I am not sure where you are getting this idea from, but you CANNOT just casually thread a Skillsoft as you indicate... You must first have a copy of said skillsoft so that you may use Threading to Emulate the Skill, and it will be capped at the rating of the Skillsoft you are emulating... additionally, YOU MUST HAVE At least one Submersion to be able to actually do this (KArma required out of Chargen)... you need the Biowires Echo for this at all... And to make it actually useful, you will need at least 3-4 Submersions to allow you the use of Higher Rating Skillsofts... Even MORE Karma...

And you cannot Thread "Up" an emulated Skillsoft... it is restricted to its base rating when you emulate it... And lets not forget, Emulatiopn is a Thread... which imposes a +2 DP penalty to everything not DIRECTLY applicable to that Emulated Skillsoft... Emulating a Stealth Skillsoft? ANYTHING ELSE YOU DO will be at a penalty... Yes, further Submersions will minimize some of these issues, but that just means EVEN MORE Karma...

Technomancers are not an "I WIN" Button...

As far as why you need to be 150% optimized, I think its more to do with the title of this thread and a practical gaming example.

Also: TM's and Hackers are annoying due to overly complex rules. I find them frustrating.

I do not think that the tendency to remark that a character is "nerfing himself because he is not maximized to its fullest potential" has ANYTHING to do with the title of this thread... Just sayin'... There becomes a point where further optimization, though possible, becomes rather useless... If you can always accompliush a task with 16 Dice, why would you ever want to get 24 Dice? You are not any better for it, and you have just wasted resources that could have been better applied elsewhere...

And, Once the rules become second nature, they cease to be overly complex... But maybe that is just me, as I have a knack for remembering most things that I read...

Do you understand what the nature of a discussion about rules is? Yeah, evaluating your character is not strictly on topic either. Just like your personal character, your group's playstyle, or whether you like your hacker with their 300 Karma or not is. Just sayin'. You bring that up despite nobody really caring about it, and then you complain when someone says that character is nerfed in a discussion about optimisedx builds? That's childish. Just sayin' and such.


Oh noes, the mancer needs something that costs 50 Nuyen! And investing some Karma in an immersion(s) certainly beats investing some 200 Karma in skills. Just, you know, sayin'.


You can thread as an itnerrupt, so you drop the threaded CF, thread whatever you need, the use it, drop, ect. Since there is no game mechanic covering this, nothing says your stealth roll is immediatly invalidated when you drop the skillsoft CF.


If you buy CFs and skills, too, then yes. The point here is a model that replaces these by reactive threading.


I do think a GM will and should put their foot down on an illegal-at-chargen item that gives a PC 5 IP (oh, and you also need the simsense booster, otherwiswe it's just 4 IP).

You should REALLY read the rules...


Quintessence: The rules don't say when it's possible, so it's always possible


Quintessence: The rules don't say when it's possible, so it's only possible when it happens to suit my plan.


As usual, you are mixing and matching rule interpretations to get the worst possible outcome, just to be able to complain about bad rules. That kind of discussion is pointless, it's like somebody who limits his social contacts to two or three people who he knows hate his guts, just so that he can complain about the world hating him. Here, have some black dye and eyeliner.

As Sengir indicated, you really need to read the rules... MINIMUM Cost for a Cracked Skillsoft (Rating 1) is going to be 1000 Nyuen (10% of 10,000 Nuyen), which will only ever operate at RATING 1 (You cannot use a Skillsoft at a greater Rating than it provides)... And lets not forget, you do not just roll your threading test and choose your own effect... When you Emulate Skillsofts, you have a threshold equal to all ratings on the skillsoft, PLUS any options applied to the skillsoft... A Rating 4 Skillsoft with two non-rated options will set a Threshold of 6 after all, Not exactly a walk in the park...



Game Mechanics do not need to cover this. Use of skills is common sense... The second you drop the threaded Skillsoft, you are no longer using said skill (The example for Stealth: YOU ARE NO LONGER BEING STEALTHY)... Extended SKills are just that... Extended... anything else you attempt to do while using said extended skill results in a penalty to the Technomancer... Sorry, arguing that you can reactively drop it to make a different skill check and then "Reactivate" your extended skill, without penalties, is just ludicrous...

