Matrix questions.
What is the difference between the “deactivated ICE” option in security measures wich you can trigger with the compromise security move and “disable activated ICE” in the melt ICE move ?
What do you call subordinate system ? Is it the same thing as sub-system ?
ICE sits in a system until an intruder comes along, then it activates and defends the system. Hackers can activate and deactivate ICE manually depending on what they want to do in the matrix system. Does that explain that?
A subsystem and a subordinate system should be the same thing, but I’ll check when I get to a computer.
Ok for subsystem and subordinate, still confusing for security measures and melt ICE…
Let’s take un example. I’m in a system, I’m safe for now (Trace < Stealth), and I'm looking in the Building Services Nodes. There is a Black ICE. Do I compromise security to avoid any further problems or do I melt ICE ?
That depends on the fictional circumstances. If the MC is describing active Black ICE coming at you, you better melt it! If the MC is describing it just standing there, apparently inactive, I’d probably try to carefully do whatever I was in the system to do.
Just the same as if it was a security guard in meatspace. If the guard doesn’t see you, you carefully do what you’re doing and try to avoid alerting them. If the guard sees you, you act differently depending on the circumstances.
This is related to why one of the outcomes of melt ICE is to deactivate the ICE rather than destroy it. That’s the difference between the guard standing in front of the doorway, and the guard’s body sprawled against the wall.
Both have the result that you get past, but the two lead in quite different fictional directions.
Ok. Just to be sure, since nobody on the system have a Trace above is Stealth, ICE aren’t active ? So it’s a matter of active/non-active ?
(Subordinate system = subsystem, btw, but I’ve added a note to standardise the language in the next set of corrections. Thanks!)
I’m not sure that I understand the last question.
Intruders can have Trace higher than Stealth, but when they do, the MC can make harder moves against them because the corp knows where they’re jacking in from.
Whether ICE is active or inactive depends on the fictional situation. The basic assumption is that ICE uses a lot of processing power and corporate systems will keep it inactive until triggered.
(Clearly I should have included a discussion on this in the book! I’ll make a note to write a blog post about this that I can point people to in the future. Thanks again!)
What I don’t understant is when, as a MC, I will activate an ICE (except when there is a weak hit on Login) ?
Any time you get to make a move.
Or, if your prep demands it, when you describe a scene or subsystem.
The same as when you get to say whether a guard notices a PC or not.
Ok thanks again for the support !
No problem! Thanks for pointing out a place I could have been clearer!