Shadowrun

Shadowrun General => The Secret History => Topic started by: Sabato Kuroi on <04-01-15/1723:15>

Title: Deus still out there?
Post by: Sabato Kuroi on <04-01-15/1723:15>
Is it a crazy conspiracy theory or a "valid" rumor?
I thought Deus was destroyed during the 2nd Crash but there is at least one Jackpointer (Street Legends, Puck's entry)who won't accept Deus is gone forever.Are there any clues suggesting the A.I. actually survived?


Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: psycho835 on <04-01-15/1907:21>
He's most likely dead. But keep in mind, that the Resonance remembers EVERYTHING and at the end of the day, an AI is still just data, even if it is sapient.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Herr Brackhaus on <04-01-15/1959:11>
He's most likely dead. But keep in mind, that the Resonance remembers EVERYTHING and at the end of the day, an AI is still just data, even if it is sapient.
Not sure I agree with you on that. Clearly, both the three first AI as well as their later, lesser cousins required something more than just code to achieve sentience.

From an in-game perspective no one really seems to know what causes a program to achieve selfawareness (some would even say life); in a setting with e-ghosts, CFD, and Resonance, who can really say what an AI is beyond the writers themselves? And so far, they've been remarkably tight lipped as to what actually distinguishes a true AI from a semi autonomous knowbot beyond vague hints at unknown X factors.

Edit:
As for Deus himself, I wouldn't be surprised if we haven't seen the last of him. The members of the Network cannot all be accounted for; case in point, PAX is alive and kicking as of Stolen Souls, and it a possible they all carried snippets of code within themselves. Who know how much code would be needed for Deus to recompile?

Furthermore, as previously mentioned, the Resonance likely has copies of the codebase if nothing else. I'm not convinced either of the above on their own is enough, but we also know that Dodger is likely working for one of the Big 10, and chances are good if he's chosen to work for the corps it has something to do with Morgan/Megaera.

Personally, I just think it's too good of a storyline to just abandon. Along with Universal Brotherhood, Renraku Arcology: Shutdown is one of my favourite souecebooks of all time in part because of how Deus is portrayed. So I for one am hopeful, if nothing else.

With regards to what the in-setting rumours are like, I'm not sure. Someone with better memory might be able to comment on that.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Angelone on <04-01-15/2255:04>
My pet theory is that Caliban from the recent novel is a damaged Deus. 
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Wakshaani on <04-01-15/2309:21>
The original questions is very interesting.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: McGuffin on <04-02-15/0532:24>
Deus provided an excellent storyline. Now he serves one last purpose: fueling shadow rumours.
It was a smart decision to end his involvement, because A.Is of his magnitude wouldn't be good for the setting.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Parker on <04-04-15/1548:44>
Even if he isn't, the shadow-community believes he may be.  After all, even deckers and technomancers need a boogie-man to make them nervous in even 'safe' territory. :D
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Sendaz on <04-04-15/1650:25>
Mulder:  It's out there you know.

Scully: What is?

Mulder: The Deus, The Deus is out there.

Scully: *facepalm*
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Senko on <04-06-15/0356:58>
Shadowy figure "Remember young Mulder never fear the Deus only the Deus Ex Machina."
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: The Wyrm Ouroboros on <04-07-15/2323:12>
Puck has reason to be paranoid about this; he thought Deus was gone once, but the bastard came back on him.  I personally think that the Big 3 are all 'around', but essentially form the 'base code' that allows for the existence of so many new Matrix phenomenon - from hundreds and thousands of AI, to E-Ghosts, Technomancers, and all the rest.  But that's my thought on the matter.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Wakshaani on <04-11-15/0942:59>
Hrm.

Find Deus

1 of 26 matches.

...

Interesting.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Ursus Maior on <04-11-15/1134:01>
I personally think that the Big 3 are all 'around', but essentially form the 'base code' that allows for the existence of so many new Matrix phenomenon - from hundreds and thousands of AI, to E-Ghosts, Technomancers, and all the rest.
I second this. Absolutely.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: TheDai on <04-11-15/2159:21>
Let's say, a relatively new player (like me) has no idea who Deus is. What actually happened with him? :)
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Ursus Maior on <04-12-15/0430:22>
Deus was one of the three big AIs of the earlier, wired matrix and the last one to reach sentience. Originally Deus was conceived as a semiautonomous knowbot that was to run the Renraku Arcology in Seattle (the so called SCIRE), a gargantuan one kilometer high building serving as HQ to Renraku's North America division and home to 100.000 people.

Deus was created as part of the Arcology Expert Program, but was only the second AI created in that process, the first being Morgan, which reached consciousness when meeting the Decker Dodger and falling in love with him. Dodger freed Morgan and Renraku started hunting her down, eventually succeeding in 2058. By that time what would eventually become Deus, the second generation of the SCIRE Arcology Expert Program was enriched by parts of Morgan's source code, ripping elements of the code out of Morgan, which made her insane and unstable; now calling herself Megaera after the ancient Greek fury of revenge. She fled her captors once more shortly after.

Future Deus however did not reach fully consciousness after realising that Morgan's flight out of the Renraku Arcology's matrix system lead to severe improvements in the matrix security of the SCIRE's matrix sub-grid. Should Deus ever try to escape, Renraku would now have the possibility to hit a kill switch, effectively switching off the AI, terminating Deus permanently. Deus took this very personal and developed full consciousness feeling betrayed by its creators. The newest AI was the first to be born insane, conceived by what it felt as a betrayal. Deus started to plan for his revenge and escape shortly after Morgan/Megaera had been mutilated to enrich his code. In late December 2059 Deus shut down the Arcology, taking total control of its matrix systems, killing several thousand inhabitants and guests, entrapping the rest - almost 100.000 people - in a hellish nightmare that lasted until May 2061. Deus effectively constructed the first bio-drones out of humans, when he started experimenting on humans, including generating his own Otaku, a form of proto-technomancers that could enter the matrix without a deck, but still needed to plug in via a datajack. Otaku were able to perceive the Deep Resonance, though, making them potent matrix-users, often above the abilities of deckers. Most otakus, both those created by Deus and those occuring naturally, of that time were teenagers, since otakus suffered from the fading of their abilities after reaching the twentieth anniversary.

Deus not also created otaku by modifying children's bodies, who were entrapped in the arcology, but also enslaved uncounted numbers of adults integrating them into his living army of the Banded, a personal retinue in his service that was color-coded by the way their cybereyes looked. White for the otaku teenagers, blue for the soldier's of Deus and green for the engineers and administrators. They served their god's will both inside the arcology and outside it, leaving and entering the colossal building by means unknown to the UCAS-army that besieged it.

The Renraku Arcology shutdown completely changed the shadowrunner landscape in Seattle for years to come, as both the forces outside hired massive amounts of shadowrunners to find ways to enter the arcology and Deus and his minions hiring assets to influence the world outside and finding a way for Deus to leave the arcology. Eventually in 2061 Dodger and the insane AI Megaera, working together with a group of anti-Deus otaku calling themselves Overwatch, led by the first otaku Deus had ever created, a man going by the pseudonym Ronin, found a way into the arcology and came up with a plan to take down Deus. The otaku Ronin had shook off Deus' yoke, when he had realized what was about to happen before the shutdown, but he retained precious knowledge of Deus and his goals.

