Well, if we're going that route, the TM could spend a shit-ton of (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nuyen.gif) on building a suit of power armor similar to what you see in mecha anime.

Woo, go mecha battles.

But yeah, grap some heavy milspec armor with mobility upgrades, strength upgrades, and a bunch of other fun stuff. Heck that isn't even all that expensive. 20k for the base suit, 6k for the mobility 4500 for the strength, 7500 for the ruthamer coating, and then however much for the other cool stuff you want. Biggest problem is legality.

I was thinking more along the lines of it being more vehicle than armor, kinda like the badguy's suit of armor at the end of Iron Man. Thickly armored, comes with rocket launchers, chain guns, etc, and really only needs 2 skills to operate, Gunnery and Pilot, which the TM would of course jump into..... with their 5 IP.

Dude, Gunnery IS a Vehicle Skill, ergo, ya get the bonus with a Control to Gunnery. Also, where is this rule that rigging reduces test thresholds by 1? (I'm not trying to jump down your throat, your just spouting rules I've never heard of and want to make sure I'm not screwing up big time here.)

Assuming that shutting down a sam is just a matter of hacking his commlink, why do you need a dozen immersions? That is something every matrix ganger can do, which is why nobody would configure his PAN like that (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

His cyber is still slaved all to a single node, the problem is that most cybernetic stuff is signal 0, so you have to be right on top of him to hack...... unless you have those ridiculous level sprites hacking it for you from VR before his Firewall can find them.

OK, everyone, you're comparing apples and oranges. I asked why a TM would be any good in melee. You all respond that the TM would send in his drone army and splatter the sammy. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/ohplease.gif)

How about we compare apples to apples. A Street Sam vs TM melee fight. If you want to have uber-mancer with his drone army then I can have the sammy use a gauss rifle and blow his fragging head off. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/silly.gif)

As has already been stated, one touch and the Street Sam is in the Matrix getting fried. All the ranged discussion was about how the Sam got close enough in the first place.

no, he doesn't.

1) the TM would need a rating 20 biowire to do that, which is 20 submersion grades.
2) the TM would need a rating 20 unarmed combat skillsoft, which does not exist, in order to thread it. read the damn book. it says they can emulate an already existing copy. if there is no rating 20 skillsoft, there is no rating 20 skillsoft CF.

the technomancer will likely have a skillsoft as high as 5 or 6 (the highest commercially available is 4, but we'll assume that a 2,000 karma technomancer has probably hacked his way into getting some experimental skillsofts which are probably 31 different flavors of buggy software, but we'll pretend the huge bugs in the software also don't exist) plus attributes, the street sam will probably have 6-7 plus a specialisation (which the technomancer can't have in a skillsoft) plus reflex recorders plus a maxed-out augmented maximum attribute (will be at least 10 after genetic optimisation) plus martial arts bonuses (which don't exist in skillsoft form). if in some way the street sam manages to get within melee range of a technomancer who hasn't spent similar amounts on melee, the technomancer is going to die horribly, whether or not they can force the street same into VR with a touch (you still have to touch, and as was pointed out, that's only a +2 bonus)

You just accepted, without directly saying so, that the sam would have a very hard time getting into melee range on said TM. Which reinforces my initial point that a TM can be quite a bit more hardcore in meatspace than most people think. No, they won't be as good in straight up melee like as a street sam, but neither is a face and the TM will be about equal to a dedicated face in combat stuffs.

sure, the TM will probably have really good ability to protect himself in the meat (in the 2k karma/millions of nuyen scenario proposed) but the street sam will also have really good stealth skills. the street sam might have a hard time, but i don't consider it by any means impossible. particularly since the vast majority of the drones and security systems will be using agents, IC, and pilot programs, and will likely not have any spider beyond the TM (who is likely only really on call, not patrolling). i wouldn't expect more than one or two sprites patrolling, if that. difficult? probably. but not impossible.

besides which, the point was made that the technomancer does not equal the street sam in melee combat, which is a valid counterpoint to an argument that the technomancer rules in everything except magic. if the technomancer can be demonstrated to be weaker in melee combat as compared to a melee street samurai, then the technomancer is clearly not superior in everything, only in most things.

I never said superior, I only said they're not as weak as everyone thinks outside the Matrix. Going back to just finished with 400 BP CG, resonance 5 or 6 TM. Compile and register a rating 6 machine sprite, put it in a doberman or lynx, it's going to have 14 dice to use its machine gun, more if it does a wide spread. That's comparable to the starter street sam. Add in 2 more sprites in a pair of roto-drones, and you've now got one TM in meatspace who can defend themselves and kill as good as any of the sams in his team.

