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[Funk]

the m4 is a better weapon but the AR 15 is a lot cheaper to buy and run if it is at the porn shop.
i like to build up a stock pile of them to iusse to new liberals or to use for mass base defeance.

[FugitiveUnknown]

So I was running a nonviolent cha/specialist, using hacking to raise my juice.

Somehow, my entire group ended up with kidnapping charges. Any ideas how this could have occured?

Also, I was going to ask about interolgations. I understand you need good psychology and adequate secondary social skills. The ancient wiki also claims heart is really vital, but I haven't found that to be true. Any tips on setting up an easy mode for turning people that isn't 15 versions out of date?

[BoxOfAids]

So I was running a nonviolent cha/specialist, using hacking to raise my juice.

Somehow, my entire group ended up with kidnapping charges. Any ideas how this could have occured?

Also, I was going to ask about interolgations. I understand you need good psychology and adequate secondary social skills. The ancient wiki also claims heart is really vital, but I haven't found that to be true. Any tips on setting up an easy mode for turning people that isn't 15 versions out of date?

For the kidnapping charges, apparently sometimes they can come from hacking. Otherwise, I dunno.

For interrogations, make sure you wear appropriate clothing for the job (it's on the wiki), otherwise try for hallucinogenics etc if you can afford it. Make sure that beatings are not done by your interrogator, or the subject will begin to hate them. Gotta do good guy/bad guy.

[HmH]

Also, I was going to ask about interolgations. I understand you need good psychology and adequate secondary social skills. The ancient wiki also claims heart is really vital, but I haven't found that to be true. Any tips on setting up an easy mode for turning people that isn't 15 versions out of date?

I know you're going for a nonviolent run, but I wouldn't neglect beatings: they're one of the easier-to-abuse mechanics in the game. Tips on beatings:
1) Strength is cumulative. If you have six Athletes, each with 20 Strength, they'll be six times more effective at beating the Wisdom out of the Automaton's head than just one Athlete.
2) The maximum amount of Wisdom you can detract per beating is forceroll/10, where forceroll is the sum of random rolls between 1 and each interrogator's Strength. For six aforementioned Athletes, forceroll will vary from 6 to 120, which means up to 12 Wisdom lost.
3) Beating is only succesful when forceroll is higher than the captive's (Health+Wisdom+Heart)*3.

Anyway, onwards to talking. The success of an interrogation is governed by a variable called 'attack'.
1) Attack is first calculated as the sum of highest Heart-Wisdom+Psychology*2 amongst all of the interrogators. It is not cumulative.
2) Then, attack is influenced by a lot of things:

Code: [Select]

      attack+=temppool.size();
      attack+=cr->joindays;

      attack+=business-cr->get_skill(SKILL_BUSINESS);
      attack+=religion-cr->get_skill(SKILL_RELIGION);
      attack+=science-cr->get_skill(SKILL_SCIENCE);
      attack+=a->skill_roll(SKILL_PSYCHOLOGY)-cr->skill_roll(SKILL_PSYCHOLOGY);

      attack+=cr->attribute_roll(ATTRIBUTE_HEART);
      attack-=cr->attribute_roll(ATTRIBUTE_WISDOM)*2;Where 'cr' is the Conservative Automaton, 'temppool' is the array of all interrogators, 'joindays' is the amount of days passed since kidnapping, 'business', 'religion' and 'science' are the highest values of correlating skills amongst the whole group, 'a' is(if I'm not mistaken) the character with the highest 'attack' score.
After that, attack gets +10 from drugs, +10 from props, +rapport*3.
If the Automaton hates you (rapport<-1) and you use drugs, attack has a good chance to automatically become 0; that sort of thing is marked by nightmarish hallucinations.
3) If the Automaton loses a check of Wisdom against the interrogators' attack/6, then the interrogation is succesful. The Automaton's juice is decreased by 'attack', their Heart increases by 1(up to 10), their rapport increases by 1.5.
4) Whenever an interrogation succeeds, the game checks for two conditions of recruitment: if the Automaton's Heart is higher than their Wisdom+4, or if their rapport is higher than 4. In both cases they are instantly recruited.

For more information, check interrogation.cpp.

[Jonathan S. Fox]

Anyway, onwards to talking. The success of an interrogation is governed by a variable called 'attack'.

-snip-

I think everything HmH wrote is correct about how it works. If this is too complicated, I'll boil it down to a cheat sheet showing the relative importance of various factors.

In talking during interrogation, the following things influence your success positively:

+10 Using Drugs
+10 Using Props
+3 Each Point of Positive Rapport (hidden, but starts 0 and ranges from around -4 to +4)
+3 Each Point of Psychology
+2 Each Point of Heart
+1 Each Point of Business
+1 Each Point of Religion
+1 Each Point of Science
+1 Each Liberal Tending the Prisoner
+1 Each Cumulative Day of Captivity
+0.5 Each Point of Intelligence, but only if you have at least 1 point of Psychology

The following hurts you:

-6 Each Point of Prisoner's Wisdom
-3 Each Point of Your Wisdom
-3 Each Point of Negative Rapport
-1 Each Point of Prisoner's Psychology
-1 Each Point of Prisoner's Business
-1 Each Point of Prisoner's Religion
-1 Each Point of Prisoner's Science
-0.5 Each Point of Prisoner's Intelligence, if they have 1 or more Psychology

There are a few random rolls that I'm papering over, but in general, if you have a positive total on the cheat sheet I gave above, you're likely to succeed. If it's negative, you're likely to fail. If the prisoner has a lot of psychology, business, religion, or science, they may resist talking even if you have a high attack score. Use drugs to bypass anything but psychology, but beware that drugs are an erratic tool and can backfire if the prisoner hates you. Getting better at psychology yourself is the only way to counter them having high psychology.