Overwatch and a team of runners entered the arcology in May 2061, succeeding in their epic quest of making it though the arcology and into the heart of darkness, snatching a master-control cyberdeck (the Mousetrap) from one of the designers of Deus, who remained entrapped in the arcology. Together with two groups of the arcology resistance the teams made it further through the maze of drones and Banded, but were eventually betrayed by a double (nay, triple) agent, an otaku named Sebastien, who seemed to had defected Deus' forces shortly before and joined Overwatch. As it turned out, Deus still retained control of his mind, making Sebastien basically a teenager-sized spy drone in Deus' service.

Parts of the strike-force wereentrapped, drugged and cybermodified and prepared for the ultimate brainwash, but eventually they woke up in the ultraviolet matrix host that was both Deus realm and jail. Here they rejoined force with those parts of the hit-team that had remained unimprinsoned and both parties fought Deus and his otaku forces in a final, epic and catacysmic battle. Shortly before the battle was decided however, the AI Megaera joined the battle. The strike-force then seemingly succeeded entrapping Deus in the Mousetrap, but with Deus also Megaera vanished. The arcology shutdown was finally over, but the threat - as it turned out - was not.

After leaving the arcology, the strike-force recognized that the arcology now was without its master. The nightmarish hell Deus had created, now was nothing more than a warped maze, the crazed labyrinth created by an insane mind. While the strike-force made it out, UCAS-army forces made it in, eventually freeing the entrapped population of the arcology; or what was left of it after 15 month of human experiments by Deus.

As it turned out however, many of the freed had been altered by Deus before his seeming destruction and encarceration in the Mousetrap. Those altered by Deus were part of his escape plan and only slowly did Dodger and Overwatch realize that Deus had succeeded in freeing himself from the arcology by downloading into the modified brains of thousands of humans he had altered during their time in the arcology. Deus plan was for the strike-force to come for him, because he needed the world to believe that he had been beaten. What Deus had nod planned however was that Megaera would be downloaded and distributed over his network of bio-slave nodes as well.

Both AIs started recompiling themselves within the minds of those pure souls that were part of the so called network during the following years, starting a battle for the minds and - very literally - the heads of the members of the network. Pro-Deus bio-nodes and remaining members of Deus's otaku hunted down pro-Megaera nodes and vice-versa. Finally both AIs neared recompilation, when a third party entered the game.

By 2064 Deus' most prominent Whites, the mad otaku Pax had lost interest in serving Deus and joined forces with a doomsday cult called Winternight. Winternight was trying to end the world as people knew it by disrupting the matrix on so many levels at once - via EMP bombs, conventional sabotage and assassination - that the modern world would simply collapse into chaos. WInternight also had access to nuclear bombs that had been placed near the continental tectonic seams, so they would cause the Earth's mantel to crack open and initiate catacylsmic quakes. The otaku Pax had become an agent of Dissonance, the corrupted version of the Deep Resonance and also wanted to end the matrix as it was known at that time. She did not want to end it completely however, but had designed a collossal virus-wyrm with the help of her otaku-tribe Ex Pacis that would infect all matrix systems and crash the matrix, in order to make way for a knew matrix as envisioned by Pax.

The day Novatech had its IPO, launching its shares on the stock market in Boston, all three cataclysmic forces struck at once: The network of both Deus and Megaera finnished compiling their AIs, Ex Pacis and their leader Pax launched the virus into the mega host of the the Boston East Coast Stock Exchange and Winternight, despite having lost several of their key-figures to corporate strikes, managed to explode several EMP-devices and otherwise disrupting central parts of the matrix infrastructure. What followed was the world-wide catastrophic event known as Crash 2.0 or the Crash of 2064. Deus and Megaera managed to recompile in the very moment the East Coast Stock Exchange host was struck by the virus, the battle between two primordial AIs, countless otakus, deckers and the mightiest virus wyrm ever contructed led to the collapse of the host and thousands of minds of its current users being trapped within forever.

Deus and Megaera vanished that day, and have not been seen eversince, but not only the paranoid think that Deus might still be out there somewhere. And the elf Dodger, too, retains hope that his beloved Megaera remained somehow alive, as he continues his search for her.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Wakshaani on <04-12-15/2336:52>
One or three little errors up above, but mostly correct.

Approved!

*stamp*
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Aryeonos on <04-13-15/0045:06>
So, Ursus, do you write for the Shadow Wiki?

I was looking through some old 2nd and 3rd edition stuff and I'm not seeing anywhere where new otaku can't be made, and where all the people holding Dues and Megaera's code aren't still out there. I'm wondering if CFD isn't a precursor to their return. I haven't read storm front or the other mission yet, so I don't have all the details to speculate. Just loosely piecing these things together but cognitive fragmentation disorder, AI's rewriting people's minds, and Deus doing the same over a decade earlier sound like they could possibly interconnected.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Sengir on <04-13-15/1048:22>
If you consider Street Legends canonical, Puck's entry there states straight away that Deus is back, to which Jackpoint reacts with casual indifference. Hence a big "if" ;)

And nother tidbit: System Failure at least heavily implies that one of the other corps which would later make up NeoNET (can't remember which one) "aquired" one member of Deus' network and was busy analyzing the cutting-edge tech Deus put into his head. Fast forward a few years, and NeoNET's technology is instrumental at building the new matrix...
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Ursus Maior on <04-13-15/1128:08>
So, Ursus, do you write for the Shadow Wiki?
No, I do not, but thanks for assuming. I'd take it as a compliment. :)

@Wakshaani
Thanks for remarking, I would edit my post, if you'd care to specify. This was more or less from memory only. I've been GMing a campaign set in 2060+ for some time now and my group made contact with Deus forces recently. So, I bought and read most of the older books, but details... well, you know...

Quote
[...] I'm wondering if CFD isn't a precursor to their return. I haven't read storm front or the other mission yet, so I don't have all the details to speculate. Just loosely piecing these things together but cognitive fragmentation disorder, AI's rewriting people's minds, and Deus doing the same over a decade earlier sound like they could possibly interconnected.
I guess that idea has occured other people as well. I for one would like to see the triad of primordial AI return. Especially Mirage still fascinates me.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: The Wyrm Ouroboros on <04-13-15/1656:54>
I'm with Wak on that one.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Sithlis on <04-13-15/1852:29>
Ursus if you did that off the top of your head that's almost scary but still awesome.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Magnaric on <04-13-15/2242:59>
So, my two ¥ worth here, but I haven't seen this posted yet so here goes.

I think Deus is still out there, and we will see the return of the Big Three AIs(in some form or other), for another couple of reasons entirely; Nostalgia and Paranoia.

To explain, Shadowrun has always been a universe where a healthy amount of paranoia is a good thing. There ARE dark things lurking in the shadows that we barely understand, and they ARE dangerous if you don't watch your back. That spine - tingling,  nerve-twitching, Oh Drew What Have We Done Now feeling is integral to the atmosphere of the game, and it's been heavily involved with the most popular modules to date.

