[All4BigGuns]

Yeah, I know it doesn't, I only mentioned it because someone else brought it up, and I wanted to get that thought out before I forgot.

[RHat]

Limited? That's a lot more than I allow to happen. Like I've said, all I'll allow is "Do you wish to engage passive diagnostic? <Y/N>"

I'm aware of that.

As for you, Falconer:  Noone's talking about making combat-primary characters anything less than the straight up best combat characters by a wide margin which we'll call "combat dominant".  But there's a very large gap between "combat dominant" and "not combat effective".  A very large gap.  And somewhere in that gap is a range of "combat effective, but not combat dominant". 

[All4BigGuns]

And to be "combat effective", one should have to invest in *gasp* combat skills. If they don't want to do that, then tough cookies.

[RHat]

And to be "combat effective", one should have to invest in *gasp* combat skills. If they don't want to do that, then tough cookies.

Nope.  Characters who are not secondary combat characters still need to be combat effective.  Characters who, due to investing in combat skills, are secondary combat characters should probably be between the combat effective and combat dominant points.

[All4BigGuns]

And to be "combat effective", one should have to invest in *gasp* combat skills. If they don't want to do that, then tough cookies.

Nope.  Characters who are not secondary combat characters still need to be combat effective.  Characters who, due to investing in combat skills, are secondary combat characters should probably be between the combat effective and combat dominant points.

No. If a character hasn't invested in the skills for combat, then they should not be able to be effective in combat. Period. If the player doesn't want to buy those skills, then they'll just have to deal with the fact that they're not going to be good when a fight rolls around. If someone suggested that the Street Sam should be just as effective in the Matrix without buying into the hacking skills, I seriously doubt that you'd agree with that. It is no different at all.

[RHat]

And to be "combat effective", one should have to invest in *gasp* combat skills. If they don't want to do that, then tough cookies.

Nope.  Characters who are not secondary combat characters still need to be combat effective.  Characters who, due to investing in combat skills, are secondary combat characters should probably be between the combat effective and combat dominant points.

No. If a character hasn't invested in the skills for combat, then they should not be able to be effective in combat. Period. If the player doesn't want to buy those skills, then they'll just have to deal with the fact that they're not going to be good when a fight rolls around. If someone suggested that the Street Sam should be just as effective in the Matrix without buying into the hacking skills, I seriously doubt that you'd agree with that. It is no different at all.

...  And now I point you to the previous argument regarding why all characters should be able to contribute to combat.

[Mara]

Half the cases of cyberhacking I've seen have been completely BS as well.   A hacker who's not in line of sight attacking someone using the sam's arm...   How?  The arm is *NOT* a drone... it doesn't have sensors of it's own...  it doesn't know where to point let alone swing the katana.   Even more to the point... the 'body' is a balanced whole...  one arm by itself does not make for a strong attack.

And, frankly, I would never expect a hacker to do that. I would expect Hackers to be able to do things like AR Spam someone, or
hack their PAN and make a smartgun eject the clip through spoofing a command to it through the PAN. Remember that we no longer
have Smartlinks requiring a partial sim-rig and induction pads in the hand. Instead, they send their info to the PAN, which sends it to the
Smartlink glasses or implant. If I were to hack a cyberarm, it would be to put it into diagnostic mode, not to do some sort of fancy thing
with it like shoot someone else.

That said, my Street Sams always have Black IC on their commlink that their combat stuff goes through, and have that in wireless mode, skinlinked, with the wireless transmitter removed(not just disabled..but physically removed). Their second and third commlinks
are for the identity broadcasting, bank account using, etc. Heck, sometimes, I still have a Datajack and a fiber optic cable to my guns on a street sam. It might be retro, but...try and hack it...

[All4BigGuns]

Half the cases of cyberhacking I've seen have been completely BS as well.   A hacker who's not in line of sight attacking someone using the sam's arm...   How?  The arm is *NOT* a drone... it doesn't have sensors of it's own...  it doesn't know where to point let alone swing the katana.   Even more to the point... the 'body' is a balanced whole...  one arm by itself does not make for a strong attack.

And, frankly, I would never expect a hacker to do that. I would expect Hackers to be able to do things like AR Spam someone, or
hack their PAN and make a smartgun eject the clip through spoofing a command to it through the PAN. Remember that we no longer
have Smartlinks requiring a partial sim-rig and induction pads in the hand. Instead, they send their info to the PAN, which sends it to the
Smartlink glasses or implant. If I were to hack a cyberarm, it would be to put it into diagnostic mode, not to do some sort of fancy thing
with it like shoot someone else.

That said, my Street Sams always have Black IC on their commlink that their combat stuff goes through, and have that in wireless mode, skinlinked, with the wireless transmitter removed(not just disabled..but physically removed). Their second and third commlinks
are for the identity broadcasting, bank account using, etc. Heck, sometimes, I still have a Datajack and a fiber optic cable to my guns on a street sam. It might be retro, but...try and hack it...

