. Every Area Alpha out there is going to have a different ID and until you know something about it you can't find it, and you can only find the hidden icon if it is within 100m.



I'm not sure how many times it has to be said or how many times you wish to ignore the book, but the matrix is not synonymous for wireless, and (devil's advocate here again. Look out!) even if it was you can still make a case for why wireless is a better option than wired in so many practical ways.

The idea that the matrix is superimposed over reality is a pretty dated concept in Shadowrun (I'm talking editions rather than timeline here). The matrix hasn't really been like this since 2nd edition. Now it's more abstracted. We could go off on another tangent about matrix topography but that would be a pure opinion argument as the book reveals so very little about it. I'd say that trying to measure how far 100m is in VR is like trying to measure how far you had to go to do a Google search.

Bah in my day, you had to Telnet with Archie going upbandwith both ways.

GET OFF MY LAN!

So another 5 or so pages on and this seems intent on being a thread about Wireless and Bricking...

On that note though, I wanted to ask - how many of the people discussing it have played a 5th edition game with, or against, a decker? I ask because I'm playing a very competent decker at the moment (about as good as you can get out of chargen) and yet I am still yet to brick a device - not because I can't, not because I haven't had opportunity, but because when it comes down to it it's just really poor economy of actions.

Indeed in our last run we were in a combat situation. A party of 5 up against a gang of about 10. If I'd decided to start trying to brick devices it goes like this: Attack the gun and do it some damage. How much damage? If I maxed my attack it would be 7, +2 Hammer, +1 Decryption so 10. The attack action (Cybercombat + Logic [Attack]) is assumed 12 dice. the defense is Intuition + Device Rating, lets say 4 dice (lower than it would be). That's 4 hits to 1 on average, so an extra 3 damage for 13. This is resisted with Device + Firewall for 4 dice, and a weapon has a damage track of 9. So assuming a very competent hacker, and a totally incompetent defender (the gun may as well be unattended) it is possible to brick a gun in 1 Complex Action. This is a situation you'd never come across. Even so, you're now facing a combatant without a gun. What happens from there? Well, he knows his gun has been bricked so he'll draw another, or close range for melee, or disconnect all his other wireless just in case and tell his team to do likewise. His friends meanwhile are shooting bullets at you and yours.

What I did instead: Hacked the commlink of the leader, silently and without detection. Intercepted all their communications to help our team. Sent messages to them from their leader, splitting them up.


So, while some may see bricking weapons as a problem, I really don't. In actuality the defenses of the weapons slaved to comms, and against the actual intuition of the opponents, the chance of bricking a gun in one round are much less favourable. But even if they managed it what actual advantage is there to be had? How many more useful/important things are there that the decker could be doing? If you're fighting against one opponent, and he has one gun, maybe it's a good option. So far that situation hasn't come up.

In any case, bricking a gun isn't the only option if a decker finds himself staring down the barrel with only his deck to defend himself. I personally feel that ejecting the clip tends to be fairly effective, but activating the safety can do in a pinch.
EDIT: Forgot that ejecting the clip leaves 1 bullet in the firing chamber, and in any case is worthless against metal storm weapons and revolvers. Go for safety first, then drop the ammo.

So, if wireless and the matrix are not the same, then by turning off my wireless bonus, my radio communications become immune to evesdropping? And bluetooth is simply unhackable, in the case of a smartgun?

Theres no rules for intercepting or interferring with wireless non matrix communication to my knowledge. Even jammers dont seem to work that way anymore because they cause Noise.

Noise should still interfere, but the fun begins as not all devices seemed to have Ratings listed, probably more oversight than intentional.

Saying that a radio o rather the communication between two sets can't be jammed is a bit silly, but then it is a weird one. Because aren't most busy parts of the city supposed to be like lvl 2 Noise?

Microtransceiver does not have a rating, but the subvocal mic you attach to it has a rating of 3.

I would as a rule of thumb use a Rating 3 as a baseline for radio/wireless/other broadcasting devices, but again you can adjust to taste.

Noise is weird. It's both too much traffic and the lack of repeater posts as well as ping times.

It's like wtf. We already had this problem with Background Count (ebb) vs. Background Count (well).

