Shadowrun
Shadowrun General => General Discussion => Topic started by: RowanTheFox on <04-26-17/1549:54>
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Nanoplasmosis - Parazoology 2 Pg. 37
"This unusual protozoan infects nanosystems, destroying the nanites as if it were a competing species. This protozoan not only feeds on the organic compounds found in soft nanites, but it has the ability to resonate a field that jams individual nanites.
Nanoplasmosis degrades nanites faster by any remaining Power rating it has after a disease resistance test. If the Power is reduced to 0, one nanosystem is still reduced by 1. If an infected subject has a nanohive, the protozoans infiltrate the system, preventing the creation of new nanites. The going hypothesis is that the protozoan awakened within a netzumi and is transmitted through fecal matter."
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It has been mentioned before, yes. Not a cure for CFD, especially since the CFD nanites are capable of reproducing with whatever the subject eats, without a nanohive. In someone already infected, it would slow the spread, essentially like giving chemo to someone with terminal cancer.
Where it has real potential is in people who are newly infected, or aren't infected. Nanoplasmosis could be used to innoculate people, essentially similar to giving people immune system boosters. So, no cure, but possible prevention.
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It has been mentioned before, yes. Not a cure for CFD, especially since the CFD nanites are capable of reproducing with whatever the subject eats, without a nanohive. In someone already infected, it would slow the spread, essentially like giving chemo to someone with terminal cancer.
Where it has real potential is in people who are newly infected, or aren't infected. Nanoplasmosis could be used to innoculate people, essentially similar to giving people immune system boosters. So, no cure, but possible prevention.
Ok, I'm actually swiping this from a buddy because we were just having this same conversation and he came up with the idea: Nutrition Spell
Here me out. The nanites reproduce via whatever the subject eats, as you said. So, just deprive them of any other food sources and cast the Nutrition spell on them until you literally starve out the CFD nanites due to a lack of usable material. No food = No new material = The CFD nanites die off.
Now, there is a risk that the more feral strains will turn to auto-cannibalism to feed themselves, but in either case the subject is good as dead no matter what. There's also no way to be sure if the old personality (pre-infection) will reemerge, or if the person is forever lost.
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Nutrition spell, combined with nanoplasmosis could have an effect, yes. However, you'd definitely need a mage willing to use a sustaining focus on the Nutrition spell for a period of days to weeks to fully cleanse the nanites. Not even going into any possible long-term effects of being under a Nutrition spell might be.
That simply stops the progress of CFD, and could indeed be a 'cure'. It would not reverse any damage already done, however, so an overwritten individual would not reemerge, and a partially overwritten personality would likely still maintain those overwritten personality traits. Though they would likely not black out any more.
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Nutrition spell, combined with nanoplasmosis could have an effect, yes. However, you'd definitely need a mage willing to use a sustaining focus on the Nutrition spell for a period of days to weeks to fully cleanse the nanites. Not even going into any possible long-term effects of being under a Nutrition spell might be.
That simply stops the progress of CFD, and could indeed be a 'cure'. It would not reverse any damage already done, however, so an overwritten individual would not reemerge, and a partially overwritten personality would likely still maintain those overwritten personality traits. Though they would likely not black out any more.
Just need mages with Quickening, thought that might be a bit hard to find. There would definitely be side effects, but there's not a treatment for any illness that comes without side effects, and anything is better than remaining a headcase, IMO. The latter would be a good reason for at-risk individuals to have a backup of their own personality as a personafix.
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It could also be argued that the nutrition spell also feeds the nanites due to the symbotic relationship between the nanites and the host body.
There is a cure for CFD.
Fire.
Lots of it. Applied directly to source of infection.
Keep application going until fine white ash is produced.
(Course, this cure sucks if you're infected mind you)
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It could also be argued that the nutrition spell also feeds the nanites due to the symbotic relationship between the nanites and the host body.
There is a cure for CFD.
Fire.
Lots of it. Applied directly to source of infection.
Keep application going until fine white ash is produced.
(Course, this cure sucks if you're infected mind you)
I'm not setting FastJack on fire.
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Personally, I prefer turning the patient into another form through the shape change spell to halt the infection (since its still technically bio- and cyberware which are rendered inert during the spell) or use Turn to Goo to pick out the hard nanites.
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Turn to Goo followed by Sludge Nanites might work.
The problem is targetting (nanites are small), and the number of nanites to "pick out" (nanites are numerous). Physically digging through a person's body while they are "Turned to Goo" might still kill them after the Goo has been restored.
