I don't think it'd be uncool or out of line for "Technomancers" to require some sort of minor technological doohickey to work their mojo, either. Otaku already need a couple little plugs and whatnot -- why is it logical to assume that halfway-grown-up Otaku won't need some minor 'ware to pull off their trick?

[QUOTE] There is no way to "tell" the lock unless you can emit a radio frequency. There's no "flow of energy" when it comes to wireless or radio transmissions* ... you aren't "manipulating latent energy" when working with radio communications. You receive radio signals, and to respond, you have to emit radio signals (which are NOT magical in nature). These systems are based in currently observable natural phenomena and technology, not the imaginary magical phenomena within the Sixth World. "It's just a different kind of magic" throws Otaku in the realm of mages and shamans and if that was the case, the rules would reflect this.

Sorry buddy. Radio waves are transmitted through our bodies all the time. Continuously. It's a commonly known fact. It is, under the SR variations on reality, viable to assume it possible for the technomancers to not communicate directly with the lock, but 'feel' and alter the signals telling the lock what to do in the same fashions hackers locate and alter the program signals that tell a computer what to do. Instead of receiving and responding to micro/radiowaves, its just as feasible to assume that altering already existing radio waves would have the same effects. What enables the technomancers to do this could be a byproduct of the manipulation of the mana field on the body in response to the technological goodies humanity has continually been integrating into themselves in the past however-many years. Or for all we know, the SR writers don't care as much as we do and'll just make them magically able to interact without hardware. Let's face it, we won't know until SR4 comes out, and if you aren't happy with their explanation, who says you have to play?

if otaku are outed as being magical, than anything they do is believable--radio brains, shooting lasers from their eyes, whatever. but i will be seriously disappointed if otaku are outed as being magical.

Why do i see a decker with PING etched into the slide on his pistol?

that, or FDISK.

You know, that's a good idea for a really cheesy joke for a comic. Have someone with a gun lining up a shot with the letters "SYN" clearly engraved on the barrel, then in the next panel someone getting shot and saying "Ack!"

~J

ah, violent geek humor.

I wouldn't call them "more powerful," but from my admittedly limited understanding of them they are differently balanced. In much the same way a mage or adept needs karma more than nuyen to get better (unlike a street sam), an otaku needs karma to get better instead of nuyen (unlike a decker). Whereas your average plughead needs to sink money (or time, raw materials, the right skills, and still some money) into a deck and programs, an otaku spends karma (and time, I guess?) into getting better at his widgetry. Same way a sammie needs cash for more hardware but an adept mostly just needs karma for more powers.

So, well, hopping out on a limb here (and I really don't know), I'd guess Otaku are "more powerful" than deckers in the same way Awakened are "more powerful" than regular Mundanes -- they do the same stuff in a different way, and tend to lack the same limits as a normal guy. The more karma, the more powerful the Otaku gets (compared to a decker). I think.

eldritch, the bio-chemistry that allows otaku to deck without a deck is in a whole different class from bio-chemistry that would allow them to project radio waves. reconfiguring a human brain to act like a computer is just a matter of making the brain think differently; it's not that far outside the realm of possibility in real life, given they types of calculations that some autistic idiot-savants can perform in their heads. reconfiguring the brain to emit radio waves is as far outside the realm of possibility as reconfiguring the brain to shoot lasers.

"You know, I have one simple request, and that is to have otaku with frickin' laser beams attached to their heads!"

*puts his pinky to his mouth*

The idea of technomancers being able to project radio waves or whatever is used for the new matrix without some sort of magical or cybernetic help is rediculous. If it's magic, fine, it's magic, and we all get to whine about Otaku being magical and that not being cool/making sense/whatever. If it's cybernetic (like I'm assuming it is, silly person that I am) then that works out just fine. Anything else, and they'd have to be some sort of wacky (and intentional) genetic mutation with a whole new set of organs designed to produce and interpret radio or whatever signals at appreciable power levels. In which case they'd better be dissected, studied, and a new series of 'Technomancer' Bioware mods made available to the foolish Otaku-wannabes everywhere.

Deckers (hackers) can connect to the new matrix via their commlink, but I doubt their gonna be able to do much decking without a suite of high-end and highly-illegal programs they can call upon. The way I see it, they're just like deckers now, only without the mobility issues.

Technomancers (I hope) work along the same theoretical lines as the Otaku do now, in that they still need the hardware to connect to the new matrix (a basic commlink to do the sending/receiving of signals, and the cyber to connect that to their brain), but they do away with all the programs that are the power base of the decker, instead using the Resonance-modified brains of theirs to mess with the new matrix directly. In other words, just like Otaku now, only without the mobility issues and with a shiny new PDA in their pocket.

At least, that's what I WANT to see. Fingers crossed.

I voted "hate" although I'd rather term it "strong dislike". If possible, I'll be running games in an alternate timeline where the otaku were all left powerless after the crash. They are effectively gone. Sure there are rumors of a few who escaped and are still able to do what they did before, but those are just rumors... right?

assuming you require otaku who access the WMI without cyberware, here's a solution that's much simpler, much less stupid, and much more in line with the previous generation of otaku: allow otaku to get the same level of utility out of trodes that non-otaku get out of datajacks. let otaku get full-X simsense through trodes, let otaku get their full Matrix initiative through trodes, let otaku run hot ASIST through trodes. even if you're out of tune with physics enough that you're fine with radio-brains, you have to admit that this idea is a lot easier to implement.