You're talking about hacking guns and other peripheral things like that. We're not saying to disallow those things. Get into the network and go into the gun, contacts, glasses, earbuds, etc. and fine do your thing, but to make cyber-ware (one of the key aspects of a Street Sam character) a massive, gaping vulnerability like that is just ridiculous.

[Mara]

However, I can see hacking a cyberarm left open and putting it into "System Diagnostic Mode", which would, effectively,
shut it off while it was running those diagnostics, as viable, as well. Or hacking the datafeed to someone's cyber-eyes.
AR Spamming someone with cyber-eyes is hacking their eyes. If they have their cyberware linked up to their PAN for
ease of diagnostics, updates, etc, that provides a backdoor into the cyberware. Move-by-wire, as it has a skillwire system,
means that I could upload a personality program into their commlink, and then tell the MBW to load it up. Since your cybereyes
have a Eye Recording unit, and, likely, are sending that data to your commlink, I can hack the commlink, and force it to replay the
last x number of seconds in a loop to your eyes. Frankly, there is so much you can do that is why a street sam NEEDS to protect
their commlink that their combat data goes through. Once someone gets into that, the street sam is just as vulnerable as if someone
shot him.

[All4BigGuns]

However, I can see hacking a cyberarm left open and putting it into "System Diagnostic Mode", which would, effectively,
shut it off while it was running those diagnostics, as viable, as well. Or hacking the datafeed to someone's cyber-eyes.
AR Spamming someone with cyber-eyes is hacking their eyes. If they have their cyberware linked up to their PAN for
ease of diagnostics, updates, etc, that provides a backdoor into the cyberware. Move-by-wire, as it has a skillwire system,
means that I could upload a personality program into their commlink, and then tell the MBW to load it up. Since your cybereyes
have a Eye Recording unit, and, likely, are sending that data to your commlink, I can hack the commlink, and force it to replay the
last x number of seconds in a loop to your eyes. Frankly, there is so much you can do that is why a street sam NEEDS to protect
their commlink that their combat data goes through. Once someone gets into that, the street sam is just as vulnerable as if someone
shot him.

That is completely ridiculous. I can't believe I'm saying this, but Falconer is right. In allowing that kind of crap, you might as well put every Street Sam at the full mercy of everything else too because if you don't those playing those other character types are going to be butt-hurt that they "can't be effective" in the same manner.

[RHat]

"At the mercy" implies there's nothing they can do to prevent it.  Wholly inaccurate.

[All4BigGuns]

"At the mercy" implies there's nothing they can do to prevent it.  Wholly inaccurate.

With all sorts of tedious, micro-management crap that shouldn't be necessary in order to have fun playing one's character. Not to mention that if you fail to think of the tiniest thing (even if the character would think of it), you're right back at square one and screwed by every hacker you come across.

[RHat]

"At the mercy" implies there's nothing they can do to prevent it.  Wholly inaccurate.

With all sorts of tedious, micro-management crap that shouldn't be necessary in order to have fun playing one's character. Not to mention that if you fail to think of the tiniest thing (even if the character would think of it), you're right back at square one and screwed by every hacker you come across.

Declare everything slaved, get a decent commlink (implant it, even), make sure you have a strong firewall, get good Analyze, Command, and Purge, grab a couple extra skills, done.

[Mara]

"At the mercy" implies there's nothing they can do to prevent it.  Wholly inaccurate.

With all sorts of tedious, micro-management crap that shouldn't be necessary in order to have fun playing one's character. Not to mention that if you fail to think of the tiniest thing (even if the character would think of it), you're right back at square one and screwed by every hacker you come across.

How many commlinks do your characters carry, A4BG? 1, 2, or 3? It is not "tedious micromanagement" to do what I do: "This is my
combat link. All stuff from my ware goes here. It is skin-linked, and has its wireless removed." That is all a smart runner need to do.
Now, Shadowrun Darwin Award Winners? They can do with one commlink, with everything running through it...just like they can
make a whirlpool by sticking an outboard motor in an above ground swimming pool. Nothing is stopping them, and it has about
the same survivability.

[Novocrane]

Half the cases of cyberhacking I've seen have been completely BS as well.   A hacker who's not in line of sight attacking someone using the sam's arm...   How?  The arm is *NOT* a drone... it doesn't have sensors of it's own...  it doesn't know where to point let alone swing the katana.   Even more to the point... the 'body' is a balanced whole...  one arm by itself does not make for a strong attack.

Even without sensors, there's a general physical shape that humans and metahumans conform to, which most cyberarms won't buck. Those assumptions help. I could see some interesting results from attempting to get raptor cyberlegs to move like normal legs, though.

Also, I find the hyperbole involved a bit much. "Massive, gaping vulnerability"? Take precautions, like you would for every other likely event that will kill or harm you.

It's already canon that security clearance personnel are likely to shut off their cyber's wireless capability / PAN connections when not in a corp-cleared clean wifi zone, while using a decent firewall on everything not slaved.