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Posted by: suoq Jul 20 2011, 01:51 PM

Caveat: Missions, Season 4.

Creating a new hacker and thinking about giving him an agent sidekick, which makes me realize that I've avoided agents on the grounds that hacking already gives me a headache and that's one more complication. On the other hand, I like the idea of a sidekick, complete with advantages and disadvantages.

Configuration 1: Agent, rating 3, is loaded into the hacking commlink (complete with Response 6, System 6 requiring 10 points of restricted Gear. ouch.) with access to rating 6 programs.
Configuration 2: Agent, rating 3, is loaded into his own commlink (Response 5, System 5) with access to rating 3 programs. (I like to think of him as "Tonto".)

Now I've never sorted out how agents actually work with regards to teamwork tests before. I'm assuming the agent rolls it's rating, plus the software's rating, no hot sim or anything like that. and I'm assuming those hits are additional dice I can add to my roll. So in Config 1, I'd get, on average, 3 more dice, and on config 2, 2 more dice.

On config run, all trace attempts come back to me. On config 2, the target has to decide which one to trace, me or the agent. Is that correct?

In configuration 1, if both of us are using Exploit, does that mean I have 2 instances of exploit running for performance purposes although I only have to purchase 1? And if they're ergonomic, are both of them ergonomic, with the limitations of the number of ergonomic programs that can be run?

In configuration 2, if I want the agent to work on his own (instead of assisting me, searching for hidden nodes for example), can he use the software on my commlink?

Anything else people with experience with agents can think of that I missed?

Posted by: Mardrax Jul 20 2011, 02:52 PM

Let me complicate that a bit further: if I had an agent free of copy protection, with Browse in its payload, could I copy the combination onto a gajillion devices, and have them teamwork to have one of them have a gajillion bonus dice on a data search roll?

Supplant 'browse' and 'data search' for other applicable uses and have any Matrix roll be a one interval matter?

Posted by: KarmaInferno Jul 20 2011, 04:11 PM

Max bonus dice from a Teamwork Test is still limited by the primary character's Skill rating.




-k

Posted by: Tymeaus Jalynsfein Jul 20 2011, 05:53 PM

And not additional Bonus Dice (equal to Primary Character Skill Rating) per Agent. You can only obtain a total of your Primary Character's Skill Rating in additional Dice form ALL TEAMWORK TESTS assisting him.

10 Guys assisting, each with 2 hits will still only add the Primary Character's Skill Rating in total.



So No... Even with a Gajillion Agents, you do not reap the rewards past your Relevant Skill Rating.

Posted by: The Jopp Jul 20 2011, 06:46 PM

Still, that's potentially 8-12 dice modification - not too shabby if you spec from chargen.

Posted by: Tymeaus Jalynsfein Jul 20 2011, 06:50 PM

Ummmmm... Skills go no higher than 10, Ever. And specialization does not raise your Skill. It adds Dice.
And is more likely in the area of 3-6 Dice... Now, are those +3 to +6 Dice potentially handy? Of course they are. But it is not all that much of a bonus.

Posted by: suoq Jul 20 2011, 08:35 PM

Just to be clear, the purpose of the above is not to game the assist system. I simply wanted to make use of an agent with this character and have been trying to understand the difference between having him on my commlink using my software or having him on his own commlink using his own software. (With the then obvious question of, could he simply use my software on my commlink even though he's on his own commlink and if so, under what conditions?) I'm looking at +2 dice with him using his own system and +3 dice with him using my system with the added risk that he's a lot easier to trace than I am.

Honestly, I could be more effective if I simply went the nanite route instead of the agent route, but the nanite route got boring unless I added the nanite tats and then the cost of the hive just got too high to make the build. So I'm trying to go with an agent sidekick instead of nanite tatoos.

Posted by: LurkerOutThere Jul 20 2011, 09:24 PM

I would recommend just sucking it up and going with response 5 and system until after your first mission when you can get response 6 a lot more cost effectively. That's just my personal way to game the system though.

Posted by: Mardrax Jul 20 2011, 11:51 PM

Don't forget you can run a R6 agent with R6 programs on an R5 'link. It'll just run at R5 until you upgrade the 'link.