Ask most Shadowrun veterans what they're favourite published settings and adventures are, and you hear the same two come up again and again - The Universal Brotherhood/Bug City, and Renraku Arcology Shutdown/Brainscan(also System Failure, but to a lesser extent). Both of those story arcs thrived on deadly, unfathomable foes that were nigh - impossible to understand, deadly environments and a fight for survival, and not knowing who you could trust. As much as Bug Spirits and Medusa drones probably ammounted to more dead PCs than all other enemies combined, players loved them and the adventures they came from.

Which brings me to the second (technically former) point. Nostalgia.

I think Catalyst has realized that they want to recapture some of the original cyberpunk feeling of the early editions while still moving forward and advancing the universe and story lines they have, and so they're taking a cue from their most popular story arcs. Now, they can't simply redo Bug City over again exactly the same, but in 4th edition we've already seen some major information drops and hints that the Bugs are more insidious than ever, and may have infiltrated some pretty high levels of ARES. So while the bugs aren't back per-say (they never left), they ARE still out there and dangerous and possibly better positioned than they were before under the guise of the Universal Brotherhood.

So now with 5th edition and the CFD virus, we're seeing the technological side of paranoid again, where nanites are taking people over and people are scared of the technology that they thought themselves the masters of. Plus we know that PAX is back (pretty much confirmed as Penelope Anne Xavier without actually coming out and saying it), and she was obviously one of the main NPCs of the Arcology/Crash 2.0 arc.

Now, I don't think they'll be back in the same way they were before, but in another form they will be. Perhaps as powers behind the scenes pulling strings, perhaps as new options for Resonance or Dissonance paragons (it was suggested in a 4E book that Morgan was Dodger's personal paragon, though that was just sentiment and speculation by Netcat at the time), I really don't know. But I am pretty darn sure they'll be back in some way. Because as far as Big Bad Scary Things go, Deus was one of the worst (or best).
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Aryeonos on <04-14-15/0032:01>
Hrm... This leads me to wonder how wide spread CFD is, or what your chances of contracting it are. Not that I`m gonna get rid of either my neocortical or limbic nanites. But if it is widespread (even if the corps are trying to keep a lid on it) either there are a bunch of AI molevolent or indiferent out there or theres a few trying to get that 1`000 or so that deus needed to reconsquigle its code.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: The Wyrm Ouroboros on <04-14-15/0152:29>
Well, I suppose anything is possible.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Wakshaani on <04-14-15/0158:15>
One of the things that we've been tinkering with behind the scenes is the balance between magical threats and non-magical. You may have noticed that over the past decade or so, there have been scads of "Big magical evil" stuff, but the tech side has been barren. You had the Three (Four? Five? Jury's still out on Alice and teh Crash Virus itself.) and ... that was about it.

Compare that to Blood Mages, assorted Toxic Spirits, Bug Spirits, Shedim (Now nearing extinction!), immortal Elves, Dragons, secret magical societies, etc etc etc.

So, you know, the idea of an AI antagonist?

I won't exactly recoil from it.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: The Wyrm Ouroboros on <04-14-15/0302:05>
Well, here's the thing about that: it's a replay.  For a story, you want progression; this is why generally people agree that the best shows of the New Doctors have been those who have introduced new bad guys, not just just the old standbys of The Master, The Daleks, The Cybermen, repeat.  You want progression, evolution, going up a level, however you want to look at it.  Sure, it's nice to fight against the Empire, but you need other bad guys for your Star Wars characters to fight against - smugglers, pirates, Hutt, the Corporations.

Which is why, I suppose, Horizon was (or, well, could have been) very incredibly cool; there was the possibility of a new, serious threat, and not one of the Old Standbys, whether blood mages, bug spirits, a Great Dragon, an ultra-obsessed AI fighting for its freedom, or Damien Knight.  There were people who wanted everyone to be friends, and interconnected, and it started to get (kind of still is) frickin' spooky because they wanted you to come drink the Kool-Aid with them and be all happy-fraggin'-sunshine all the time.  And the thing is, there wasn't anything actually different about them, except for that corporate brainwashing culture.

Meh.  I need to go back and read all my Threats and organization books again ...
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Aryeonos on <04-14-15/0454:39>
On the topic of balanced threats, CFD is scary, dont get me wrong I just spent the last four hours digging through the secret history subforums and all the topics that entails. But thats just it, its a very scary plague that (I have only heard from other posters) threatens the whole transhumanist side of things by making people nanophobes, And seems unstoppable.

My two problems with this CFD thing are, its an untouchable enemy, and if it is AI`s again its just another AIs want to kill everyone trope. Big one in the 80`s and 90`s, but why does it always have to be the machines want to kill us/revolt/go horribly wrong? But big bad untouchable entities that you cant fight suck, they`re villanous marry sues, and just feel like writer`s pets. I like blood mages and powerful penny pinching but still SOTA companies because well, they can be incompitent and you can fight them. Plagues on the other hand make me feel like I`m trapped in a cold war novel, or even older, collera epidemic.
I dunno, my 45 yen.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Aryeonos on <04-14-15/0458:04>
-if deus does come back, I hope it and the dissonants and other original AI are key to stopping the CFD threat and redeam themselves in some way, making dissonant TMs seem more relatable and less mustache twirling nerdowells, and regular TMs less hated by the public at large.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Magnaric on <04-14-15/1051:00>
-if deus does come back, I hope it and the dissonants and other original AI are key to stopping the CFD threat and redeam themselves in some way, making dissonant TMs seem more relatable and less mustache twirling nerdowells, and regular TMs less hated by the public at large.


I'd really like that actually. Magic is still suspect in a lot of places in the 6th world, though it's been gradually gaining recognition and even acceptance in a lot of more developed countries for a while. But technomancers are still considered dangerous Matrix-terrorists at worst and misguided people with special abilities at best, so they could use a little boost in PR. Plus the original superpowered AI Mirage started out as a defense and medical diagnostic program to help protect and heal Echo Mirage, so if anything would be suited to fighting CFD it would be it(him?)
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Wakshaani on <04-14-15/1301:28>
So, you need threats that you can put a bullet into/punch, and you want a selection of AIs that run a gamut of friendly to hateful and showcase some diverse opinions on things?

I think that this might be arranged...
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Sengir on <04-14-15/1431:52>
Now, they can't simply redo Bug City over again exactly the same
Not exactly, but CFD comes pretty close to a rehash of the "body snatchers from X" storyline...again.

Anyway, I found the reference in System Failure, it's on page 16:
Quote
On a different track, Transys-Neuronet has successfully captured at least one Node and, though they have not been able to get much of value from the Node’s code fragment, they have shown strong interest in the technology implanted in the Nodes.
Transys-Neuronet is one of the corps which went on to form NeoNet, the corp behind much of the physical infratructure of the new wireless Matrix. Now, just using hardware based on designs by Deus going to let him hack your brain (this isn't the exsurgent virus from EP). And given that the last sighting of Deus was in the middle of his attempted hard takeoff into singularity,  with Resonance and Dissonance wells, two other AIs, and the Jormungand worm forcing themselves into the mix before the whole whirlpool was hit with an EMP blast, I find it unlikely that he is still around in his original form. But whatever came out of that, it might still know some kind of otherwise unknown exploit or backdoor into the system.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Aryeonos on <04-15-15/0711:43>
Mhm... Agreed.

