Skitterdoc 2077

[prussiangrandier]

Brain protection is the number 1 thing I would get in cyberpunk if I ever got any implant

heck, I would go so far as to install wires between them and permanently keep it in airplane mode

that an anything to keep people out of my mind

Metallic lining in the scalp will probably put a stop to any electromagnetic thing, but on the downside means no more pet scan, x-rays and especially no MRI

Taylor can cope with that, it will raise the price of her trauma team subscription, but she can do it, I doubt any portable machine can interface thru 1 mm of titanium plating

this actually made me more paranoid about cyberpunk because I did not know that there were ways to hack people's brains without cybernetics

 

[Letsparty]

Well, that happened. As they say, the plot thickens! That was a nice meaty chapter.



I find it a little dubious that such a thing would work on a Trauma Team beacon. Broad spectrum jammers are pretty easy to build or acquire; even in RL, never mind a high-tech alt-future. Consider it. If they did work, then everyone and their cyberdog would use one every time they took a swipe at a corpo suit they even suspected having Platinum coverage. Then TT's rep would go straight into the tank as they repeatedly lost their clients to this jamming. Jamming TT does come up in CP2077 and Edgerunners, but in both cases, it involves placing a chip (or something similar) directly into the target. These devices are also implied to be rare and difficult to come up with.

A broad spectrum jammer isn't necessary for this scene to work anyway. Trauma Team's response is quick, but definitely not instant. If they ambush Taylor some place without immediate air access (pretty common in NC), then they can delay it further. So they would just need to subdue her relatively quickly (which they already do), place a jamming chip in one of her sockets, and vacate the premises. The faraday cage would just end up being the insurance of someone planning ahead (like this attacker clearly did). If said jamming chip simply jammed her TT beacon and cell phone, it wouldn't interfere with her escape plan either (as they likely use NFCs for the reprogramming, which are very short-ranged).

Click to shrink...

Except in this kind of situation if you are going to use a shard based attack you better be sure that it is going to do what you want it do, and we have seen in the previous parts of the story that Taylor has not only a firewall (that the last virus she encountered went thru) but also a Zetatech ICE (which did stop it).

I nodded and enlightened them, "Yes, there was a virus in her system when I connected; it got through my firewall even, but it was stopped by my ICE,"

Click to shrink...

First, immediately, I was greeted with my Zetatech system springing into high gear and quarantining a piece of malicious code that had tried to bridge between us through my firewall appliance. That was interesting. What was also interesting was she had quite a few pieces of cybernetics, including a networked internal biomonitor that was trying, but failing, to send a signal out to... ah, she was a subscriber. Although I didn't have any Trauma Team implants, I did have a bunch of their software. I ran it in a sandboxed virtual environment, just like the software from NC Med Ambulance, but it was helpfully popping up, for my perusal, this woman's file.

Click to shrink...

So in short, going with a jammer instead of a shard was a valid tactical choice (and its possible that they did try a shard when she was unconscious and it just did not work).

 

[Lincolnator]

Well, that happened. As they say, the plot thickens! That was a nice meaty chapter.



I find it a little dubious that such a thing would work on a Trauma Team beacon. Broad spectrum jammers are pretty easy to build or acquire; even in RL, never mind a high-tech alt-future. Consider it. If they did work, then everyone and their cyberdog would use one every time they took a swipe at a corpo suit they even suspected having Platinum coverage. Then TT's rep would go straight into the tank as they repeatedly lost their clients to this jamming. Jamming TT does come up in CP2077 and Edgerunners, but in both cases, it involves placing a chip (or something similar) directly into the target. These devices are also implied to be rare and difficult to come up with.

A broad spectrum jammer isn't necessary for this scene to work anyway. Trauma Team's response is quick, but definitely not instant. If they ambush Taylor some place without immediate air access (pretty common in NC), then they can delay it further. So they would just need to subdue her relatively quickly (which they already do), place a jamming chip in one of her sockets, and vacate the premises. The faraday cage would just end up being the insurance of someone planning ahead (like this attacker clearly did). If said jamming chip simply jammed her TT beacon and cell phone, it wouldn't interfere with her escape plan either (as they likely use NFCs for the reprogramming, which are very short-ranged).

