QUOTE (HentaiZonga @ May 11 2008, 10:02 AM)
Huh. So... how are technomancers cool again? Also, didn't Reaction used to matter for riggers, before SR4?
from a rigging perspective?
well, first off, there's the fact that a TM even has the possibility of getting a rating 12 machine sprite which they can use to control a drone. granted, that's probably only a compiled sprite, not registered, but still, that's a sprite which is likely throwing either 10 or 24 dice at most problems. that's not exactly minor. secondly, depending on how you rule multiple pilots for one vehicle (for example, having one drive and one shoot), you might be able to use a couple of sprites for an additional drone or drones, which will still have very respectable dicepools. all of these sprites would (apparently, per the latest errata) have edge, which regular drone pilots won't. they can't be spoofed by normal hackers, either (it takes another TM). but perhaps most importantly, is that by starting off with a good command CF (5 of 6) and threading it up (i figure 3-4 points from threading isn't too unreasonable to assume) and following up with a registered sprite giving a boost to your command CF (another 3-4 points) you can have an effective command CF of 12ish fairly easily (even 14 or more isn't too improbable, if you have resonance 6 to start off). if you then take the codeslinger(control device) quality, and add onto that hotsim, you're getting 16+ dice to most tests... or rather, 16+ dice plus skill. plus handling for pilot skills, of course. throw in a machine sprite with diagnosis for another few dice, and you're looking at a very scary rigger. assuming we actually top out everything (base CF of 6, thread for another 6, and get an assist operation from a rating 6 sprite) it's 22 dice before skills. so for example, your passive dodge will be 22 dice for such a tricked-out technomancer.
now of course, this is not without problems. but the point is, a tricked out technomancer can actually do some pretty crazy stuff... you just have to build specifically for that, and accept you won't be much good at other stuff... which basically describes the tradeoff for any technomancer you care to create.