And of course. I forgot about the teamwork limit.

Posted by: Udoshi Jul 21 2011, 01:30 AM

Regarding the Nano-hacker, suoq:
Cyberhands. Cyberhands are fantastic to put nanohives in.

For what its worth, i believe Probing explicitly allows a +1 dice pool modifier(not teamwork test) for each agent or sprite you have assisting you doing the probing.

I've done agent-assisted hacking before. It was worth about 2 dice on most of my tests on average. The problem is it doesn't have the passes to keep up with a fast hacker.
The UPSIDE is, however, that its a cheap way to get 3 extra actions, if you're doing stuff that doesn't need rolls to take.

If you're going to use an agent, the best way to do it is spec for it at the start. It can put a drain on your resources, but having a reliable agent around is excellent. it DOES put a pretty big drain on your resources, though, so you kind of have to adjust your approach a bit

Commlink:
System 6
Firewall 6
Signal 5 (not worth restricted gear at all when its so cheap). Get a directional antennae instead.
Response 5. <--- upgrade to response 6 in play.

Programs: Common use at 6, Ergonomic, Optimized 3(this is intentional because agents use Pilot for System, so it keeps your agents dice pools from going to shit when it Roams).
Agent 6, Mook option(unwired. Avail=2, cost x 1.2): At rating 6, its availability is 18. Add in mook, and its a flat 20. Perfect for restricted gear. Nuyen-wise, it comes out to 18000Y
I don't recall how Copy protection in missions work, but you MAY want to have a second set of Common Use programs for your Agent to use. The Ergonomic/Optimized setup really works well, because it can hang out on pretty much any node and still have decent dice pools.
As for Options on your rating 6 hacking programs(availability 12, sadly) - just pick those up in play. Options are supposed to be easily installable customization packages, just point people to the relevant section in Unwired.

For hacking, just get your programs at 6. You're planning on getting Response 6 in play as soon as you can, anyway. If they're proving to be too expensive, get Black Market Pipeline for hackware and links. This should help a bunch in getting stuff in play as well, because its a missions: Buying stuff uses Buying Hits. Contacts have really shitty stats. Black market pipeline upgrades a contact.
For the record, a Spider from Contacts and Adventures has a Charisma of 2 and no Negotiation. Even the Armorer has a charisma of 3 and negotiation of 3 - thats 6 dice, or 1 hits. Each net hit in your favor gets you 10% off, and black market pipeline gives you +3 dice and 10% off to start. With a little bit of thought put into your social skills(and empathy software( at start, it should be trivially easy to pick up cheap, discounted hardware and software in play. If you can get 4 hits at start(only 16 dice, so 10 dice between charisma, negotiation, and a specialization, plus empathy soft), black market adds another 10%, vs the Armorer as an example: you can get 40% off. If you choose your contacts more wisely, they won't even have enough dice to get a hit to resist.


You may even want to consider springing for a Luxury lifestyle at start, for the starting money boost. High is 2bp, Luxury is 20 BP. Both roll 4d6 for starting cash. 1200 unspent nuyen gets you +12 to the roll, the maximum possible bonus.
High's roll multiplier is 500. But luxury's is 1k. Assuming you roll a pair of 7's, your cash roll is going to be 26. Minimum, it will be 16. Maximum is 36.
So it MIGHT just be worth it to splurge a little and start the game with about 20 thousand nuyen that isn't capped by availablity limits. If you plan on this approach, you basically shouldn't need to spend restricted gear for anything that you might otherwise want to start with. Response 6 comes to mind, as does a Simsense accelerator commlink mod(availability 14). When you start to look at it that way, the high cost of a Luxury lifestyle doesn't seem that bad compared to each 5 points you're not using on Restricted Gear. If you otherwise would have taken all 3 instances of it(a 15bp value) and a High lifestyle(2bp), swapping to Luxury and buying in play on starting cash is only 3BP more.

As I recall, Missions uses a campaign calendar. It should be really easy to put together a pre-game Availablity test/buying table, and 'effectively' start the game with a boost.