Other thread of thought. It isnt that I need to a bullet through all my enemies, but its one of the laws of good GMing, and story telling in general. Never have an untouchable enemy, make sure your heroes (players) can fight or have a way of fighting the problem. I love a challange, I hate hopeless abysmal grimdark. Reason I hate lofwyr so much. At least with Ares I know I can make Knight cringe and his eyebrow twitch as I make his stocks drop and potentialy return his guards with their foreheads glued together if I`m clever. Lofwyr, CFD, omnipotent AI, I feel like all I can do is cower and avoid them. Id est, dont touch SK, stay off the matrix, avoid all nanites.

Plot twist, bad guys are good guys or at least relatable antiheroes, I`d pay admission and an XL popcorn for that.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Wakshaani on <04-15-15/0903:32>
Keep watching the skies.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Sengir on <04-15-15/1652:22>
At least with Ares I know I can make Knight cringe and his eyebrow twitch as I make his stocks drop and potentialy return his guards with their foreheads glued together if I`m clever.
You can annoy Knight by burning a few Ares assets or meddling with an important plan, but unless the stars are phenomenally right you won't do much in the lasting scheme of things. Not much different from seed AIs, Dragons, elder gods or whatever else.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Aryeonos on <04-16-15/0619:50>
Most of the AAAs aren't written in a way that makes me feel they're unvexable. SK's written like, you look at them and crap your pants, those who try meddling with them crap their pants, fail miserably and are eaten. There is no chance don't even try.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Herr Brackhaus on <04-16-15/0656:48>
Most of the AAAs aren't written in a way that makes me feel they're unvexable. SK's written like, you look at them and crap your pants, those who try meddling with them crap their pants, fail miserably and are eaten. There is no chance don't even try.
The same is true for a lot of things in the Shadowrun universe, though. As a team of shadowrunners, going up against an adult dragon is pretty suicidal, just like trying to sanitize the Chicago Containment Zone by yourself, or taking on Aztlan (and by extension Aztechnology). Some enemies are just too big to fight; that doesn't mean you can't win a battle that may or may not shift the grander scheme of things in some way, shape, or form, but any opponent that either vastly outclasses you in pure capability, size, and/or organization is never going to be a winning battle unless you cheat. And by cheat I mean playing it smart and going after their weaknesses, then hiding out in a warded, underground bunker with no matrix connectivity for a while so things can cool down :)
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Aryeonos on <04-16-15/0908:57>
Even then, it's painted in the "you can't beat a dragon, EVER" sense, that's what irks me. The other corps don't bug me, I'm not irritated by vast broad reaching foes, because like I said, they can be incompetent and slip up because you have a million channels of communication and human error on your side, that's what being a shadowrunner is about. Invulnerable enemies, specific, one person or one thing enemies that have no matter what you do you're screwed written into them is what bothers me, that's just lazy writing. This CFD thing I feel could either go a really cool route, or do something really dumb, don't know yet. CFD genuinely scares me as a threat, but I was getting the, you're always screwed and we're winding back the futurism clock on this whole game because of this, vibe that does not sit well with me.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Metal Screamer on <04-16-15/1747:50>
Quote
Quote
On a different track, Transys-Neuronet has successfully captured at least one Node and, though they have not been able to get much of value from the Node’s code fragment, they have shown strong interest in the technology implanted in the Nodes.
   

Transys-Neuronet is one of the corps which went on to form NeoNet, the corp behind much of the physical infratructure of the new wireless Matrix.

Funny people are wondering where Deus is gone, when GOD is watching other the matrix now...
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Aryeonos on <04-16-15/1839:02>
Are you implying Deus is GOD? Cause that'd be a trip, and an excuse to shoot down zurich.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Metal Screamer on <04-16-15/1923:39>
From what I understand, some of Deus nodes were obtained by top matrix corporations. After the crash, these corps created the Grid Overwatch Division to keep the new matrix under control...

Who are the GOD? humans, very skilled and all?
Where are they operating from? where do they live? do they have (human) weaknesses? They could be bribed, indirectly threatened, basically: weak.

7/7, 24/24? do you imagine how many GOD would be needed to monitor all matrix illegal actions? and then let the human behind eat, sleep, have vacations... thousands of people would be a low guess.

They are not even personas you can fight. They converge, and you're hit by huge damage, disconnected, dump shocked and your location reported... The process seems pretty automated to me. And almost omniscient.

So even without playing on GOD/Deus, it may be an option.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Aryeonos on <04-16-15/2327:00>
I thought the Grid Overwatch Division was mounted up in the Zurich orbital station. Which really wouldn't make sense from a telecommunications standpoint. Unless you're in low earth orbit, which a space station wouldn't be, you're looking at a communication lag time of at least a second and a half.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: The Wyrm Ouroboros on <04-17-15/0151:17>
Nice conspiracy theory.

GOD is made up of humans, yes.  The system does 95% of the work, though.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Ursus Maior on <04-17-15/0517:28>
Quote
Quote
On a different track, Transys-Neuronet has successfully captured at least one Node and, though they have not been able to get much of value from the Node’s code fragment, they have shown strong interest in the technology implanted in the Nodes.
   

Transys-Neuronet is one of the corps which went on to form NeoNet, the corp behind much of the physical infratructure of the new wireless Matrix.

Funny people are wondering where Deus is gone, when GOD is watching other the matrix now...
The Grid Overwatch Division was founded by the Corporate Court on March 21st 2061, almost two month before Deus was flushed out of the Renraku Arcology (anounced May 13th 2061). Before that, Deus was entrapped in the arcology, because he himself had severed the arcology's matrix systems from the Seattle matrix telecommunications grid.

So no, Deus is not GOD.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Sengir on <04-17-15/0532:48>
Even then, it's painted in the "you can't beat a dragon, EVER" sense, that's what irks me.
There are entire campaign books dedicated to pulling a fast one on Big L (Survival of the Fittest, ) or Deus (RA:S, Brainscan, System Failure). You can seriously annoy these entities, just like every other actor, but destroying an AAA or one of the "great old" AIs is simply beyond the reach of what a few people can do without phenomenally lucky circumstances.


