| From: | "T.O.G. (Girardot, David)" <GIRARDOT@********> |
|---|---|
| Subject: | More Questions: Decking, Spells |
| Date: | Sat, 7 Mar 92 04:22:34 est |
in for good measure) character. I took Tech 3 -- now, this would
give $400k or 50 force points of spells. Since the character
wanted both, I ruled he'd get the cash, but only 20 force points
of spells. Whaddya think?
2.What th' heck does a program carrier do?
3.On loading times for decker utilities: The one section on decking
seems to imply that one can simply load all ones utilities *before*
one even jacks-in -- thus circumventing (effectively) the load speed
of the deck. I.E. the lower prices of some decks are in part
justified by their snail's-pace load speeds. If you can load up
before you jack in, then there is nothing stopping a decker
from buying a cheapie deck with tons of extra memory and storage,
and also tons of rating 6-9 utilities that he can basically load
up at his leisure.
My first instinct was to limit the deck to a number of programs
storable in memory to the persona rating of the deck. I.E.,
the Fuchi-4 could handle 6 utilities. Well, even I know that's
a kludge. Isn't memory supposed to be the limiting factor?
Then I thought, "Okay, you can't load any utils before you jack
in, cause ... cause ... cause the deck is only powered up when
you jack in, yeah! Well, ok, there is some battery-backed
memory -- kinda analogous to CMOS ram on our computers -- say,
10% of total memory ... that can hold utilities pretty much
indefinitely." Well, I sort of like this solution better.
The Decker/Mage has 500mp of memory, so he's got 50mp of
battery backed memory that he can keep utils in basically
all the time...
Waitaminute... most *good* utils are at least 30-60mp long --
and at 20mp/turn, that's quite a while to hang-around in
a potentially dangerous area of a matrix waitin' for your
goodies to load. Hmm. Well, to be honest, I am tempted to
just play around with load times. C'mon folx, todays hard-
drives have *mili-second* access times. We're talkin'
multiple *turns* just to load a medium sized utility? Please!
Seems to me that two things ought to be done:
1). Limit Memory and Storage. Decks should have
a total limit to both, say, 3 times the normal amount.
Secondly, it ought to cost about twice as much.
10% of this memory is battery backed indefinitely.
The rest is powered up only while the deck is jacked
in. That means, also, that if a deck is crashed
before items in memory can be saved to storage, it
is lost after the crash.
UPS's (Uninterupptible Power Supplies) should be
available to the decks. But they should cost, and
at best offer only, say, about 6 hours of power.
And, they can be exploded by sneaky IC ... (hehe)
2). Change Load times to something reasonable. At
*most* a program load should take an action or three.
Only one program can be loaded at a time, and, except
for battery-backed memory or UPS memory, can only be
loaded into a deck that is jacked in.
Also, it takes an action to delete a program already
in memory.
Hey, a new form of IC... Paisley -- it zaps the deck
with a deluge of info -- fills up all the memory,
even over-writing utilities in storage ... or
Silver, like paisley, but has a delayed effect. Stores
itself in battery-backed memory as a sort of virus
and then enacts Trace and other nasty IC manuvers
whenever the hapless decker hacks in again... hehe,
again.
3.Spell Concentration: As far as buying skills goes, consider
a mage buying... He spends 4 on Sorcery. If he specializes
in spellcasting, he's at 5, right -- but only in a particular
category. Oops, that should be concentrates in, rather. So
then can he specialize in a particular spell for a rating of 6?
4.What's the difference between the "treat wounds" and "heal wounds"
besides the fact that the drain code for the "treat" spells is
lower?
By the way, I have the Mage/Decker (more or less) online, so if anyone
wants a copy...
Later.
--David
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-*-
"For after all, as great scientists have said and as all children
know, it is above all by the imagination that we achieve perception,
and compassion, and hope." --Ursula K. LeGuin
