Runners do have options for blending in with the wired-in masses. Basically, a cheap commlink broadcasting their fake SIN while their real commlink runs in hidden mode. But there will be times when runners will actually be physically infiltrating a corporate compound, because an effective enough disguise to get them and their highly dangerous/illegal gear in will not be possible. And in those cases, the adept about to garrote the guard doesn't need his ruthenium sneak suit to be broadcasting "ARES, WE MAKE THE SNEAKIEST SNEAK SUITS!!!" Runners should be able to blend in when needed, and turn into ghosts when needed. The whole premise of a shadowrunner is being able to exist off the grid.


This is kind of moot in a discussion about errata, though. We will get rules tweaks, things clarified, contradictions resolved, stuff like that, but they are not going to completely overhaul everything.

Multinational Megacorporations do not build military hardware specifically for Seattle.

Hence gear that only works correctly in the sprawl, but is in the fluff designed and built for stuff like Desert Wars, or incredibly popular in 3rd world anti-tech hellholes does not make sense.

Guys, is this thread about errata changes really the best place to have Yet Another Wireless Argument ™?

Probably not, but they seem to flow without cessation every time we start to think about how the wireless rules are written.

And just to throw some greek fire into the flames:
in a poor attempt to fix the idiocy that is matrix connection instead of pan connection, they released a piece of ware called an internal router.
which, for a cost of both nuyend and essence does what the rules, as per the original writer, should have been doing anyway without the added cost just to fuck over the mundanes even more.

I my mind the fact wireless brings up so many arguments or discussions tells me it is probably a really good candidate for errata. The simplest would be to change the wireless bonus to mean it just needs to be connected to a PAN. Done and fixed. It's what the people want. Give them what they want.

Just to go back to the fiction topic for a second...

I don't mind fiction in my game books when the rules are complete and consistent. And some of the Shadowrun fiction is good. But what the rule books desperately need more of in my humble opinion are examples of play. This is an area I felt 3rd Ed did very well that has been lacking since. If half the fiction wordcount in a 30th Anniversary book got converted to examples of play that combined world flavor with illuminating confusing rules I'd be a very happy camper.

It does not pass other tests as well. Because the online rules apply of course the intelligence agents, the corp soldiers and the cops as well. Every Renraku Red Samurai Team announces their presence to their Desert War competitor just by casually checking the logged in smartlinks, each CIA undercover team blows up because of the online silencer is shown on the SK system and every narc cop fails the raid because the online baton is shown the the Aztech decker supporting the dealers. The rules do not apply only corp vs runner, but corp vs corp vs state vs other "incredible powerful entity with county equivalent resources at its fingertips" as well.

SYL

Corporations do not directly fight other corporations. That's literally why shadowrunners exist.

As for something more realistic, a narc squad vs drug dealers. The drug dealers are going to know the narc squad is coming, regardless if wireless is on or off, because it's a question of speed, not about surprising. Or are we to expect the drug dealers don't have the most basic of surveillance equipment but have a world class Azlan decker on their side every time?

As for an undercover agent, if everyone else is broadcasting, which they should be. There is no problem. Or once again, are we to assume that no one uses readily available MAD scanners? Everyone knows everyone else is carrying a gun, there is no reason you need to hide it. The only people that don't pack heat are those who have other people to do that for them.

As for military conflicts, communications is more important than running silent. Having tactical mastery of the battle field is more important than hit and run gorilla tactics. So, if you have sensors, friendly RFID tags, jammers blocking out all other signals that are not friendly, and Matrix support from a decker, why wouldn't you also be running with wireless on your smartgun? If you don't have good Matrix support you're going to have more friendly fire casualties than to enemy combatants.

While wireless on is a liability, there are enough benefits and counters in the Matrix to make it relatively speaking, safe. Is it perfect, obviously not, because deckers need to exist, but there is enough benefits and protection to keep wireless on in most normal circumstances.

But of course they do. Starting with Desert Wars. Starting with the Bushfires in Central/South America. And if you extend it to corps vs state then you open a lot of other battlegrounds where military forces are engaging each other.



Oh, it does not really have to be a world class decker. But there is a difference if you announce zone-wide aka "hey, there is this strange amount of combat equipment popping up in our Wifi / sensor / ubiquitous networking equipment, which is a little bit different from that of the rest of the 200k wageslaves in this area" or if you actually have to enter the surveillance zone.



Yes, what a normal wageslave would broadcast. Which is usually not an online silencer or other parts of police/swat/SEAL/Red Samurai equipment.



