Back to the main page

Mailing List Logs for ShadowRN

Message no. 1
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Da Twink Daddy)
Subject: Matrix Gear Questions and Gripes
Date: Tue Jun 11 16:00:01 2002
----- Original Message -----
From: "Gurth" <Gurth@******.nl>

>> Also, WTF does "add 10 percent to the cost" (p 67 and 170) mean?

>It probably means that if you want things hardwired, it costs 10% extra,
per
>the rules on page 62. The strange thing, though, is that those rules say
>hardwiring is _cheaper_...

I thought it was more expensive but less time consuming the Matrix (as
opposed to VR2), but I could have it backwards. I have my book but I'm not
gonna look it up. :P

Plus, it's not even clear to me that that text means "hardwired cost". All
the other costs on that page are for non-hardwired opponents. Personally, I
figure FanPro should just convieniently leave that line off the two tables
next printing.

>> In general, there doesn't seem like anything interesting on the matrix is
>> even approachable by someone whose spend less than 150KnY on a deck plus
>> more on programs. This fails the logic test for me. If there's no way
>> you can make money with a 30KnY deck, there's not going to be any deckers
>> around that HAVE 150KnY decks. Could someone paint a scenario in which a
>> ganger (or any person without Megacorporate funding) becomes a decker?

>Not me. Which is one of the reasons why I've decided to divide all
cyberdeck
>prices by 25, and all software prices by 10: it makes the decks affordable
to
>people who haven't already made a couple hundred thousand nuyen.

Wow. Sure, the programs ARE overly expensive and the decks tend to be as
well, but dividing by that much makes it far to easy (IMO) to have a decker
with ALL programs ('cept maybe Black Hammer, Track, and Killjoy) at 6 to
start AND a killer deck.

I would be more inclined to have some easier hosts around (or just lower
target numbers in general so you don't have to have a rating 6 program to
bring it down to an 8!!), something for youngters and beginners to "play"
on. Sure, RTGs, LTGs, and PLTGs are going to be well protected. But, I
figure there are a lot of easier targets out there, maybe the public library
and school systems (Edit Slave --> Fire alarm goes off; Edit File --> Hmm,
you seem to have already pai the late fee for this overdue book/Odd, I don't
remember johnny making an A in my class. I guess he must have impressed me
with his final project...) The thing is how do you "get paid"? Practice is
fine and good but how do you get your 2/2/1/2/1 deck upgraded?

There should be some systems that you can hack with a terminal, though
you'll probably be traced and tagged if you stick around very long. With
stuff arond rating 3 you can definately start getting paid. Around rating
6, most systems are easy to hack, but they've become less interesting; the
real data isn't on most systems. Around rating 9, you are less limited by
the sytem and more about what you know. Which hosts you need to hit becomes
more important than "can I do it?". Making a SIN might be possible with
some friends @ this level, but the banking system is still off limits.
Also, SOTA becomes a large issue here. If you ever make it to rating 12 you
can probably create money by creative accounting, but you understand that
you can't to it to quickly or you are gonna get brain-fried (or worse put in
JAIL), plus SOTA is always trying to pull you down, and you are lucky to
stay @ that level.

>> But, low and behold, joe-blow can get a cyber terminal that's
>> 3/5/4/0/0 from any store that sells Sony.

>That is strange, yes... I hadn't noticed it, but then I haven't looked at
the
>cyberterminals for more than about a second.

Sorry, I tend to pick nits when it comes to matrix rules. I'm a rules
lawyer @ heart, but I'm recovering. Also, I'm a computer science student
and have always loved computers (when they are working). I almost always
play deckers, unless they are banned from the game. I think it needs to be
fixed.

[Oh, and I did get the rating wrong. Sony doesn't sell a terminal with
Evasion to the public market, the correct notation would be 3/5/0/0/4.]

>> Wizkids has GOT to make rules for running your own host from the shadows.

>Host construction rules were written up for Matrix, but weren't in the
actual
>book :(

Is there any way I can get a copy to is it still covered by an NDA?

>> Is there any uppoer limit on the amount of hardening a terminal can have?

>The amount of money you're willing to spend, and/or how well you can roll.