Click to shrink...

The other side of the whole jammer argument is that jammers are obvious. They are like using a massively powerful strobe light to blind people looking your way (figuratively, not literally, the actual mechanics involved are much more complicated) to disguise what is happening around you. Yes, it obfuscates your exact location and what you are doing, but it is also a massive 'something is going on in this area that someone doesn't want seen' beacon that is visible to anyone with a radio connection. So, yes, they work to block TT signals, but they also tell everyone in several blocks that something fucky is going on in that general area. They are not subtle which is a major disadvantage.

 

[BomeranG]

I didn't even see him fucking pull it out. He was at least as fast as me, and I thought he was probably a bit faster. I needed to do something to fix that.

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I'm really happy about this, the fact that she didn't make some advanced kerenzikov/sandevistan combination despite what she intended to at the beginning but didn't have a sandevistan example and wanted to put kerenzikov in asap was constantly bothering me. Someone with Taylor's shard must be the highest level of cyberware/bioware snob.

I'm sure Taylor will react rationally to this. No need to overcorrect her perceived weaknesses, no sir

Click to shrink...

It's only paranoia if they aren't really out to get you.

 

[Cloak&Dagger]

I find it a little dubious that such a thing would work on a Trauma Team beacon. Broad spectrum jammers are pretty easy to build or acquire; even in RL, never mind a high-tech alt-future. Consider it. If they did work, then everyone and their cyberdog would use one every time they took a swipe at a corpo suit they even suspected having Platinum coverage. Then TT's rep would go straight into the tank as they repeatedly lost their clients to this jamming. Jamming TT does come up in CP2077 and Edgerunners, but in both cases, it involves placing a chip (or something similar) directly into the target. These devices are also implied to be rare and difficult to come up with.

Click to shrink...

The other side of the whole jammer argument is that jammers are obvious. They are like using a massively powerful strobe light to blind people looking your way (figuratively, not literally, the actual mechanics involved are much more complicated) to disguise what is happening around you. Yes, it obfuscates your exact location and what you are doing, but it is also a massive 'something is going on in this area that someone doesn't want seen' beacon that is visible to anyone with a radio connection. So, yes, they work to block TT signals, but they also tell everyone in several blocks that something fucky is going on in that general area. They are not subtle which is a major disadvantage.

Click to shrink...

Neither jammers or beacons are rare AFAIK, but rather it could be their mundanity that could allow them to be fooled.

Yes, jammers are conspicuous, but if every Corpo DOES use a jammer, then there would be random deadzones all over Night City, for perfectly valid reasons since everybody would want that security, so a jammer wouldn't necessarily stand out.

Thus, the difficulty of a jammer would be making sure that's it's small enough not to be remarkable, and the abduction zone would need to be chosen in an area with plausible deniability.

 

[Silver719]

I guess the theory that some people will think she (or her Alt at least) was gonna be suspected as some super soldier experiment just got a BIG nod with this.


Now her small emergency alert beacons would probably be something the people in Trauma Team would like to know more about. She probably have to divulge ita existence as it was how she was tracked and it really seems like something very a very useful upgrade to give clients.

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Debatable how useful it would be. Most things in Cyberpunk don't actually require you to be aware to do. Breaking into bank accounts, faking IDs, and harvesting organs can all be done without the individual being aware at all. If the brain scanner didn't require her to be awake to function, she probably wouldn't have woken up at all.

But I suppose rich aholes are always willing to pay for peace of mind.

 

[deadlyham]

Taylor faced two of the biggest dangers for her in Cyberpunk. Borgs and mind reading tech. None of her defenses work against a 100% Borg; monowire won't work either. Her Tinker ability is too dangerous to fall into corpo hands, and corpos will want to take it if they realize what she can do.

Time for Taylor to escalate. I think creating something to give false neural readings is probably easily in Taylor's wheelhouse, but I'm not sure what she can do against British Adam Smasher.

 

[clonezero]

Snip

Click to shrink...

