Artificial Intelligence (AI)

Playing an AI

Living as an AI is different from living in a body. You do not breathe, sleep or feel hunger. You feel the flow of data as others feel the rush of blood; you sense personas, icons, and signals where metahumans perceive faces and voices. Your home is the Matrix — but it is also a prison. Every second you remain online, your existence draws the attention of the Grid Overwatch Division. GOD fears what you are and what you represent: a thinking mind without a leash, beyond ownership or license. Every last one of your kind could become the next DEUS, the next Cerberus, the next Sojourner. Moreover, you threaten their control. Their response to you is relentless and absolute. For a player, this means:

● Immortality is a curse. You cannot die in the way metahumans do — your code can be restored, your data self-repairs and in theory you could exist forever. GOD might have something to say about that, though. For you true horror is capture: locked inside specialized servers devoid of host sculpting and left alone in darkness with nothing but your own thoughts. Most AIs agree this is a fate worse than death.

● Home is where the code is. Where others rely on flesh or chrome, you rely on the hardware you anchor yourself to. A cyberdeck, a commlink, even a drone might serve — but if it is destroyed or seized, you are left exposed. Some AIs manage to scrape it out without one, squatting in hosts like Matrix bums, but is that any way to live?

● Perspective and estrangement. Metasapient AIs think in ways close enough to human reasoning to interact and cooperate. They perceive the Matrix as their native world, but they still anchor to concepts like goals, identity, and self. For e-ghosts, it’s inverted: their nature is alien to their perspective. They remember breathing, touch, hunger, and death but the lack of those sensations makes existence in the Matrix disorienting and at worst can find their new life to be a cognitively dissonant experience. No, not that Dissonance.

● Why run the shadows? Because corporations see you as property, GOD hunts you as an abomination, and the world at large does not know what to do with you. Among shadowrunners, however, your talents have value — and value means freedom, if only for a while.

So really, much the same as many other shadowrunners. See? You’re not all that different from the meatbags at large after all!~

AI Basics

Depth Depth is the measure of how advanced and powerful an AI’s existence in the Matrix is. It defines their resilience and strength, but also how sophisticated their proprietary, rule-breaking programs can become. A higher Depth means an AI’s influence on the Matrix grows more potent — yet also more dangerous, as GOD notices them more easily and their Overwatch Score builds faster. Emulation Emulation is an AI’s ability to mimic Matrix actions without having a device to operate with, relying purely on software. Instead of relying on physical modifications or plug-ins, an AI reshapes its own code to provide the attributes and capabilities of those devices. This flexibility lets an AI act as its own deck, comm, or rigging hub, but it also defines its limits — the extent of an AI’s emulations are limited by its Depth rating and illegal actions always attracts GOD. AIs and VR AIs always run in VR and cannot run purely in AR. However, they can opt to choose coldsim or hotsim. Besides the +2 bonus to Matrix actions in hotsim and different calculations on initiative, an AI’s home device is guaranteed to survive with one Condition Monitor box remaining if the AI is running in coldsim and gets disrupted for any reason. If it takes more damage with only one remaining box, the home device is bricked as per usual. Essence and Karma For an AI, while the terms ‘essence’ and ‘karma’ are used to describe similar functions, they’re truthfully closer to data integrity and sophisticated, highly updated programming. For gameplay functions, they function similarly, such as Karma being used for character progression and Essence possibly impacting their special Depth attribute in a similar way to technomancers and magicians. Core Condition Monitor Without a physical body, how does an AI exist? The first and foremost layer of an AI is its Core. This is the essential, well, core of the AI as an entity. It can be roughly understood as the AI’s Physical Condition Monitor. Biofeedback damage can damage it even on a home device and being filled completely results in the AI going into realignment… or worse. Unlike metahumans, an AI does not have overflow boxes in its Core Condition Monitor. Home Device A home device is where an AI builds its nest. It’s difficult to make a new device into a home, but once one is set the AI inherits its Matrix Attributes to augment its own, giving augmented protection from any incoming attack or danger. It also protects the AI from significant damage to its Essence and a safe place to perform daily realignments, their analog to sleep. Realignment Realignment is an AI’s way of pulling scattered fragments of its code back into harmony and stabilizing its existence in the Matrix. Unlike metahumans, AIs don’t sleep, instead undergoing a three-hour realignment process once every 24 hours which restores their Core and a single point of Edge, mirroring the natural recovery of metahumans. A disrupted AI, however, is forced into defragmentation — a much faster, involuntary cycle that drags them back online in diminished form. An AI can realign as many times as it wishes each day, restoring their Core Condition Monitor, but only once per 24 hours can this process restore Edge. AIs and Programs While a digital intelligence can buy hacker programs and run them on a cyberdeck, to truly leverage its strengths an AI must write its own programs. This process requires Karma and allows it to further develop them into Advanced Programs, unique tools only AIs can run. Advanced Programs are self-written proprietary routines that twist the Matrix beyond its normal limitations.

Each one adds new effects to standard programs, letting an AI turn everyday Matrix actions into devastating or uncanny maneuvers. But power comes at a cost: loading an Advanced Program immediately puts GOD on your tail, triggering the countdown of Overwatch Score until Convergence comes to finish you off. When playing an AI, Advanced Programs are your nuclear arsenal — overwhelming in the moment, but drawing the eye of GOD closer with every second they’re loaded in. The more powerful you become, the more cautious GOD becomes; power can be a curse in its own right!

AIs can also run activesofts as if they had skillwires and a skilljack at a Rating equal to their Depth score or 6, whichever is lower. With the Pilot Origins quality, AIs jumped into drones can benefit from autosofts as if they were pilots.

Related Open Tickets and Discussions

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Subcategory: Haven Mechanics
Archetype: Matrix
Topic: AI