I never really understood why trodes got as terrible a set of mods as they do (okay, they aren't as good as 'jacks. They should still be worth something, especially with all this fluff shit in various SBs about trode rigs almost as good as 'jacks), but while that's more acceptable it's more acceptable the way I'd prefer to die in my sleep rather than be set on fire until dead. The outcome remains the same.

What I can't comprehend is how they would do such a thing (I have my suspicions about why). Is it a new organ or some sort of byproduct or effect of the Dissonance or some undiscovered Echo that fundamentally alters the brain structure, is is some sort of genetic byproduct creating something akin to CyberGeneration, or what?

Personally I'd like to see 'trodes have their flavour text brought in line with their modifiers rather than the other way around.

~J

it's stupid. if you dislike otaku, or don't care about them, i can see how that might not be a concern. i like otaku, though, and i don't want them to be stupid.

I thought the trodes made sense, unless I missed some text. You cant run hot or pure DNI on trodes but most users don’t anyway so for most users they are almost as good as a datajack.

And I can conseve of a way for a brain to transmit RF, its however reliant on a structural change in the brain (or elsewhere), a specialized chain of high conductivity nerve like cells and passably an electric organ similar to eth one found in some aquatic animals would allow for transmitting and reserving RF, this of cause is an identifiable biological change that was not present in otaku.

Edward

there is... sorta. hot ASIST requires pure DNI, and pure DNI is listed in the "Using a Datajack" section, seperate from the "Using Trodes" section. the Matrix rules are spastic enough that it could go either way; personally, i wouldn't allow hot ASIST with trodes, but i'm not going to say that's canon.

and, well, the point of the post is that otaku should (in SR4) be able to run hot ASIST through trodes, where most users can't. the limitation with hot ASIST for trodes is (or isn't!) based on the fact that trodes don't transfer data into your skull well enough. if otaku brains are configured by the Resonance to be more receptive to ASIST signal, then they'd be able to accept data from trodes more easily than non-otaku. and since trodes are a largely-unexplained technology (writing data to the brain through the skull without unintentionally affecting other parts of the brain? oooookay), you can just hand-wave the whole thing without upsetting anyone too badly.

oops, right. well, regardless--allow otaku to run the Matrix on trode rigs as well as normal people run it on datajacks (ie, with pure DNI and full init), and you've got implantless otaku.

It's always been a muddled part of the rules, but IMO, trodes should allow Hot ASIST. Reason being that you can read BTLs with a modified simdeck and trodes (dreamdecks are mentioned in both Shadowbeat and Cannon Companion), so the technology is there for trodes to allow the same high-peak ASIST signals that Hot ASIST uses. However, because those levels of signal are illegal, you won't be getting Hot ASIST with an off-the-shelf deck and a set of trodes. The technology that limits Hot ASIST-level signals seems to be in the deck, which does the actual signal processing, not in the transmitter (datajack or trodes), which just passes on whatever ASIST signals it is fed, whether they are Cold or Hot.

Pure DNI, however, is the realm of only datajacks, since trodes don't have a direct neural interface.

i should qualify that. i like otaku as they're written. i almost uniformly dislike the otaku that people end up playing, because they stray so far from the material. that's largely unaviodable, though, because otaku weren't really intended to be playable in the first place. personally, i'd almost be happier if they weren't playable. i don't see why they should be, any more than vampires or wendigos should be playable.

the other option is to change their basic nature so that they are playable. i guess that's okay. but "playable" is a far cry from "i pick up my favorite radio stations with my brain-meats".

Screw radio, I want to pick up XM or Sirius with my brain-meat.

But, yeah, I have to agree with mfb. I think my favorite analogy to Otaku is the 6 year-old kid who knows more about dinosaurs than most adults, only tweaked so much towards knowing about them that they know more than most Ph.D.s about them as well at the sake of any and all social development beyond the basic FFF instincts. Well, to be fair it's not like they forsaked that development for that so much as--given their backgrounds--they never had it. It's hard to play a character with that kind of traumatic background and crippled emotional and psychological state. Hell, it's hard to deal with people with similar backgrounds IRL let alone convincingly play someone who combines both of those characteristics with the fact that they became Otaku through highly-charged, quasi-mystical experiences. So you get a traumatized kid with autistic tendencies and a savant ability towards computers and other related areas combined with the fervor that's usually associated with the most highly-charged charismatic devotional beliefs, and you've got a character who is pretty hard to play without fucking them up.

Can somebody point me to the early references to otaku, before anybody tried to make them playable

Edward

Denver Boxed Set. Denver: The City of Shadows, "The Nexus" chapter, "The Otaku" subchapter, pages 84-87.

You know... On a positive note, the cool thing about Otaku is they aren't -quite- as floofy and gay as elves.

Your elves are floofy and gay?

I'd be afraid of most of the elves I've seen played because they are so... not floofy and gay.

Shadowland has a different tone than many of the books.

As hard as it may be to believe sometimes, I'd like to think that there are multi-dimensional non-caricature characters out there in the non-SL gaming world.