Actually, it looks like WizKids ruled on this. It's the ONLY Decking/Matrix
question answered on their FAQ. For those interested, Hardening maxes out @
MPCP rating.

--
Da Twink Daddy (not working from his normal computer).
Message no. 2
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Gurth)
Subject: Matrix Gear Questions and Gripes
Date: Wed Jun 12 05:50:03 2002
According to Da Twink Daddy, on Tue, 11 Jun 2002 the word on the street was...

> >Not me. Which is one of the reasons why I've decided to divide all
> > cyberdeck prices by 25, and all software prices by 10: it makes the decks
> > affordable to people who haven't already made a couple hundred thousand
> > nuyen.
>
> Wow. Sure, the programs ARE overly expensive and the decks tend to be as
> well, but dividing by that much makes it far to easy (IMO) to have a
> decker with ALL programs ('cept maybe Black Hammer, Track, and Killjoy)
> at 6 to start AND a killer deck.

That is true, but it is also realistic, IMHO. If you have the money today,
you buy a top-of-the-line PC with the best software for what you want to do
with it, which is how I expect deckers to work as well.

I must admit that part of the reason for making things this cheap, besides
realism issues, is that it would encourage players to _use_ computers,
instead of hire deckers every time they needed something looked up on the
Matrix. It worked insofar as that there are now two PCs with a cyberdeck in
the group, whereas there used to be one at most, and usually none.

> >Host construction rules were written up for Matrix, but weren't in the
> > actual book :(
>
> Is there any way I can get a copy to is it still covered by an NDA?

To the best of my knowledge, since FASA didn't use the rules, the rights to
them are mine... However, with the overhaul of the deck construction rules
for Matrix, the host construction rules would also need to be updated -- they
were written to parallel the VR2.0 deck construction rules.

--
Gurth@******.nl - http://www.xs4all.nl/~gurth/index.html
Little ever changes, if anything at all
-> NAGEE Editor * ShadowRN GridSec * Triangle Virtuoso <-
-> The Plastic Warriors Page: http://plastic.dumpshock.com <-

GC3.12: GAT/! d- s:- !a>? C++@ UL+ P(+) L++ E W--(++) N o? K w(--) O
V? PS+ PE@ Y PGP- t@ 5++ X(+) R+++$ tv+(++) b++@ DI- D+ G+ e h! !r y?
Incubated into the First Church of the Sqooshy Ball, 21-05-1998
Message no. 3
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Da Twink Daddy)
Subject: Matrix Gear Questions and Gripes
Date: Wed Jun 12 13:35:01 2002
----- Original Message -----
From: "Gurth" <Gurth@******.nl>

>That is true, but it is also realistic, IMHO. If you have the money today,
>you buy a top-of-the-line PC with the best software for what you want to
do
>with it, which is how I expect deckers to work as well.

>I must admit that part of the reason for making things this cheap, besides
>realism issues, is that it would encourage players to _use_ computers,
>instead of hire deckers every time they needed something looked up on the
>Matrix. It worked insofar as that there are now two PCs with a cyberdeck
in
>the group, whereas there used to be one at most, and usually none.

True, and if the decker gets out of hand, you can always start invoking
SOTA more often. Reducing the costs as much as you do, actually makes it
possible to play a decker in a <90KnY campaign.

Besides SOTA, I think that deckers really need to worry about legality. As
I've posted before, I'm of the opinion that most utilities are stictly
illegal, since no legal user (even grid-sec) needs them. Sure, it's easy
to conceal what's on a dick from a casual observer, but if you
house/deck/computer gets searched, you could be in a world of trouble just
for owning a lot of the stuff deckers have.

And while other characters might get permits, I'd wager that a lot of
decker stuff doesn't even have permits available.

Program prices / 10 makes sense. I mean, take a simple application
(multiplier 1, maybe a word-processor) give it a decent UI and features
(rating 3 say) and it suddenly becomes a (3^2 x 1 x 100nY) 900nY piece of
software. That's just not reasonable, 90nY is probably about the right
place.

Cyberdeck prices / 25 is quite a drop. That brings a 400KnY deck down to
what, 16KnY? I'm not sure cyberdecks are THAT cheap. A Kraftwerk-8 is a
pretty damn hot computer. Think about what it takes to develop it: someone
with rating 8 skill. Now look at the description of a rating 8 skill in
SR3, how many people in the world you think can do that? I might buy
'deck/'term prices being slashed by 5 or maybe even 10, but 25 seems like
taking it too far.