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There's also the option of casting Stabilize on them and pumping them full of enough EMP to euthanize an elephant, followed up by a Heal spell or other medical treatment. It'll fry the rest of their 'ware, but that's replaceable.
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It could also be argued that the nutrition spell also feeds the nanites due to the symbotic relationship between the nanites and the host body.
There is a cure for CFD.
Fire.
Lots of it. Applied directly to source of infection.
Keep application going until fine white ash is produced.
(Course, this cure sucks if you're infected mind you)
I'm not setting FastJack on fire.
Why not???
He's old, dry, and krusty! He'd go up like a match!
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This makes me wonder... From a metagame perspective, will CFD be "cured" in the manner a disease would be, "solved" like a problem, or "stopped" like a malevolent force? Will there be a big climax? Or is it more a matter of time...
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We need new, better, naniten hunters, with STRONGER personalities to not lose to the virus!
Fight fire with fire!
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CFD is more of a "Fuck you, can't be solved" type of plot twist than anything else. Electric damage, hardwired Nanite Hunters, Immunization to Soft Nanites along with only eating organic matter, none of them is effective. Or any other for that matter. The best solution is "Deal with it and roll up a new character".
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Personally, I prefer turning the patient into another form through the shape change spell to halt the infection (since its still technically bio- and cyberware which are rendered inert during the spell) or use Turn to Goo to pick out the hard nanites.
Hmm. Now there's an idea. Not the Turn to Goo followed by physically picking millions of microscopic nanites out of the goo, that's just silly. But using magic to alter the form of the target, thereby suppressing their ware...
Yeah, a variant of the Shapechange spell that allows you to turn the target into another metahuman form would suppress CFD and its effects during the spell's duration. Wouldn't be a cure, and unless the target was a Mage, Adept, or Face, their running career might be over (due to not having that helpful ware anymore), but they would be alive, and themselves AS THEY CURRENTLY ARE.
Fun fact, that last bit means that you could also use the spell to 'lock in' the CFD persona if you cast it while it was in control.
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But would it?
Generally, ware stops working under a shapechange spell because the physical body has morphed into something else and the ware just can't function in the new body.
But nanites? Mircoscopic machines affected by shapechange? I'm not so sure, yes a nanite hive stops working, but animals have been infected and carriers of CFD, so I am less sure of shapechange stopoing or even slowing down a CFD infection...
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Since the process of rewriting a personality involves recording it however briefly, you could retrieve a personality from the eternal library via a submersion. You'd then need a way to upload it back into a host that had been cured somehow. Nanites perhaps? N other a cure but a treatment perhaps.
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But nanites? Mircoscopic machines affected by shapechange?
I'd say 'yes'. My guess is you're conceptualising nanites as a kind of invading force - which isn't untrue, but they're also a hard/soft nanoware system like any other, and those (along with any other nanoscale natural entities) are considered part of the body.
In any case;
Soft nanites are officially affected by chemicals and can be destroyed entirely by pumping the subject with the right chemicals. Hard nanites are not, and can forcibly excrete toxins / chemicals from the subject.
Electricity stuns hard nanites temporarily - long enough to kill soft nanites with chemicals.
Blood Filtering and other combined medical procedures will halve nanite volume.
Nanoplasmosis will jam hard nanites and eat soft nanites, but that doesn't significantly improve the situation from using chemicals and electrocution as presented in 5e.
It could also be argued that the nutrition spell also feeds the nanites due to the symbotic relationship between the nanites and the host body.
The spell itself is fairly explicit.
This spell prevents starvation and dehydration
One hit is enough to satisfy the target for a few hours, with extra hits increasing the quality of the delivered nutrients
One could argue that soft nanites within the body could be fed by the nutrition spell, but hard nanites?
Hard nanomachines are artificial constructs, nano-scale drones made from diamondoid composites, with almost frictionless bodies and internal power supplies.
I wouldn't agree they can be satiated the same way. Which leaves them a viable target for pseudo-starving a target out of CFD infection. Or at least to the point where they can (worst case) indefinitely survive in a living hell of electroshock containment without being rewritten.
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It could also be argued that the nutrition spell also feeds the nanites due to the symbotic relationship between the nanites and the host body.
There is a cure for CFD.
Fire.
Lots of it. Applied directly to source of infection.
Keep application going until fine white ash is produced.
(Course, this cure sucks if you're infected mind you)
I'm not setting FastJack on fire.
Why not???
He's old, dry, and krusty! He'd go up like a match!
