I can't answer this. I don't see any sense in any possible answer, sorry. Maybe another user can provide a more useful information.

Thank for the Info, Cain and Not of this World. The more i rethink it, the more i tinker with the Idea how to rewrite Otakus for the 4th Edition.

Cain: In Unwired, Technomancers gain the possibilitie to learn an Echo called "Biowires", so they can have a Skillwires equivalent equal his Submersion Grade (capped at 4). Then they just have to buy the Skillsoft, thread it and can use the skillsoft. It's not that much of a gamebreaker, IMHO.

It doesn't sound like a gamebreaker; but there are many other implants that could improve a TM's abilities. The problem is, they can't get them without taking a hit to their Resonance. I also don't have my books handy; so I'm wondering exactly how much karma they'd need to spend to have the equivalent of Rating 4 skillwires. If I did a BP comparison, would it even out?

Edit: I'm also wondering about another character type, the skillwire decker. Basically, he has the skills to program his own skillsofts, saving him lots of money. Using this Echo, do they use normal skillsofts? Because if so, they can't code their own skillsofts, as the TM computer skills are incompatible with normal commlinks.

Keep in mind that the +2 dice that both hackers and technomancers can achieve from running hot sim is that technomancers can do this all the time and hackers do so at their own risk of BTL addiction. A hacker should not be allowed to run hot sim all of the time without serious consequences. Even limited use should require addiction tests.

And yes, while they are tremendous karma sinks they still tend to accumulate cash quite quickly. And when they start to submerge they are just able to do so many more things than a hacker could ever achieve.

Cain: Yes, they use normal skillsofts. But can't they code regular programs with their own Software Skill?

Wes, that was unbelievably beautiful. You sir have just saved the lives of countless technos and AIs in my campaign world

The problem is this: What levels of Submersion are required for TM's to equal/exceed a normal decker? I think it was Frank Trollman who put it at several hundred karma or more for them to reach a point that deckers couldn't. That's outside the range of a normal campaign, and the game wasn't playtested at those levels. Also, a decker will be improving with karma as well; a 500 karma decker with equivalent cash will likely still be a formidable challenge for a 500 karma TM.


Not if I recall correctly. I don't have my book on hand, so someone else will need to double-check me.

Just call me the Shadowrun Oscar Schindler.

the skills are different, but mostly they are used for the same thing.

that is, your hacking skill is different, but when you use it to exploit a system, while you are using a 'different' skill with a CF instead of a program as a technomancer, the outcome is the same.

likewise, you can use the technomancer software skill to program normal stuff. most technomancers will probably consider that to be a slow, clumsy, distasteful thing to do, but it can be done. and of course, it's not as if they have a better use for their money anyways, whereas a technomancer can turn time into registered sprites, so don't expect to see most TM players wasting their time programming their own activesofts anyways when they could just use their money

Hope I'm not digging up something too old here, but here's my opinion (from having built a technomancer that looked ok, then had it fail miserably; I'd played hackers before). Note: CF = Complex Form (I hate writing it out).

Build costs:
Technomancers: 1 BP = rating 1 Exploit CF. Hacker: 1 BP = $5000 = rating 5 Exploit program. Seriously, WTF.

TMs use more stats across the board than nearly any other build (I.E. all four mental stats mean something that if the technomancer has +1 of, he's just that much better; only exception is CHA, which you can buy to 4, then spend the same 10 points on Natural Hardening, then raise CHA to 5 later--Natrual Hardening is a little hard to justify getting after char gen). This is above and beyond the points needed for CFs (by the way, if you have Logic 5 (or 6), don't bother with a CF rating 3 (4) or lower, just default and get the same dice).

Hacking:
In general doesn't use Logic (unless you're defaulting because you don't have a program/CF, which hackers apparently have to do all the time (local games never took system response times into account, it was too messy to deal with), TM less so, but still to some extent). This has never made sense to me (a smart hacker is just as good as an idiot with money, which the idiot is more likely to have more of). Example: Google. Google is a powerful search program, but I still have to wade through the results and the higher my intelect the better search terms I can give and the more false positives I can skip over without needing to examine them with more than a glance.

Hacking on the Fly is made of failure, always. NO ALWAYS. Systems you're trying to get into nearly always has more dice against a lower threshhold than you do.