Of course, with these decreased, parts prices should be decreased as well.
And what are you considerations for DIY programmers? I mean if it takes
you 72 hours to write a 90nY program, it's probably not worth it.
(Although, that's a little unrealistic for DIY deckers, they'd probably get
4 or 5 successes and bring the time down to 14-18 hours...)

Also, since programs are cheaper do you lower the costs for 'softs (I seem
to remember CC relying on the programming rules for these), and the various
drone modules?

>To the best of my knowledge, since FASA didn't use the rules, the rights
to
>them are mine... However, with the overhaul of the deck construction rules
>for Matrix, the host construction rules would also need to be updated --
they
>were written to parallel the VR2.0 deck construction rules.

If you don't mind, send them to me as is. I own VR2 as well, and can do
the conversion myself.

You really produce a lot of good optional/house rules, Gurth. You should
probably submit more of them to TSS. I love custom lifestyles!

Da Twink Daddy
datwinkdaddy@*******.com
ICQ# 514984
Message no. 4
From: shadowrn@*********.com (shadowrn@*********.com)
Subject: Matrix Gear Questions and Gripes
Date: Wed Jun 12 17:20:00 2002
On Wed, 12 Jun 2002, Da Twink Daddy wrote:

> illegal, since no legal user (even grid-sec) needs them. Sure, it's easy
> to conceal what's on a dick from a casual observer, but if you

its juvenile humour I know, but I found the mistype amusing :-)
not that I never mis-type....

--
john@*****.net http://www.kript.net/shadowrun
SRGC SR1+ SR3++ !SR2 h b++ B--- UB IE+ RN+ !W ma+++ gm M-- P-
"He's an oversexed shark-wrestling wage mage haunted by an iconic dead American
confidante. She's a bloodthirsty Bolivian Valkyrie with her own daytime radio
talk show. They're Shadowrunners!"
Message no. 5
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Mark M. Smith)
Subject: Matrix Gear Questions and Gripes
Date: Thu Jun 13 01:05:01 2002
At 6/12/02 12:01 PM, you wrote:
> >That is true, but it is also realistic, IMHO. If you have the money today,
> >you buy a top-of-the-line PC with the best software for what you want to
> >do with it, which is how I expect deckers to work as well.

A bit of a difference of opinion here. IMHO I feel that mainly the script
kiddies are the only ones to just go out and buy the top of the line
off-the-shelf computer and software for it. These are the equivalent of the
people out there with some overpriced Dell box writing VBScript macro
viruses in MS Visual Studio and claiming to be 1337 h4X0Rs! Deckers to me
are more Unix/Linux hackers who grok C and Perl hacking out code in vi or
Emacs between compiles under gcc. Deckers stay home on friday nights to
recompile thier kernel.

>Program prices / 10 makes sense. I mean, take a simple application
>(multiplier 1, maybe a word-processor) give it a decent UI and features
>(rating 3 say) and it suddenly becomes a (3^2 x 1 x 100nY) 900nY piece of
>software. That's just not reasonable, 90nY is probably about the right
>place.

No, it's not reasonable, but $400 or so for MS Office isn't reasonable
either now is it? I'd decry that even 90 is a bit much. I might cut them
down a bit more even and restrict the high level stuff a lot. This is
essentially script kiddie stuff IMHO. Any real decker worth anything and
with any cred at all writes his own code. Sure, he may not write ever
single little utility he uses, but most of that stuff is probably going to
be slightly more legit (Read/Write, Browse, etc.) or modified versions of
commonly used software and diagnostics (Analyze, possibly various versions
of Encrypt). Most of it is likely also garnered as open source in the same
way that it is today (Browse likely being grep for 2060, I don't even want
to imagine EMACS...) and thus the cost is reflected more in time, media,
access fees and the like. Really, what sort of person is going to be out
there cracking with off-the-shelf software? Or even black market commercial
software? The high level programs thusly are either created custom by the
decker or one of their contacts or are something really hot and likely
stolen from the corps, government, or a really, really pissed off decker.
Sadly I don't think anyone else wants to implement a logarithmic software
pricing scheme...