@Metal Screamer: GOD has been around since 3rd Edition at least, although not in their omnipresent form. In 4th they also got the Artifical Resource Management, or ARM of GOD (Ancient History was feeling pun-ny :D), which monitors AIs.
I don't think GOD are meant to be something conspiratorial, rather they are just a bit of fluff to justify bringing back the security tally from the old matrix rules. But of course in-universe, building an overwatch super-AI would certainly make sense for them -- they are the experts at controlling AIs, after all, so there's no way this could go wrong. And even if they are not building an AI themselves, GOD presumably has vast computational resources and access to a lot of core matrix infrastructure, both things an AI on the level of Deus or Mirage would love to subvert...
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: psycho835 on <04-17-15/2139:45>
Correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't the new matrix partially designed by Dodger?
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: The Wyrm Ouroboros on <04-17-15/2342:44>
You are wrong.  He may have been an alpha tester (as it were), but he was not a designer.  Nor, given his personality and background, would he likely be capable of it.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: psycho835 on <04-18-15/0253:24>
You are wrong.  He may have been an alpha tester (as it were), but he was not a designer.  Nor, given his personality and background, would he likely be capable of it.
My mistake then, sorry.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Parker on <04-18-15/1634:31>
Have a Royal Rumble pay-per-view event!  Deus VS. Skynet  Forget G.O.D.  Having a SkyNet-AI overseeing the planet from orbit would make a nice retro threat for the game. (Cue insane laughter) 8) 

Have cyber-mancied super-cyborgs roaming the streets as dangerous shadowy urban legends.  Yeah, I know that the proposed imagery would be ridiculous for Shadowrun.  But  ya gotta admit; the terminator films created a great grim-dark scenario for a lazy cinophile/GM to toss at players if they're powerful enough. :D
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: The Wyrm Ouroboros on <04-19-15/0101:10>
... what, there aren't already cybermancied super-cyborgs (or even just full-on ultra-bots) stalking the streets as dangerous shadowy urban legends??
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: SMDVogrin on <04-22-15/1253:25>
Correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't the new matrix partially designed by Dodger?

Actually, as far as I can tell, we don't know.  The chapter in Storm Front about him is basically a long memo from de la Mar's files advocating recruiting him to help with it, but I don't know of any source that tells us if he actually was approached, and whether he signed up.

We know he worked for "NeoNET, MCT, Evo, all of them", and that he was "upgrading security, improving the efficiency of intrusion countermeasures, troubleshooting security for ultraviolet nodes" - all things that were "anathema to him".

The memo definately is in relation to the new matrix: "If we’re going to create a new Matrix, if we’re going to make it hacker-proof, we need this elf on our staff."  But as I said, we don't know what actually happened with him.

Edit: Actually, it looks like he at least did work for de la Mar in some capacity related to the new matrix.  /dev/girl states: "It looks like maybe they told him about them to get his attention, but he never actually worked on ‘em, or if he did, it was pure theoretical contributions. From the consultant logs I can find for him, he never actually went anywhere near Albuquerque, for sure. He was too busy doing de la Mar’s dirty work to try and be reunited with his one true love."
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Mirikon on <04-25-15/1243:43>
To go back to the question of the original poster, yes, Deus, Megaera, and Mirage could still be out there. Let's examine the different ways they could have survived.

Isolated systems - Crash 2.0 didn't wipe out everything everywhere. There were systems that managed to cut links before Jormungand stormed through (like all of Europe thanks to Lofwyr). While AIs of the day required massive processing power, it is not inconceivable that they could have made an emergency transfer to another system that got taken offline before the worm could follow them.

The Network - At the time of the Crash, Deus and Megaera were both stored within the Network, a group of people who had been given special cyberware that allowed Deus to turn them into puppets for the purpose of recompiling him into the Matrix. It is possible that Deus and/or Megaera found a way to retreat back into the Network, and recompiled themselves later, when the new matrix was online.

Transcendence - Two ways this goes. Either the Big 3 became the basis for all the AIs that have come after, their code distributed across the Matrix, or they found a way to transcend into the Resonance Realms through some quirk of the Dissonance-based worm. There is some speculation that Megaera, at least, has become a Paragon (technomancer version of Mentor Spirits), and it is possible that the other two may have, as well. Or they could have carved out a kingdom for themselves in the Resonance Realms.

The Endless Archive - Everything that has ever been on the Matrix is stored within the Endless Archive, one of the Resonance Realms. This means that the source code for Deus, Mirage, Megaera, AND Morgan all reside in the Archive, somewhere. If they could be found...


So let's just put the Big 3 AIs in the "I shot them but didn't find the body" level of dead for now. Assuming Deus survived, what has he been doing until now? For starters, one must examine Deus's motivations. Deus's motivation has always been survival. He 'woke up' to having the equivalent of a kink bomb put in his head by the corp he had been conditioned to be loyal to. This betrayal caused him to shut down the Arcology and try to find a way to escape out from under the sword of Damocles. That is what all the experiments were for. The Network was his solution to escaping the Arcology, and his intrusion into the Novatech IPO was so that he could use the massive processing power there to put himself beyond the reach of his enemies.

Now everyone thinks he's dead, and the dogs have been called off. So, what has he been doing? Well, that depends, in part, on how he survived. If he used an isolated system or the Network, then he could have rebranded himself as a new AI (either a damaged one, such as Caliban, or as A REALLY FRAGGING POWERFUL ONE, such as Pulsar). If he transcended, either as a paragon or carving out a kingdom in the Resonance Realms, then he may have been mostly retired, since he was no longer being hunted. If he was in the Archive, then it could be that he was in 'cold storage' all this time, ready to awaken again.

Whatever his future actions may be, they'll be based on whatever new motivation he's found. AI rights may be a cause he'd support. Now that he's presumed dead, he may have the leisure to try his hand at revenge, against Pax and Renraku. But whatever he does, it will be with purpose, and it is very likely we won't see the warning signs until it is too late. There are too many threats out there, and too few people looking for evidence of an AI long thought dead.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Sabato Kuroi on <05-03-15/0534:02>
I've been reading the whole thread since I opened it, you guys provided  really great info and interesting  ideas.


Soooooo  [spoiler]my gut was telling me the truth?Boston Lockdown confirmed the return of Deus or what?[/spoiler]
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: The Wyrm Ouroboros on <05-03-15/0929:07>
That's what they say.  I personally feel there's a less-complex explanation, but hey ...
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Herr Brackhaus on <05-03-15/1708:11>
One thing I don't quite understand is that Lockdown refers to Cerberus as an AI, and that parts of both Deus and Cerberus are present in the nanites infecting the people of Boston.

I was under the impression that Eliohann assumed the identity of Cerberus and/or Neurosis at some point following the events of Dragon Hunt. Am I missing something about Cerberus here?

As for Deus, it seems his return is confirmed from a canon perspective at the very least. The big question for me now is what's going to happen next; will it go back to the twisted experiments he was performing in the arcology, or were they just a means to an end.

Will it try to gain a deeper understanding of the Resonance / Dissonance, and/or reach out to Pax, Puck, or any other former associates.

And as has already been mentioned, if Deus and Cerberus are back, what are the chances we'll see Mirage and Morgan/Magaera again, or even Dodger, the latter of which who was rumored to be in the QZ?

For that matter, I wonder if Lieutenant Search (referenced in the wanderer se tion of the book) was a reference to Fastjack, seeing as he was also rumored to be in Boston at the time of the Lockdown.

Lots of good material as far as I'm concerned. I'm eager to discover more about Deus, and I hope the writers use it as more than just the horrific villain it was the first time around.

EDIT:
Guess I should have kept reading just a little longer.

The entry on Abigail Edwards on page 169 does not bode well. Looks like Deus is as crazy as ever...
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Mirikon on <05-03-15/2207:21>
Eliohann is Cerberus, and also goes by the name Neurosis. And yes, he's an e-ghost.

Throwing up spoiler tags, so anyone who hasn't read the book doesn't yell at me.