Effectiveness:
Compared to a hacker, they lose, hands down all the time. Hacker has more money to throw at programs at char gen and doesn't need as many attributes (willpower and intuition, some logic all others can be dumped for points if you're min-maxing to the extreme and has no Resonance attribute, those points can instead got to Edge or elsewhere if the TM bought edge).

I can not find a printed rules advantage to being a technomancer over a hacker except possibly being able to run more programs (one, maybe two unless the hacker spends a pile of money OH WAIT THEY HAVE IT TO SPARE UNLESS THEY BOUGHT FOUR DRONES WITH MINIGUNS, which by the way, own face against everything not in the matrix individually).

Okay I have to respectfully disagree here.

Hacker
Exploit program of 5 (restricted to 5 because of the response rating of commlink unless restricted gear is taken during char gen) but lets say 6.
Hacking skill of 5 (unless 8 more BP for 6 and then perhaps a specialty for 2 more) so lets say 6 (8)
Stealth program of 5 (again unless restricted gear) lets say 6 again.

Now Hacker rolls 8 hacking + 6 exploit + 2 for VR just for fun for a total of 16 dice
Node gets a Firewall + Analyze needs only 6 successes to detect the hacker

Technomancer
Charisma 7 elf (this is important later)
Exploit Program of 5 (not enough BP for higher because resonance would have to be bought to 6)
Hacking skill of 5 (7) (again BP is in short supply)
Compiling 5 (7)
Registering 5 (7)

Now here is the difference
Technomancer Threads his exploit program to 8 with 7 charisma and 5 resonance he can buy 3 dice for the drain and take no drain damage
Exploit now = 8
Technomancer has a Registered sprite add its 5 rating to exploit
Exploit now = 13
Technomancer repeats this process with stealth
Stealth = 13

Technomancer now rolls 13 exploit, + 7 Hacking, + 2 from paragon, +2 from VR for 24 dice (You could buy 6 successes with that many which is the highest firewall a system can have barring SOTA or Military Technology)
Node gets a Firewall + Analyze (usually max 12 dice) against a 13 stealth

With this analysis I can't see how they loose hands down "every time". You also have to remember they may only be able to buy a firearms skill of 1 at chargen but machine sprites go a long way to making them viable in the real world. Also remember that since Technomancer CF's are not restricted by their response ratings and whatnot their mental attributes don't have to be "maxxed" at chargen. This gives a bit of wiggle room for later on.

Rules aside, I absolutely love technomancers. But I started in SR4 and haven't played older editions with Otaku. They just seem so amazing to me, the concept of them...reminds me if I were alive during that time (which was actually suggested to me by a friend, that I was a technomancer).

In the rules, I like threading a lot - it's unique, versatile, and relatively powerful. Sprites are an obvious ripoff of spirits, though they don't take karma to register, which makes them more powerful as a TM with nothing but time can make infinite sprites, theoretically. I don't like how implants reduce Resonance, and I don't like the internal commlink bit. I think they should have the benefits as they do now, but require hardware to connect to the matrix. I also think they shouldn't have to worry about augmentation in terms of reducing Resonance.

Besides the fact that i really enjoyed the TM fluff in UW, TMs aren't that bad ruleswise, really- when you make decent use of sprites and threading, possibly also widgets, they'll pwn most hackers in the matrix.
Totally.

Yes, they pay more for their CFs than a hacker pays for their programs- that's because they can boost them to levels no hacker could ever dream of.

Also, after submerging, they are able to pull of stunts nobody else can do, like resonance realm searches.
They can get nifty echos, eg completely blur their matrix signature or just mask as somebody else entirely without even having to bother about spoofing that.
And so on.

Plus, sprite bonds (even more than sprites in general) offer insane possiblities.
Just get a networking bond with a Edge1 sprite, constantly reassemble it during downtime and soon, you won't have to worry about your CFs any more, as you can access every complex form your spoon-fed supersprite has (it's not that hard to bring it up to Rating 8, high Edge, tons of powers and every CF and skill available to one of your sprites at 5 or greater - it's just a matter of time and countles registered sprites sacrificed to your new friend).
And even before that, you can spare a lot of CFs and even a lot of matrix skills because your sprites can do it for you.

As a downside to this, TMs are highly specialized, of course- building a hacker who is useful outside of the matrix is so much easier.
But it has to be, as otherwise, there'd mechanically be absolutely no point in playing a hacker (besides access to botnets, worms and malware).