>Cyberdeck prices / 25 is quite a drop. That brings a 400KnY deck down to
>what, 16KnY? I'm not sure cyberdecks are THAT cheap. A Kraftwerk-8 is a
>pretty damn hot computer. Think about what it takes to develop it: someone
>with rating 8 skill. Now look at the description of a rating 8 skill in
>SR3, how many people in the world you think can do that? I might buy
>'deck/'term prices being slashed by 5 or maybe even 10, but 25 seems like
>taking it too far.

I would again cut prices quite a bit on hardware as well. Looking at things
as a modern-day geek I expect that the good deckers are likely to build
their decks far more often than buying them with the only exceptions being
the novices and dedicated script kiddies. Maybe some corp deckers might be
forced into buying decks, but likely everyone else out on the street is
building them from solid SOTA components.

I'd comparatively make the components a bit higher rating than most of what
you can buy, but the pre-assembled decks being a little cheaper as a total
unit, again until you get to the top of the line SOTA equipment which is
probably still in Beta.... :)

>And what are you considerations for DIY programmers? I mean if it takes
>you 72 hours to write a 90nY program, it's probably not worth it.
>(Although, that's a little unrealistic for DIY deckers, they'd probably get
>4 or 5 successes and bring the time down to 14-18 hours...)

I'd probably be more likely to increase the rating somehow. Probably rather
low-level stuff is on the streets and thus you need to code it yourself to
get anything worthwhile. Think about it... 72 hours to write code worth $90
on the street isn't really that much time at all. Don't have the Matrix on
hand, but maybe you can skimp on the debugging a bit and drastically cut
down on that time ("Bah! It compiles and that's damn well good enough...")
considering that debugging is usually about 2/3 of the total time spent on
coding anything.


--
Mark M. Smith
belgand@**************.com

-----BEGIN GEEK CODE BLOCK-----
Version: 3.12
GS/CS/AT d- s-: a-- C++++ UL++>++++ US P+>++ L++>+++ E@ W++(+++) N+++@ o+
K++ w---() O- M-- !V PS+@ PE++(+++)@ Y+@ PGP- t+ 5 X++@ R++ tv++ b+++
DI++++ D+++ G++ e>++++$ h(!) r++ y+**
------END GEEK CODE BLOCK------
Message no. 6
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Gurth)
Subject: Matrix Gear Questions and Gripes
Date: Thu Jun 13 05:55:04 2002
According to Da Twink Daddy, on Wed, 12 Jun 2002 the word on the street was...

> True, and if the decker gets out of hand, you can always start invoking
> SOTA more often. Reducing the costs as much as you do, actually makes it
> possible to play a decker in a <90KnY campaign.

It should be noted that my current campaign isn't a low-money one -- most
players took at least 400,000 nuyen to build a character with.

> Besides SOTA, I think that deckers really need to worry about legality.
> As I've posted before, I'm of the opinion that most utilities are stictly
> illegal, since no legal user (even grid-sec) needs them. Sure, it's easy
> to conceal what's on a dick from a casual observer

All you need to do is wear trousers... *g*

> Program prices / 10 makes sense. I mean, take a simple application
> (multiplier 1, maybe a word-processor) give it a decent UI and features
> (rating 3 say) and it suddenly becomes a (3^2 x 1 x 100nY) 900nY piece of
> software. That's just not reasonable, 90nY is probably about the right
> place.

That's what I figured, too.

> Cyberdeck prices / 25 is quite a drop. That brings a 400KnY deck down to
> what, 16KnY? I'm not sure cyberdecks are THAT cheap. A Kraftwerk-8 is a
> pretty damn hot computer. Think about what it takes to develop it:
> someone with rating 8 skill. Now look at the description of a rating 8
> skill in SR3, how many people in the world you think can do that? I
> might buy 'deck/'term prices being slashed by 5 or maybe even 10, but 25
> seems like taking it too far.

In the last thread, I mentioned my reasons for this. What it comes down to,
is that I see cyberdecks as normal computers with a bit of extra stuff tacked
on to handle the VR and decker-specific stuff. (This is also why I've started
calculating prices for normal computers using the cyberdeck construction
rules.) Initially I wanted to cut prices to 1% of the listed ones, but a bit
of experimentation showed that was taking things too far.

