Hackers in 5th Edition, Decker vs. Technomancer Options

[Kyrinthic]

(on a side note, i don't think adepts cost too little, nor do i think that an adept hacker is illogical; the magic is in the hacker, not in the matrix. it's improving the hacker's mind and skills, not bending the matrix. furthermore, the "problem" is not really with adepts, it's with builds that combine adept abilities with high resources to get the best of both worlds... adepts on their own are just fine. really, i feel the problem comes more with the fact that having a high priority in race is pretty insignificant, and that high priority in attributes, while good, is not nearly as good as, say, high priority in skills or resources. in other words, if attributes A was giving enough attributes that resources A couldn't compensate for dumping it, i think we'd see a lot more adepts with attributes, skills, and magic taking up the top 3 priorities, not necessarily in that order. and there's not nearly as much impressiveness in resources D to go crazy with. likewise, if race A was worth more, i think that would help make it a harder choice. alternately, to be fair, you could just *decrease* the value of adept, magician/mystic adept, aspected magician, resources, and skills... personally, i feel like beefing up attributes and race would be a bit more straightforward though).

When I first played around with the priority system in 5, I really didnt like it, 4th had a lot more logic to costs and whatnot.
But after playing around with it some, I really like the idea behind the priority system, but I think some of the specifics are a little off. Forcing real and significant choices at the priority level gives a different feel to the whole process.

That said, here are things I feel the priority system does wrong.
Metatypes feel off, and I find it hard to want to make a troll. That priority needs better reasons to drop your A/B in it.
Magic/resonance is expensive (which is good), unless you are an Adept. I think that being able to put a 4 magic Adept into rank C allows far to many other Archtypes to just plain be done better by an adept. If you had to pay you're A/B rank for it, that would not feel so common.
Resources have an odd progression, E resources feels too low, its worsened by the high cost to transfer karma to nuyen. You lose 2 out of 14 attribute points or 4 out of 22 skill points dropping from D to E, so why do you lose 44k out of 50k nuyen making the same drop? if you are at 12 attribute points, you can probably buy up 2 of them from 1-2 with 20 starting karma, skill points probably less to recoup your four, but you are capped on 10 karma to get to halfway back to D rank resources.


I dont know that you could make the A attribs match what you can do with ware without making it broken, or changing how ware works. Its not total points that bring power, its points in your primary focus stat, and 'ware plus adept is the best way to be 4 points above people who just put an A in attribs, no matter how many points they get there. When I look down the street at a guy with a gun, I'm a lot more scared of the cyberadept with 11 (7[elf/trait boost]+ware/adept stats) agi and 11 skill (6+spec+adept skill) than I am of the guy with 5-6 across the board on his stats.

But at this point I think we are heading into an entirely different, if interesting conversation than this thread started as. (and I am entirely at fault for this), so I am going to stop typing (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[Jaid]

the guy with a single high attribute and skill is better with that one skill (whether it be shooting, climbing, or whatever else). and that's an excellent ability to have. often (especially in opposed tests) having a massive dice pool is great.

but don't underestimate the power of being able to beat almost everyone the huge dice pool guy beats, while also being able to beat said character in a dozen other areas.

certainly, the person with crazy good agility and automatics is a powerful force to be reckoned with, but if you also have the ability to climb into an advantageous location, bluff your way past a security checkpoint, outrun a hellhound, and withstand small arms fire, and "only" a 14 for your dice pool... you're still almost as good at shooting people, but much better at getting yourself into situations where you can shoot people, and much better at getting away successfully after shooting people, which generally makes you much more useful to a shadowrunning team, and i'd much sooner have the guy who is really good in a lot of areas on my team than the guy who is really ridiculously good in one area and completely useless or worse in other areas.

not that being an adept and getting an amazing dice pool makes you automatically bad at everything else, mind you, but the main problem is that right now, they can specialize that much and there is little if any opportunity cost to "dumping" other areas of their character.