Really? Tell that to the American Military coming out of Viet Nam. *shrug*
And hell, the Vietnamese troops were not even our Equals either.

Which goes to show that the need for bricking was all in the head of the Line Developer. Hackers ALWAYS (always, always, always) had things to do in combat. However, just because there are better things to do does not excuse the stupidity of the bricking rules. As a Hacker, If I want to deprive someone of their weapon, I SHOOT THEM. I don't care to brick their stuff because it is stupid. It was stupid in SR4 (which is why they retracted from it as the edition progressed), and it is Stupid in SR5. My nerd rage for it is mostly based in the fact that they decided to force it down everyone's throats in this edition because someone thought it would be cool. I have news... it is not cool, it is stupid. *shrug*

I hate to increase the arguing, but I figured I'd throw my two cents in on the "Spotting an icon running silent" debate going on.

Here's my interpretation:
If you know nothing beyond "there's likely an icon running silent I may need to worry about", you need to do a Matrix Perception test to determine if there are any silent running icons within 100m of your physical location or within the same host. This won't reveal any, just tell you if there are. You then do the Matrix Spotting test as described in Running Silent (pgs 235/236, SR5) as well as in the Matrix Perception activity (pg 241, SR5) on random silent-running icons to determine what they are. If they're outside 100m physical range, you can't do squat.

If you already know something about the icon you're trying to find (for example, you know the hacker who just ran from your system is a persona, which has 5 boxes of Matrix damage from the digital slapfight you had prior to him booking it), you can attempt a Matrix Spotting test to try to find the icon again, which in this case is the same spot test from Running Silent as above to see if you can spot the icon again, assuming they did something to hide from you (either wiping any marks you had on them and using Hide, or rebooting). If they didn't Hide or reboot, or they attempted to Hide and you still have a mark on them, you can still see them no matter what.

The problem you run into is "determining an icon is present" outside of 100m if it's running silent. There's really no rules for this. Whether that's rules-as-intended, I'm not sure, but it's how it's written. The way I'm planning on handling this if it ever comes up is: If you're trying to spot a silent running icon that's farther than 100m out, and you don't know anything about it beyond assuming that it's there, you can still ATTEMPT a Matrix Spot test if you're reasonably certain that the icon is there and have some sort of idea about what you may be looking for. The player may work this different ways, from having an appropriate Knowledge skill (if you're trying to find a device's icon, having a Knowledge skill based around the manufacturer's products may show that you know what kind of icons the manufacturer tends to use), using a Matrix Search test (if you are looking for another decker, searching the forums of the shadows for what kind of persona skin they favor can possibly help), or even just layering Matrix Perception/Spot tests (one Perception test with a threshold of, say, 3 and if this is successful, then you can attempt the opposed Spot test).

ok, seriously, did you even read the stuff i posted?

you can do a matrix perception test to find things within 100 meters or in the same host. you can *also* do a matrix perception test on a specific icon if you know one feature of that icon, *regardless of range*. the fact that there are rules for detecting all icons within 100 meters is beside the point. that's like saying because there are rules for suppressive fire, i can never ever ever make a specifically targeted shot at someone, i can only hose down an entire area with lead and hope that my target is in that area.

there are multiple mentions of being able to find hidden icons from beyond 100 meters. deal with it.

as to having better options: generally speaking, you can do all of those things *and* set up someone's stuff to get bricked. they're not mutually exclusive. you can even target multiple opponents. now, the matrix somehow magically protects sim modules from being made active except by the owner, so that's not an option (which makes no sense, considering if they can defend that functionality with 100% effectiveness in an inexpensive piece of equipment, the same should be true of pretty much everything else), so you can't generally force the *really* nasty stuff on someone unless they choose to go into simsense... but there's still lots of other things you can do. also, you don't brick their gun. as has been discussed, you brick their wired reflexes, or their cybereyes, and so forth (note: you can also do this to two targets at a time, per hacker involved. note that hackers can become involved from miles away, and with virtually no risk... so for example, if you have 10 hackers sitting in a heavily armoured command vehicle somewhere, any time a squad within range encounters an enemy you can send all 10 of those hackers to participate in the fight and they will arrive generally speaking within a few seconds... try doing that with regular infantry or even combat aircraft).

