Okay. I don't get it. Smartlinks became an eye mod in SR4. I mean, I understand partly why that is -- they've gone from the paradigm of internal simrig to gun camera. Keen. I get it. But why don't we have the option of subdermal induction pads?

It seems to me that /most/ of the 'suggestions' that even hardened street samurai should be walking around with an easily hacked gateway to all their cyberware can be ignored -- after all, most cyberware either ionterfaces with other cyberware or is a closed system.

Smartlinks, though, are required to interface with an external piece of gear. Why are we now forced to use a wireless link? Are we forced to? Can we assume palm induction pads can be used rather than wireless?

You can actually skin-link it if you want, or run it through a data-jack. The old school plug-and-play system is gone, but any way you have of getting your gun into your PAN will connect it to your eye system, which in turn will get the smartlink activated.

Yes, you can just let your guns be part of your wireless system, and yes this will make you get haxxored from time to time or eavesdropped, or both. But it will also let you fire your gun remotely, or shut it off with your mind, or do all that other fancy stuff. There's a definate trade-off: security vs. utility. what's important to you will depend upon what you're doing.

-Frank

I dig that. I understand that it can sometimes be useful. I suppose my problem with it is this: suddenly all those paranoid folks who don't trust commlinks have just blithely turned in their induction pads?

I suppose it's something I can HR in my own game. It just bugs me a little. The entire feel I am getting from the new matrix rules is that hackers are 'supposed' to be able to hack a street sam's gear. I just don't buy it. Anyone spending that much money on augmenting their body is going to make is secure.

Ah, well. Maybe I'm in the minority. I suppose I can also simply add in an 'induction pad' as a piece of gear, too.

i find it odd that a piece of technology that's been around for two decades--especially one that is permanently implanted in the user's body-- would suddenly fall off the market in five years or less.

Just what we need: an eight track tape implanted in the body. And please, for the love of God don't tell me where!

With the invention of Skinlink, there's no need for an induction pad.

Naughty elf, you know sex has no place in the main rulebook.

A version for people over 21 - or "european only": no violence, but sex.

Heh, a hentai adventure version of SR where you have to hawt elf sexxor your way past the security guards... I can see it now.

Oh my... And just imagine what the boss battle against the dragon is going to be like...

Hey, they were discussing strategies for that boss fight over in the Drop Bear thread a while back. It involved Lofwyr, tactical computers, and latex.

*shudder*

I know, i had been there. It was an experience that keeps me awake at night, in horror and pain....

Some of this stuff makes me wonder whatever happened to the good old days of having sex with your ally spirit.

why bother with the ally spirit, now you can do it with your comlink/agent

ok, so you could do so earlyer to. but hmm, having said agent uploaded to some lady you shake hands with and then have it take over her body

Heck, you can have your own "Virtual Person". To hell with Dikoted Ally Spirits... AR is so much more convenient.

hmm, that reminds me. in blue planet there is a similar system, and people there use it to wear a kind of digital mask. so that if you have the right setup the person you pass will look diffrent under AR. hell, there are even special clubs and bars set up for people that have a interest in this.

is there any talk about this kind of social use in SR4?

Yes.

OSUMacbeth

nice

So it looks like the set up you need for a smartgun is one of the following:

-SG mod gun+commlink(standard)+goggles w/smartlink(can be hacked unless all are skinlinked)
-SG mod gun+datajack+image link+smartlink(cable method)
-SG mod gun+commlink(standard or cyber)+image link+smartlink(skinlink the gun and commlink(if standard) to secure)


Did I miss any?
The last method, skinlinked, is basically what we had in SR3...

EDIT: Ok, so I was really on the wrong track earlier. All you need is a smartgun with the skin link mod. Touchlink is totally unrelated. Fixing now. Thanks Rotbart, calm, and hobgoblin !

Quick follow up/add-on: Am I correct in reading that you get the Touchlink cyberware and that lets you interface with Skinlinked objects? Or is Skinlink an added security feature on commlinks and has nothing to do with Touchlink?
Some of this stuff just needs a flat-out better explanation than it has as-written.

Touchlink is for 'feeling' AR.

AFAIS, there is (yet) no implant version of Skinlink.

I'm under the impression that anything can be skinlinked, don't know if this is right or not.
So it would be possible to skinling to goggles/glasses etc, though contact lenses are open to interpretation.

SG mod gun+commlink(external)+goggles (all skinlinked)

secure and no need for cyberware....add another 2 dice for gun toting adepts...

i would belive that contacts to should work as the eyes should be able to carry the signal to them

Forget about wearing gloves, though.

Why not just get some gloves that carry on the signal? There's nothing particularly magical about your skin.

heh, true.
trace amounts of some metal or similar in the material and presto.

True, a bit of copper meshed into the fabric of the palm would suffice - or even a skinlink enabled smartglove.

i have a feel that gloves becomes high fashion

I see a rise in popularity of chain-mail gloves.... making a comeback after 600 years.

--K

Shaking hands is not something you ever have to do. With the rise of Aztec, Japanese, and Indian corporate cultures, you can jolly well bow in any of a number of ways when introduced to someone instead of reaching out to touch them, and an insistence on an actual hand-shake at that point by the other person would be so socially awkward that noone would do it. Think Bride and Prejudice, if someone clasps their hands in front of their body and bows into them, they've pretty much done their part of the social contract - and no touching has taken place.

Of course, why you would need the gloves is something of a mystery to me. Your skin carries the information from your Commlink, so the gloves aren't necessary at all. Back when you had induction pads that a trained observer could spot as being part of killer equipment, sure, but in 2070 you just have a smartlink that's skinlinked to a gun and therefore the entire portion of your PAN that's dedicated to killing people is completely invisible in Matrix Space. Police Drones aren't going to look at you twice. Your PAN is in active mode, and you have to be seriously ghost hacked before people can even find out that you are also maintaining a silent sub-PAN that's exclusively used for killing people and otherwise breaking the law.

-Frank

I still remember the simsense stuff from Shadowbeat about PolyPOV (multiple point of view) simsense..

Allowing you to be either of the actors in a scene.. and if you modify your sim player (sim module) able to be more then one person at the same time..

Kind of gives the line "go frag yourself." a whole new meaning...