As for comments on in-game experience, it is an example that refutes everything that you are trying to say here... In game experience indicates that Technomancers are not the powerhouse that you are complaining about. Anecdotal, Yes... Irrelevant, Absolutely not...

Quntessence: In SR4, if it's not forbidden, it'S legal, so yes, that's a way nobody can argue is illegal (retarded? sure. annoying? of course. But thank the person who wrote these rules).


You aren't familiar with Unwired's rules for pirated software, then? But yes, it was hyperbole, the pedantic version is 50 to 5000.


Given your love of Vampire as PC, that's more your cup of tea, and sharing makeup isn't very hygienic.

I'm staying out of this discussion, but if you guys want to make any headway in your discussion, you -really- need to start providing page quotes to support your arguement.

So threading doesn't take an action? Prove it!

Actually it's very painfully obvious that you aren't, as said a few posts ago rating 1 pirated skillsofts costs 1000 (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nuyen.gif) and will only give you a skill of 1.

So can anybody post up a Optimized 400 BP technomancer? I've tried to build one here, but Im sure I missed a few points.

Implants lower Essence and therefore Resonance. Get rid of the hand or suffer a reduction to Resonance 4, reducing your complex forms. I would replace Codeslinger with Perceptive 2.

I have few problems with the Infected, because just like I don't apply yout approach as decribed obove to the matrix or social interactios I don't apply it to alternate character concepts. Chaste emo vampires are only for somebody who desperaty needs to make ip something he can cry about, so no makeup for me, thanks.

Oh, if hermit posts one, this is going to be fun really soon...

@hermit: just to be sure:
Your TM has no skills, because he has 5k (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nuyen.gif) for every skillsoft he needs (which degrade btw), seems not very practical to me...

Dropping Stealth while hacking is really bad:
As exploiting is a extended test, if you drop your stealth in between you will be easier to catch.

cya
Tycho

The booster is avail 8. Sure it costs a bunch of cash, but compared to the costs of being a TM, it's chump change.

And, as a GM, you have to basically crap on the rules to prevent someone from buying an unrestricted item through legal channels instantly at game start. A high lifestyle with beefed up starting cash will see to your funds. Then, you just plug it into your comm.

But, hey, if you want to ignore the rules, then yeah, Hackers suck and TMs are the boss forever.

Availability and Nuyen won't stop any decent hacker, even if you don't allow it at chargen. With Hardware they can easily build anything they want at a 50% price reduction and no availability issues, and with pirated software they can easily pirate any software under R6 at 90% off and no availability issues. A hacker can easily get everything they'd ever want except cyberware just by building or pirating it and the only thing stopping them from building all the cyberware they need is that there's no specific rules laying out the interval period.

Yes. He could also spoof himself an account with these on-demand Horizon skillsoft flatrate services, but that's a bit of a stretch at Chargen.


You can buy them at different ratings. I assumed the maximum price.

Yes there is: the GM. One, they need to get a design plan, or have some way of designing said hardware. Two, there may be specific parts required (e.g. a chipset) they need for the device, which has the same Availability as the item required.

Q.V. pg. 78 of Arsenal. Most of those rules would apply equally well to hardware.

they probably have the Limitation program option. but cracking the code isn't too time consuming

On the note of maintaining the Stealth CF, whats to stop the techno from calling up a sprite (w/ stealth ofc) and using it to maintain his Stealth CF while he runs around doing the other CF threading. I agree that you cant drop a CF and expect its effect to continue. Also is there any way for a techno to gain that many Ips?

Yes and no. Per my undertstanding (AFB):
#1 The design plan is simple. Any hacker can easily get Cerebral Enhancements to have a decent logic score, his ware applies to Knowledge tests (since they're logic linked skills) and he can pirate any Knowsoft he needs for cheap. Besides the fact that, since he has his own commlink, he already has a basic blueprint for the thing he wants to build.
#2 The quote from arsenal does not apply to hardware, although it could. Even then though, there's not really a good reason he can't just cook up the special chip he needs in his shop, it's all basically just optical chips. So the GM can limit a hacker this way, and should for R7 and above, but for R6 and equivalent systems he basically has to "finesse" both RAW and logic.