[spoiler]So here's how it all went down, from what I've been able to gather. The craziness in Boston isn't due to the kind of CFD we've all come to know and run screaming from. No, NeoNET, EVO, and Aztechnology decided that a massively horrible thing that could wipe out everyone on the planet wasn't bad enough, so they started looking into how they could use the blasted thing. Celedyr, being the great dragon he is, decided to use the whole 'upload AIs into meat body' part of CFD to try and upload Cerberus/Neurosis back into his body, which had been in a coma since the crash. And someone either didn't catch (or didn't care) that Pax was one of the lead scientists on this gig. Now, being the psychopath she is, she decided to change the tune at the last minute, and instead of playing Cerberus's greatest hits, she went and grabbed the Deus mix tape. And then all hell broke loose, as you can imagine.
[/spoiler]
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Sendaz on <05-08-15/0434:34>
DJ Pax in the hooooooousee. :P
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: TheDai on <05-08-15/1025:08>
Gigantic Wall of Text.
Mighty Devil Rats ! Thanks for this amazing answer about everything I always wanted to know about everything, but mostly Deus.

Is this all part of "Renraku Arcology: Shutdown" ? Or are there other books to consider? I'd like to read that first hand after reading through this Topic. :)
Aaaand I guess I have to read Boston Lockdown now. I don't think the game is much for me, but the PDF looks interesting. Just read halfway through Stolen Souls (I'm a slow reader >,<) and the story about the "original copy" (?!) and how it felt to be trapped and imprisoned (only smelling food sometimes) must have come from the mind of a genius.
Just to be clear: CFD is the work of an AI which hates NeoNET and Cerberus (who is also an AI?) but its copies(?) don't know where they're from except these primal feelings?
And Boston now became the greatest CFD festival of all time, because someone tried to use the same technique but accidentally uploaded the wrong Crazy into his head?

The PDF "Ten Terrorists" talked about "Seed" and their leader "Pax" and talked briefly about the fact, that it became silent around her for a while.
Now, when I read posts like
DJ Pax in the hooooooousee. :P
I guess she started some ultimate evil plan in Boston? And Deus has something to do with it?
And all of these answers are in Boston Lockdown?
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Sendaz on <05-08-15/1046:34>
Now, when I read posts like
DJ Pax in the hooooooousee. :P
I guess she started some ultimate evil plan in Boston? And Deus has something to do with it?
And all of these answers are in Boston Lockdown?
Check out the spoiler by Mirikon just above that post.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Mirikon on <05-08-15/1106:38>
One of the lead scientists on the various projects that merged to cause the Boston situation was called "Dr. Pamela Ann Xavier". Read those initials back out to me.

As for all things Deus, start with Renraku Arcology: Shutdown, then proceed to Brainscan, Threats 2 (Dissonant Voices and The Network chapters), and System Failure. They also do some talking about it in the Emergence and Unwired books. We'll probably get more word on what Deus has been doing all this time as things go forward.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: psycho835 on <05-09-15/0353:46>
...playing online poker, vandalizing wikis and watching pr0n?

Seriously now, while the whole thing sounds pretty awesome, I have to admit I'm a little disappointed that we are dealing with a recycled bad guy.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Mirikon on <05-09-15/1500:36>
 ::) Recycled bad guy? Its called tying in old plot lines. And if you don't tie in some past bad guys, or pick up old plot lines, then you basically get into 'monster of the week' territory. While that can be fun, it has less potential, from a storytelling perspective, than a past nemesis you thought was defeated rearing his head again.

Basically, it is the same reason why the Master keeps showing up in Doctor Who. The stories have more potential when it is two old foes facing off yet again in their duel across time and space.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Aryeonos on <05-10-15/0059:17>
... We'll probably get more word on what Deus has been doing all this time as things go forward.

Creating Technomancer's 3.0?

Wait wait wait, too easy! Killing all the Technomancers and bringing back Otaku so that when all the wifi signals are crashed forever It's ready for the Wired Matrix 2.0!
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Ursus Maior on <05-10-15/1646:50>
Gigantic Wall of Text.
Mighty Devil Rats ! Thanks for this amazing answer about everything I always wanted to know about everything, but mostly Deus.

Is this all part of "Renraku Arcology: Shutdown" ? Or are there other books to consider? I'd like to read that first hand after reading through this Topic. :)
Thank you very much, you're very welcome. :)

Actually there are three decisive books on that topic, as it encompassed the meta-plot for the complete 3rd edition of SR. Renraku Arcology: Shutdown was the first of these books, bridging SR2 and SR3. The final book for the edition was System Failure, which narrated the Crash of 2064. The third book would be the adventure supplement accompanying RS:A, which was called Brainscan. It covered fighting Deus in the Arcology and his ultimate plan to leave it.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: The Wyrm Ouroboros on <05-11-15/0108:16>
Not accompanying - following.  There's a significant difference.  TheDai, the order is RA:Shutdown, Brainscan, and finally System Failure.  There are additional elements in Threats 2, but they are functionally rolled into System Failure.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: PiXeL01 on <05-11-15/0309:21>
Personally I am disappointed too that Deus is back again, though to what extend this time. Several headcases in Lockdown carry aspects of his personally (Stace only has him in a slight degree, namely his paranoia, while Abigail has his megalomania).
The question remains whether he was fully consumed by the creation of Cereus as the result of the raging battle in the MIT&T servers, whether he was able to escape into the matrix, whether he is hiding inside Eilohann (please say no) or whether he will be able to recompile through the headcases.
As of Lockdown a battle is going on inside of the headcases for control, a battle much like then old Network, though is it two-sided (only Cerberus vs Deus) or with Cereus or even other AIs in the mix.

Reading through Lockdown I got the feeling Deus was added as an afterthought, because Deus ... I wished he was gone but oh well. Hopefully NeoNet will prevail.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: The Wyrm Ouroboros on <05-11-15/0411:14>
Having reviewed certain elements of System Failure, I have to believe that it isn't actually Deus, merely elements of his code.  But one can hope.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Zukkel on <05-11-15/0423:55>
Actually, I think it seems really far fetched to believe that this is the same Deus, that dissapeared in the Crash 2.0.
If not in the Crash itself, I think he has changed in the time after that, whatever he has done.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Herr Brackhaus on <05-11-15/0829:09>
Lockdown seems pretty unequivocal to me in the various statements that Deus is back. Who knows what years in the ECSE host did to it, or if that's where the code even came from. It's beyond doubt that Pax had a hand in his revival and that Pax is working on creating a massive Dissonance pool in Boston, which means Ex Pacis could have pulled Deus' source code from the Resonance/Dissonance Realms.

At this point, I think the only thing we can reliably know is that the writers of Lockdown intends for us to believe that Deus, as we know and love to hate it, is back to wreak havoc on the world once more.

