Alright. This is all going to sound kinda stupid. And before I'm told, I've read the core rule book and have little access to the supplement books. So I would like to clear up a bunch of questions regarding magic, the matrix, and other rules in general.

Matrix

First off, without getting into much of the detail, how do I start a decker up when they say "I want to jack into the local corp's Matrix"? I know I have to keep track of a security tally to know when it's passive and active alerts. But I don't know how many tallies to add each time he does something, nor do I know what to test him on when he starts to log in. I'm sorry if I do sound stupid, but when I look at the book and the long lists of programs, actions, and decker stats...I get confused. @.@

The next question is, when he has logged onto the matrix and starts to travel from node to node, is there any order to how a system is built. I'm running off from my knowledge that he would have to get past a few firewalls and servers before he can get to the CPU or any stroage devices. But another thing is, how do I stage the difficulty of each node? And how does the color and security rating effect his rolls. Another thing is what actions can he take (other then obviously Deception and outright attack) while he's at a node he needs to get past?

Ok. Now at some point, he's going to frag up a roll and the IC becomes active. At this point, I'll need to put him into combat with the IC and have them battle until he can win or jacks out. Barring the obvious of Black IC, what types of IC are there and how are they used against the decker? How are the attack programs used against the IC? Is it like normal combat? I know that the IC shows it's first form at Passive Alert, then uncovers a harder form behind that at Active Alert. When the tally is up there at Active alert, does anything else, game wise, happen?

Finally, when and if he gets out of everything in the matrix, what's the best way to keep the game flowwing. My firend argues that matrix combat and navigation happens within nano-seconds. But the rest of the group is waiting there. Usually, I just say that they each take 6-second turns no matter what.

This is my first group of questions. I have more, and I understand that this all seems very basic for a lot of you. Seriously, I have been playing for over 2 years now, but we never get into matrix or magic because none of us have grasped the concepts yet.

Well, i'll do what i can to help, since i'm first, i think.

Jacking in would require a Logon test (dependant on exactly what they're jacking into). As for security tallies, EVERY success that the host gets againist the decker counts towards security tally.

As for order, it sounds like you might be interpreting things a bit too "realworld-ish". To my knowledge, hosts arent broken into storage/cpu/other servers. The way i perceive it is literally as "rooms" very much the way you describe it ICly. You're likely to first have a "lobby" style room, full of doors, but not much else, you go through a door, and enter a hallway, that leads to a guard post (firewall perhaps). you then walk through that door, and enter into some style of research facility (depending on what they do: are they a chem company? then a regular chem lab or some such is apporiate i think, but if it's something less obvious you can be creative.) and so on

As far as alert levels go, yes, each level imposes a +TN on all actions EVERYONE on the server takes (unless they're legit ofcourse)

Unfortunately, this is the tough part, as matrix stuff really tends to grind everything to a halt. The best thing i can reccomend, is if it's possible to run both at the same time, do that, but if it's something that the team has to wait on (unlocking doors or diverting cameras) well, you odn't have much choice. Thats one thing i don't like how those rules are written... "The decker can do all of this in NANOSECONDS!(but it's gonna take a half hour game real time to get it done...)

So what would be the opposing tests? What would the decker roll and what would the security roll, what are the TNs based on?

the deckers TN's are based on the ACIFS sub system ratings. So, for your decker trying to log on to the seattle RTG, which is part of the UCAS RTG, which is a green-4 6/8/6/6/6 host his TN would be 6-his deception program rating.

The hosts TN is the value of the deckers Detection Factor, and it gets to roll the number of dice immediately following the color code, so our green-4 host gets to roll 4 dice. His detection factor is set by the average of his deck's masking rating, and sleaze program.

@.@

Where did you get that information on the RTG? Glarg....I've read that book front to back, and I never saw any of those numbers. ;_; I'm gonna cry...I'm so confused.

Ok. I understand what they roll. Now, on the tally...does the tally only go up when the decker fails and the system has net successes? Or is EVERY success counted, regardless of who wins?

Tally goes up on ALL successes for the host...

and a correction, on arriving at the passive alert levels, subsystem rating all increase by two (which, actually, is like increasing the TN, but it's only at the passive alerts):page 211.

Also, since we both seem to have too much time on our hands, if you have access to aim or yahoo, you can msg me at:

now, for pages:

"tally goes up":page 210, SR3, under "Security Tally"

RTG ratings: chart, page 203, Sr3

I'm at work, so I can't IM. I'll look this up when I get back home. I'm just good at story telling, so I need to know all of the rules.

alright, I have a feeling that you're working mostly from the Matrix book, thinking, hey, it's the book about the martrix, the basic rules should be there too, right? nah uh. It's frustrating for me too, i hate going between books. note for SR4! reprint the applicable rules in the modular books as well, even if they're in condensed form, pwease?

http://forums.dumpshock.com/index.php?show...ic=90&hl=matrix

This is what you want.

Well...after reading a bit into that topic, I found that I NEED the matrix handbook to even think about running matrix runs.

The things I find hard to figure out are jack points, system ratings, and the different numbers in the MPCP. The security sheaf and the IC are pretty easy to understand for me, but I constantly get hung up on when to make rolls and who makes them.

I would get a friend's help and use a throw away character to run through a bunch of scenarios. There are cheat sheets all around to help figure out what goes when and where (wordman's site perhaps). And the biggest thing is, The Matrix rules are not the core rules. You can choose to not allow any part of them at any time (like the laser and satelite links, or any utility you don't like).