[Moirdryd]

Okay, I promised an update on the TM in my game with the rules tweaks I've put into effect.
Last night he had to hack a Rating 5 (minor security) LoneStar Host to grab some Security Camera feed footage from the edge of Redmond.
For the record this TM isn't as good in the stats for DPs as I posted for doing the deck dummy hack.
He IDed the SecCameras (they went to the area they wanted the data of) from their Silent state and pulled their Grid, Slaved Host etc. Hooray for Matrix perception tests.
He hopped to the Seattle Local Grid (I still want to say LTG).
Then it was a very smooth Hack on the Fly and Enter Host. OverWatch tally was at 8 by this point.
More Matrix Perception to correctly ID the Timestamped File he's looking for, again does it easy.
Now this is where it went a bit wrong...
His next Hack on the Fly comes up with no hits where as the Host gets 5... Probe IC is immediately launched.
He gets bitten by the shimmering orphidian IC getting another Mark on his Persona and now Trace IC is launched. He Succeeds his Hack this time as he fends off the Trace IC. Edit File doesn't work out too well so he still can't grab the Data, the Serpentile IV is still biting and poisoning his persona (up to 3 Marks now) and the BloodHound with the silver nose and sherrifs badge almost placed his location. Needing some backup before more IC gets activated he compiles a Fault Sprite (R3) into existence while getting attacked by the IC again and sets the wicked Darkling like creature on the Blodhound with the silver nose.
Getting worried that his OW tally is getting higher (guessing to me that it must be well over 20 by now, it was actually 18) and that the Host would be spitting more IC very soon he drops any pretence of Decking the System and goes to using his CFs. It still takes 2 attempts with opening up his CF Level to 5 and spending Edge on the second try (first attempt saw him get like 2 hits on a Level 4 where the Host tallied 8 his on 11 dice) he rips a copy of the File. The Sprite is Electron Storming the hell out of the Trace IC (good sprite rolls poor IC rolls).
On the first pass of turn 3 the Trace IC again fails to trace the TM and then gets crashed by the Fault Sprite. The Prove IC can do very little as the TM dumps the File into the team's Commlinks conference call and then jumps from the Host as the Fault Sprite slips back into the Resonance.
The TM throws his LP into Reboot and the team watch the footage of a Gang hijacking an Ares - Evo - Horizon subsidiary (Cyberspace Systems Inc) cargo Hum-Vee and it's two escort cars.

Result? Hack successful, newbie to SR got to have some fun learning the rules and paying with Hacking, CFs and a Sprite while experiencing IC and Host. Fading taken was 1 box of Stun (at RAW values would have been Five boxes).

[Jaid]

and this is why you should brute force everything rather than hack on the fly when hacking a host... unresisted matrix damage is bad, but not as bad as the host getting marks on you and releasing the hounds.

[Jack VII]

Not sure if I would agree with that. For a TM, unresisted matrix damage = unresisted stun damage. So unlike a decker, it actually can impact their dice pool if they take too much. I think hack on the fly is appropriate in this case.

The TM was very fortunate that Lone Star had the most vanilla of IC loaded. Had it been something like Tar Baby -> Track -> Killer, they would have had a pretty tough time of it.

[Moirdryd]

It's a Host running a few blocks of Security Camera and Panic Button! In north west Redmond. Z rated zone so no security spider (well not at first, probably after a few turns) and running Probe-Trace and then maybe some nasty stuff. Cheap and simple, especially as most of the cameras and alert systems don't work anyway in Redmond.

[Jaid]

Not sure if I would agree with that. For a TM, unresisted matrix damage = unresisted stun damage. So unlike a decker, it actually can impact their dice pool if they take too much. I think hack on the fly is appropriate in this case.

The TM was very fortunate that Lone Star had the most vanilla of IC loaded. Had it been something like Tar Baby -> Track -> Killer, they would have had a pretty tough time of it.

fading damage cannot be healed with first aid or magic, but matrix damage has no such restrictions for technomancers. step out of the host if you take damage, heal it up, and then log back in. you've got 15 minutes before your oversight goes up due to time restrictions, and it takes a few seconds to get healed.

now, perhaps if you're in the middle of a firefight, that might change. but in general, it's much better to risk a bit of stun damage (particularly since 5 net hits for the defender is pretty unlikely if you're not hacking something way above what you should be going after).

[Moirdryd]

Of course, winning at Hack on the Fly means no one knows you were there. Brute force is likely to see IC very very quickly.