also, considering AR is still a thing, and is essentially people in the real world perceiving the matrix... yes, the matrix being overlain on the real world is an old concept. it's also a concept that is still in heavy use. not every location in the matrix correlates to the real world, but pretty much every location in the real world does correlate to a location in the matrix.

page 221, the augmented world: "The majority of people interact with the Matrix
in augmented reality, using their commlink."

now, since i don't want to double post, i'll just add this response here as well:



yeah, you have any actual proof of this, or is this just your personal interpretation of why you are right and everyone else is wrong?

yes, i noticed that datajacks have a cable. i also noticed that when using that cable, there is no noise penalty, ever. there is no point in having noise reduction 1 a special matrix bonus, unless wireless and on the matrix means two different things, because if they are the same the *only* time you can ever have noise penalties is when you're on the matrix in the first place. it would be like stating you get a +2 bonus to ride your bicycle, but only when you're on a bicycle. sure, that's true, but why would you go out of your way to say that?

as another very explicit example, the grenades and launchers i mentioned are perfectly clear. having the grenades on the matrix means you can trigger them as if you have DNI, whether you have DNI or not. not having them on the matrix doesn't determine whether they can be triggered by wireless or not, it merely means you must *actually* have DNI. if being on the matrix and having wireless on are the same thing, then that means you never need DNI, because every single one of the grenades *and* grenade launchers have that special ability. so the fact that there are rules that ever state you can wirelessly detonate them as a certain action without DNI, combined with the fact that being on the matrix means you don't need the DNI at all, indicates there is a difference between having them in wireless mode and having them on the matrix. otherwise, they wouldn't bother ever telling you that you need a DNI, because the only time you could ever use that DNI to trigger them, you wouldn't need the DNI.

microtranceiver, detonator cap: wait, weren't you just a little while ago going on and on about how there was no such thing as wireless without the matrix? how every single form of wireless communication, no matter how minor, was on the matrix, making it absolutely impossible to ever under any circumstances control a device wirelessly without using the matrix? so how is it that these two specific devices seem to outmagic the magical matrix and manage to remain separate when that supposedly isn't even possible? i'm going to go out on a limb here and suggest that it's because the matrix doesn't magically subsume all forms of wireless communication.

Or....maybe you were just wrong?

I'm going to go with Occam's Razor here.

A parsimonious shave every time.

Also, here's a quick and dirty refutation of the Matrix being "transmitting and receiving on any and all bands"

Visual Light is a band that exists inside the electromagnetic spectrum. So are radio waves and microwaves.

I can build a transmitter and receiver for all three across the wireless spectrum.

The first is known as a laser and it would be a bad idea for the matrix at large to utilize these bands, as it would blind us. Ergo visible light is not part of the matrix.
The second is known as a radio. And unless my car's radio is considered to be on the matrix when it is receiving, and incapable of transmitting, then radio waves are not part of the matrix.
The third is the band of wavelengths that cause excitation of water molecules to heat food (and other things). Even more high energy waves exist and quickly start becoming dangerous and/or deadly but it is still technically possible to build a wireless communication network using them. But it would not be advisable to do so. Ergo the high energy waves are not part of the matrix.

Fourth, there is no upper or lower limit on wavelength. The "band" is effectively infinitely wide and it is not possible to use all of them (see: Gabriel's Horn).

Thus, the matrix, as you define it ("transmitting and receiving on any and all bands"), is wrong.
Q.E.D. I can build a wireless-capable device that is not part of the matrix.

Does remote controlling a drone require matrix access?

If not, then wouldnt a remote controlled drone with its matrix access off be unhackable?

Within Line of Sight?

Completely reasonable. It's how all RC planes, cars, and copters work today.

Physics becomes altered in the 2070's, though. I thought you knew.

Cant those things be interfered with and hijacked?