MAD scanner, microwave, camera, chemsniffer yes ... which are usually sensors for a rather small area. Not really comparable to a zone wide matrix announcement. "Hey Joe, could you please configure your Wifi / sensor / mainframe / ubiquitous network to give us a call if smartlinks, silencers and stealth suits show up without having a flag in our own spec ops entries? Thank you, Joe"



Except of course if your literal life could depend on radio silence. Which is the reason by radio discipline exists even today, especially against technological superior or at least same level forces. Starting with Black Ops / Spec Ops. Again: you don´t want to announce the SK commando squad in an Amazonia network because you want to start some bushfire between Amazonia and Atzlan.

SYL

or, to put it another way:

it doesn't bother me that the stuff made for the average citizen would have wifi. even for stuff like guns. and if we were to assume you can get a stealth suit for hunting, it doesn't bother me at all that those suits might be designed to be wireless (actually requiring that they be connected to the matrix to function properly sounds stupid, still, but whatever, i can ignore that for stuff designed to be used by joe hunter who likes to go down to the shooting range and fire off a few dozen rounds of ammunition every weekend).

the idea that *nobody* has equipment that is just designed to function without broadcasting itself on wifi, however, is stupid. the idea that the CIA doesn't have guns that won't show up to a matrix scan? preposterous. the thought that a bodyguard for megacorp CEOs can't get wireless reflexes that won't broadcast their own location (and by extension, the location of the person they're supposed to protect)? absurd. the notion that a military sniper can't have a stealth suit that works without broadcasting its location on the matrix? laughable.

it's fine if regular stuff designed for regular people is designed to be on the matrix. but it is just silly to think that nobody would design, create, or use that kind of equipment. and that's the kind of equipment that you'd expect shadowrunners to have.

as to MAD detectors everywhere detecting every gun with 100% reliability, that's pretty silly too. at secure checkpoints, sure. you're not going to get into renraku's research labs where they study AIs without going past a MAD scanner (not that a MAD scanner is impossible to fool either). but most people won't have them. why would they?

Looking over the rules, I was confusing MAD with cyberware/millimeter wave scanners.

The cyberware scanner, picks up ware, as well as weapons, has a range of 15 meters, and at 1500¥ for a rating 6 wall mounted version, is pretty cheap considering what it can do. And considering these things can also be mounted on drones, and be used to randomly inspect people around a sprawl, how can you really hope to hide an illegal weapon if not just keep it within plain sight?

So, since shadowrunners must exist, and gun culture is a part of mass consumer culture, guns must be a social norm in the setting. And since it's near impossible to hide a gun, you shouldn't need to. So, how do you not hide a gun that you need to use for crimes? You register it to a fake SIN and buy a fake License.

This also implies that every run needs to supply a fake SIN and license for each runner, but that is semi-realistic as you don't want your data trail to be traced back to your real self. But this can be hand waved as part of the cost of the run, while if a runner wants their own unique fake SIN, they need to pay out of pocket for it. It'd become too much book keeping if runners actually needed to buy and keep track of all their fake SINs for each run.

well that would make sense if the setting told us there were cyberware scanners on everything ever. but there aren't. so, no, you don't need to have everything on the matrix just to make sure the bajillion cyberware scanners don't spot your concealed stuff. you need that if you're going to, say, get on a semiballistic flight to china, or walk past a secure checkpoint somewhere. or, alternately, you just need an excuse, because there are legitimate reasons for people to not have their gear constantly broadcasting.

... which only work - if it work at all - in North America, because, as every core rule book tell us, the availability and legal ratings of the equipment represent Seattle, UCAS and that different ratings exist in different places in the world.

That's a pretty good illustration of why trying to turn Shadowrun into the iFuture ™ was a piss-poor writing decision in the first place.

Anyway, going back to the original idea of errata:

One question is will Recoil/Progressive Recoil be reviewed for errata?

Has anyone picked up the second printing of Street Grimoire? It is any good?

Well, I got the PDF updated to second printing. But I havn't noticed anything different, yet. I'm sure there are changes, but no idea what they are.

It does have a different cover art.

Bye
Thanee

There are a few changes, but a lot of errata has not been included yet according to the other forum, fizzygoo goes through the list of the official errata on page 3 of the thread.

http://forums.shadowruntabletop.com/index....58186#msg458186

Probably was left out while they are still assembling the new errata team.

Ah, thank you! Will have a look.

Bye
Thanee

I did pick up the new printing of the Grimoire, and none of the errata that I checked was included

...and presumably a lot of others did, because demand for the first printing was larger than the supply. If there's an obvious market for the book as it is, what would motivate CGL to invest a single dollar into improving it? Their dedication to delivering a finished product?