Success in talking will both change their heart/wisdom and improve rapport, making later successes easier. Progressing either far enough will turn them.

[FugitiveUnknown]

Ok. I made a new game. I have a psyche (psy 17) specialist now, but I soften em up with 12 angry firemen hackers with bondage gear who don't even convert. They just drug the guy and beat him with specialty props while blaring Gangnam style in his ears.

Then when the target is half dead, the firemen leave and my leader Psy comes out and converts them with his epic dance moves.

It's pretty hard to resist!

Thanks for the explanation. I didn't realize goon swarms were so effective.

[FugitiveUnknown]

Next question..

I'm trying to set up a non-violent run again. This time I have 81 juiced writers (using liberal guardian) and a team of 14 or so hackers and credit scammers.

So my questions are...

1) I had gotten the idea that over time, heat goes down on characters naturally. Is this true, and if so, can it be hastened with any activities (say, community service?)

2) Is writing/graffiti/hacking an effective way of changing hearts and minds? Does this actually work, or will there be certain issues that writing about simply won't touch? How do murals/graffiti/demonstrations effect public opinion?

[ed boy]

1) I had gotten the idea that over time, heat goes down on characters naturally. Is this true, and if so, can it be hastened with any activities (say, community service?)

2) Is writing/graffiti/hacking an effective way of changing hearts and minds? Does this actually work, or will there be certain issues that writing about simply won't touch? How do murals/graffiti/demonstrations effect public opinion?

Community service is the only activity that actively decreases the heat decreasing, but only slowly - each day has a 1 in 3 chance of decreasing heat by a single point. It also increases public opinion of the LCS slightly.

Writing, graffiti and hacking all make public opinion more liberal. Hacking is the most powerful of the three (it changes the issue's opinion directly, rather than background influences), though it brings in a lot more heat than the others. Writing changes background influences, and doesn't have a very strong effect, but is reliable and legal. If you have the liberal guardian, then the public reaction to major news stories can be very heavily made to favour the LCS, however, which is an extremely powerful effect. Grafitti influences public opinion directly, though it takes time. However, as long as your characters have a good street sense skill, they will be able to operate without police attention. Graffiti has a lower magnitude of effect than hacking, though.

[Darvi]

but is reliable and legal.

Sometimes.

[ed boy]

but is reliable and legal.

Sometimes.

Newspaper writing is always legal. The writing to the liberal guardian activity is 1.5x as effective for day-to-day effects, and is legal in all but C+ free speech laws.

[Darvi]

Yes. Although "sometimes" is probably not quite the right term to use. "Most of the time" woulda been more accurate.

[BoxOfAids]

1) I had gotten the idea that over time, heat goes down on characters naturally. Is this true, and if so, can it be hastened with any activities (say, community service?)

2) Is writing/graffiti/hacking an effective way of changing hearts and minds? Does this actually work, or will there be certain issues that writing about simply won't touch? How do murals/graffiti/demonstrations effect public opinion?

Community service is the only activity that actively decreases the heat decreasing, but only slowly - each day has a 1 in 3 chance of decreasing heat by a single point. It also increases public opinion of the LCS slightly.

Writing, graffiti and hacking all make public opinion more liberal. Hacking is the most powerful of the three (it changes the issue's opinion directly, rather than background influences), though it brings in a lot more heat than the others. Writing changes background influences, and doesn't have a very strong effect, but is reliable and legal. If you have the liberal guardian, then the public reaction to major news stories can be very heavily made to favour the LCS, however, which is an extremely powerful effect. Grafitti influences public opinion directly, though it takes time. However, as long as your characters have a good street sense skill, they will be able to operate without police attention. Graffiti has a lower magnitude of effect than hacking, though.

In regards to this, can police arrest your liberals that are doing community service? Also, how much is "1 heat point"? Like how much would a murder give in terms of heat points, for example? Just curious as to how much this actually affects your heat level.

[ed boy]

Liberals doing comminity service are not able to be arrested during the act.

For an example of how much heat is generated, a regular car theft generates 14 heat, a police car theft generates 24 heat (it's pretty much the only activity I can find that gives a static heat increase). Heat from going forth is governed by a more complex formula.

Keep in mind that even if a liberal has their heat reduced to zero, if they get captured they still get tried all the same. Low heat does not mean a less harsh sentence.

[KA101]

Some further perspective: stuff like Theft*, Vandalism, and Disturbing the Peace (media takeovers!) typically doesn't carry any Heat.

*Being seen taking things on-site, or opening a Safe--not stealing a car.

Non-trivial aspect of the Liberal Guardian is that LCS actions get priority: unless there's a major national event that day, if your raid was newspaper-worthy it'll make the front page of your paper.  (This greatly enhances their effect on public opinion: less people read the back pages.)  Multiple raids will stack up on p. 2-3 or so.  That said, LG readership depends on people knowing about and thinking highly of the LCS to begin with.

[ff2]

How do you get a sleeper that can recruit?