What can be hacked, what can't? How do you know what has a wireless connection, and what doesn't? I was hoping for a big master list that would say Hackable, non-hackable..

Anything, nothing.  Everything, nothing.  That answer your question? :p

I'm sure that details on doing GiTS style cyberware hijacking will come in Unwired.

What Tear said I was under the impression if it was electronic it was hackable in SR 4.

There are lots of people who don't like it.

I forever, think it's cool. Hackers (Formerly Deckers) Not only can do things other than sitting in a chair on a run, but can be directly effective in combat.

Besides, it's not like you can't turn your cyberware's wireless functionality /off/.

You're still vulnerable to Activator nanites unless you basically sabotage your own 'ware's wireless capability, however. Those devious li'l bastards could really ruin someone's day, applied judiciously. They're too expensive to use as a general air vector security measure (well, unless we're talking about the big ZO), but a few stealth RFID tags and some Activators planted as a trojan horse can be an excellent way to keep tabs on specific target until you're ready to take action.

That's one of the reason that hunter nanites are a must have fore SR4.  Even if you don't intend on getting a hive installed in your body, having an injection or two handy before or after a run is a necessity.

These are things you're not likely to see on a regular basis.

The average ganger doesn't battle a Samurai by pumping him full of nanites and hacking him.

Yeah, I see nanites as being the kind of thing only prime runners and the nastier breed of corp facilities make regular use of. Nanites that interact with cyberware have to beat the device or system rating in an opposed test, so it's the kind of stuff people use when it falls off the back of a truck or when they know the payday will be worth it, because it takes a pretty high rating (and expensive) dose of nanites to approach reliability. If anything, I think Activator nanites and the like may actually be most useful for characters who aren't accomplished hackers, since they can help you access to a device you may have no chance in hell of getting into on your own. Doesn't prevent a real hacker from coming in and shutting your li'l ad hoc operation down, but it could still be a useful trick to have up your sleeve when you're working on a tight timetable. I going to start lugging around an emergency dose of Activators on some of my characters in my tabletop group, since carrying around an instant subscription to a wireless device in an aerosol can sounds like something that could come in handy when you least expect it. If nothing else, it can force a facility's timed gateways open until someone manages to reboot the system.

I don't see nanoware as that expensive, its like bio or cyber as long as you pick and choose and don't try and have it do everything its reasonable. Rating 6 nanoware hunters and a rating 6 alphaware nanoware hive to support it, is 35,000, not cheap but not so expensive you could never afford it.

I didn't say that it's expensive for a runner.

I am implying that you can't assume every one of the opposition will be tossing nanites at the cybered char.

Corporate security and gangers likely don't have that sortof thing.

You don't need a rating 6 hive to have rating 6 hunters. Nanohive rating only determines the maximum number of systems it can support, not the rating total of the systems involved. Regardless, I still don't think having nanite hunters is even remotely mandatory. I'll probably get a nanohive on many of my characters, but Nantidotes, O Cells, and a TCS are all higher on my shopping list than nanohunters.


PS: One thing that hits me as somewhat messy is the "soft/hard" designation. Does it mean you can choose to have soft OR hard nanites when buying a particular system, or does it mean that a particular nanite system is considered "hard" for detection purposes but cannot be reprogrammed due to having "soft" nanite components? I would never have dreamed up the latter definition, btw, except for the fact that hard nanite reprogramming by the RAW only gives a penalty range of -2 to -4 when giving a nanite a new role, which is somewhat messy considering that there's Soft/Hard Rating 9 Universal Nantidotes sitting there just begging to be reprogrammed if you can indeed get a purely hard version...

Well, if your character is a ganger, then I'd say you probably don't have to worry much about nanites.  At least, not yet.

However, if you're playing a shadowrunner, then I'd say that having access to them will become a must at some point.  Perhaps not to have as a permanent installed nanohive, but definitely I'd have an injection or two handy.

My reasoning?  I'm a shadowrunner.  Eventually, no matter how well prepared you are, things go wrong that you didn't foresee.  Sure, it's probably not something that most security guards would carry, but who knows what might come at you once the guards start calling for backup.  Plus, I have the following reasons:

1.  GMs are evil.  Having gone to the School for GM Evilness (TM), I know this firsthand.  (Oh, he thinks that he'll never get attacked by nanites, does he?  MuaHahahaHahaha....)

2.  "Apparently, the J forgot to mention the nanite lab in the basement..."

3.  The mom and pop company that you're raiding is actually owned by X megacorp, doing Y illegal research that they don't want anyone to know about... ever.

4.  Experimental nanites (Oh, look!  Test subjects!)

5.  Recent upgrade in the security system. 

I should point out that I'm suggesting to at least have them in the get away van alongside that savior medkit, and not saying that everyone needs a nanohive full of them straight out of chargen.  Remember, there's no such thing as a predictable shadowrun. 

Eh, I think WK and I just take issue with the implication that nanohunters are "must haves" for the majority of runners. Obviously, you want to own ways of dealing with just about anything that can come up, but I'm not entirely convinced that Nanohunters are the best way to cope with nanotech for a relatively "average" shadowrunner. They're honestly pretty inadequate as a pre-emptive measure and make for a somewhat unreliable cure, to the point where I'm not sure I'd not rather just try and get to my tech wiz/street doc contact and get blasted with an EMP rather than mess with hunters myself. Remember that from a mechanics POV that nanites are essentialy a fancy pants version of your typical chemical warfare, so an ounce of prevention is still worth a pound of cure. Impermeable, chemical protected clothing and internal airtanks are still the practical and paranoid runner's best friends. I do fully intend to someday have some kick ass universal nanite hunters on my mundane characters, but frankly, at the end of the day, I'm still more worried about that bullet with my name on it than nanotech.

That's pretty much a ditto.

I never said hunters were a must have either, its more along the lines as one of those small luxeries you allow yourself when you have extra cash. That seems to me to be what a lot of the stuff in augmentation is, the basic core book will give you access to all the ware you need to make a complete runner. The stuff in augmentation is more specialty gear or unique ways to do the same things the basic stuff does.