Not sure if this was directed at me or not, but I've read over this thread as well as the SR5 book on this issue. Yes, you can attempt to spot a hidden icon at more than 100m away from you, provided you know the icon is there and you have some piece of information about it. The problem is that there are no rules for detecting if there are hidden icons beyond 100m, from what I can glean from the entire Matrix section of the rulebook. If you think there's a decker running silent 200m out, you have no way of detecting if there are hidden icons beyond your 100m signal range. Until you know for certain there's a hidden icon, you cannot attempt to spot an icon that you don't know is there. You can attempt to find the hidden icon either by getting within 100m and doing a Matrix Perception test to notice hidden icons or by encountering the icon in some fashion before they go silent and hide from you beyond that 100m range.

Now, this does kind of open up a grey area where you can rule that observing the opposing decker's results (some piece of tech on your side gets bricked, etc) lets you know that the hidden icon exists, and as long as you know something about that icon (what their persona-skin looks like, or whatever) you can then attempt a Matrix Spot test...but until you know for certain that that icon is out there, you can't do squat about it until it gets within 100m of you while you're actively looking for hidden icons.

TL;DR: Matrix Spot test requires you to know a hidden icon exists before spotting it, there are no ways to know there are hidden icons beyond 100m.

Hell, any asymetrical modern conflict. The most technically advanced army in the world has repeatedly had its nose bloodied in Afghanistan by guys working with shitty 40 year old munitions and Soviet-era AKs beat together in caves up in the mountains.

That is very true...

or, you can see that there is a person with gear that is not visible on the matrix, and hey guess what: you now know there's a hidden icon there. crazy how that works. or, alternately, if they actually have all their wireless shut off to prevent that, then we're right back to the point we've been making all along: you can't reasonably expect organizations to buy gear which is designed to only function properly in situations where they don't use or need that gear. if you can never use the bonus to hit from smartgun, no military organization is going to want to buy it. you either do without the wireless bonus (in which case, why is anyone building stuff that cannot reasonably be used for the purpose it is designed for), or you are vulnerable. all because someone was too stupid to design the device to function without the matrix in the first place, just like they have for years.

it would be like if you go to a store looking for an underwater camera, and you can buy an underwater camera, but none of the extra stuff beyond the most basic function actually works when it's underwater; you can't zoom, there's no filters, etc. and then finding out that the camera actually can do all of those things, but only when you open a seal that is required to make it waterproof.

sure, you *could* buy a special outer case or something like that, but why wouldn't you design the camera to be fully functional in the place where it is designed to be used in the first place?

right now, we have a device which only functions partially unless it is made vulnerable, and it is being sold pretty much exclusively to people who are going to be in situations where they can reasonably expect to be targeted. that doesn't make sense. i mean, it makes sense for a clock or a refrigerator or even a standard car to be on the matrix, because you're not selling those to people who are professionally paranoid and who are expecting someone to try and kill them at any minute. but when you sell somenoe wired reflexes, you are selling it to someone who has every expectation to be in combat, and who therefore can expect any vulnerabilities to be exploited as a means of attack. i don't care if an electric razor has a special wireless bonus that looks up the latest fashion in beards and displays in AR how to trim mine to look fashionable, because that's the sort of thing that makes sense. i just don't want it being required for my covert ops gear to function at full capacity, because that *doesn't* make sense.

100m is ~328 feet. Unless you're both standing in the middle of a long, straight, clear street, good luck seeing someone with gear in most urban environments outside of 300-odd feet. Additionally, knowing the gear is there is no certainty that an icon is there. You may be able to see a commlink 500 feet away, but that doesn't necessarily tell you if the device is on and connected to the Matrix.

By a strict reading of the Matrix RAW, this wouldn't be enough to attempt a Matrix Spot check, because you don't *know* the icon is there and running hidden, you're just assuming so. You'd have to get within 100m of it and do a Perception check to see if there are any hidden icons to know for sure.

-- Absolutely. Making sure people don't stomp on each other at RC meets is a thing.

Im boggled then by the idea that a $100k cyberdeck cant control a $10 toy from radioshack, because the radio in the cyberdeck cant reach the right frequency?

I'm boggled that you think it should, without needing to be in the same country.*

Not to mention that a cyberdeck, built to interact with the matrix should not use the same frequencies as the RC plane...or the RC plane's controller could hack the matrix! Screw the $100k cyberdeck.

There's a reason that this is a thing:



*It's wireless, therefor matrix, therefor hackable from anywhere. Seems legit.