True but it was still a useful tool to get around jammers. Considering the influx of ways to prevent the current alarm system Trauma Team uses from working properly (two scenarios in the story so far), the company needs to keep up and update their countermeasures and Taylor's improvised method worked.

The bigger thing IMO is it once again shows Taylor's amazing capabilities. She continues to prove how valuable of a talent she is.

 

[Rhostadt]

Also: we're getting Taylor's perspective, not the objective truth and Taylor is not an expert on jamming.

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Ok, that is an excellent point. In that vein, it's probably not a broad spectrum jammer at all. Given the order of events (she transmits, then gets jammed), it seems more likely that British-ninja-dude is using some sort of narrow beam smart jammer. When Taylor transmitted, it detected that, locked onto that frequency, then aimed the jamming right at her. He wasn't jamming her before, because TT does use anti-jamming techniques and his device needed some info first to counter them.

The other side of the whole jammer argument is that jammers are obvious. ... So, yes, they work to block TT signals, but they also tell everyone in several blocks that something fucky is going on in that general area. They are not subtle which is a major disadvantage.

Click to shrink...

Wouldn't they also be trackable? Broad spectrum jammers spew radio waves all over the place by design, and triangulating on such things is also pretty easy. Also, general jamming is the sort that's most easily countered/penetrated. Which I would assume TT was capable of doing, hence my doubt as to whether broad spectrum jamming would work at all. However, given kaosisreality's point above, I'm not sure this matters any more.

 

[Cloak&Dagger]

Time for Taylor to escalate. I think creating something to give false neural readings is probably easily in Taylor's wheelhouse, but I'm not sure what she can do against British Adam Smasher.

Click to shrink...

The question isn't what she can do, the question is what CAN'T she do? She's been sandbagging pretty hard, she's fully capable of making unstoppable biocomputer software, hardware, and nanobots, as well as devouring swarms of microorganisms.

 

[deadlyham]

Also looking to how Taylor escalate her security. Like... can her shard fugue her railgun from Dragoon in her hand or something like micromissles with bioweapon paylods in sholders? Or realy good EMP against cyberninjas.

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Taylor admired those missile launcher arms in earlier chapters. A bullshit tinkertech EMP that takes down even hardened cybernetics would be a huge boon to Taylor. Full borgs sidestep her best bio-weapons, and a tinkertech EMP could stop them cold. Toss paralytic grenade, blow up EMP, collect loot.

The question isn't what she can do, the question is what CAN'T she do? She's been sandbagging pretty hard, she's fully capable of making unstoppable biocomputer software, hardware, and nanobots, as well as devouring swarms of microorganisms.

Click to shrink...

Taylor, grab the Scav brains. She also needs to setup some distress beacon that cannot be blocked by a radio jammer or faraday cage. Maybe a pheromone to summon a horde of borged out pigeons?

edit: Also forgot while Taylor's shard is a baby that's not as powerful as Bonesaw, it has more malleable limits, if any. Maybe her shard will react to this attack.

 

[Dalriaden]

I did a cold weather course in Alaska which was fucking stupid because this was right after 9/11 and I was like i don't think the Russians are going to be invading Alaska guys.

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It makes more sense than JRTC before deploying. I would have been cool with it if it meant going to fight Hezbollah in South America and getting time off to hit the beaches in Brazil or something but doing it before being sent to Iraq was dumb. The entire amount of foliage I saw around Tikrit might have matched an acre of Fort Polk lol.

 

[Alivaril]

but I'm guessing they know this is Taylor, but not the same Taylor.

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There's an easier explanation than "alternate universe Taylor": given the prevalence of cybernetic enhancements in this setting, and Taylor's own possible use of biological brain enhancements (see weird brain growth in the form of Chiwuwgeon's connection), there's a whole ton of room for "am I really the same person that I was before all these changes?"

 

[WillRobinson]

The question isn't what she can do, the question is what CAN'T she do? She's been sandbagging pretty hard, she's fully capable of making unstoppable biocomputer software, hardware, and nanobots, as well as devouring swarms of microorganisms.

Click to shrink...