Regarding Black Market Pipeline. BMP: Wares makes your team LOVE YOU. Especially considering missions have gimped/low yield rewards - though I am not sure if this is as much an issue in newer modules.
If you're Agenting, a good goal for you to shoot for in play is a Beta or Delta grade datajack - for an agent with ergonomic programs in its payload, it can basically fill all its needs in terms of Response and Processor Limit.

Anyway, the big thing to keep in mind for this agent setup is that 12 dice(pilot 6 + program 6) translate to 3 bought hits if there's no dice penalty. Which is actually not to bad when you think about it. It ALSO gets 12 dice to most things(14 if it has an Attack with, say, Targeting), which is NOT bad at all. A rating 6 agent can be surprisingly effective if it acts on its own, if you choose your actions carefully: Crashing programs, for example, is Hacking + Exploit(12 dice for your agent) opposed by System + Firewall. (at most 12 dice for your target). So its even money that it will be successful. Just don't forget to give it an Electronic Warfare autosoft, because it can't decrypt or wifi scan without it.

Posted by: suoq Jul 21 2011, 02:10 AM

I realized that I needed to drop most of the programs down to 5 anyway because of Mute's +1 to availability. Rating 6 exploit + Mute = Avail 13.

Currently the Agent ("Tonto") is a level 6 agent (restricted gear) sitting on a second response/system 5/5 commlink with a bunch of rating 3 programs. (Read "cheap" - except for stealth and exploit. Those were useful enough to go with 5). The hacking commlink is 5/5/5/5 with rating 6 common use and rating 5 hacking programs (with mute and ergonomic sprinkled appropriately on both commlinks).

I'm going with the assumption that when I'm not using the hacking commlink the agent can use the programs on it instead of the programs on it's own commlink.

Currently, the hacking commlink is coming in at 81,800:nuyen: and "Tonto" is coming in at 58,750:nuyen: (add to that an Encephalon and Pushed and we're a hair over 185 grand.)

Posted by: Udoshi Jul 21 2011, 03:16 AM

Thats what I'm saying. Start with 6, and upgrade your programs with options in play.



Missions rules put you in a unique position to get rid of the Registration and not suffer from Degredation, so just buy the better version from your software manufacturer. Everyone knows that registered software gets automatic updates. So instead of just stealing it, you pay for the pro version.

I would also strongly suggest not running your Agent on a second commlink. A Betagrade datajack will do just fine, and is significantly cheaper for the same matrix stats. If you have enough ware, and Optimized programs, Tonto can pretty easily reside on the ware you already have.


This is indeed how it works. You only need to double up on programs that you want it to use at the same time, or take in its payload. Which should help save on costs.

Posted by: Yerameyahu Jul 21 2011, 03:21 AM

Don't encourage your sneaky tactics, especially for Missions.

Posted by: Udoshi Jul 21 2011, 03:27 AM

What? its not sneaky.

Missions is literally billed as the straightest by the book game out there.

Posted by: Yerameyahu Jul 21 2011, 03:30 AM

That's *why* I just said, 'especially for Missions'. Cyberware-as-cheap-commlink is hax, and cyberware are peripheral nodes anyway.

Posted by: Udoshi Jul 21 2011, 03:40 AM

Yeah, and that literally doesn't matter for a roaming agent. The core book specifically points out that their capabilities vary greatly depending on the node they happen to be on.

By the book games are by the book games. Just because you don't like the device rating rules or the matrix( i will admit they are not great) doesn't mean you shouldn't be familiar with them when you're playing a hacker. Or try to discredit it, with slander, because you don't agree with it.

its not sneaky at all. It actually pretty simple.

Posted by: Yerameyahu Jul 21 2011, 03:50 AM

Yup, and apparently those capabilities are greater on a node designed for minimal matrix function, than on a real commlink? Yuck. Illogical, imbalanced, wrong. I won't keep on about it in this thread, but I had to at least point out that your something-for-nothing trick is evil. We all know how bad 'by the book' can be, which is why I didn't say it was *illegal*. I said it was a sneaky tactic. That's hardly slander, and it *is* sneaky: the simple (straightforward, normal, intended, balanced) method is to run it on a commlink. So, when I see you shoulder-devil-ing suoq away from that, I make a small comment.