> Of course, with these decreased, parts prices should be decreased as
> well. And what are you considerations for DIY programmers? I mean if it
> takes you 72 hours to write a 90nY program, it's probably not worth it.
> (Although, that's a little unrealistic for DIY deckers, they'd probably
> get 4 or 5 successes and bring the time down to 14-18 hours...)

I think I'll leave program times as they are; you just don't write a complex
program in a couple of days, and like you say, someone with a high enough
skill will cut down the time anyway.

> Also, since programs are cheaper do you lower the costs for 'softs (I
> seem to remember CC relying on the programming rules for these), and the
> various drone modules?

I don't know yet... nobody has bought any in this campaign, and though I feel
they are too expensive (skillwires are very uneconomical due to the high cost
of skillsofts, IMHO) I also feel that they should be expensive due to the
fact that they're intended to interface with a person's mind rather than with
a computer. We'll see what happens when a PC in my campaign wants one of
these, I suppose.

> If you don't mind, send them to me as is. I own VR2 as well, and can do
> the conversion myself.

I'll need to dig them up first, though :)

> You really produce a lot of good optional/house rules, Gurth. You should
> probably submit more of them to TSS.

No comment :)

--
Gurth@******.nl - http://www.xs4all.nl/~gurth/index.html
Little ever changes, if anything at all
-> NAGEE Editor * ShadowRN GridSec * Triangle Virtuoso <-
-> The Plastic Warriors Page: http://plastic.dumpshock.com <-

GC3.12: GAT/! d- s:- !a>? C++@ UL+ P(+) L++ E W--(++) N o? K w(--) O
V? PS+ PE@ Y PGP- t@ 5++ X(+) R+++$ tv+(++) b++@ DI- D+ G+ e h! !r y?
Incubated into the First Church of the Sqooshy Ball, 21-05-1998
Message no. 7
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Gurth)
Subject: Matrix Gear Questions and Gripes
Date: Thu Jun 13 05:55:27 2002
According to Mark M. Smith, on Wed, 12 Jun 2002 the word on the street was...

> > >That is true, but it is also realistic, IMHO. If you have the money
> > > today, you buy a top-of-the-line PC with the best software for what
> > > you want to do with it, which is how I expect deckers to work as
> > > well.
>
> A bit of a difference of opinion here. IMHO I feel that mainly the script
> kiddies are the only ones to just go out and buy the top of the line
> off-the-shelf computer and software for it.

Note I said "for what you want to do with it" -- what I had in mind was more
legitimate uses, like buying a machine that can run Photoshop 7 if you want
to work with images, rather than keep using your old 286 with Windows
Paintbrush... :)

> These are the equivalent of
> the people out there with some overpriced Dell box writing VBScript macro
> viruses in MS Visual Studio and claiming to be 1337 h4X0Rs! Deckers to me
> are more Unix/Linux hackers who grok C and Perl hacking out code in vi or
> Emacs between compiles under gcc. Deckers stay home on friday nights to
> recompile thier kernel.

Except that, going by all the Matrix books FASA ever published, if you want
to be a good decker you (almost) _need_ an expensive deck and ditto
utilities.

> (Browse likely being grep for 2060, I don't even want to imagine EMACS...)

Probably the MPCP :)

> Sadly I don't think anyone else wants to
> implement a logarithmic software pricing scheme...

If calculations are your main worry, put it into a table and I don't see a
problem...

--
Gurth@******.nl - http://www.xs4all.nl/~gurth/index.html
Little ever changes, if anything at all
-> NAGEE Editor * ShadowRN GridSec * Triangle Virtuoso <-
-> The Plastic Warriors Page: http://plastic.dumpshock.com <-

GC3.12: GAT/! d- s:- !a>? C++@ UL+ P(+) L++ E W--(++) N o? K w(--) O
V? PS+ PE@ Y PGP- t@ 5++ X(+) R+++$ tv+(++) b++@ DI- D+ G+ e h! !r y?
Incubated into the First Church of the Sqooshy Ball, 21-05-1998
Message no. 8
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Da Twink Daddy)
Subject: Matrix Gear Questions and Gripes
Date: Thu Jun 13 12:45:12 2002
----- Original Message -----
From: "Mark M. Smith" <belgand@**************.com>