Since when do attack dice pools increase when performing a Wide Burst?

News to me...

Keep the Faith

Negative modifier to defender's defense pools is about the same as extra dice to the attack roll.

Not really, no, but I understand where you are coming from now...

No Worries...

Keep the Faith

The unwired errata has some things to say about Biowired skillsofts. Namely, you can't improve it or thread it better. Sprite assist operation is a-okay, though, if you need a little extra oomph.


I'd like to point out that Immersion is potentially hilarious, because it lets you jump -anything-, even stuff that isn't meant to be. When you rig something, you override external commands. I mean, who bothers putting firewalls on maglocks. Or fridges. Or automatic doors. Or, heck, say you manage to kick the Spider out of a rigged building. Now you can jack it by jumping in, and have everything at your fingertips.


In the vehicle section. Driving by VR(pilot programs get this bonus) reduces Thresholds by 1. This doesn't really help against opposed tests, like shooting people. If you're physically driving, and have Subscribed to the vehicle, you get +1 dice to all Vehicle tests which IS useful, but remote control is specifically exempt from this bonus. Somewhere buried in the rules is a modifier that says anything you do via remote control is at a -2 dice pool(which is why pilot skills have remote control as a specialty), but I can't find the relevant passage right now. If someone finds it, please tell me.

no, not really. the sam also probably has dodge, and especially likely has perception, all in ranges those drones can't hope to compete in while also being able to drive and shoot. not to mention damage soaking, stealth, mobility (the street sam can probably climb walls and swim better than the drones), plus a street sam can easily start with more than 14 dice in a firearm skill.

sprite-controlled drones are fairly handy, and can pack a respectable punch. but equal to a street samurai they are not, in many ways.

I also have a question: OK, the uber-mancer just touched the sammy and brought him into VR cyber combat... what's to stop the Sammy from having picked up enough hacker skills to fight the TM? Hell with a commlink only taking up 2 capacity, the sammy could have multiple commlinks and just Agent Smith the TM. Yeah, the TM can take on one hacker, but one hacker and 4 Rating 4 Agents (half with Expert Attack and half with Expert Defense and all with Cascading) with Attack 6, Armor 6, and each program has as many options as they can have.

I mean the sammy can have a commlink link in each limb, and one in his head. He can also cluster his cyberware and make that another node and have IC running on that... hell make that the "Medic" agent... it's repairing the damage the other IC is taking from the TM.

After searching through Unwired, SR4A, and Arsenal, *unless* you are referring to the -2 penalty for being distracted (which only applies to particular tests), that penalty appears to be akin to that episode of Nina Bedford about 'Toast F*cking' (you know...where you f*ck or are f*cked by toast): something that occurred in a dream.

(I didn't mean to be too snarky about that -- I can't pass up an opportunity to quote Brain Candy. Long story short: unless the rule appears in a totally obscure location, the penalty you described doesn't exist.)

Why on earth would I slave my cyberware to the commlink? The Wifi on a cyberarm is only need for reapairs or firmware updates, everything else can be done via DNI.

Those agents are going to have a hard time with their 12 attack, 12 defense and 12 soak against a TM with 14+ attack, 18+ defense, and 14+ soak, not to mention his rating 6+ Fault/Tank/Paladin sprites. And that's only if the TM only has Resonance 6 and isn't threading. Your sam with all his agents in VR against a TM is like a group of Halloweeners trying to take on the sam in the flesh in a fight, they MIGHT get lucky, but chances are very much not in their favor.

The attack agents would get 13 dice (Rating 4 Agent + Rating 6 Attack + Rating 3 Expert Attack) and on every round that they don't do damage their Attack goes up by 3 dice (Cascade Rating 3). The Medic IC would be repairing the agents damaged in VR combat.

Doesn't matter. Since we're back with a higher karma TM, let's look at it this way, and I'll be nice and assume the TM is only Resonance 12 and not threading, and has not bought the exceptional attribute quality for any of his mental attributes. AND assuming the sam will be able to use all those links and it's not just his mind being brought into the Matrix.