Posted by: Hida Tsuzua Jul 21 2011, 11:17 AM

There's also the fact you can't just buy betaware datajacks in Missions unless it's a special adventure thing.

Posted by: suoq Jul 21 2011, 12:50 PM

It's information. Someone may want to use it, so feel free to share it since that's how the game works. I realize that beating people up for playing by the rules has gotten popular here, but if people don't know what the rules are first then they can't make their own decisions.

That being said, I'm just going to stick with the 5's and running Tonto off his own commlink. I really have no desire to play an experienced hacker who is close to the top of his profession and didn't realize "OMG! I can add MUTE to my hacking software" until the day he starts running Missions. That's really not my style. This guy is rolling too many dice as it is and really is a lot less generalist than I'd prefer at the moment. He needs some editing.

Can't find anything about agents needing electronic warfare autosofts, but that doesn't surprise me since I forgot about the mook requirements. Can someone point me to the pages that say what skills an unrestricted agent has and which one he needs autosofts for in the rules?

Posted by: Hida Tsuzua Jul 21 2011, 01:24 PM

All I can guess his old good commlink got stolen or something. Then again, rating 6 mute exploits are pretty hard to find (on your own it takes weeks at best) so maybe he's just really unlucky?

If you want any help, I'll be willing to take a look at the sheet. Admittedly I'm used to looking at high TR hacking from older missions and not the season 4 missions so some of my tactics might be out of date. For example, mundane hackers might actually be able to sleaze systems and don't have to take a "smash though the door and get what needs to be done before the muted alarm goes off" approach in season 4.

If you want to be more "generalist," a cyberlimb of awesome (a cyberlimb with good stats) quickly allows you to pull your weight in combat.

Posted by: LurkerOutThere Jul 21 2011, 01:25 PM

Well some of it is a matter of how important mute is to you, off the top of my head the most bang for the buck program to get it on is exploit. So my advice to you and other starting hackers is by all programs at rating six except exploit which you get it at 5 plus + mute. Then first off the bat upgrade response + system to get the full 6 out of all your programs (especially stealth which is the real make or break for that extra point, all otehrs the benefit is negligable)

Also and I am awake on book, i think you can spend 1 restricted gear pick for both response and firewall.

Posted by: Udoshi Jul 21 2011, 02:18 PM

Please, Yerameyahu The only reason you hate peripheral nodes is because Unwired gives you an easy finger to point at.

The thing you're ignoring is that the matrix was designed to work this way, out of the box, since 4th(before unwired, before anniversary edition), with nearly piece of electronics being able to be run firewalls, connect to things, and be hacked. And has worked that way since 4th came out.

What I am trying to say is that the devs had plenty of time to fix their stuff and do a balance pass even BEFORE they published the book.
Remember the rating 6 credstick running agent smith abuse?
Same shit, different edition.
And that actually got patched out of the system.

Note that Electronic Warfare is not on that list of skills. Electronic Warfare autosoft is on 246

Additionally:

So yes, there is an agent version of the EW autosoft.

Posted by: KarmaInferno Jul 21 2011, 02:57 PM

Eh. I read that as "to figure out the cost and programming for the listed Agent Autosofts, use the cost chart and programming rules for Drone autosofts".

As in, "you want to figure out the nuyen cost of a Replicate 4 Autosoft? Consult the Autosoft entry in the Matrix Programs table on page 330 of SR4A, which tells you that it's AutoSoft Rating * 1000, or 4000 nuyen."

Or, "you want to add the Optimization option to a Cascading Agent Autosoft? Use the same Programming dice rolls as installing an option on a Drone Autosoft."


Not "Drone autosofts are also available for Agent programs".



-k

Posted by: suoq Jul 21 2011, 03:05 PM

How do I delete a thread?

Posted by: KarmaInferno Jul 21 2011, 03:17 PM

I'm not sure you can.

Best to just ignore it and hope that everyone else does too, so it can slink back to the back pages of the forum, like an embarrassing shirt being pushed into the back of the closet.






-k