Technomancer/Hacker encounter, Just for fun Options

[Jaid]

In that instance the technomancer has a slight edge, since they can throw the sprite at the decker and go about the hacking job while the decker contends with the active threat. Throw a few Tattletales at the decker and the techno probably has plenty of time to finish while the decker is rebooting or risking covergence.

The decker, even with an agent, wouldn't be nearly as successful at stalling the technomancer. Popping the agent would also brick the deck,while a lost sprite isn't a huge concern.

the sprites that can hack can't fight worth crap. the sprites that can fight can't hack worth crap. the technomancer sicks a sprite on you, you enter the host. the sprite attempts to follow and hilarity ensues. at that point the technomancer either has to burn through 2 more tasks just to get the sprite back on you (sending it away = 1 service, sending it to attack you is another) and that assumes you don't get lucky and avoid being spotted for long enough to succeed on your task and walk away.

a large part of the reason the decker's sleaze is so low is that he's geared up for a fight.

on a side note, a hacker can basically just instantly swap all programs and attributes to whatever he wants on a whim... i mean, it's limited to the number of reconfigure programs he cares to buy (or copy), but while he can only run one instance of the program at a time, he can have as many copies in storage as he feels like.

[RHat]

In that instance the technomancer has a slight edge, since they can throw the sprite at the decker and go about the hacking job while the decker contends with the active threat. Throw a few Tattletales at the decker and the techno probably has plenty of time to finish while the decker is rebooting or risking covergence.

The decker, even with an agent, wouldn't be nearly as successful at stalling the technomancer. Popping the agent would also brick the deck,while a lost sprite isn't a huge concern.

And if we were doing a real test, that Sprite would have been compiled, not registered, because we can't at all assume that a chargen technomancer is pulling off Level 6 registrations. Which means a more notable Fading value and CM penalties. The whole thing's kinda skewed towards the technomancer, really.

And Tattletale's only-slightly-less-than-Control-Thoughts Fading value doesn't have anything to do with the fact that it literally cannot affect most of a runner's targets. It doesn't do ANYTHING, for example, to spiders, or anyone who hasn't yet begin to accumulate OS. It's a very limited tool, hence why it's an unlikely choice. And to get the OS that high, you'll need to generate a fair few hits, which means plenty of chance for a bad roll or two to take you out (especially since at that point you no longer have the benefit of Full Matrix Defense to keep the decker's Attacks at bay, which means the Stun stacks up even faster).

Really, the decker didn't NEED to stall the technomancer anyways - he probably could have flat-out finished the job faster in the first place.

[Dolanar]

also, the Decker would have been better off keeping Sleaze as his primary for another Round of 2 getting a couple of Marks on the TM, then hit him with a huge Dataspike to attempt to one shot him. that would have made the TM waste a turn with remove mark or risk the huge hurt of being Data Spiked with 2-3 marks.

[Epicedion]

And if we were doing a real test, that Sprite would have been compiled, not registered, because we can't at all assume that a chargen technomancer is pulling off Level 6 registrations. Which means a more notable Fading value and CM penalties. The whole thing's kinda skewed towards the technomancer, really.

And Tattletale's only-slightly-less-than-Control-Thoughts Fading value doesn't have anything to do with the fact that it literally cannot affect most of a runner's targets. It doesn't do ANYTHING, for example, to spiders, or anyone who hasn't yet begin to accumulate OS. It's a very limited tool, hence why it's an unlikely choice. And to get the OS that high, you'll need to generate a fair few hits, which means plenty of chance for a bad roll or two to take you out (especially since at that point you no longer have the benefit of Full Matrix Defense to keep the decker's Attacks at bay, which means the Stun stacks up even faster).

Really, the decker didn't NEED to stall the technomancer anyways - he probably could have flat-out finished the job faster in the first place.

Of course, the Technomancer didn't take anything supremely useful like Infusion of Sleaze. A quick trip to the dice roller with Infusion of Sleaze (Level 5, 6 Fading) has the technomancer starting with a Sleaze of 10 and 2 Stun, for 15 dice to avoid detection (versus the decker's 10/12 dice for perception).

Likewise Infusion of Firewall could start the Technomancer off with a Firewall of 13 for a measly 3 Stun, by a quick run on a dice roller, getting him 20 defense dice against attacks.

[RHat]

Of course, the Technomancer didn't take anything supremely useful like Infusion of Sleaze. A quick trip to the dice roller with Infusion of Sleaze (Level 5, 6 Fading) has the technomancer starting with a Sleaze of 10 and 2 Stun, for 15 dice to avoid detection (versus the decker's 10/12 dice for perception).

