| From: | TopCat <topcat@***.NET> |
|---|---|
| Subject: | Re: Runner's Attitudes |
| Date: | Fri, 4 Jul 1997 02:14:58 -0500 |
>On Thursday, July 03, 1997 18:39, TopCat[SMTP:topcat@***.NET] wrote:
>> >Just to make a point about how you get 'professional' runners as
>> >opposed to gutterpunks, I'm going to give an exemple of how a PC
>> >could be such a thing, drawn from my PCs
>> >Team leader: Ex-military, left because his team got the knobby
>> >purple shaft and were set up to die. Wanted for being AWOL and
>> >stealing Govt Property (a tactical computer.) Mercing would
>> >involve too much exposure. Hence, he disappears into the shadows.
>> So that's a character history. Let me guess, the guy plans things, wears
>> black, makes a lot of stealth successes and would still be seen if he
>> walked by a camera? Professional in attitude won't keep you from being seen.
>> Wearing day-glo wetlook leathers and running around screaming like an
>> idiot just makes it easier (I wouldn't consider such a person a shadowrunner,
>> I'd consider them dead). Wearing black still doesn't prevent you from being
>> noticed. So once again, your point would be?
>Nope. He doesn't walk in front of the camera in the first place. Not unless
>he *knows* that it has been neutralized. A camera is actually fairly easy
>to fool/spoof. Other sensors (motion/heat in particular) are much harder to
>beat. So he (and the rest of the team) doesn't. They go after the slag who
>is manning the sensor if they absolutely cannot go around it (or otherwise
>suppress whatever the sensor is reporting to.
Have you seen the camera? Do you know that there aren't others? Do you
know that there are no further security measures present? Is there only one
camera? Tough questions to have to answer on the fly, pray that you don't
get noticed while answering them...
Also, getting to the security center has to be perhaps the single most
difficult run imaginable to me. You have to get through everything from the
perimeter outside to the security center without setting off anything in
between. Impossible in my game, possible in some others...
>>>Exactly. Read the first section of Fields of Fire. TopCat apparently
>>>believes that *all* runners fit into the mold that Matador puts them in.
>>>Even Hatchetman (who is apparently a runner, and should know better,
>>>agrees with him.)
>> [I, of course, don't...]
>I apologize. My take on your comments (and everyone else's re-comments)
>made me think this.
Accepted if you accept mine for this later bit. You were merely agreeing
with someone who didn't know what he was talking about before I could
interject to clear the muddied waters and I got a bit defensive as a result.
>> Stealth, magic, and tech and a plan can only get you so far when the
>> degree of stealth, magic, and tech that the megacorps have is so far
beyond >> your runners abilities as to make them laughable. Can any system
be beaten?
>> Perhaps one part of it, but single-layer security is foolish. You
>> combine cameras with pressure sensors, motion sensors, physical security,
>> magical security, matrix security, building layout, fences, walls, locks,
>> doors, drones, and whatever else to create a security web which no-one can
>> get through without being detected. So what if a scientist is detected,
>> there's no reason to shoot him. But if nobody is supposed to be in Room 412
>> after 7pm and someone's there, then security takes effect. Most security
>> techniques now essentially become impenetrable when layered. In 205X
>> there's so much more to play with...
>So don't be in the room in a black-out period. Have a legitimate reason to
>be there. You are apparently thinking that the runners are going to beat
>their head against the brick wall of security. Why should they? I tell you
>three time: The human element is the most vulnerable element of a security
>system, and any security system MUST have it. If security is hair-trigger
>enough that any spoofing attempt will be detected, tickle it. Degrade the
>responses of who/whatever is responding to the security alert. (Calling up
>the ready-alert squad three nights running for a false alarm is going to
>tick them off.)
Security personnel know they have a job to do and they'll do it. If they
don't, that great corporate wallet they've been living off of for the past
however many years will suddenly shut on them and they'll be fired. Being
fired to most people isn't a good thing, but to literally be thrown out in
the street (lose your house and such) when you get fired is another. Also,
in some cases (Renraku, Mitsuhama, Fuchi, Shiawase, and other corps of that
sort) this means loss of face for one's self and one's family. Bad news all
around if you don't take your job seriously.
Corporate installation security isn't akin to retail security simply because
of how it's handled and viewed by the corporation or gov't that installed
it. Woneal has had many problems with this concept so far, and I dont think
he will get around to udnerstanding this. I'm pretty sure you've got it
down, at least it seems like you do, but I wanted to throw that in because
it seemed like a good place to do so.
Also, detection doesn't necessarily mean alarm. Security should *always*
detect, then it should act if there's something wrong. When I walk through
the hallways of a given corp or gov't facility, I'm noticed. If I'm
supposed to be there (visiting and with a worker or working there myself)
then nothing happens. If I'm not supposed to be there, then problems can
and have occured. If I was really trying to sneak in and deactivate
security, I (an anyone else) would have a hell of a time getting on the corp
grounds let alone doing anything after that. CorpSec goes into this in
great detail and does it better than I could here in a few long posts.
>I said it before, I'll say it again: No security is impenetrable. It is too
>bloody expensive, too bloody difficult, and too bloody annoying to the
>people who have to work around it.
It's a lot cheaper and easier, as well as less noticeable, than I ever
would've thought. Read through CorpSec and then think to yourself "how the
hell does anyone get through all this to the goodies?". I know that's what
I thought...
>> A good plan and a professional attitude is going to get you by that?
>Yep. And if a plan cannot be found in a reasonable time, I've had the team
>return their front money to the employer.
Now there's something that makes a great deal of sense. Every once in a
while I throw a suicide run at players just to see if they'll accept it or
if they'll look for something else or even stop the run if it gets too hot
for them. Mike, Mike, and Jason... you guys get that? ;)
>I resent that. I guess you would consider a voluntary extractee giving them
>inside aid "divine intervention," then. Or intra-corporation politics
>preventing effective response to a threat?
It all depends on how you view security. If you view security of a given
installation as being the only security force for the installation, then
intra-corporate politics and voluntary extractees won't help a whole lot as
they'll be their own entity within the installation. If you view every
division represented in the installation as having their own security, then
there could well be problems, though I can't think of a situation where that
might be the case.
Security will be totally separate (and in many ways, above) all other
departments of a given installation. It is their job to keep corporate
resources safe and make sure that things run smooth and sure around the
clock so the wishes of someone in another division will have to conform in
some ways to the practices of security. In simpler words, an inside guy
helps, but not a whole lot if there's security around.
> As someone else pointed out, a
>corporation is not a group mind (certain parts of Aztechnology
>probationarily excluded...) and does not always act as such. Classic
>examples of this in the SR world would be a run where one part of Fuchi
>(Nakatomi) commissions a run against another (Villiers) - a situation where
>the security officers' loyalties will most certainly be strained.
An interesting situation and something that could often be found no doubt.
However, security officer's loyalties will rarely, if ever, find themselves
strained. Most of this is due to paranoia: any Villers site will have
Villiers security and any Nakatomi site will have Nakatomi security. They
wouldn't even think of letting one of their rivals place troops at their
door. In the big, happy megacoporate picture, they all wear the same Fuchi
uniform.
--
Bob Ooton
topcat@***.net