[Jack VII]

fading damage cannot be healed with first aid or magic, but matrix damage has no such restrictions for technomancers. step out of the host if you take damage, heal it up, and then log back in. you've got 15 minutes before your oversight goes up due to time restrictions, and it takes a few seconds to get healed.

The only thing you're going to be able to rely on is first aid or stim patches since magic can't heal stun damage. If you've got a stud medic that can get past the penalties, it might work. I'd rather just not have the Host know I was there (at least until I hit the first protected file) given that you can get the same pools for Brute Force and Hack on the Fly, so same chance of success or failure.

I guess if your Sleaze is really high, you might be able to Brute Force without the Host being able to spot you. It would be an interesting concept.

[Jaid]

IC can't do anything to you until it finds you. and if you don't have crazy stealth dice pools, you shouldn't be attacking a host regardless; the IC is already going to be checking for icons that don't belong anyways, 99.9% of the time (there's even an example in the book where a hacker gets into a host, and there is a patrol IC sitting there checking all icons to make sure they belong).

so really, you log in, the host checks for you whether you used attack or not, and you move on with your life.

also, you should be getting your marks on the host by getting marks using direct connections to slaved devices ideally, anyways.

[Jack VII]

IC can't do anything to you until it finds you. and if you don't have crazy stealth dice pools, you shouldn't be attacking a host regardless; the IC is already going to be checking for icons that don't belong anyways, 99.9% of the time (there's even an example in the book where a hacker gets into a host, and there is a patrol IC sitting there checking all icons to make sure they belong).

so really, you log in, the host checks for you whether you used attack or not, and you move on with your life.

If you use Brute Force to get your MARKs (either on the Host or a device slaved to the Host or a file or whatever) the owner is alerted immediately each time you succeed, which likely results in an active alert to the Host which will start launching IC. Sure, they can't do anything until the Patrol IC spots you, but once it does, all the IC that have been loaded can then target you. You're really relying on the Patrol IC not being able to get a net hit and you don't have nearly as much GTFO time as you would with Hack on the Fly.

I do still think a Sleaze prioritized Brute Force decker might be an interesting and viable idea, particularly if the decker is more of a mess around with devices in meatspace kind of decker.

ETA: A TM, of course, is not going to be nearly as successful at this.

[Jaid]

you can go ahead and use hack on the fly for direct connection to devices slaved to the host to mark the host, that's not a bad idea. with a direct connection, the devices will have an awful defence pool, in many cases as low as 6. so while the drawback of failing is bad with hack on the fly, it's *extremely* unlikely for you to fail. likewise, in these situations, the drawback for succeeding on an attack in this case is pretty bad, since if you succeed (which is very likely) with a sleaze, there is no drawback.

in contrast, a host generally has really *good* defence pool, as it doesn't really have any reason not to (by default) assign the highest values to firewall and data processing. in contrast, it has very low offensive pools (it's a bit vague, patrol IC is not assigned an attribute for matrix perception checks, but i'd presume it uses host rating x 2 [data processing] for it's perception in much the same way that other IC uses the host's attack x 2 [attack] for attack actions. now consider that a host you're hacking is likely rated between 6 and 8 for a chargen character, with some 5s.

so the IC's perception dice pool is 10-16, with probably +3 to that on defence against sleazes (max data processing, as you have to find anything before you can do anything against that thing). against a 13, you've probably got a fair chance of success to score a mark, but it's probably not that far off 50/50 either unless you're really hyper-specialized, and if you fail, you have been spotted, and you need to remove a mark before you can hide. that's pretty nasty. on the high end, i don't think i'd go in assuming i'm going to beat a dicepool of 19 on a regular basis. the consequence of failure should you fail a sleaze action is huge, the consequence of failure should you fail an attack action is relatively small, and you are pretty likely to fail in most cases anyways. not that your chance of staying hidden vs a 16 dice pool is great either, but it's going to take them at least a couple of actions to even try and find you, and if they fail that, your odds of being found go down dramatically (and good luck hacking a tough system for multiple marks).

so really, if you're up against a host's dice pools, i for one don't like my odds of beating the host consistently. a 50/50 chance of a roll that i'm probably going to need to make multiple times going horrifically wrong is not something i'm willing to risk lightly. a 50/50 chance on a roll that i have to make once (after which retries are penalized -2 cumulative per attempt), and where something comparatively minor goes wrong only if i succeed, on the other hand, is not so bad. particularly since at least i can try to hide again if they make that check, since i'm not marked, just spotted.