A: It's FastJack. B: In my fanon, he's currently sitting in a nutrivat owned by Aztechnology. So he's actually old, withered, and soggy.
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This makes me wonder... From a metagame perspective, will CFD be "cured" in the manner a disease would be, "solved" like a problem, or "stopped" like a malevolent force? Will there be a big climax? Or is it more a matter of time...
One of the transhuman style cures I always saw happening was let people figure out how to program their own nanites and basically you infect yourself with.. well.. you.
Now you have a nanite based system working to keep you as you and can fight off other nanite infections, even potentially reversing minor damage caused as it basically has your script written into it and works to bring you back to that baseline. Your own personal nanohive would update itself, cross checking and double checking any updates/upgrades to make sure it isn't going off track.
Worries about infecting others is minimal if everyone has their own set and you could put in further limits.
Course the 6th world version of anti-vaxxers who insist on staying nanite free do tend get shafted, but hey...them's the brakes.
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That'll work great, for all of thirty seconds until someone gets the idea to hack the 'you' nanites and make you the 'you' they want you to be. Self-reinforcing mind control, without even needing to be a mage, or have big, expensive PAB units!
Can you imagine the market for 'designer girlfriends', without the risks of personafix addiction?
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Yeah, gotta admit that sounds like it'd just be hacked and overwritten by the infecting AI and their own swarm of nanites, and basically just speed up the process of you getting overwritten.
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Opened thread expecting some sort of disintegration ray, was disappointed.
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Yep, but that was because SR has basically painted itself into a corner with it.
In play Cryptoanalysis trumps any cryptography. No matter what level of coding you used, all you needed was a single extended test based around a CT and you were in.
Now there were gaming reasons for this, the classic go get pizza scenario tends to occur otherwise, but the end result is there are few real ways to secure your tech from being permanently usurped.
But that is why the master nanohive for these should be an offline design and the nanites built to be non-reprogrammable. They can only do the task they were built with and the hive makes new ones to fit new tasks. By itself it should be able to maintain a high enough pool to fend off initial attempts by outside nanites and not let them get a foothold to start with.
But that doesn't work out so well because CFD is the miracle hacker... could hack/hijack both hard and soft nanites, even those built to be non-reprogrammable, infecting equipment and people alike, PLUS it seemed to shrug off several treatments that normally should have worked against them, won't even go into that rant.
Again this was done for game reasons, otherwise players would have yawned and debugged themselves and loved ones with minimal effort.
But at the end of the day, in their attempt to create a new boogeyman they created a September Monster which has quickly become a take it or leave it option to the game that many tables just ignore because it just doesn't mesh well with their campaigns.
The funniest part is they sort of have been down this path before with Ghouls, what with the contact infection vector, which created the possibility of someone just grinding a ghoul or two and feeding it into a city's water supply or Stuffer shack snack rack to infect a city. They eventually changed that infection vector, but really what did they think was going to happen with CFD?
But on a lighter note, if you want a more humorous view of something similar, check out High Aztech by Ernest Hogan. Where they create a religion virus (can substitute soft nanites here basically and passable by skin contact) that reprograms the victim to believe in a particular diety or set of dieties, even having hallucinations about interacting with them. Originally designed to infect the local populace with a passion for the traditional Aztec pantheon, it quickly gets messy as every major religion unleashes their own version. But the twist here is rather than one set of deities overriding the other, the brain of the victim starts to intergrate the multiple gods together so now you have Buddha hanging out with Quetzalcoatl partying with Loki inside their head, making for some humorous insights.
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Personally, I prefer turning the patient into another form through the shape change spell to halt the infection (since its still technically bio- and cyberware which are rendered inert during the spell) or use Turn to Goo to pick out the hard nanites.
Hmm. Now there's an idea. Not the Turn to Goo followed by physically picking millions of microscopic nanites out of the goo, that's just silly.
Do you even magnet, son?
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Personally I'd just use "Shape Nanites" to render them inert and clump them together, pull them out like a wire and make sure the goo is within a healing ritual circle and hit with a super heal spell to undo any damage left. Supercharge the immune system with prophylaxis and for good measure add the nano plasmosis.
At least that's how I resolved the problem in my games ;D
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Most spells are terrible at targeting nanites for two reasons. First, they are too small to be seen individually or create a connection to them directly. Second, they are highly processed, and magic and tech do not blend well. Spells cast on a head case targeting the nanites, have their Drain increased by +2 at a minimum and may not work at all. Be creative, and make it tough—this virus is not fair.