Oh, and yes, the whole TM chapter in Unwired is, as far as i'm concerned, probably the most captivating and vibrant part in all of the book (besides matrix phenomena and sprites...you see where this leads).
I also liked the otaku in SR2, we had a technoshaman in our group for some time back then, but TMs offer so many more possibilities, both as far as as crunchy gameplay and roleplaying the interaction with their paragon and their subculture is concerned.

I argued a lot about that, and I don't like them fluff-wise because I think this spontaneous evolution is not only implausible, but tends to diminish the parts of Shadowrun that are Cyberpunk. If Man can evolve to fit new environments that fast, the cold Cybernetic dream of replacing yourself to upgrade to transhumanity is pointless.
Maybe there will be a totally convincing explanation for this in the future, but as it is, I don't like Technomancers because they're just another gimmick the world didn't really need.

You so need to have an Aztlan culture-based Reality Filter for that TM...

Oh, gods, we have MECHA-BLOODZILLA!

Falacy: You can't have a skill rank above 6 for a starting character and if you're a hacker you'll be buying the skill group which has a maximum rank of 4. Buying rating 6 programs at start isn't easy either, there are 7 or 8 that the hacker would want to buy at $6000 each. Every $1000 he saves (getting a 5 instead of 6) means he can buy something else.

Even with Stealth of 6, the node has Firewall (5) plus Analyze (5):
Hacker: 9 dice vs. 5
Node: 10 dice vs. 5



Build points to build your Hacker above: 45 points or less (buying the one skill instead of the group is cheaper).
Build points you spent on your TM: 130 points or more (did not calculate skill groups) and is good at ONE thing (breaking in), good luck Decrypting data, Encrypting it, Spoofing your trail, or Defusing data bombs, much less participating in Cybercombat.

Now, getting into the details.
First: Not everyone is going to play an elf, here you're just twinking. This is not an average build.
Second: Threading TWO programs at the same time subtracts 2 dice from the hacking attempt (sure, you're threading Hacking and that doesn't impinge your ability, but Threading Stealth will).
Third: Paragon, that's a Quality from a book I did not have until about 3am last night building a different character for a different game. I have no idea what this does due to the poor wording of the book.
Fourth: Firewall (6) is not the highest you can get non-military. You have a copy of Unwired (see third point above), check page 78 on the sample systems. I see a Firewall 9 on there.
Fifth: Your method here uses sprites, reading over them carefully they don't stick around for long--even if you register them--which means you'll be spending half your free time making more of them and registering them. Secondly to me the way sprites work for skills is broken (especially given your summation on how to use them).

I am not sure what you mean by fallacy, the 8 Dice the hacker was using for hacking was coming from a hacking 6 with a specialization in Exploit giving him 8 dice.

Sprites that are registered stick around forever until you ask them to do a task and it only takes 2 complex actions to compile and register one so in full VR thats less than 3 seconds meaning I will not be
using hardly any free time getting to my max.

Playing an elf is not twinking, thats like saying because you play a troll street sam your twinking. Certain races are good at certain things that has the added side effect of making them live longer in the shadows this dosen't make you a twink. Yes not everyone will play an elf but I do so that's what I was basing the comparison on since I was trying to use the max dice possible from each "class".

I did make the mistake on the threading stealth but even without it you have a stealth of 10 which is still considerably higher than the max of 6 for normal hackers and if you do still want to thread stealth you have a stealth 13 and a 22 hacking dice pool instead of 24.

Technomancers don't need a ton of CF's because they can summon sprites that use those CF's for them. Really all they need is Armour, Shield, Attack, Analyze, Exploit, and Stealth everything else can be covered by sprites.

I was really only trying to say that starting with basic 400BP characters Hackers are not going to be able to come close to a technomancer inside the matrix. Now with all the BP that they save they can become dual classed and do soo much more in the meat world, but that dosen't make them better than technomancers just a different choice.

I agree with you here, and I played in SR3 with Otaku. I really enjoy the concept behind technomancers and I really don't care how its explained (biology or magic). The idea of the body evolving a nervous system and a neurological structure that can see and interact with radio frequencies dosen't seem like that far out there to me. I know that Sharks have a thing called electroreception that allows them to "see" electromagnetic fields produced by other creatures. So the idea that humans can evolve such a trait dosen't seem so far fetched to me. Besides all that though I just like the "Idea" of technomancers and they appeal to the way I enjoy the game. I don't agree on augmentation reducing resonance though I think it should reduce resonance. The idea behind the technomancers ability (be it magical or biological) is that his nervous system is the main antenna. Almost any change in the bodies structure will disrupt its nervous system and disrupt the ability to "see" using it creating blindspots and dead areas. This would make it very logical for augmentations to reduce resonance (resonance magical or mundane simply representing the strength of the technomancer's antenna). Ohh and actually bonding spirits dosen't take Karma either but it does cost a small amount of money.