> IMHO I feel that mainly the script
> kiddies are the only ones to just go out and buy the top of the line
> off-the-shelf computer and software for it. These are the equivalent of
the
> people out there with some overpriced Dell box writing VBScript macro
> viruses in MS Visual Studio and claiming to be 1337 h4X0Rs! Deckers to me
> are more Unix/Linux hackers who grok C and Perl hacking out code in vi or
> Emacs between compiles under gcc. Deckers stay home on friday nights to
> recompile thier kernel.

I'm an avid programmer, but I don't want to spend the time building a
computer from scratch. Even with PNP, It's just not worth my time to
fiddle with plugs and installing drivers. I will upgrade my system
periodically, with a new HD, CD, or extra ram, and my peripherials, but if
I'm gonna upgrade the processor, I'll usually just buy a new box from
Compaq, Dell, or Gateway. I like the warm feeling of a warntee. :)

I worked as a computer tech, and I enjoyed it somewhat, but now I just
don't want to mess with it.

> >Program prices / 10 makes sense. I mean, take a simple application
> >(multiplier 1, maybe a word-processor) give it a decent UI and features
> >(rating 3 say) and it suddenly becomes a (3^2 x 1 x 100nY) 900nY piece
of
> >software. That's just not reasonable, 90nY is probably about the right
> >place.
>
> No, it's not reasonable, but $400 or so for MS Office isn't reasonable
> either now is it?

I don't know. I'm kind of divided on the issue. On one hand, I love free
software, and everything I've done so far, I probably would have done for
free. On the other hand, it is a lot of work to make something like MS
office and, if people want to get paid, they have that right. Maybe $400
isn't too much, you do get 3-5 apps with a measureable level in
intregration and they mesh well with your OS.

> Sure, he may not write ever
> single little utility he uses, but most of that stuff is probably going
to
> be slightly more legit (Read/Write, Browse, etc.) or modified versions of
> commonly used software and diagnostics (Analyze, possibly various
versions
> of Encrypt).

Most utilities don't go anywhere near legit. Legit users don't have to
make tests for stuff they do. [Encryption is an exception, and
interrogation operations are as well.] most utilities are there only to
fool the system into doing stuff it shouldn't by exploiting security holes.

> Really, what sort of person is going to be out
> there cracking with off-the-shelf software? Or even black market
commercial
> software?

Even now, you are starting to see virus creator software running through
the hacker community, and I see the trend increasing. Almost all hackers
freely deseminate their attack schemes, so others can use it, and in the
future I'm sure we'll see larger, more complete programs that are capable
of gaining opening the door into systems for people that use them.

Sure, the software IS from hackers, so maybe you shouldn't trust it, but
that's why FASA game us the rules for analyzing software you buy. If you
don't, it may come back and bite you.

But, the time savings can be very substantial, and there is some degree of
"honor among hackers". I definately see deckers (from the shadows to the
corp-sec back to the script kiddies) using software written by others to
hack.

> The high level programs thusly are either created custom by the
> decker or one of their contacts or are something really hot and likely
> stolen from the corps, government, or a really, really pissed off decker.

Maybe or they could just be the work of a Matrix gang / Hacker enclave that
wants some money for their work. Plus, there's a lot of hot programmers
and security analyists that don't have the balls to really run up against
IC. They can create very effective software, and make good money selling
to the people that don't value their life either to stay on the good side
of black IC.

> Sadly I don't think anyone else wants to implement a logarithmic software
> pricing scheme...

For most of the poeple on this list, I don't think logarithms would be an
issue, but for published materials, I think you'll have to restrict your
operations to addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, square
roots, and integral expoentiaion, plus step functions.

> >I might buy
> >'deck/'term prices being slashed by 5 or maybe even 10, but 25 seems
like
> >taking it too far.

> I would again cut prices quite a bit on hardware as well. Looking at
things
> as a modern-day geek I expect that the good deckers are likely to build
> their decks far more often than buying them with the only exceptions
being
> the novices and dedicated script kiddies.