Likewise Infusion of Firewall could start the Technomancer off with a Firewall of 13 for a measly 3 Stun, by a quick run on a dice roller, getting him 20 defense dice against attacks.

And in the first case, he's at -4 to do... Well, anything, really. In the second case, that's 3 physical, and thus -3 or -5 to do anything (depending on Running Silent or not).

In any case, I want to be clear on something: Are you trying to argue that technomancers are balanced?

[Oregwath]

Tattletale also has the issue of being Permanent. It is limited by level, so if you want to add 5 to the opposing decker, you have to thread it at level five or higher. You then have to sustain it for FIVE COMBAT TURNS. Not passes, but full turns. If you don't, the OS returns to what it was. I honestly don't see anyone willing to take a -2 for that long to add five to someones OS. I know you can have a sprite hold it, but you could also just have that sprite assist you in threading your resonance spike.

[Jack VII]

I know you can have a sprite hold it, but you could also just have that sprite assist you in threading your resonance spike.

I was going to say "Registered, but your point stands" but you ninjaed me. LOL

[Oregwath]

Yeah, I am working on three hours of sleep since Saturday. I will notice things, but not always in time to avoid the dreaded Edit Button. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/grinbig.gif)

As soon as the kids go to bed, I am passing out and not getting up until thursday...

[Voran]

would the use of something like tattletale be potentially bad for the TM too? You might be racking up overwatch score on your target, but that would logically result in a virtual scramble to your 'location' (node, whatever) which would likely make the responders look for other things in addition to the OS slammed target. So the TM screams WOLF WOLF WOOOOOLLLF! invisibly, hunters respond and chase off or nuke the target, but should also be checking to see if anyone else is there too. Chumming the water would make it harder for the TM to carry out their mission even if the hacker is now gone.

[Oregwath]

I haven't seen any rules to suggest that, but I also haven't seen any rules to say that you get wet if you stand in the rain. If I were running then the demiG.O.D. would at least look around. And with their abilities it wouldn't be hard for them to notice you and see that you are not running on any device. TM's aren't the most respected beings on the Matrix...

[Jaid]

Of course, the Technomancer didn't take anything supremely useful like Infusion of Sleaze. A quick trip to the dice roller with Infusion of Sleaze (Level 5, 6 Fading) has the technomancer starting with a Sleaze of 10 and 2 Stun, for 15 dice to avoid detection (versus the decker's 10/12 dice for perception).

Likewise Infusion of Firewall could start the Technomancer off with a Firewall of 13 for a measly 3 Stun, by a quick run on a dice roller, getting him 20 defense dice against attacks.

and then he starts the whole thing with -1 to all rolls, and the second he takes a single point of matrix damage he's down to -2 on all actions, from injuries. oh, and of course the sustaining penalties for those two complex forms as well.

i'm not entirely certain having lost half of your stun track before you even start doing anything is a sound strategy. also, that just puts him another two actions behind the decker, who as mentioned should be busy getting into the host and completing the job rather than wasting any time on silly things like fighting someone who is most likely going to get the job done slower anyways.

edit: mind you, it's a heck of a lot easier to pick things apart after the fact and say "oh, well X should have done this and then Y would have lost", but to be fair, it's not like either character would have had a day and a half to pick apart the battle the way we have (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif)

[Oregwath]

But back on subject, when you go to try them out with the increased karma remember that Jared can spend his nuyen to improve his matrix attributes and his karma on his skills, giving him two ways to increase his dice pools. Tim has to spend (submersion 1 = 13) + (Resonance 7 = 35) karma for a total of 48 to raise his fade resistance pool by one die. So those complex forms that seem so nice now are going to be less and less effect as the characters advance.

[Epicedion]

And in the first case, he's at -4 to do... Well, anything, really. In the second case, that's 3 physical, and thus -3 or -5 to do anything (depending on Running Silent or not).

In any case, I want to be clear on something: Are you trying to argue that technomancers are balanced?

1) It's 3 stun, as it was 6 hits. It only flips to physical if you get more hits than your Resonance.

2) -3 to actions seems okay considering the nigh-impenetrable 20 dice defense (25 on full defense), which beats the decker by at least 5 or 10 dice on all actions. The set-up was a fight-a-thon, not a hack-a-thon. And a cheap sprite can handle the extra -2 from sustaining for a few combat turns.

3) What's balance? Or at least what would you consider balanced? These are two disparate entities, not equivalent ones. It's an RPG, not a board game. There's some expectation of balance between two Technomancers with different priority selections, and there's some balance expectations about the general abilities of starting characters to perform their basic common tasks, but you can't just throw two characters up on the screen and suss out if they're balanced or not as compared directly to each other, especially when you start to get into abilities that one sort of character just can't replicate and even more especially when you start talking about the specialization of roles.