You can't HAVE Skill Rank 6 Hacking at char gen. You get one skill at 6 OR two at 5. Hacking is part of an extremely useful skill group, cough cough, max 4 ranks. Specialty gets you to 6.



Fine, but it doesn't make for a "here's an average example of a character someone might build." Instead you didn't care about BP or well roundedness and instead threw every point you could into Exploit/Hacking. That does not give a balanced idea of where one character stands in terms of another. It's like my building a troll to survive a fall from orbit and claiming he's a good tank because look at how much damage he can shrug off despite his inability to carry or use a gun of any kind.



Which seems strange to me, Logic 5 gives you 10 complex forms of which you don't use half of them.



My point was that to be as effective of a character you have to spend upwards of two or three times as many BP to be "as good as." Sure, min-maxing you can be retardedly good at one thing, but god help you if you need to do something else. Which you will if your GM isn't brain damaged.

My character was built with the idea that he hadn't been a technomancer long, and as such didn't compile sprites because he hadn't learned their usefulness yet, only to find out that in order to be competent he needed them only to find out here that using them moves you above "competent" to "game breaking."

Emphasis mine. It's kind of embarrassing when you prove yourself wrong in the same breath you used to scream out a completely and utterly wrong bit of information.

Wrong. It takes a number of hours equal to the Force of the sprite to bind it.

Option I'd like to pick missing: Unsure as of yet, Haven't seen one in action.

I've got someone in my soon to be starting game playing one. So far his build looks good (As do all the other PC builds) but we'll see how everything works out once the game is up and running.

You right mate I completely missed that one thinking it was the same as compiling. Thanks for that!

First of all the skill group is called Cracking, you can't have cracking higher than 4, Hacking can be a 6 with a specialty in exploit

Second I rarely have a logic of 5 since complex forms are not limited by system rating as are programs SR4 (233). I usually have a 3 meaning I can have the 6 complex forms I mentioned as well as 20 more points to spend elsewhere.

Third yes my character is not maxxed in hacking I actually have a 4 cracking, 4 electronics, 1 Firearms, 1 influence and 4 dodge, With my level 4 emotitoy, machine sprites, and a 7 charisma I tend to be a good face, decent in combat and much better at matrix combat, hacking, and coding than any out of the box hacker. Yes you have to spend more karma than a hacker but that dosen't make you a 1 trick pony.

I've never heard it put better.

But at the risk of seeming arbitrary, I'll give my reasons for not liking TMs (in fact, they don't exist in my campaign).

The first reason is personal taste: I like the strong distinction between magic and machine that has existed since 1st edition. TM's violate that and also bring in the problem of magic people being better than mundanes. Developers have posted here on Dumpshock that TM's are not magic, but despite their protestations, we have a number of heavy-duty reasons why people will believe that they are: the fluff, the mechanics, the ability to do things that cannot be justified by the laws of physics as we know it (most of SR tech is of a "we can't do it" nature rather than a "it can't be done" nature but TM's are squarely in the second category), their ability to do things that cannot be justified by the "laws" of the Matrix as we know it - quests to recover deleted data, etc., the ability to carry out actions that technically adept non-Technomancers cannot, e.g. perceive attributes of the software environment, contact software entities (e.g. sprites). Some of the things can be justified with the bio-computer nervous system explanation but only with effort and sometimes not at all. Quite simply, TM's come across as magic and I don't like magicians dominating magic and technology, both.

My second reason is one of the effect on different players. TM's negate a standard SR archetype - the Hacker - by their very existence. In the rules sense, no mundane hacker, no matter how much they may want to play the archetype of the brilliant programmer / genius / obsessive programmer, will ever be able to beat the TM at what the TM chooses they'll be good at. It doesn't matter as much what the karma costs are, as it does that the territory of "the best" is clearly the TM's. The Hacker is relegated to the jack of all trades. You can play that, but if your preference is to play someone who's good, bad luck - you've just been shown as always second best. Leaving aside the rules, they also make the Hacker less viable simply via fluff. You can be a character that studied programming all your life and knows the Matrix code inside and out, a six year old child can be a TM that will become one with the Matrix in a way that you are forbidden to ever come close to. Quite simply, the existence of TM's makes the Hacker, regardless of game balance, the also ran. I really don't like that.