IOW, you fiat'd CFD away rather than actually solve it or deal with it?
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Personally, I prefer turning the patient into another form through the shape change spell to halt the infection (since its still technically bio- and cyberware which are rendered inert during the spell) or use Turn to Goo to pick out the hard nanites.
Hmm. Now there's an idea. Not the Turn to Goo followed by physically picking millions of microscopic nanites out of the goo, that's just silly.
Do you even magnet, son?
IIRC, hard nanites are not made from ferrous metals, but rather things like silicon and other such elements, that the body doesn't naturally try to break down and use, like it would iron, or react badly to. So magnets would do drek all to it. Well, not quite. Standing next to a VERY powerful electromagnet could probably scramble the nanites, but at that point the fleshy body they're in would also be suffering some severe effects.
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I have to agree. CFD is a plot device. There is no real cure for it until the Devs say there is... and I doubt its going to be soon.
There has been a lit speculation as to 'why' CFD was brought in, ranging from an excuse to remove nanotech from the game to trying to create a 'technological boogieman' to threaten players with...
I don't know the real reason, and don't really care. For me, CFD is fringe plot point that doesn't get a lot of attention other then as a device to excuse random changes in personality among villians...
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I've heard that it was conceived as an excuse to justify why everything, especially augmentations, is more expensive now. Seems like a lot of work for something that could be explained by inflation.
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I've heard that it was conceived as an excuse to justify why everything, especially augmentations, is more expensive now. Seems like a lot of work for something that could be explained by inflation.
Inflation works as an excuse when it is a small change. Wired Reflexes, for example, went from 11k/32k/100kk to 39k/149k/217k between 4th and 5th. Which means that if this was due to 'inflation', that would be inflation of 200-400% in the course of a year or two (from beginning of Dragon Civil War to the new edition coming out). That is the kind of thing you see in global economic meltdowns, like the Great Depression.
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Global economic meltdown, huh? That would've been interesting to see.
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A global economic meltdown is pretty much inevitable. The shadowrun economy runs on capitalism gone mad. Capitalism depends on constant economic growth, which is utterly unsustainable in the long run.
Anywho, I actually managed to bring FastJack back in my fanon. The gist of it is that he got snapped up by Aztech, who then fried all of his nanites (and other 'ware) with EMP, using a Stabilize spell followed by a Heal spell to make sure it didn't kill him. After that his overwritten mind was more or less a blank slate that they pumped full of skillsofts for their purposes (which were horrible and psychopathic of course), after replacing the fried 'ware.
He did, however, remember one name: FastJack. He started to wonder who that was, or if it was him. He would periodically slip his proverbial leash to find everything he could on this "FastJack". Over the years, he started to put the pieces together, using it to build a personafix for himself. He's got a lot of "blank spots", things he can't remember because he couldn't find any info on them on the matrix. For starters, he no longer remembers his real name, and a lot of his old skills are gone, save for the ones his Azzie handlers plugged into him.
How he got out is a story all it's own.
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Most spells are terrible at targeting nanites for two reasons. First, they are too small to be seen individually or create a connection to them directly. Second, they are highly processed, and magic and tech do not blend well. Spells cast on a head case targeting the nanites, have their Drain increased by +2 at a minimum and may not work at all. Be creative, and make it tough—this virus is not fair.
Yeah, that's a typical quote of someone who doesn't know their own rules very well. There are half a dozen spells by now that do nothing else but interact with technology. Drain increase is a non-issue with reagents and fetish spells. The Shape (Element) spell is specific enough and allows to influence volumes of special materials. Not being able to see is a non-issue for the spell - otherwise targeting air or other gasses wouldn't be possible either.
Silicon or whatever else nanites use for their processors would be the top choice.
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The Shape (Element) spell is specific enough and allows to influence volumes of special materials. Not being able to see is a non-issue for the spell - otherwise targeting air or other gasses wouldn't be possible either.
So true.
When you Run with Mungo after he has had his Tuesday Taco Shack, having your mage able to cast Shape [Flatuance] is a downright necessity.
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What, you mean it's not more convenient to summon an air spirit and have it handle the situation?
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What, you mean it's not more convenient to summon an air spirit and have it handle the situation?
Nothing will drive an air spirit toxic faster than Mungo's taco farts.
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What, you mean it's not more convenient to summon an air spirit and have it handle the situation?
Nothing will drive an air spirit toxic faster than Mungo's taco farts.
Exactly.
