How Immortal is V?

[🎀Hara🎀]

I feel like a lot of people are sleeping on just how powerful the Relic chip really is and the fact that it actually does what it says.

The relic is Killing V's mind but V physically dies at least 2-3 times in the main story maybe more but is brought back by the relic.

So while the relic is killing V's mind it does seem to work at making V's body pretty much Immortal since it just gets revived.

I also feel like this isn't really explained ingame but reactions from some characters in the game and especially DLC show that they know killing V won't work which is why they don't try to kill V off as a loose end.

I believe the chip was intended to be used with the engram in the chip being the one inside of the body (saburo's engram, on saburo's chip, in saburo's head) this would pretty much do what it does for V.

That is reviving the body after death, but with the engram in the chip matching the body, it would not replace the mind of the person, but would repair the damaged pieces of the mind from the backup info on the chip

i believe that what happened to V with the mind being overwritten was never an intended use of the chip, which is why hellman was so interested in the data, and why it wasn't used to put saburo in a new body right away. Arasaka needed the data from V to do it first.

in the end if you give V's body to johnny, then the chip start's acting out it's intended function, not only does Johnny have V's body, he has it with the immortality of the relic

[🎀Hara🎀]

a weird irony that, the very thing that is slowly killing V's mind, has made V's body immortal.

i really wish one of the ending options was to save V's mind by merging it with Johnny's instead but then again the moment they die and are revived again the chip would once again try to restore the mind with what is on the chip, that is unless the engram on the chip changes as it learns more too.

kind of makes the suicide ending pointless when you realise the relic is probably just going to revive your body and probably with johnny in it since the damage will take a while for the chip to repair it

[EricHVela]

The Relic ends up damaged and can't even be removed while it's still functioning. It doesn't revive V from any secondary deaths, just that V almost dies a few times.

Its purpose is to overwrite and quit functioning as explained at a few points during the game (requiring the Arasaka choice to get a complete picture).

[🎀Hara🎀]

i think it's actually functioning fine, the bullet to the head definitely kills v and revives them, the voodoo boys attack kills all of the netwatch guys and fries you too. if you listen in on the conversation of the 2 voodoo boys members standing outside they even mention seeing your dead body and panic when they see you alive again.

it's no miracle machine and wouldn't revive you from being beheaded or being blown apart by grenades, but i don't actually think it's the chip that is damaged , i think it it V that is damaged.

i think the chip was only ever intended to be used on the body that the engram belonged to, with the engram only making repairs to the mind of that body, the chip think's it's in Silverhand's head and is trying to repair what it thinks is his damaged mind.

at the start of the game i don't think anyone at Arasaka knew what would happen if an engram was placed into a new body with the chip, and the reason V can't remove the chip is because without the chip, V's brain wouldn't be able to make sense of itself

[🎀Hara🎀]

i don't think removing the relic would kill V i think removing the chip would put V into a Coma until the chip was put back in again and at that point it would just continue trying to put johnny mind into the body, which... i'll admit is basically death.

though that's just guessing at that point.

all i can really say is the chip is active.

V's body Dies at least 2-3 times through the story and is revived by the relic.

the relic is trying to repair what it thinks is johnny silverhand's mind.

it doesn't really need to be damaged to be doing what it does in game, it's kind of working as intended and if it was slotted into johnny's body there would be no reason to think it was damaged at all

[Silverbane7]

Think you are partially right.
Yes, the Reliquary (what I call Saburo's personal Relic, to distinguish between that and a normal Relic chip) was designed specifically to do just what its doing (to V)

It was always intended to replace the 'client' (the engram in the chip) over the mind of the 'host' (the body its slotted into)
Hellman admits as much in his conversations with us.
Which is why I'm kind of flabbergasted that such a supposedly smart man, never considers the fact they buggered up the tests by using 'neuraly indifferent' subjects.

He knows Saburo....so why did it never occur to him to try testing on a filled mind?
I mean....overWRITE. Isn't it obvious?
You can't overWRITE an empty mind. Only fill it.
Same as with an old floppy disk or USB stick.
To write over something, there has to BE something TO overwrite.
Otherwise, you are just copying TO.

V isn't immortal (outside of personal fanfics, and the possible home brewed tabletop game lol)
The damage done to V both times, is to the head, the brain. The nanites in the chip fix that, its their job.
Don't think they would fix the body, their area is grey matter (again, outside of personal fanfics)
They can (and do) fix the brain damages but likely can't fix flesh outside of brain tissue and functions.
(This is why we can 'die' other ways, like drown, shot, blown up ect)

[EricHVela]

Originally posted by Silverbane7:

Which is why I'm kind of flabbergasted that such a supposedly smart man, never considers the fact they buggered up the tests by using 'neuraly indifferent' subjects.

Would V's results be considered a successful test for the purposes of the Arasaka ending or did they somehow wipe the new host?

How did Alt put V back in to V? If Alt took Johnny's engram from the chip (and took the Johnny-ized V out of V's brain and disentangled them), would putting V's engram in the chip cause it overwrite the Johnny-ized V with the disentangled V?