Taylor doesn't have Bonesaw's full power, which has advantages and disadvantages. Almost like Leet, she has very limited access to the design and construction assistance that tinkers get. On the upside, she still has knowledge and proficiency within her specialty, and a non-blackboxed database of medical tech.

Within Worm, she would probably be comparable to a couple of the pseudo-tinker powers that Teacher can grant. Access to the tech from Cyberpunk 2077 is really boosting her efficacy.

 

[Wulfenbach]

Ah the ol' attempted kidnapping between family to fuck wi- i mean, "check up" on them in a clandestine manner. I miss the days gone by.

 

[prussiangrandier]

ok i got something

Dynalar Subdermal Armor (Skull)

Hey, your skull doesn't have any moving parts, at least not in the important places, like right over your brain! So why not get subdermal plating on your main cranium? It protects like a helmet in every way (there's a 1-4 on 1D10 chance any head attack hits an unprotected part—like our face or...

cyberpunk.fandom.com

has this and then create a grid pattern of electric wires running underneath it, it will in effect create a faraday cage inside her brain, making her immune to 100% of scanning tech that doesn't require a literal brain extraction

it also makes net running and cyberware more efficient as you can simply cut yourself entirely from the net and there isn't much anyone can do to stop it

 

[kaosisreality]

Wouldn't they also be trackable?

Click to shrink...

Yes.

Broad spectrum jammers spew radio waves all over the place by design, and triangulating on such things is also pretty easy.

Click to shrink...

Also yes. But keep in mind that electromagnetic energy is still energy and jamming is just putting out a higher amplitude energy than the communication devices. The faraday cage doesn't do that. The faraday cage creates a barrier that dissipates electromagnetic signals going in and out of the cage. The easiest way to bypass a faraday cage is a physical wire, but a faraday cage is not perfect and a strong enough signal can turn the cage into an antenna. Organic life is unlikely to survive that amount of energy, but it remains technically possible.

 

[Cloak&Dagger]

Taylor doesn't have Bonesaw's full power, which has advantages and disadvantages. Almost like Leet, she has very limited access to the design and construction assistance that tinkers get. On the upside, she still has knowledge and proficiency within her specialty, and a non-blackboxed database of medical tech.

Within Worm, she would probably be comparable to a couple of the pseudo-tinker powers that Teacher can grant. Access to the tech from Cyberpunk 2077 is really boosting her efficacy.

Click to shrink...

She doesn't need to have access to any of the magic upgrades, physics limited biotech is earthshattering enough.

 

[The_Shameful]

Hmm. Shame that the skills learned from controlling units in that MMO will never be useful, if only she had some sort of, drone idea or something, that would benefit from her time spent in-game. Guess we'll never get to see it.

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I didn't want them to just shave my head like a sheep because then things would have become personal, and I would have to kill them all. As it stood, there was still a chance that that wouldn't be necessary.

Click to shrink...

Evidence that Taylor is willing to avoid escalation. Just don't touch her hair.
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List of cyberwear Taylor directly stated/ implied she missed having:
-high-end espionage cyberwear (or other counter-mind-reading measures)
-giant arm cannons ("You know what they say, bitches love cannons.")
-even faster reflexes

Other issues which she will likely want to resolve:
-Lack of stealth detection (solution: better sensors)
-Poor hand-to-hand capabilities
-Lack of anti-jamming capabilities
-Lack of borg countermeasures (solution: fun things)
-Weakness to shock (solution: Inductor cyberwear)
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Also, let's agree that Taylor must have a pretty high COOL stat to stare down a gun like that while being stuck like a fish in a barrel. I think she impressed him.

 

[Kemayo]

I'll be honest, I'm not really a big fan of the whole [it turns out the mc is a scion of some powerful family] trope. It reeks of some cheap YA fiction.

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It's a pretty standard cyberpunk trope. "Scion of powerful family, rebelling / slumming it" is the normal form, of course, but in this story that was Annette, not Taylor. It's a mixed blessing at best for Taylor -- she has a powerful faction that's personally interested in her, but because it's a cyberpunk faction they're assholes. They care about the long term good of the family, not about her -- e.g. note that in a previous chapter someone was speculating that it was unusually sentimental that Annette wasn't just quietly assassinated after she left her family.