Maybe, maybe not. The hacker/computer computity isn't as homogenous as
most people think. I can think of at least 6 different categories: gamerz,
programmerz, hardware geex, hackerz, crackerz, and phreex. Some people
fall into more than one of these, and most hackerz and crackerz at least
nominal programmerz.

Programmers will produce most of your open-source software but may or may
not have any interest in invading any computer.
Crackers think all programs are free and specialize in generating CD-keys
and disabling protections or ads, they focus more on the method than
writing a good program to do it but they know enough programming to turn
their method into a perl/shell script or C-code snippet.
Hardware geeks produce things like 400 MHz cips running at 950 MHz, or a
beowulf cluster of 386-66s that outperforms SGI machines.
Gamerz are the lowest form of geek, but it offers a good entry-way: trying
to run a game without the CD can get you interested and teach you a few
things about cracking; Quake-C and Ut customization can get you started
down the path of the programmer; and an enless obsession with framerate can
easily lead you into hardware geek land.
Hackers are out to expose security issues in software, and possibly exploit
them. They probably as much programming as crackers.
Freakers (or just Freaks) concentrate on the intracacity of the telephone
system and know how to dial military numbers, or get free long distance, or
even have an illicit conversation over an open line without ever knowing
the other parties phone number.

[No none of these terms are "official" and someone much more into the
underground of computing might have better terms or want to clarify things
but this gives you a rough idea.]

I'm a programmer. I don't build my own box, I don't even like compiling my
own kernel (but OH the benefits; if you didn't compile your own kernel, you
aren't getting all you can out of linux). I wouldn't know the first thing
to do to try and break a CD-key, 'cept to maybe break out a debugger and
find the validation code. I'm not a security expert, and I'm really not
the good at games. I now know what tools I need to open a phone box, but
it would take a lot of time on alt.2600 for me to be confident enough to
try and make a call from one, much less do something I can't more easily do
inside my house.

Even if you don't agree with my assessment of the "computer world" just
think about TIME issues. More often then not, the time it takes to make a
deck and programms themselves it not acceptable to the people that want to
use the deck and software. The people that build the decks and write the
programs either do it AS either source of income, or aren't in any type of
hurry.

> >And what are you considerations for DIY programmers?

> I'd probably be more likely to increase the rating somehow. Probably
rather
> low-level stuff is on the streets and thus you need to code it yourself
to
> get anything worthwhile. Think about it... 72 hours to write code worth
$90
> on the street isn't really that much time at all.

Not true, the same 72 hours of contract or salaried work will gross you
anything from $720 to $3600.

Experienced programmers are going to cut down that time anyway, so 72 hours
is probably not a good estimate, but anything more than price / 5 hours is
to long.

> Don't have the Matrix on
> hand, but maybe you can skimp on the debugging a bit and drastically cut
> down on that time ("Bah! It compiles and that's damn well good
enough...")
> considering that debugging is usually about 2/3 of the total time spent
on
> coding anything.

Bug-ridden option is way to simulate this, but I think there are better
ways.

Da Twink Daddy
datwinkdaddy@*******.com
ICQ# 514984
Message no. 9
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Adam)
Subject: Matrix Gear Questions and Gripes
Date: Thu Jun 13 19:30:00 2002
> >To the best of my knowledge, since FASA didn't use the rules, the rights
> to
> >them are mine... However, with the overhaul of the deck construction
rules
> >for Matrix, the host construction rules would also need to be updated --
> they
> >were written to parallel the VR2.0 deck construction rules.
>
> If you don't mind, send them to me as is. I own VR2 as well, and can do
> the conversion myself.

Please send them to me, also !
I always appreciate a good house rule.

> You really produce a lot of good optional/house rules, Gurth. You should
> probably submit more of them to TSS. I love custom lifestyles!

I second that :)))

>SmilingBandit<

Further Reading

If you enjoyed reading about Matrix Gear Questions and Gripes, you may also be interested in:

Disclaimer

These messages were posted a long time ago on a mailing list far, far away. The copyright to their contents probably lies with the original authors of the individual messages, but since they were published in an electronic forum that anyone could subscribe to, and the logs were available to subscribers and most likely non-subscribers as well, it's felt that re-publishing them here is a kind of public service.

Thwap!