This assumes that 'basically just optical chips' are something you can cook up; maybe, maybe not. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) The basic rule, AFAIK, is that the best you can get for building yourself is 50% cost, same avail. Assembly, not fabrication.

#1 makes assumptions that you just need to be really smart to duplicate the efforts of the megacorporation R&D centers, staffed by equally smart researchers, technicians, and developers, and can design your own novahot processor. That is, of course, assuming the character is attempting to design their own hardware. If all they're trying to do is obtain a legitimate AR plan or design specs, well, how easily obtained are those specs? That'd be the Availability score.

#2 Why would it not apply to hardware? Sure, any hardware may be a conglomeration of optical chips. But then any chemical compound is an amalgamation of base elements, formed into molecules. Does the character have the facilities needed to turn Radio Shack parts into novahot hardware? No. High-end hardware would be custom designed, with custom firmware/hardware/software/chemical compositions that enable it to be better than any simple kludge.

Now, many of the parts will just be basic components, but some parts will be those key parts that would require a high-end facility to fabricate. Just obtaining the key components would suffice, then. And how does one obtain them? Availability rules.

...I'd change the metatype to dwarf which costs 5 less BP and adds to Strength (+2), Body (+1), and Willpower (+1).
This will give him a 4 BOD (nice to have when the lead starts flying) and 4 WP (important for shaking down spell effects) The 10 BPs saved from Strength could go to Intuition (Response). Drop the Analytical Mind quality and add the 5 BPs saved on the metatype to take Natural Hardening.

Yeah, CHA drops to 5, but with Natural Hardening his biofeedback filter is 6

...and yes, ditch the Cyberhand/Genetech. Resonance is just too important (which is why I never play TMs as I like having a bit of speed in the meat world)

This is exactly what Fastjack has done and is famous for, although most of the really good hackers/deckers design their own custom programs and hardware to compete with the megas. Regardless, the max knowledge threshold I can recall from the book is 4 for obscure knowledge and with a 5 knowsoft and +6 from ware you'll be rolling that before including Logic, which is easy to boost with Cerebral Enhancement and makes a ton of sense for a hacker w/ cyberware because it has great synergy w/ the rest of his ware. And that's presuming nobody has ever snatched any of these designs and posted them anywhere on the Matrix, making them one extended browse away. Besides the fact that he has a high-end commlink already that he can disassemble, examine, and reassemble.


Why would it apply to hardware? We've gone passed comparing apples to oranges to comparing guns to computers. Worse, we've gone to a world where everything, even the guns, is a computer. There are advanced computer parts in the toaster. Unless there is some absolutely unique part that only appears in high end commlinks and appears in no other computerized device anywhere in the world and the effect cannot be duplicated by any other means, then the parts should be easily available.


We had the availability rules break down fairly quickly. There's lots of obvious reasons why you would want a high end device with a Signal of 1 or 0 and a Persona limit of 1 for Nexi. As near as I've been able to find, there's no availability for such customized devices.

But going back to the original point from Saint Sithney, yes, the GM can bar you from legally purchasing it in character creation and yes, the GM can strongly demand availability rolls. You must have pissed your GM off, or he's worried about a balance issue arising, but then you just shift your focus away from high end commlinks to low end commlinks for tricks and high end Nexi for processing power. Your Matrix power will still increase but instead of increasing at regular intervals it will massively increase occasionally throughout gameplay. Assuming, of course, that you don't either talk to him about his concerns or just purchase a Black Market pipeline.

You can set your Signal to anything, within the ranges. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) A nexus, by definition, has a Persona limit > 1, although I can't imagine any reason that would matter anyway. Not very convincing examples, heh. Besides, a commlink is essentially a Response chip, a Signal antenna, a System program, and a Firewall program. You buy the parts (50% discount being the best case), and assemble them. Rating 7+ is military… steal it from them.