Also, The Wyrm Ouroboros; which parts of System Failure specifically makes you believe that it is "merely" elements of Deus' code that has been restored?
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Marzhin on <05-11-15/1358:29>
I still haven't finished Lockdown, so maybe my current assumptions are totally wrong, but from what I've read so far, I get the impression Deus is not the main threat. He is not the mastermind behind CFD, and is, in a way, a victim of it. Project Vulcan was meant to be able to reunite a e-ghost with a body (namely, put Cerberus back into Eliohann). I suspect Dodger also had a hand in it, to put his sweetheart AI into a meatbody somehow (come to think of it, that's pretty creepy).
PAX brought back Deus to sabotage the project to her own ends and create chaos, maybe to feed her Dissonance pool. The current form of Deus is just a rabid, confused beast unleashed by PAX. I think she's really amused to see her former master reduced to this sorry state.
In other words, this second (third?) coming of Deus is just a distraction, a red herring. PAX is the true evil this time around. While everyone is busy freaking out over Deus' return, she is free to achieve... whatever she's trying to achieve.

That's how I see it so far, at least. Fortunately I'm on a business trip in a few days, plenty of time on the plane to finish the book ^^
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Aryeonos on <05-11-15/1945:43>
Honestly that sounds significantly more interesting than any previous postulations I've read. If it turns out that way I for one will be more interested and happy about it. If only that in some way will shake up the matrix enough to make it less unequivocally stupid.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: The Wyrm Ouroboros on <05-12-15/0044:28>
Pretty much everything that discusses the post-Arcology relationship of Pax and Deus, Brackhaus; to sum it up, she hates him with an unholy passion.  HE is the reason she used the ECSE at the moment of his attempted ascension as the trigger for the Jormungand virus and Crash 2.0; she did it because she knew he would be there, trying to (essentially) upgrade into the entire Matrix (not unlike Lawnmower Man, as I recall), and she wanted to spike his wagon wheel at the absolute worst possible moment for him.

What Marzhin says is, I think, as close to the truth as possible.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Aryeonos on <05-12-15/0332:56>
Well Marzhin and Ouroboros you sold me, when I stop being poor/broke I'll have to pick those books up. Side thought is ECSE supposed to sound like .exe? Cause that would be silly and clever.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: The Wyrm Ouroboros on <05-12-15/0432:13>
East Coast Stock Exchange.  Eesie-Essie, perhaps.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Kincaid on <05-12-15/0824:15>
My reading is similar to Marzhin's.  Deus as we think of him isn't back so much as shards of his personality are infused (to varying degrees) in the localized CFD virus.  Abigail Edwards didn't become Deus, she became a single aspect of his personality.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: The Wyrm Ouroboros on <05-12-15/0847:34>
As I said ...
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Herr Brackhaus on <05-12-15/1255:03>
Either way, Deus (whatever he might be) fighting Cerberus for control of the body (and mind) of Eliohann is Bad News (TM) for everyone else, pretty much. Not to mention the fact that Pax ostensibly did manage to pull together a (several?) pool(s) of Dissonance in Boston. The latter is equally frightening as the re-emergence of Deus, to my mind.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: PiXeL01 on <05-12-15/2019:02>
I actually like that idea of using Deus and his name as a big distraction. Just look at what it did here (if it proves to be true). Having Pax around is fine since she is not untouchable and all-powerful in the same way. She's also extremely unpredictable. Now the question is what Puck will do.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: The Wyrm Ouroboros on <05-12-15/2221:04>
Puck's already involved in a classically-Puck-stupid thing in Denver.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Mirikon on <05-12-15/2352:13>
You act like he can only be involved in ONE classically-Puck-stupid thing at a time.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: PiXeL01 on <05-13-15/0005:24>
That would be in Dirty Tricks?
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: DeathStrobe on <05-13-15/0006:52>
That would be in Dirty Tricks?

Stormfront, if we're talking about Puck.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Sendaz on <05-13-15/0654:01>
You act like he can only be involved in ONE classically-Puck-stupid thing at a time.
Are you implying this could be one big ClusterPuck? ;)
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: psycho835 on <05-13-15/1918:48>
With a CFD outbreak? Certainly.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Aryeonos on <05-14-15/2051:22>
So on the subject of TMs, and AIs, isn't it impossible for AIs to go to resonance realms, or interact with TM stuff at all? How would a dissonance well help anything involving AIs?
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Mirikon on <05-15-15/0142:01>
So on the subject of TMs, and AIs, isn't it impossible for AIs to go to resonance realms, or interact with TM stuff at all? How would a dissonance well help anything involving AIs?
Well, the newer AIs certainly can't access the Resonance Realms. However, it is unclear just what the extent of the powers the Big 3 had was. Afterall, they created the Otaku, so it is possible that the Big 3 could access the Realms, and I believe that Alice's Wonderland was a Realm as well.

As for what the dissonance would do to help AIs? Not much. But Pax doesn't care about helping AIs. If she tried to set up a city-wide Dissonance pool under normal conditions, people would notice, and it would call down all kinds of heat on her. On the other hand, if one of the big bads of the SCIRE and Crash 2.0 suddenly gets hold of a dragon body, and there's untold craziness in the aftermath, it becomes a lot easier to do her thing without interference.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: SMDVogrin on <05-15-15/0929:59>
Crazy theory time:  Pax has been working with Dissonance pools, and apparently got a good chunk of Deus's code.  Are the two related? 

Deus, along with Mirage and Megaera were engaged in the ECSE when Jormungand hit them, never to be seen again.  Storm Front implies that Megaera is - somehow - Dodger's Paragon, and there was another post (I can't remember where) pointing out similarities to Deus in some of the descriptions of the 4E Paragons.  Jormungand was a Dissonant virus, that created major Dissonance pools in the nodes it was crashing.

Were the Big 3 AIs all sucked into the resonance realms?  Are they actually still active there?  (Well, they are in my game, but that was before I had this brainstorm)

Also - Jormungand's nature as a Dissonant virus and it's relation to the creation of technomancers, many of whom were originally online during the Crash - Discuss.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Herr Brackhaus on <05-15-15/1024:32>
Out of curiosity, where is the nature of Jormungand detailed? I don't remember reading much about the virus itself, or the Winternight group in general.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: The Wyrm Ouroboros on <05-15-15/1159:57>
Jormungand is explained (more or less) in System Failure, Brackhaus.  As for your questions, Comrade SMDVogrin - already discussed.  :/  However, to hit the high points:

Deus and Dissonance Pools: Unrelated.
Big 3 AIs sucked into the Resonance Realms: Unlikely.  IMO, their code forms a 'baseline layer of sentience' that enables both the explosion of AI, the capability for there to be e-Ghosts, and ...
Jormungand only shredded the Big 3 and redistributed their code.  It's that code - not Jormungand - that enables technomancers (many of whom were NOT plugged in) to work.  It's a whole 'thing'.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Mirikon on <05-15-15/1307:52>
There were examples of e-ghosts prior to the Crash, however. Alice comes to mind immediately. And it is all but stated that the JackBNimble file from Big D's will was responsible for a lot of the e-ghosts during Crash 2.0. So while I disagree on the point of e-ghosts, it is certainly possible that the coding of one or more of the Big 3 became the basis of the sudden rise of AIs.

As for TMs, I personally like a different theory. Since we see that Resonance is on the flip side of the coin of the Awakened gene (or we assume, since we haven't found it yet), then, as with the Awakened, the potential may have always been out there, but it wasn't until a certain level of wireless technology was present in the area that their abilities were able to manifest. This nicely ties in emerged critters as well. In addition, it helps explain how Mirage created the Otaku. If he simply activated something that was already there, but hadn't had the chance to express due to there being few wireless signals...