Jammed, certainly. Hijacked is a bit more difficult, but theoretically possible if you knew what signals it was expecting and on what band. Or had a computer fast enough to figure it out realtime. They don't exactly encrypt simple stuff like that, after all.

Don't forget about the Texas university students who basically showed the DHS how they could divert a drone by spoofing the GPS signals.

Granted they couldn't land it as they had not cracked actual command codes, but when you can effectively change the map it's using, convincing it that it's going east when actually it's going west is not bad.

This would be a great and meaningful post if the book had ever defined what criteria you had to apply to 'knowing' an icon should or should be there. As it is entirely subjective, your wall of words is just as reasonable as a player stating consistently 'I would have a holdout, I assume everyone else would too, so clearly there are hidden icons at work'.

Why shouldn't it?

That doesnt necessarily follow. A cyberdeck is a controller but a controller is not a cyberdeck. A comlink uses the same frequencies as a cyberdeck. It cant hack the matrix.

Also:

Why would they go through the expense of putting two different radios into these devices? One for matrix access, one for non matrix access? If the cost is so negligible that it doesnt matter, then, why not in my cyberdeck? If its one radio that can do both, then why not in my cyberdeck? Hell, why not in every device?

It just seems strange to me that we are saying that there are wireless signals being flunh about, but a highly expensive piece of equipment designed to hack shit cant interact with them. Because apparently that would be unfair?

Level with us, do you have any idea what wireless communication really is, or why you would want to use different frequencies for different purposes? Because from your post above, I don't think you actually know what you're talking about.

It's not necessarily unfair, but rather a division of labor so to speak.

The cyberdeck is designed to work with programs to navigate and interact with the matrix and all of it's protocols. That is enough to keep it plenty busy.

I imagine you could modify one to cover a broader spectrum of tasks, so if you wanted to have your cyberdeck run micro transceiver conversations or old fashioned CB radio if you really wanted, but the question is do you want to?

As I sit here at my computer I can scan for available networks, because that's what I want my system to do, but I am not going to detect radio stations, old fashioned TV signals or my neighbour son's RC car he is running up and down the street (note to self, mini land mines).

Could I adapt my computer to do these things, sure with some added bits and time, but it wont be standard for the device.

Fair enough

Pretty much this.

Actually, Occam's Razor comes down on my side here. We have:

- The game term, "wireless", which is a Matrix connection and is used for every mention of device to device connection, with the sole exception of...
- The game term, "radio", which is used for detonator caps.

Now, on the one hand, we have two assumptions;

- This represents all non-wired connection options
- Microtransceivers use the latter.

Any other possibility requires more assumptions than that, and in fact requires assumptions that are fully outside of the rules.

And for your own awareness, the Rigger chapter makes it clear that drones are hackable.

Apparently that very point is conceptually to hard to grasp so what you're supposed to do is assume you can anyway and then complain that hackers are too powerful.

It's me going from within the rules, rather than outside of them to define new connections.

Also, you and I seem to be reading different grenade rules, because in my copy of SR5 the only time the Grenade rules mention DNI is under the Wireless Link heading.

And yes, "wireless" - which in the text stands different from "radio", and the text makes no provision for using "radio" for anything BUT the detcaps and probably microtransceiver (and that's specifically taking the interpretation that prevents MT's being subject to normal snooping; there is a viable argument that would suggest otherwise).

It's only true because those very forces are commanded by governments who aren't willing to do whatever it takes to win, while usually the other side is, mainly because they have very little to lose.

Outside of detcaps and possibly microtransceivers, there are no rules for wireless non-matrix connections at all that I can find.

Not surprisingly this didn't answer his question.

And there's where your whole argument comes crashing down. You do not know anything, you're only assuming possibilities. Until you KNOW something about an icon, you can't interact with it.

Or, I guess you could just forget that running silent should have a point to it, rip that section out of the book and then complain that section is not in the book and that hackers are too potent without it. Which is a completely sane way to go about considering system mechanics isn't it?.....................

By your own definition, it is therefore impossible to interact with running silent icons at all, as you can never definitively know that they're there as opposed to any given device being a throwback.