That's pretty much it for me. It's never been an issue as no-one has ever wanted to play one. Which is also a tangential problem because Synner is dropping hints that TM's and Resonance is going to be one of the big metaplots of 4e. You only have to look at the adventure framework Emergence to see how irritating it is when an entire campaign revolves around how special a particular type of person is. TMs = X-Men, non-TM's = Bobby's Parents. Either you don't have any TM's in your group in which case everything is slightly remote, or you have one in the party and they get to be the central character thematically (which is bad whether the player is a glory-hog or a wall-flower).

Technomancers. Bleh! I think the Devs are too in love with their child to see how ugly it really is.

My personal opinions of course. I recognize not everyone feels that way, but at least they are derived logically from the facts of the matter.

-K.

To be honest, I'd rather they just kept "decking naked" in the game rather than replacing it with otaku and then technomancers. But I don't mind technomancers conceptually (I hated otaku though; my suspension of disbelief didn't include bringing an 8-year-old kid along on corporate espionage jobs), just their execution.

Excuse me, but this is the point I was getting at:



Emphasis mine:



Thanks for your input Tsithlis, next time I play a TM I'll keep that in mind (might be a while, the next game I play I'm likely to hit the other half of Runner's Companion for the neat stuff I'm missing out on this time playing a Drake Adept--which'll also let me delve into Augmentation for the first time, lots of stuff in there I keep trying to use and keep having the wrong kind of character).

Knasser

While I do not agree with your stance on hating Technomancers (as I enjoy them alot) I can agree with the fact that you gave clear reasons why. I also agree that some of them make sense. I also do not like the fact that you can just quest into some quasi realistic plane of existence and retrieve data that was deleted from the matrix. So in our games that we play we have removed that aspect of the Technomancer and explained the Virtuakinetic phenomenon as a new form of evolution derived from the ubiquitous nature of radio signals during this period of the sixth world. As I stated earlier Sharks as a species evolved to be able to "see" electromagnetic fields", it dosen't strike me as beyond belief that humans, a species already under constant bombardment by radio signals in the early 2000's, could not evolve a way of interacting with them on a neurological level. The nervous system evolving into a radio antenna that captures radio waves sending them to the brain which are then interpreted by areas of the brain currently dormant and sent to the cerebral cortex to be transferred into visual and auditory data. This I think would solve some of your issues with them feeling magical in some way since they would no longer have access to metaplanes and would have a clear reason as to how they interact with radio signals.

As for your second reason for disliking Technomancers I really can't comment much because I agree with you. The do by their very nature outdo mundane hackers inside the matrix, but with that being said Mike Portnoy outdoes me on drums but that dosen't prevent me from getting up everyday and practicing for hours to be better. Just remember though that only a tiny fraction of a percent of the worlds population became Technomancers after the crash and even less are alive now because of the events that have happened in Emergence. This gives hackers a serious advantage in the area of numbers and can make for a good campaign arc if the TM is just thrashing matrix sites left and right. All that aside Technomancers require a Karma level outside of the realm of a normal campaign to interact in both the Physical and Digital worlds as well as a Hacker can so while they do outshine him inside the matrix, they will likely never fulfill the same role in a team. This giving gaming groups with smaller numbers an option of a multiclassed character while giving slightly larger groups the ability to explore a new phenomenon of the sixth world. When it comes right down to it playing as a hacker or a technomancer will have almost no bearing aside from story value. If your DM wants you to succeed at something you likely will and if he does not then you likely won't... everything else is just fluff.

Thanks for the chance at a civilized discussion

While I agree with you on the fluff end; the karma costs are indeed a factor. By the time a decker is completely maxed out, the TM will still be behind the curve. They require so much karma to become "the best" that it simply will never happen in the course of a normal campaign. Being "the best" on paper doesn't mean much in play, especially when it's some theoretical point that will probably never be achieved.

You know, this gives me an idea. I'm going to start my own thread on this one....

"Normal" is relative. I haven't played in any campaign that did not run for years, and where karma didn't accumulate way beyond a few hundred karma.

And the numbers argument is false. We're talking about player characters, and a fictious greater number of hackers doesn't really help the PC hacker rendered obsolete by the magic hacker.