For Taylor this means that she has enemies, but not really any support. The family looks sort of favorably at her because she's doing well for herself independently / is the child of someone's favorite grand-daughter. They're presumably vaguely interested in tapping her for something if she's needed (probably greatly inconveniencing her own personal plans), but they don't want to just pull her in and pamper her.

Note that the YA version of the trope would tend to give the character direct benefits from the relationship.

 

[prussiangrandier]

Hmm. Shame that the skills learned from controlling units in that MMO will never be useful, if only she had some sort of, drone idea or something, that would benefit from her time spent in-game. Guess we'll never get to see it.

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Evidence that Taylor is willing to avoid escalation. Just don't touch her hair.
-----

List of cyberwear Taylor directly stated/ implied she missed having:
-high-end espionage cyberwear (or other counter-mind-reading measures)
-giant arm cannons ("You know what they say, bitches love cannons.")
-even faster reflexes

Other issues which she will likely want to resolve:
-Lack of stealth detection (solution: better sensors)
-Poor hand-to-hand capabilities
-Lack of anti-jamming capabilities
-Lack of borg countermeasures (solution: fun things)
-Weakness to shock (solution: Inductor cyberwear)

Click to shrink...

running wires seem to solve most of these issues, as well as making her immune to most netrunners

see people think that nerves run on electricity, but they don't, it's bioelectric signals that travel at the speed of sound

electricity in the other hand travels at 1/3rd the speed of light or higher

 

[WillRobinson]

She doesn't need to have access to any of the magic upgrades, physics limited biotech is earthshattering enough.

Click to shrink...

She's not just missing the magic upgrades and supply-chain-skip, she's missing the shard-aided design abilities that let tinkers make incredibly complex mechanisms and skip the years of R&D needed.

If the magic upgrades are like Citrine (minor tweaks to physics or material properties to make tech work better than it should), and the tech database is like Miss Militia (an archive of technology and first principles designed and discovered by the host species), the design element is like Accord: shard-provided superintelligence when designing incredibly complex tinkertech.

Taylor doesn't completely have this processing power, so even if she has access to better materials in Cyberpunk, she has to design her tech the hard way.

 

[0xFFF1]

Do you think Chirurgeon could come up with a multitasking cyberware to give Taylor multiple threads of consciousness? I doubt it could get as ridiculous as what Queen Administrator could do, but in that case QA was offloading a lot of the computation onto her shard hardware. Cyberpunk Chirugeon is running on low power mode, so anything like that would have to work based on mundane physics.

 

[Cloak&Dagger]

She's not just missing the magic upgrades and supply-chain-skip, she's missing the shard-aided design abilities that let tinkers make incredibly complex mechanisms and skip the years of R&D needed.

If the magic upgrades are like Citrine (minor tweaks to physics or material properties to make tech work better than it should), and the tech database is like Miss Militia (an archive of technology and first principles designed and discovered by the host species), the design element is like Accord: shard-provided superintelligence when designing incredibly complex tinkertech.

Taylor doesn't completely have this processing power, so even if she has access to better materials in Cyberpunk, she has to design her tech the hard way.

Click to shrink...

Which is easy for her. Understanding DNA means she can code whatever she wants as easily as a regular programmer, superintelligence means she can put those programmers to shame and type whatever comes to her mind effortlessly and have it be valid code, and the nature of biotech means she needs almost no resources and can easily make AI assistance for anything she needs help with.

Like, yes, would she need to collect and examine a specific biotechnica biological sample to copy it or design something specifically tailored against it, because she has no magic? Yes. But that's such a small thing it doesn't matter. It's already the easiest part.

 

[WillRobinson]

Which is easy for her. Understanding DNA means she can code whatever she wants as easily as a regular programmer, superintelligence means she can put those programmers to shame and type whatever comes to her mind effortlessly and have it be valid code, and the nature of biotech means she needs almost no resources and can easily make AI assistance for anything she needs help with.

Click to shrink...

...Did you just completely ignore the part where she doesn't have Accord-style superintelligence?