There are a few things that I'd offer the Technomancer that they don't currently get -- for example, the ability to "bond" a "focus" by spending Karma and nuyen on a technological device that covers the same ground as a magician's focus (and is targetable by enemy deckers/technos to fulfill the magic/techno system analogue) for activities such as sustained threading. But as they are, I don't think they're as completely hosed as you're trying to present them.

[SpellBinder]

Of course technomancers have no Resonance equivalent of foci to bond with. If they were too powerful in SR4, then adding that option would've made them Matrix gods. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/sarcastic.gif)

[Epicedion]

Of course technomancers have no Resonance equivalent of foci to bond with. If they were too powerful in SR4, then adding that option would've made them Matrix gods. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/sarcastic.gif)

I think they should probably have them now. The major downside would be that they'd have to be Wireless On while active, making them pretty fat targets while in use. Also, since Resonance actions are pretty much just Thread/Sustain and Compile/Register/Decompile, I'd probably stop short of offering a Resonance Focus, instead keeping them distributed. I'd also consider a Program Focus.

These would have to be damned expensive nuyen-wise, though, or else they would get too powerful too quickly.

Might as well reuse the term "Nexus" here.

[Dolanar]

I believe they had something similar to Foci in SR4

[SpellBinder]

Widgets, I believe is what you're thinking of. They took a Threading (Rating x2, 1 hour) Extended test to create, and the technomancer took Rating x2 in Fading damage. They lasted only 8 hours (no extensions), and they were lost as soon as the technomancer was knocked out. You were pretty much limited to one at a time, unless you didn't mind little ones. They could also be crashed.

The only one I really considered at the time was the RAM widget, that would hold a program (complex form or threaded skillsoft) of a total rating no greater than its own. Honestly have never had any technomancer character in SR4 go for the Widget Crafting echo myself. Just didn't seem worthwhile to me. Maybe Rendering for a compiler technomancer, but that's still iffy.

If they were rewritten for SR5, I honestly expect them to be something that'll generate OS the instant they're created, and probably require a separate echo for each type of widget you wish to make (as opposed to just one echo to pick and choose when you make one).

[Epicedion]

I believe they had something similar to Foci in SR4

Were they added in an expansion book? I don't recall them in the main rulebook.

Here's a rough idea (using Nexus for Focus solely for differentiation):

Resonance Nexus (Threading or Sustaining) -- Karma (3 x Level) -- Money (6000 x Level) -- Avail (4 x Level)F

Sprite Nexus (Compiling or Registering or Decompiling) -- Karma (2 x Level) -- Money (4000 x Level) -- Avail (3 x Level)F

Program Nexus -- Karma (Level x 4 ) -- Money (Level x 9000) -- Avail (4 x Force)F

Explanations:
Forbidden for all of these, since Technomancers are all scary.

*Nexuses are technological devices in the vein of Commlinks, RCCs, and Cyberdecks. When bonded and activated, they act as if slaved to the Living Persona of the Technomancer -- that is, they use the Technomancer's Living Persona attributes instead of their own when targeted by Matrix attacks.

*A Nexus can actually be a wireless device such as a Commlink (the additional cost of the device is added to the cost of the nexus, and the worse availability is used -- but still always Forbidden), and thus be a useful tool while not activated. While not activated, it maintains whatever attributes are normal for a device of its make/model. While activated, it uses the Technomancer's, and cannot be used as its normal device type. In either case, if someone gets a look at it, it appears to contain a large amount of incomprehensible junk data that only other Technomancers can recognize as the Resonance signature of the bonded Technomancer.

*An activated Nexus is always Wireless On. It tags along under the Technomancer's Logic+Sleaze (if the Technomancer is in Hidden Mode) umbrella, though.

The Resonance Nexus is based on the Spell Focus but more expensive in both Karma and nuyen, since Spells are handily segmented into types, and Complex Forms are just Complex Forms (that is, it'd work for every CF and you don't have to have more than one to cover all the bases). It's not 5 times as expensive, since CFs don't quite have the power range of spells, but the fact that you only need one of each makes them individually worth a bit more.

Sprite Nexus = Spirit Focus. Reasonably cheap.

The Program Nexus is based on a combination of the Metamagic Focus and the Qi Focus, and is more expensive Karma-wise, and comes with some special rules:

1) Each Level of a Program Nexus can support 1 point worth of programs.
2) Common programs are valued at 1 point, Hacking programs are valued at 2 points.
3) You still have to buy the programs and store them on a data chip or somewhere else that's convenient.
4) Virtual Machine is special -- it takes no program space but temporarily adds 1 to the Level of the Nexus, at the Virtual Machine penalty of +1 unresisted damage to its owner from attacks.
5) Loading the Program Nexus is done at activation. The only way to shut down programs is to deactivate and reactivate the nexus.
*6) Programs in the Nexus can't be crashed individually -- the Nexus itself has to be crashed by Matrix attacks.

