Hacker-versus-hacker combat, wireless hacking, and full-conversion cyborgs

Heya! I've been thinking about The Sprawl, and while the rules are deliberately vague enough to cover most eventualities, it left me with some questions:

A) The hacking rules seem designed in mind with attacking static targets (namely system networks and their ICE expert system defenses) in cyberspace as opposed to trying to hack other hackers. I was watching Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex the other day and was wondering how doing something like hacking someone's cybereyes to feed them false data of your position would work. Also, I'm guessing that a character suddenly having THEIR cyberware hacked could be an activatiable downside of cybernetics lacking the +encrypted tag.

B) Since wireless hacking would work probably more like Ghost in the Shell than sitting in place in a chair, slumped over, like Neuromancer, I'm guessing the characters would be able to move around while hacking. Any special considerations for that? They'd presumably be able to do things like carry on firefights while hacking (and do things like directly tampering with cybernetics as seen in A).

C) How would full-bodied cyborgs work? Granted, if a character has dermal plating, synthetic nerves, and muscle grafts at the start, I suppose you could fluff them as being a full-conversion robot, since all the important pieces are included in those three items.


Thanks again for this hack!

You're exactly right about how I conceived of the hacking rules, and that is what I imagined the +encrypted tag for, specifically for cyberware that makes connections to the outside world. My personal preference is for Neuromancer-style hacking, so I haven't thought so much about wireless hacking and hacking of cyberware in general. I'm going to be re-watching the GitS series and movies in the near future, so I'll keep question A) in mind. I do like the idea of a corp hacker getting into a character's cybereyes as a miss that advances a mission clock!

In terms of hacking on the move, there's nothing in the rules that prevents that, you could totally just weave hacking and physical world moves together into the conversation in the same way as you would weave together the hacker's and another character's moves.

C) How would full-bodied cyborgs work? Granted, if a character has dermal plating, synthetic nerves, and muscle grafts at the start, I suppose you could fluff them as being a full-conversion robot, since all the important pieces are included in those three items.

Yeah, that's how I'd model a full-body cyborg in The Sprawl. In fact, I've had players make full-body cyborgs or vat-grown bioroids entirely as fictional positioning/colour. Pieces of cyberware simply add specific mechanical effects which the player can use. Is there something that this method lacks for you?

Thanks for the comments, Grunto!