[Rooks]

Trying to figure out the usefulness of this but I can recall in SR4 you can just run something on your comlink and it would translate it for you, hell theres an app irl that will translate written word into your prefered language and most smart phones you can just type what you want to say and it will translate it in whatever language you want

[The Wyrm Ouroboros]

Mmm-hmmm.  Absolutely correct.  And you can google how to do anything, and any information you want to know is on the web somewhere, so why have skillsofts either?

[Rooks]

Mmm-hmmm.  Absolutely correct.  And you can google how to do anything, and any information you want to know is on the web somewhere, so why have skillsofts either?

Time? it takes time to learn a skill even knowsofts it takes time to search a book on electronics even then you dont know the procedures you just know the stuff about it or the what not the how

[The Wyrm Ouroboros]

Oh!  So there would be a reason to have a knowledge/skill chip handy!!  Good to know.

[Top Dog]

Simple translations would (usually) work fine. We often use that in games, too.

However, remember that, when using social skills, you're limited to the language skill in question - that would be 0, here. That makes sense - when translating via commlink, with all the pauses, incorrect phrasings, etc inherent in computer translations, you won't be able to properly express yourself (remember, even with 21st century computers, perfect translations can't exist because different languages use fundamentally different concepts).

Not to mention that using a commlink to translate might come over badly to a lot of people, giving further penalties. And it's slower, much slower to communicate that way.

[Rooks]

Course you can just speak the language not understand what the person is telling you

[Top Dog]

Course you can just speak the language not understand what the person is telling you

... What?

Linguasofts also allow you to know what people are telling you, if that's what you're saying.

[Senko]

I see it as. . .

Know language X
"So sir he backed into your parked car?"
"Yes the car backed into me"

Linguasoft
"Ccxxxxxc"
"so he keyholed your ruderbager eh"
"What?"
"xjfxhxjjxjdj"
"xhxjzhddfkz"
"He backed unto your car?"
"yes"


Either way you can talk but you can't be charming and diplomatic because your waiting for translations which may or may not be misinterpreted by the machine (depending on the softs rating" and even thr best ones will miss certain key concepts underlying the language.

[Reaver]

Especially true for Tone languages (like many Asian languages)

Spent 20 minutes trying to pronounce my Hotel's name to a taxi driver (that actually spoke broken english fairly well)

I would pronouce it and he would go:

Huh? The no hotel called Sidewalk!
[Me]
Huh? The no hotel called market.
[Me]
Huh? Oh you want meat market! Me take you to whore house.
[Me]
Huh? No hotel called slap face in Vietnam!
[Me]
Oh! Park side hotel! Ok i take you!

●●●●

Just cause Google shows you the word, doesn't mean you can actually say it correctly 😲

[Rooks]

Especially true for Tone languages (like many Asian languages)

Spent 20 minutes trying to pronounce my Hotel's name to a taxi driver (that actually spoke broken english fairly well)

I would pronouce it and he would go:

Huh? The no hotel called Sidewalk!
[Me]
Huh? The no hotel called market.
[Me]
Huh? Oh you want meat market! Me take you to whore house.
[Me]
Huh? No hotel called slap face in Vietnam!
[Me]
Oh! Park side hotel! Ok i take you!

●●●●

Just cause Google shows you the word, doesn't mean you can actually say it correctly 😲

course you could just show them the word or use a text to speech device

[Reaver]

Not for tone languages.

As is common in many asain languages, they have a single character that represents multiple things. Its very hard to explain....

For example:  "$" to us it means money, or dollars.
In a sex services posting, each "$" means 100 bucks...

For them, the same symbol could mean:
House,
Boat,
Sunset,
Flower,
Smelly.

So "showing" a character means nothing to them without a context for it. And that boils down to the tone of each sylible of the word. Emphsize the sylibles differently, different word.

Mehow. (The character for hello)
ME-HoW: fuck off
MeH-oW: wonderful sunset
me-How: I am happy
Meow: I want cat for dinner.

[Top Dog]

Reaver, they may seem the same to us, and they may be written the same in Roman script, but you can just show the text in the actual language. When written down, those words are very much different.

[The Wyrm Ouroboros]

... and 'written down' is kind of exactly the opposite of what we're talking about, here - nor is there always a difference in the tonal character. To boot, it requires an understanding of the tone of what you just heard, or a linguasoft-level infochip to provide that tonal 'ear' to it.  You can, of course, speak/type in 'please direct me to the Hotel Mari' and (hopefully) your commlink translator program will work properly, but you still have a step or two distance between your lips and their ear.  You have to hope that the translation program has an accurate 'ear' as well ...

[Reaver]

Reaver, they may seem the same to us, and they may be written the same in Roman script, but you can just show the text in the actual language. When written down, those words are very much different.

Then by all means, goto Vietnam and wave your Iphone with a single character at them. Won't help.

[Rooks]

Exactly! just like you need an active soft for navigation and tracking  cause ya a mapsoft cant just do that, oh wait in 4e it could