So if you activated a Level 4 Program Nexus, it could house up to 4 Common programs, or 2 Common programs and 1 Hacking program, or 2 Hacking programs. Or a variety of combinations involving the Virtual Machine. All for the low low price of 16 Karma and 36,000 nuyen.


Along down the idea line:

Some sort of Enchanting analogue for Technomancers -- Modulating / Demodulating and (?) -- for the creation/destruction of nexuses and then the temporary imbuing of a file with a triggered Complex Form.

Some sort of Reagent analogue -- think of something like Bitcoins, little scraps of unique data mined by Technomancers (or potentially Deckers who can't use them) and sold (illegally) on the Matrix.

EDIT: The above is long and probably thread-inappropriate, but I'm sort of a rules-generator that outputs to handy windows. Sorry.

EDIT-EDIT: I've made some additions, marked by *

[Dolanar]

yes the Widgets is what I was thinking of, I never said they were useful but that was the closest thing TM's had in 4E

Epic, not to throw a monkey wrench in your plan, but if you make a full on Foci style for TM's you'll wanna start at their creation, someone has to make them afterall. How will you handle the Telesma aspect? add something entirely new?

[Jaid]

some of the widgets were pretty good. they just flat out added to your dicepool, so even just a rating 2-3 widget could add quite a bit on that basis.

[SpellBinder]

I believe they had something similar to Foci in SR4

Were they added in an expansion book? I don't recall them in the main rulebook.

Yup. Unwired, pages 147 & 148-149.

[Epicedion]

Epic, not to throw a monkey wrench in your plan, but if you make a full on Foci style for TM's you'll wanna start at their creation, someone has to make them afterall. How will you handle the Telesma aspect? add something entirely new?

Telesma would be based on Device Rating rather than Object Resistance -- you would have to convert some existing device into a focus, generally following the Enchanting rules. I'd probably call it... Schematic Level (apparently I'm now calling the Formula equivalent a 'Schematic') plus twice the Device Rating in dice for the opposed test (to make up for the 1-6ish scale rather than the 3/6/9/15+ scale of OR).

This system needs new Modulating (Artificing) and Demodulating (Disenchanting) skills to work (unnamed third skill for triggered CF files a la Alchemy to round out the group). Replace 'Arcana' with 'Hardware' where relevant, regarding Schematics.

Anything with a wireless connection can be the 'telesma' here -- while active its function is entirely replaced with its duty as a nexus, though.

Rules while I'm thinking about it: Matrix damage boxes are based on the Device Rating of the nexus (not its Level or the TM), so having a DR 7 commlink instead of a DR 1 pile of junk is actually a decent benefit.

[Dolanar]

yes but what will be considered a "Virgin Telesma" for this? For that matter, are these going to be VR tools or will they be available in meatspace (available only in VR makes sense since thats where most if not all of the powers work). if its a Software type of thing just use Software, if not just use the Compile/Decompile skills. Think of it like in Reboot, Bob had Glitch that helped him, these would be something like Glitch(in fact Glitches would be a good name for them. Glitches in the system that allow the TM to do more than they should normally be capable of)

[xsansara]

I think it is okay for the TM foci to be moved to the new Unwired. And it is okay for introducing an item without giving precise rules on how to make them. I don't recall precise rules on how to build a gun or a tank or even a Deck. And that is fine. The book is long enough as it is.

I agree that the agents section is a bit short. I will add the lack of statistics for Agents such as Initiative and boni in the errata thread.

Overall this thread has been extremely helpful in my understanding of good Matrix options and mechanics and I am very much looking forward to the 100 Karma rematch (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[Epicedion]

yes but what will be considered a "Virgin Telesma" for this? For that matter, are these going to be VR tools or will they be available in meatspace (available only in VR makes sense since thats where most if not all of the powers work). if its a Software type of thing just use Software, if not just use the Compile/Decompile skills. Think of it like in Reboot, Bob had Glitch that helped him, these would be something like Glitch(in fact Glitches would be a good name for them. Glitches in the system that allow the TM to do more than they should normally be capable of)

I'm not following your line of questions at this point. If you're asking what the telesma literally are for the purposes of this stuff, they're any piece of wireless gear with a device rating. Commlinks would be good ways to get higher DR cheaply, but I'm presuming you could use anything from a survival knife to a medkit.