[Jack VII]

so really, if you're up against a host's dice pools, i for one don't like my odds of beating the host consistently. a 50/50 chance of a roll that i'm probably going to need to make multiple times going horrifically wrong is not something i'm willing to risk lightly. a 50/50 chance on a roll that i have to make once (after which retries are penalized -2 cumulative per attempt), and where something comparatively minor goes wrong only if i succeed, on the other hand, is not so bad. particularly since at least i can try to hide again if they make that check, since i'm not marked, just spotted.

But since this conversation is based on TMs (at least, I believe that is where this started), you're eating unresisted stun damage each time you fail a roll. I wouldn't consider that "comparatively minor" in that situation, particularly if there is a large disparity in dice pools between what the Host is throwing and what the character is throwing and you expect to fail fairly often.

Which I think gets us back to the point which we both agree on: that TMs are pretty underpowered in many hacking situations.

[Jaid]

the technomancer can be healed relatively quickly. particularly if he provides a sprite to improve the use of a first aid kit. even if you're the only one in the group with the skill, you can set it to wireless (assuming your group doesn't ignore wireless bonuses for being stupid) for an easy 12 dice pool plus whatever the sprite gives, plus any sane technomancer will take quick healer, which counteracts the emerged penalty, and if you're hacking a host you're probably in at least average conditions, so 11 dice...

heck, there's nothing preventing you from doing it yourself, strictly speaking. and being a technomancer, you'd likely specialize in treating whatever it is that happens to technomancers when they take matrix damage.

and in either case, you're not really expecting massive amounts of damage. and even if it's a possibility, it's still not as bad as what will happen if the host gets to set up an IC gangbang on you before you can remove the mark and hide.

[Jack VII]

11 dice

Going with 11-14 dice, you're going to average 3-5 hits. The threshold is 2, so you can heal 1 to 3 boxes of stun and it takes a number of CTs equal to the amount of damage you're healing, probably 1-3 CTs as well. During that time, you're probably Brute Forcing (and possibly failing) multiple times, which further increases your stun damage. You can't really stop as IC is going to start loading up the first time you succeed and that Patrol keeps rolling perception checks.

and in either case, you're not really expecting massive amounts of damage. and even if it's a possibility, it's still not as bad as what will happen if the host gets to set up an IC gangbang on you before you can remove the mark and hide.

I imagine its more likely that the Host is going to set up an IC gangbang when you use Brute Force. Outside of the Host, the MARK from the Host you get for failing a Hack on the Fly does nothing unless they deploy a security decker who exits the Host. So you can just log out and wait, clearing both MARKS and OS, assuming you're hacking a Host and don't really have to worry about time. You try until you succeed, then enter the Host. At this point, it really depends on what you want to do, but it's pretty much going to be the same dice versus same resistance with Brute Force vs. Hack on the Fly. The only difference being that the TM that used Brute Force to get into the Host is immediately on a timeline given that the Host has been alerted to their presence.

At least, that seems to be the way it would work to me.

[DeathStrobe]

This topic got me thinking about how to munchkin a Technomancer. I'm pretty much giving this munchkin TM unlimited resources and karma, just to see how high, high is.

Metatype Elf
Attack - 8 ['cause elf]
Sleaze - 7(6) [exceptional attribute, but -1 intell from pain editor]
Data Processing - 6 (9) [+ cerebral booster]
Firewall 6 (8) - [+1 from pain editor, +1 natural hardening]

Now our Munchkin TM is just a bit better than a Fairlight Excalibur at the cost of 142,500 ¥ and .9 essence (and a bunch of karma), might as well toss in a data jack to make it a nice and even 1 essence and to get that -1 noise.

