I’m not sure how I want write up programs
at this point. I’m half tempted to say scrub them all and start
over using the rules in the Building a Better Program section.
Just build your own system defenses (don’t forget to make them
continuous) and give the players a couple hundred hours of programming
to build their arsenal. Don’t forget that intrusion, decryption,
anti-system, evasion/stealth, Anti-IC and Anti-personnel programs
are controlled if not black market items. In general your average
netrunner can’t just go down to egghead and buy a copy of Hellbolt.

In later versions I’ll include extensive
program lists, but for now a couple of rule of thumbs about currently
published programs. First off the detection/alarm and protection
categories are now gone. To write a program that does nothing
but detect make a utility with the detection add-on. Protection
programs have been made obsolete by fully realized datawalls.

Lets go section by section through the basic
rule book looking at specific programs. I should probably cover
some of the stuff in the expansion books but I haven’t gotten
to it yet. The Intrusion programs seem fine. Decryption are
ok as well. In the detection/alarm section speedtrap doesn’t
seem to have any value any longer at least not without heavy modification.
Nothing wrong with any of the anti-system programs. With the
exception of replicator all of the evasion programs in the evasion/stealth
section of the basic rule book are actually stealth programs.
There is a difference, evasion programs keep a netrunner from
being traced, while stealth programs render the netrunner unseen
and prevent anyone from attempting to trace him in the first place.
Anti-IC ok. Firestarter and Jack attack in the Anti-personnel
section should be in the Anti-system section (not that it matters
with the above system). Controllers, ok for now I might re-write
later. Databaser, Alias, Gatemaster, padlock, packer, and backup
utilities are no longer necessary as their functionality is controlled
by the deck/system BIOS. Demons stand as written for now I need
to clarify/re-write these rules but it hasn’t happened yet.

If you get the feeling I have a lot of work
to do on programs you are right.

Building a Better Program

BaseCosts:

For simplicity Evasion, and Stealth were
all bundled together as were intrusion and decryptors. Anti-personnel
has also been expanded for the various types of attack.

Programs are either constant or instant.
A deck/computer is limited to a certain number of constant programs.
If this number is exceeded the Netrunner loses one action per
turn for each constant program above the rated number. It takes
an action to start or end a constant program. It also takes an
action to run an instant program. A netrunner can run as many
instant programs a turn as he/she has available actions. A single
program may only run once per turn.

Add­Ons:

When writing a program add the cost of the
base type or types to any add-ons the programmer wants, plus the
strength of the program (1-10 no greater than the programmers
programming skill). This number is his or her difficulty number
to write this program.

Next figure the time difficulty. Time difficulty
operates under the assumption that certain code is reusable or
similar enough that it has similar pitfalls. Figure time difficulty
the same way as difficulty except if a similar piece of code has
been written cut the difficulty in half. Any add-ons that have
already been written can be halved with the exception of icon.
So if a programmer has already written a program with movement
ability, any program he writes from here on with movement ability,
that ability will be at half cost to time difficulty. The time
difficulty number times two is the number of hours of actual programming
it will take to write this program. [I was looking for quicker
programming because the amount of down time I experience/give
in cyberpunk games is almost nil. If you don’t like the feel
of this use the original 6 hour multiplier]

For example using the above gibberish example:

Thus the first program would take 36 hours
and the second program would take 66 (instead of 70) hours.

Lastly the programmer rolls Int + Programming
+ 1d10 vs the difficulty number if he fails the roll the program
does not work in some way. He may try again in time difficulty
divided by three hours, this roll is at -2 to difficulty. If
the programmer critically fails any programming roll the program
works fine and passes all tests, however at some critical point
it will fail.

Modifying Programs

If you are trying to modify a program you
have the source code for it works exactly like above except everything
except strength is at one quarter to time difficulty. For example
I decide that the above anti-program program isn’t strong enough
and I need to upgrade it to a strength seven it would only take
32 hours.