Not to mention racking up that Spirit Index faster with that sort of job.
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What, you mean it's not more convenient to summon an air spirit and have it handle the situation?
Nothing will drive an air spirit toxic faster than Mungo's taco farts.
Exactly.
Not to mention racking up that Spirit Index faster with that sort of job.
I gotta say that the atonement ritual afterwards will be fragging spectacular.
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That's all nonsense. Air spirits can conjure nauseatingly toxic gases at will (as per Noxious Breath) and don't need to breath, so I see no reason they'd take offense at a few gaseous hydrocarbons.
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That's all nonsense. Air spirits can conjure nauseatingly toxic gases at will (as per Noxious Breath) and don't need to breath, so I see no reason they'd take offense at a few gaseous hydrocarbons.
They'd be offended because it's not their nauseatingly toxic gas. Air spirits are just as vulnerable to toxic waste as any other spirit, breathing or no breathing.
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That's all nonsense. Air spirits can conjure nauseatingly toxic gases at will (as per Noxious Breath) and don't need to breath, so I see no reason they'd take offense at a few gaseous hydrocarbons.
Dude, they don't have to breath it. We have seen Mungo's err.... discharges from the astral and I swear to Cougar that it left an astral haze in it's wake.
I don't know exactly what is wrong with the boy, but those bowels ain't normal.....maybe he has a Horror in there or something....
But if YOU want to put your summoned buddies through that, by all means feel free, but don't come crying back to us when nobody will return your summonings because they don't fancy being your personal air freshener for you. ;)
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I think it's a Shedim that crawled up there and got trapped by Mungos cheesey aura or something. It's definitely got a whiff of the dead about it. I swear there's ghouls who balk at assaulting that passage.
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A global economic meltdown is pretty much inevitable. The shadowrun economy runs on capitalism gone mad. Capitalism depends on constant economic growth, which is utterly unsustainable in the long run.
I'll just point out that there have been two hard resets on the global economy in the Shadowrun timeline, and we're only 20 years after the last one.
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Magic shouldn't be able to counter CFD.
The setting has WAY too much reliance on magic for all it's threats and cures. So it'd be nice if the new technological threat did not have a magical solution.
Magic fights magic. Resonance fights Resonance. It'd make more thematic sense that AIs and nanite would be able to cure the AI/nanite threat.
With Bugs and Shedim, magic is your best solution.
Back when it was Ex Pacis, you'd use your own Otaku.
When it was Deus, you had 2 other AIs there.
I'm just saying, you fight fire with fire.
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A global economic meltdown is pretty much inevitable. The shadowrun economy runs on capitalism gone mad. Capitalism depends on constant economic growth, which is utterly unsustainable in the long run.
I'll just point out that there have been two hard resets on the global economy in the Shadowrun timeline, and we're only 20 years after the last one.
I know, and it'll keep happening over and over because the powers that be are too arrogant and greedy (read: stupid) to learn. They'll just keep screwing themselves, and guess who gets to pay for it again? If you guessed "the little guy", then DING! Right again!
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Magic shouldn't be able to counter CFD.
The setting has WAY too much reliance on magic for all it's threats and cures. So it'd be nice if the new technological threat did not have a magical solution.
Magic fights magic. Resonance fights Resonance. It'd make more thematic sense that AIs and nanite would be able to cure the AI/nanite threat.
With Bugs and Shedim, magic is your best solution.
Back when it was Ex Pacis, you'd use your own Otaku.
When it was Deus, you had 2 other AIs there.
I'm just saying, you fight fire with fire.
Fire? Fire.
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I'm gonna have to disagree on your list of 'best' ways to deal with threats, DeathStrobe.
Normal spirits? Yes, magic is your best bet. But Bugs and Shedim? No. Any bug too strong to get taken down by an AK-97 firing capsule rounds of KE IV insecticide, or a Shedim too tough to get taken down by a grenade launcher on SA, is going to eat your mage for breakfast (perhaps literally). The best bet for bugs and shedim if you can't use violence is to de-ass the area immediately, and let someone with a higher caliber of violence take care of it.
For the rest, I'm a D&D player. That's where I started. You don't target the Cleric's Will save, the Fighter's Fort save, or the Rogue's Ref save. You just don't. That's stupid. Same with the threats you're talking about. You don't fight Pax or the uber AIs in the Matrix. You fight them in the meat, where you have hellaciously more options than they do, and you aren't playing to their strengths.
For CFD, the best counter is thermobaric munitions.
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That's a very liberal interpretation of "cure".