Putting V back into V's brain directly with that chip still active but now blank would've been a glaring error that Alt, a super AI hybrid, shoulda considered.

...or did she disable the chip when she copied Johnny out of it which left V's brain Johnny-ized. That still seems like something a super-AI hybrid shoulda considered.

Meh. In the end, it's a video game. The story in many video games is like a movie at a drive-in theatre where people go to grope instead of watching the movie. The story in CP'77 does a much better job of holding one's attention, though. (At least, it does for me.)

I shouldn't try to overthink it. (I have to admit, it's kinda fun to do, though.)

[Silverbane7]

Try thinking of it like 'finalising' a DVD.

When I've done recording on a DVD recorder (stand alone, below the TV one) it can only be 'read' on someone else's DVD player if I go thru the process of 'finalising' it.

So think of what happens in Mikoshi like that.
Depending on who is going to inhabit the body, ether V or Johnny is 'finaliased' by Alt.
The Reliquary is the device used to 'burn' the engram into the mind (the DVD)
Its not that Johnny or V is inside the chip, but that they pass thru it to get fixed in the mind, as it were.
(At least, that's how I see it)

Its why we can't just separate them and then put the other back into the chip.
(Tho, no reason why we couldn't slip Johnny or V onto a separate, normal Relic chip. In fact, 'Valerie Silverhand' on YouTube did just that with her fanfic 'secret, cut content ending' vid. Its what I recommend for those of us who want a better ending, and are Team Johnny. We don't see V die, so we can dream a little, and it ends with a cliff hanger lol)

Unless Alt could stop the Reliquary doing its job (write over the host, with the client), its not going to help ether of them to slip one back onto the Reliquary.
But I guess they didn't think anyone (players) would be satisfied with V living 6months with Johnny on a normal Relic (or Johnny living a life, with V as his digital sidekick)
(Jokes on them... My main V would take that in a heartbeat lol. Ether version)

[EricHVela]

Wow. I know all the technology you're referencing, but I'm getting my brain wires crossed trying to untangle all that. I'll admit, it looks like it should be plausible, but something in my brain isn't making a connection somewhere.

I think this goes back to your mention of overwriting versus writing. DVD-ROM (or any RORM medium) doesn't allow for rewriting. If the brain does allow for rewiring and rewriting, it does seem like the best solution is to use the Reliquary (I honestly can't recall them using that word, but I like it, so I'm going with it regardless) to DVD-RW the brain... unless Soulkiller puts the finalizing on the brain (which would require a complete wipe of a DVD-RW to undo IIRC... haven't used any removable disc technology in over a decade and rarely used writeable removeable discs prior EDIT excepting back in the 1980s-early 1990s).

Personally, I like the no-happy-endings for V. I really hoped for at least one possibility of a sunshine and roses ending, but "NC always wins" feels appropriate. If feels like the only way to "win" against NC is to cheat one's way out of the game (like deceased Johnny getting ahold of V and just leaving it all behind). NC doesn't really lose, but the escapee doesn't win against NC, either. That person just finds a way to stop playing NC's game.

[Silverbane7]

no, they never used the term Reliquary, i use it because it feels right, and fits. (it is Saburo's 'hail Mary' after all lol)
it also means i have a way to distinguish the difference. Saburo's chip is supposed to be a one of a kind thing, while the rest are (expensive) more plentifull.

I mean, i wouldn't call dying in 6 month (both of us, by the way. If Johnny and V go back together, that would be both of them agreeing that death in 6 months was preferable to life as an Engram) a 'happy ending' made of sunshine and rainbows lol.
But its together. Enough for my main V.

in the original (2013 box set) tabletop, Alt was just about to 'jump back into her body' when the C4 blew the door lock.
it damaged the communications to the room, and stopped her getting back into her body (it said she needed time to 'gather her strength' to jump back)
to the side on the page, was a small box with details on how players could actually SAVE her.
by the time the 2020 sourcebook (i have the 2nd print of that) that was gone, so somewhere along the line, Mike and co decided she couldn't/shouldn't be saved or saveable.
I'm guessing that no one managed to be smart enough to stop Johnny.
(that, or too few of them did back then)
later, they had her stuck inside the net, even when she wrote a copy of herself to a clone.
for some reason, she was unable to move back
(this was in the now not quite canon 'Cybergeneration' game)

it was that Alt (there) could COPY to....(send to usb) but MOVE to was dissabled.
since the backup she made of Johnny was not in the net, but was more like a backup, it worked for him. he was not left stranded in cyberspace like her.

back when they first dropped info on the game, and i learned they had plans for an 'immortality chip' and that Johnny SIlverhand was going to be 'V's guide to NightCity' (right when it first started being talked about, back before the 2018 deep dive or the reveal of Keanu as Johnny) I kept saying that whoever was after Immortality would not like it if they DID get it.
(because i thought it was the immortality Alt has. Forever trapped inside the net. Bartmoss had not broken it back then. think he remade it in Cybergeneration, and watchedit from the INSIDE... the utter nutter)