Still not as flexible as a deck, but seeing how stun damage won't stop the TM with the pain editor, he can over thread or just take it to the face in the Matrix and keep going, at least until he fills his physical. This TM will also be better at cyber combat then a decker. Also our TM could also moonlight as a pretty decent face for a team too.

[Jack VII]

I don't think Natural Hardening is supposed to boost the Firewall attribute. I believe it is supposed to be added to Firewall when rolling to resist Biofeedback. Pretty entertaining though.

[Jaid]

you should never be hacking against the host's dicepools unless you're inside the host, or you severely outclass the host and for some reason don't need to be in the host.

for example, suppose there's a security host for the facility you're hacking (if there isn't, then presumably the doors etc aren't hooked up to *any* host, and the host concern is not there).

you walk up to a door at some point. you connect to it directly with a cable. the door now only gets it's own dice pool for defence, and i'm going to propose that it would be classified roughly as a "corporate security device", giving it a device rating (and by default, firewall and data processing) of 3.

the matrix defence pool for that door against your hack is going to be 6. go ahead and sleaze it, because you're incredibly unlikely to get marked anyways.

and now, because of the miracles of slaved devices, you have a mark on the host and can log in, without ever having even once tested the host's defences.

now, suppose you later come across another door, or perhaps a security camera or gun drone. these are likely also slaved to the host, but whether they are or not, they won't benefit from the host's defences, because once on the host you count as having a direct connection to everything that is slaved to the host.

so basically, the only time you should ever be going up against a host's defences at all, is when you need marks on something that is entirely local to the host. like a file, or IC. hopefully you are never crazy enough to waste your time hacking IC itself, so that pretty much leaves files. which you're going to need to break the copy protection of anyways (an attack action).

until you make that *successful* attack action (note: the action to break the protection is vs protection rating x 2, which is unlikely to be more than maybe 8 dice, so there's very little risk there), there isn't really any pressure. you can just go ahead and wait 3-9 seconds, it's not a big deal. once you have succeeded, it's pretty much time to stop worrying about setting off alarms, because you can't help it regardless.

[RHat]

you walk up to a door at some point. you connect to it directly with a cable. the door now only gets it's own dice pool for defence, and i'm going to propose that it would be classified roughly as a "corporate security device", giving it a device rating (and by default, firewall and data processing) of 3.

the matrix defence pool for that door against your hack is going to be 6. go ahead and sleaze it, because you're incredibly unlikely to get marked anyways.

True for deckers, not true for technomancers.

[DeathStrobe]

I don't think Natural Hardening is supposed to boost the Firewall attribute. I believe it is supposed to be added to Firewall when rolling to resist Biofeedback. Pretty entertaining though.

I don't know. All Matrix damage a TM takes is biofeedback. It all does stun or physical, so I do think it might be on all the time for a TM.

[Jack VII]

I don't know. All Matrix damage a TM takes is biofeedback. It all does stun or physical, so I do think it might be on all the time for a TM.

I think it's on all the time, I just don't think it helps on tests not directly related to resisting biofeedback damage.

[Jaid]

True for deckers, not true for technomancers.

what, you mean you think that technomancers can't get a cable to do this?

....

you *have* heard of 'trode nets, right? because if a hacker can do it with a datajack, then a technomancer can bloody well do it with a 'trode net.

[DeathStrobe]

I think it's on all the time, I just don't think it helps on tests not directly related to resisting biofeedback damage.

That's not what I mean, I mean all damage a TM takes in the Matrix is biofeedback. And it looks like the example on p102 might agree, but I know a lot of the examples are wrong, so that doesn't entirely help my argument.

[RHat]

what, you mean you think that technomancers can't get a cable to do this?

....

you *have* heard of 'trode nets, right? because if a hacker can do it with a datajack, then a technomancer can bloody well do it with a 'trode net.

Actually, whether or not a trode net works for that is debatable at best, in RAW.

[Jack VII]

That's not what I mean, I mean all damage a TM takes in the Matrix is biofeedback. And it looks like the example on p102 might agree, but I know a lot of the examples are wrong, so that doesn't entirely help my argument.

I'm arguing that Natural Hardening shouldn't help with resisting, say, a Hack on the Fly attempt, which uses Firewall as part of the opposed resistance test.