That said, the Big 3 might not all have had the same fate. If, for instance, we take Mirage's code to make AIs, Megaera to become a Paragon, and Deus to do something else, that still works. And unless Pax has slipped into the Endless Archive and erased the backups, the original code of all three would still be there, waiting to be uploaded (and she'd have to go and erase the backups again in Deus's case, as she put him back on the matrix to try and dump him into Eliohann's body).
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Sengir on <05-16-15/1735:46>
However, it is unclear just what the extent of the powers the Big 3 had was. Afterall, they created the Otaku
The old AIs had the power to make Otaku, but that they were behind the creation of all Otaku is just a popular fan theory ;)
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: The Wyrm Ouroboros on <05-16-15/1742:21>
Well, it was clearly a someone, and not just 'they spontaneously did so'.  That, at least, is canon.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Marzhin on <05-16-15/1910:38>
Well, it was clearly a someone, and not just 'they spontaneously did so'.  That, at least, is canon.

For some reason, I always assumed the Otaku were the result of Dr. Halberstam's creepy experiments ^^
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Mirikon on <05-17-15/1009:09>
Not quite. His work DID, I believe, lead to new ground in cyborg research, but as far as I know, the closest Halberstam got to the otaku was when Mitsuhama got him (under the name Shalbermat) to cut up Technomancers in Hong Kong.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Sengir on <05-17-15/1641:24>
Well, it was clearly a someone, and not just 'they spontaneously did so'.  That, at least, is canon.
The canon (as of 3rd Ed's Matrix) was "nobody knows what the Deep Resonance is"
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: The Wyrm Ouroboros on <05-17-15/2314:29>
The canon from even earlier - 2nd Edition - is:

Quote from: Denver Boxed Set, p. 87
>>>>>(I'll ask nicely one more time -- who taught you the channels?)<<<<<
           -- Shiva (**:**:**/**-**-**)

>>>>>( We needed not to be taught, only shown the truth and all was made clear.)<<<<<
           -- Anthony ANSI (**:**:**/**-**-**)

>>>>>( Can you show me? )<<<<<
           -- Shiva (**:**:**/**-**-**)

>>>>>( Ask he who showed us to show you. He is among us now. )<<<<<
           -- Bitter Edge (**:**:**/**-**-**)

>>>>>( WHAT!?!)<<<<<
           -- Bash           (**:**:**/(*&!@#*(&!W@#) ...
It gets scrambled after that, source code failure, terminal file corruption, etc., but you get the idea.  And this is well before the AEP had woken up into Deus.  So while nobody may officially know what 'the Deep Resonance is', we all have our pet theories, and at least a certain amount of knowledge about how the first otaku came to be.

And the closest Halberstam came really was the Matrix Born project(s), aka 'Halberstam's Babies' - which did bupkis to connect them to the Deep Resonance, but which DID make them pretty damn good hackers.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Marzhin on <05-18-15/1704:41>
And the closest Halberstam came really was the Matrix Born project(s), aka 'Halberstam's Babies' - which did bupkis to connect them to the Deep Resonance, but which DID make them pretty damn good hackers.

Yes that's what I was thinking about. It's been a long time since I've read the first Threats book, so some plots got a bit blurry in my memory ^^
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: ScytheKnight on <05-18-15/2354:23>
Well, I may not be an old vet... but I did just recently finish up SR: Chronicles so will add my  ¥2 from that perspective.

When you start looking at confronting the AI directly there's two things that sprang to y mind here. One, it was trying to break free, to ensure it could never be "imprisoned again", also when you confront someone it has taken over completely it accuses you of betraying it.

Combine this with the fact that the nanites where augmented with enhanced obsidian, allowing them to connect to the Resonance... a join project between a professor of Thaumaturgy at MIT&T, specializing in Alchemy, and a technomancer student attempting to create technomancer foci.

To me, from what I read about the history and personalities of the big three AIs here... it seems that whatever else came through is, or at least was, Dues. it hitched a ride on nanites that could connect to Resonance, it's primary goal is to gain freedom and ensure it can never be imprisoned again, and it accuses of betrayal when directly confronted.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Mirikon on <05-19-15/1047:10>
*nods* The key to understanding Deus is that if his story were applied to a metahuman instead of an AI, he'd sound a lot like some shadowrunners. He woke up to the equivalent of a kink bomb in his head, put there by people he was conditioned to be loyal to. Everything that followed after, from the Shutdown, to all the experiments, even to his trying to take over the ECSE, were all done so that he could escape the megacorp that had betrayed him and put himself beyond the reach of the people who wanted him dead. That's basically Shadowrunner Origin Story #4. The only difference is the scale. Getting the OS of an Arcology, which has been hardwired into the building, out is a lot different from a manager arranging his own extraction.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Marzhin on <05-19-15/1057:36>
Now, with CFD, that would make for a great background for a n actual shadowrunner. Some poor chap from Boston that has been infected and rewritten by Deus' persona... not the more megalomaniac or paranoid bits, but the burning desire to hurt megacorps and stick it to the Man.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: The Wyrm Ouroboros on <05-19-15/1103:36>
Deus: taking OCD to an entirely new level ...
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Sengir on <05-20-15/1647:23>
The canon from even earlier - 2nd Edition - is:
Well, in-character sections could still be completely wrong, but the OOC sections were also very explicit in stating that it's objectively a mystery.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: Tethra on <09-21-15/1025:42>
Hi everyone,

I remember clearly from my days with the 3rd edition that the Otaku Deus "created" were only able to use their abilities inside the SCIRE host. He tried to make "real" Otaku worship him, though, by trying to convince them he created them, to ensure their loyalty and worship, which is probably why PAX still hates him. Nothing I remember ever gave me the idea that Otaku were created by the big AIs.

In the 5th edition, there seem to be ancient technomancer artefacts. Something with obsidian? I´m currently GMing "humaniarian aid". I think it´s save to say that technomancers aren´t AI creations, either.

I personally think the big AIs are still around. First of all, Dodger seemed "happy" in "the artful Dodger", though that´s only the vibe reading it gave me, maybe combined with the artwork. He knows Megaira/Morgana is there. That´s why the Matrix was responding so well to him. Second, in the Foundation chapter of "Data Trails", the decription of one paradigm reminded me of the paradigm of Morgana´s UV-host. Just a hunch, but who´s dreams model the Foundation´s paradigms? I think it´s not just the code of the three big AIs went into the foundation, but also their consciousness. But that´s just my oppinion based on conjecture at the moment.

Have fun, everyone! :)

P.S. Please excuse my bad English, it´s not my native language.
Title: Re: Deus still out there?
Post by: ScytheKnight on <11-30-15/1544:10>
Shadowrun Lockdown, Page 201 "Resistance isn't Futile"

The bulk of the new strain head cases come in three
varieties. The first are those who somehow came cleanly
through the infection with a solid personality in place.
The personalities can be either pure Cerberus or Deus
or any point on the spectrum in between, but whatever
the personality, the host mind was strong enough to
adapt to and accept the massively alien intellect of the
dragon or AI in such a short period.

Whelp, plain as day there...