Echoes: Skinlink and Resonance Trodes (required for pulling the sam into the Matrix), Overclocking, Advanced Overclocking, Swap x2 (just because he's not threading this instance doesn't mean he doesn't)
Black Hammer 12 with Area 6, Targeting, Rust, Armor Piercing 3, Shredder, and Psychotropic 6 (Incompetent: Cyber Combat)
Armor 12
Shield 12
Response 8 if troll, 9 otherwise (6 Intuition +2 Overclocking/Advanced Overclocking, +1 hot sim)
System 6 (5 if Ork or Troll)
Firewall 6 (or 7 if a dwarf)
Edge 6 (7 if human)
Cybercombat 7

Now, without even having sprites out, just that one TM and the sam with we'll say 6 agents (1 per arm, 1 per leg, 1 from torso, 1 from head). Your rating 4 agents have a condition monitor of 10. TM will almost certainly go first with a Matrix initiative of 16/17 default. Area effect Black Hammer to all the agents and the Sam. Rolls:

7 cybercombat + 12 Black Hammer + 2 targeting -12 extra targets + 2 hot sim= 11 dice, not a very impressive pool, to be honest, but all it needs to do is get 1 net hit beyond defenses, and each agent rolls its own defenses (10 for the attack agents and 13 for the defense agents), and that's not including adding edge. We'll say the defense agents resist it, but the attack agents and Medic IC are almost certainly going to get hit. Their armor 6 drops to armor 3, and if they don't soak at least 3 levels of the 12 damage, they're gone. So now you've lost a medic IC and let's say 2 of the 3 attack agents. We'll even be nice and say the sam's not completely fried because he's got an impressive body in the meat despite this not being his area of expertise. Your attack agent rolls 13 dice and your defense agents roll 10 dice to attack. The TM's not even going to be affected with 9 Response + 6 Firewall + 12 Shield + 2 hot sim = 29 defense dice (20 if the GM wants to cap it). I'll even be nice and say the agents have targeting on their attack programs and that raises it to 15 and 12. They're still unlikely to get through the TM's defenses, and assuming they do, they now have to deal with System 6 + armor 12 + 2 hot sim -3 armor piercing = 17 dice armor. The TM is, to say the least, unimpressed.

Next IP, the TM throws another area effect Black Hammer, this time at 17 dice because it needs to target 3 less opponents, which almost guarantees the agents will fry. And if the sam isn't fried yet, he will be by the end of the third IP. Sure, the street sam can go Agent Smith on the TM if he wants, but Agent Smith got the crap kicked out of him by one guy, and the Matrix is the TM's home turf. Everyone says don't mess with a TM in the Matrix, mess with em out of the Matrix. Thank you for helping prove that point true while helping support my supposition that while TMs may not be gods in the meat, they're certainly not the helpless mewling babes everyone makes them out to be either.

black hammer doesn't do jack to the agents.

however, this is all rather a moot point. at 2000 karma, while i don't think the technomancer will have upgraded *all* of his CFs, i do think it is very reasonable to suppose the technomancer will have upgraded his stealth CF to 12. now, you could rule that as soon as the technomancer attacks, he becomes visible (i don't see why), but even if you do, the street sam is going to die as soon as the technomancer attacks anyways (again, a technomancer designed for this will be boosting their CF, threading is easy to get it as high as 9 or 10, add in a long-term registered sprite to assist operation, and you could easily be dealing with a rating 15+ black hammer without stretching. add in net hits, the samurai gets no defense roll (he doesn't know it's coming), and you're looking at soaking probably 20 damage or more.

the agents could actually be dealt with fairly easily by a databombed fake technomancer icon, restricted to not damage the technomancer.

i will readily accept that as soon as matrix combat ensues, the street samurai is screwed. i just don't see the technomancer having all that easy of a time getting into melee with the street samurai, let alone hitting in melee combat.

about the only chance the street sam has once he's in the matrix is that he has a friend who will shoot the technomancer in the meatworld before the technomancer slaughters him with the matrix equivalent of a thor shot.

I never said the TM is going to completely overthrow the street sam in the meat, but as we pointed out, the TM would have a pretty sizeable army of drones to help protect him at a distance, and if the sam got close, the TM would be able to use Resonance Trodes to pull him into the Matrix. At which point as you said, the sam is hosed, even if he does go Agent Smith as KCKitsune suggested. All I was stating is that TMs are not as helpless in the meat as everyone makes out. Yes, they're squishier than a street sam or troll phys-ad, but they can make up for squishyness with cunning. Your average face or mage isn't going to be as tough to kill as a street sam but no one assumes they're so squishy a one-armed baby could kill them, so why make TMs out to be such?