[Archi]

My buddies and I have recently gotten back into shadowrun. We're old vets of 3e and 2e (and even 1e!), but 4e is still pretty new to us.

My question is this:

Why would you ever put a commlink on/in your gun/weapon? We've been poring over the arsenal book and the 20th anniversary rule book, and i've found examples of things you can do to a wepon that has a commlink, basically hacking it and disabling it, but all the examples I've read are negative.

Is there an upside to embedding a commlink in your gun/weapon?

Thanks in advance and sorry if this was discussed in another thread.

Archi

[Medicineman]

Why would you ever put a commlink on/in your gun/weapon?

Ingame : Thats the Power of Advertising from Ares Arms
Outgame : Don't, Its a stupid Idea !

He who Dances in & out of game
Medicineman

[Railstar]

The way I understand it, weapons and cyberware don't have full commlinks in them (they can't run outside programs or store data), they usually have some combination of an RFID tag (which is basically just a digital name-badge) and a small dedicated microprocessor that handles the guns functions so that you can command it with a wireless smartlink or check the status of the barrel, ammo, or whatever.

Someone wanting to hack your gun directly would have to be within a couple of meters of you because the signal rating on those kinds of peripheral devices are so low.  (cyberware and intra-pan devices, signal rating 0, SR4A pg. 222).  The RFID tag could be hacked from further away (40 meters, SR4A pg 222.) but why would anyone bother to hack your gun's name tag other than to prank you?

I'd say the safest ways to secure your wireless enabled weapons is to make them slaved to your PAN (Unwired sourcebook), or get a cyber safety (Arsenal sourcebook).  Both methods basically make your gun harder to hack (or totally unhackable) and still allow you the benefits of using AR to control and monitor the weapon's functions.

As with all things in the wireless world of 2072, make sure your personal commlink has a good firewall, analyze program and maybe an IC loaded if you're extra paranoid.  Run in hidden mode when on a job, and when things get scary, reboot the commlink at the first sign of hacking.

[CanRay]

If you want to have your Weapon as central to your PAN, it does make sense.  Rather than a Smartphone-sized item that's easily lost, you have an assault rifle or such that you've been trained to never be without and is harder to lose.  Giving it a personality will also give you someone to talk to that you want to, rather than the drekheads that are on your team. 

Also, a lot of newer infantry weapons coming out on the market for military and security units have 'Links integrated into a weapon in order to have an efficient TacNet going at all times.  It also monitors your fire control, even if the weapon doesn't have a smartlink, and can tell a CO when a unit is starting to get low on ammo, is wasting ammo, is under attack, and so on.  The flipside, of course, is that you're always emitting a radio freq, which can be tracked or jammed.  Or you're in a dead zone as your 5,000¥ retransmission blimp drone was shot down by some local guy holding a 750¥ knock-off Surface-to-Air Missile who just fades back into the jungle/desert/city.

Marketing gimmick in my mind.

[Archi]

thanks for the responses!

Very helpful, just the info i was looking for.

thanks again, guys.

[WellSpokenRunner]

I've always though the all the hacking examples were how to mess with a smart linked gun, not even a full comlinked gun.  Reading Arsenal, I get the idea that adding the full suite of "brains" for your gun are for people who wants essentially gun drones.  (Hmm a pair of Ares Predators flying around me controlled by murder thoughts does have a nice ring to it.)

[Blue_Lion]

I think there is a example of a bad gun com and a good one in the runners black book. One of the guns has a rating 6/6 6/6 comlink and says it provideds the basis of a squads network. Think the idea was to use it as nexus for your group. They can have full comlinks on them a crappy one is a bad idea but a good one could be running ice and agents to attack hackers.

Also the in reaged com is so your weapon can run a personalty program. Imagine a sniper who has his rifle run the atmophic caculations for him and tells him how to make the shot as say Mr Rodgers.

[CanRay]

"Can you say 'Red Mist', I knew you could."

[Mäx]

Heh, have been thinking of making a hacker/sniper who uses Ogre Hammer for sniping and it's internal 6/6/6/6 commlink for hacking.
IMO thats pretty well spend 38k nuyen and a single resricted gear quality.

[Blue_Lion]

Heh, have been thinking of making a hacker/sniper who uses Ogre Hammer for sniping and it's internal 6/6/6/6 commlink for hacking.
IMO thats pretty well spend 38k nuyen and a single resricted gear quality.

Be damn hard to hide a austalt cannon, not to mention the soun of it getting shot. Be a quick way to get the fuzz on you if you is it in town verry much.

[Crash_00]

Another, often overlooked, way to get a commlink with rating 6 hardware at character creation is to snag up military armor with restricted gear and use the rules for upgrading it given in the military helmet section (+8500 for Response/Signal of 6). Expensive, but it's great for characters that need the extra protection.