This ^

With regards to radio communications? Pretty sure that's RAI for microtransceivers - you're free to disagree (however, such a thing couldn't be done with a commlink so far as I can tell). As far as bluetooth, it would appear to be folded into "wireless"; you can't have wireless off and still be wirelessly connected.

And as a complete aside, I am somewhat suprised you needed me to specify "useful spectrum".

Seriously? Are we really taking an argument that far into reality about a game that has dragons in it? I mean FFS, none of this stuff matters. The game has set rules to create boundaries around how certain archetypes exist because they didn't want Deckers/Riggers being the archetype that does everything from home while urinating in empty mountain dew bottles.

There's no point arguing against stuff like this, it's totally pointless. Just don't play SR5. Problem solved. Oh but keep ignoring every other logic loophole that exists around the other half of the rules because those ones you just happen to like, that were alive and well in every other version of SR out there.... because fuck it, that's why.

So you've moved on from trying to unsuccessfully argue from a standpoint of not knowing what you're talking about, to arguing that caring in the first place means we're wrong? Good show, mate.

I'm pretty sure absolutely none of us have arguments against design intent, as far as getting riggers and deckers out and running. What we have, and are continuing to have, is arguments about the mechanics choices they made being both inherently flawed and poorly thought out.

If you're arguing that the idea of a wireless bonus is inherently flawed, I have a pretty solid counter-example on that:

If there were an expert system (which, if you're not familiar with them, basically have two components: the rules through which it makes inferences, and the knowledge base it uses in order to apply those rules and reach conclusions) that was designed to pull data from sensors in the area to help expand its knowledge base in live time, then forward conclusions about what is going to happen in the very near future to your Wired Reflexes and Reaction Enhancers, would you disagree with the proposition that such a system could help your Wired Reflexes and Reaction Enhancers work better? Or that such a system would require external connectivity? Keeping in mind that this is an example of how a wireless bonus could work, and thus setting entirely aside the present implementation of wireless bonuses, if you disagree with the preceding what would be your reasoning?

exactly this. you never KNOW the icon is there. you can make an educated guess, at best. you can never 100% know it's there until you have actually spotted it. so we can either presume that the system is designed so that you can't search for a hidden icon unless you have already somehow spotted it, which is moronic, or we can assume that you can make an educated guess.

you need to know ONE feature of an icon. one. not everything about it. just one. there is even a matrix perception table with dice pools for spotting hidden icons that are more than 100 meters away from you, which clearly indicates that you are supposed to be able to do so. since you can never KNOW beyond a shadow of a doubt that there is a hidden icon unless you have already spotted it, it is ridiculous to suggest that you must know beyond a shadow of a doubt. you must be making a guess (an educated guess, but a guess nonetheless), and it is completely insane to suggest that your hardware magically knows whether you're just guessing or whether you know beyond a shadow of a doubt.

you can do a blind check for hidden icons within 100 meters. you can also do a non-blind check, where you know something about the icon you're looking for, beyond 100 meters. otherwise i put a host into hidden mode and it becomes completely impossible to ever find for anyone unless you're already inside it, because hosts are never within 100 meters of anything and you never actually *know* the host is there unless you can already see it (otherwise, you're just guessing that it's there, and has not been taken offline or never even existed in the first place).

I had a thought about this too for the smartguns, so that by pinging off the other sensors/systems in the area, it can make predictions on target location, so say target runs behind a car for cover. If I could access other sensors, I might be able to extrapolate where they were behind the vehicle to punch through if you have a heavy enough weapon or if they were moving out where would be the most probable exit path to cover.

But the one flaw I see in this is how does my system get access to those other sensors/system. Sure as a mesh/matrix system they share some processing cycles but do I get access to hard data from them and if so, shouldn't this be managed somehow? Sure for my smartgun, tapping into local weather bits to help plan for windage and such, but if I am using my wireless enable weapon inside the Azzie pyramid, should I reasonably be able to access those surrounding sensors for the added bits for my own system to benefit....

I am hesitant to use the term, but the anology does sort of fit and I would almost treat the Azzies sensors as aspected, meaning those designed to work with Azzie tech could benefit but other wireless systems wouldn't necessary get the full package...