Disclaimer: In my first
Post-Kill Code House Rule post, I stated that I will
mostly post stuff that a. isnīt meant to fundamentally change everything about the Matrix gameplay and b. is not supposed to have some kind of "The official rules are terrible, this is so much better!"-Vibe. This one is kinda borderlining here, because it affects something that is, IMO still not explained very well and (provided that I interpreted the rules correctly) quite counterintuitive and too restrictive. Oh, and it also introduces two new keyords, which allows for some perks to tinker around with it.
Detection RangeThere it is, our first new keyword. What does it mean? Itīs that arbitrary radius of 100 Meters* mentioned in the Core Rules in which you automatically detect any Icon thatīs not running silently. Itīs also the range in which you can try to determine if hidden Icons are nearby. And (this is not RAW, but silently assumed by many players) it is the range in which you really donīt need to trace an icon, because you already have a good idea on its phsysical location by looking at the AR overlay. Henceforth, these 100 Meters shall be named
Detection Range.
The Center of your Detection Range, your
Viewport, is the device your persona is running on. It sometimes may look like your Persona is wandering around the Matrix when doing stuff, but this as just a visual Metaphor: So far, the only way to move the center of your detection range or
POV is to move this device. (Note that all of this is already quite contested:
https://forums.shadowruntabletop.com/index.php?topic=28037.msg505938;topicseen#msg505938 If Iīm getting this wrong, Iīm happy about any corrections or annotations, especially when supported by rules texts or other kind of authority
)
Now that we defined the problem space: Letīs change that! I think it would be good idea to let Matrix users actually "wander" around the Matrix, tapping in on new location by shifting their Viewport to other places. The following Action is kinda inspired by
Watchdogs (love it or hate it), where you can "jump" from device to device after hacking them.
Complex Action: Shift/Multiply ViewportTarget: Device. Needs 3 Marks on the Target.
You shift or multiply your Viewport to another device to percieve the Matrix as if your Persona was running on it. If it is a device you own (or have the permission of the owner), no test is needed, only the Marks. Else, you have to succeed in a Electronic Warfare + Logic [Data Processing] VS Intuition + Firewall Test. You can use the new viewport until you leave the Matrix or until you shift to another device.
Note that you canīt use this on a device that is running another persona. I you choose to multiply your viewport, you can monitor as many viewports as you like. However, you incur a -2 Dice Pool Modificator per additional viewport after the first to all your Actions because of the distraction. Note that you canīt use this Action inside a host and that you automatically shift back to your original viewport if the target enters a host or leaves the Matrix. Also note that the shifted viewport doesnīt affect noise, tracing attempts or, in fact, anything else beyond what you can percieve in the Matrix.
Example 1: Paranoid Polly is waking up in the middle of the night, dead certain that thereīs a Mitsuhama Kill Team just outside of her appartment. While she hastily gears up, she decides that she needs Matrix support and calls up her friend H0ward the Hacker. Polly may be paranoid, but she trusts H0ward, so she also invites him for 3 Marks and gives him all the permissions needed to help her out of this mess. H0ward uses the Marks to shift his Viewport to Pollys commlink. He can now spot all the devices in a 100 Meter radius around her that are not running silently. However, IF there really was a Kill Team, they will probably have their equipment running silently, so H0ward uses Matrix Perception to determine if there are PANs running silently in Pollys detection range. He finds nothing, and grumpily tells Polly to go to sleep again.
Example 2: Later, H0ward is out an on run and tries to get a better view on the digital Infrastrukture of a small Horizon outlet. Scanning his way through all the wireless devices inside the building would be tedious, but what if he can use a spy? In a little Cafe 200 Meters down the street, he managed to hack the commlink of an unsuspecting Horizon employee on a break for 3 Marks. Now he returns to work. H0ward rolls Electronic Warfare + Logic [Data Processing] against Intuition + Firewall of the employee to shift his viewport to the marked Commlink. He suceeds, and as the employee approaches the building, H0ward starts to map out the wireless devices inside the building.
*ACKCHYUALLY itīs not
that arbitrary: Itīs also the range after which the first noise penalties emerge