[Makki]

A weapon with an integrated commlink is much easier to (re-)distribute among soldiers. One less piece of equipment to be taken care of. I can think of several more reason, but none of them is for runners.

[CanRay]

Exactly.  It makes sense for a Military/Security unit, but it makes the weapon less desirable to Shadowrunners.

Which, actually, is a bonus in and of itself from the point of view of the manufacturers and buyers.  If the Commlink is going to start screaming "BLOODY MURDERER!!!" every time it's picked up by someone not in the same Squad/Platoon/Company (Depending on it's programming), it's not likely to be stolen/fall off the back of a truck/sold on the black market.

[_Pax_]

Why would you ever put a commlink on/in your gun/weapon? We've been poring over the arsenal book and the 20th anniversary rule book, and i've found examples of things you can do to a wepon that has a commlink, basically hacking it and disabling it, but all the examples I've read are negative.

  Hacking a commlink - a competently-put-together commlink anyway - is really not that easy.  I have a character designed and waiting for a campaign, who has a weapon commlink.

  First of all, it's a Cavalier Deputy revolver (with Melee Hardening, Personalised Grip, Internal Smartgun, Skinlink, and 2 levels of Customised Look).

  Then, it's also a Commlink with Response Response 5, Signal 3, System 5, and Firewall 6.  (It's a Novatech Airwave, running Vector Xim ... with maximum upgrades to everything but Signal).  Running on it is a rating 5 copy of Analyze.  Oh, and the 'link is optimised for Firewall.

  Any hacker wanting to get in to that will need to meet a threshold of 6, 9, or 12 (for a User, Security, or Admin level account).  To do muchof anything, they're going to need an Admin account.  Now, a threshold of 12 is going to take several (Complex) actions.  And n the meantime, my 'link gets to roll Firewall+Analyze to detect the attempt - and don't forget the Optimisation - against a threashold equal to the hacker's Stealth.  IOW, it gets to drop 12 dice, and it's threshold is going to be around 4 to 6 for most hackers.  Less, for kids and amateur wanna-be's.

  Once it detects the intrusion attempt, a Restricted Alert is triggered against that Access ID = hello, +4 bonus.  So the Firewall starts trying to disconnect the hacker from the 'link, now rolling 16 dice (against a threshold of the intruder's Hacking + Exploit,probably in the 8 to 10 rating).   Also, that bonus applies to rolls AGAINST the firewall, so if the hacker isn't already in, their threshold just got 4 dice bigger!

  And in the meantime, if it's a combat situation?  I've been shooting at the hacker the whole time. 

Is there an upside to embedding a commlink in your gun/weapon?

  No especially, no.  Except it's one less item to have to keep 'hold of.  That, and maybe RP reasons.

[Yogi]

Why would you ever put a commlink on/in your gun/weapon? We've been poring over the arsenal book and the 20th anniversary rule book, and i've found examples of things you can do to a wepon that has a commlink, basically hacking it and disabling it, but all the examples I've read are negative.

  Hacking a commlink - a competently-put-together commlink anyway - is really not that easy.  I have a character designed and waiting for a campaign, who has a weapon commlink.

  First of all, it's a Cavalier Deputy revolver (with Melee Hardening, Personalised Grip, Internal Smartgun, Skinlink, and 2 levels of Customised Look).

  Then, it's also a Commlink with Response Response 5, Signal 3, System 5, and Firewall 6.  (It's a Novatech Airwave, running Vector Xim ... with maximum upgrades to everything but Signal).  Running on it is a rating 5 copy of Analyze.  Oh, and the 'link is optimised for Firewall.

  Any hacker wanting to get in to that will need to meet a threshold of 6, 9, or 12 (for a User, Security, or Admin level account).  To do muchof anything, they're going to need an Admin account.  Now, a threshold of 12 is going to take several (Complex) actions.  And n the meantime, my 'link gets to roll Firewall+Analyze to detect the attempt - and don't forget the Optimisation - against a threashold equal to the hacker's Stealth.  IOW, it gets to drop 12 dice, and it's threshold is going to be around 4 to 6 for most hackers.  Less, for kids and amateur wanna-be's.

  Once it detects the intrusion attempt, a Restricted Alert is triggered against that Access ID = hello, +4 bonus.  So the Firewall starts trying to disconnect the hacker from the 'link, now rolling 16 dice (against a threshold of the intruder's Hacking + Exploit,probably in the 8 to 10 rating).   Also, that bonus applies to rolls AGAINST the firewall, so if the hacker isn't already in, their threshold just got 4 dice bigger!

  And in the meantime, if it's a combat situation?  I've been shooting at the hacker the whole time. 

Is there an upside to embedding a commlink in your gun/weapon?

  No especially, no.  Except it's one less item to have to keep 'hold of.  That, and maybe RP reasons.

What about running it in hidden mode with rating 5 Stealth program running?  It will be one more hurdle for the would be hacker to begin his/her attempts at getting into it.