Balance-wise, the devil is in the Support Operation service. It is way too good, because it permits you to leave the expected range of program ratings. You have to watch the mechanics for Hacking (Stealth), Matrix Combat (any attack program), Spoofing Orders (Spoof), Matrix Perception (Analyse). In effect, the TM can, provided any registered sprite service is available, point at an (indirect) opposed-test matrix rule, and say "is not balanced that way".

Assume there was no such service. No more "+5 to any program rating", and that basically for free. They would still be able to have effective CF ratings around 9-10, and sprites, and paragons, and echos, but pay more than the hacker and forego hacking implants (because the answer is NO!). As compensation I would disconnect Resonance and Essence, because I find that rule counter-intuitive anyway.

(I´m not really concerned about balance between players. My bunch has learned to share the spotlight, even with the totally-not-efficiency-minded RPG newbie. I´m concerned about balance with the rest of the matrix. If I build a "fair" system for a hacker, I can also build a TM that can walk over it without facing a single real challenge. Hacking on the fly + Stealth 12 = any problem is a nail. Hence the previous comment of me as the GM giving input on the "kosher" power level.)

There are 30 echoes. In order to buy all of them, you'd have to initiate 30 times. That's, what, over 500 karma or so right there; and that's not including any raises to Resonance, skills, or attributes. (If we just buy all of the echoes, without initiating, it still costs us about 450 karma). I'm too lazy to calculate the exact numbers including Resonance and other raises, but the point remains that by the time the otaku actually becomes a matrix god, we've gone significantly beyond a "normal" campaign, and still well past even a long-running one.


So set up matrix runs that require more than just stealth. Threading more than one program isn't really that effective. Besides which, how easy it is to thread to rating 12? That's require 18 dice on average, and a starting character can only have 12.

I like technomancers from a thematic perspective a lot, but their gameplay mechanics bother me. I wish they interacted with the matrix in a more arcane way then being a hacker who codes on the fly and takes IC to the brain.

What would you have him do? Cybercombat? If unskilled the TM would get his ass kicked in two rounds and spend a week in the hospital and not be able to be any better at it later. Encrypt and Decrypt data? You have to find something the TM isn't good at, but has, which is a problem given the optimal build (4 to 6 common hacking programs at rating effective infinity). If they're defaulting they're rolling 5-6 dice, maybe (skill (4 or 5) + Logic (3) - 2).

A technomancer CAN NOT BE a jack of all hacking trades with the standard 400 BP. If you build him as such then he's no good at ALL of it and the game becomes, once again, unfun as you can't hack your way inside a cereal box without invoking the bonuses that make you absurd (because doing so just makes any mission a nail anyway).

I've not finished reading Unwired, especially not the chapter on TMs, so I'm basing my thoughts on the BBB TM.

They are serious karma hogs. Out of the box the hacker is so grotesquely more efficient, and can throw down some serious dice without needing to hyperspecialise at the expense of all other skills. The hacker in my campaign is also the medic and the repair genius, and doesn't make a half bad face (first impression and pheromones FTW). I'm prepared to accept that a thoroughly twinked out TM will be able to PWn in their area of specialisation within the matrix, be it drones or stealth/exploit, but not both. In a nutshell, the mechanics turn me off.

The very concept of TMs I don't object to. I quite like that the Matrix has got kinda weird and wiggy at the same time that everyone is wandering around online all the time. The Matrix is a bit more grungy around the edges, and at the same time more intertwined with meatspace.

I've not had a PC interested in playing a TM, which has worked out quite well for me. When a friend of mine was GMing I played a TM, and got away with some quite amusing stuff, since he was running pretty loose with the rules 'cos it was his first time GMing SR. I didn't do anything that a hacker couldn't have done as well though, and probably better.

CF 5 + Support Operation 5 + Threading 2. Translates to one registered sprite service = any node hacked on the fly, assuming you can get 12 hits, rolling your Exploit pool twice. The part in the bracket was meant under RAW.

Yeah, but that only lasts for 15 seconds. Then you're down to a CF of 7, with a sustaining penalty. Which means, when you add to that the penalty for having a bound sprite, you end up with a net -2 dice.

You prove my point. An otaku simply cannot be as good as a decker in all things; and by the time he's earned enough karma to exceed the decker, the game is probably over.

1.) I need six seconds, 15 is comfortable.

2.) The plan is to drop stealth to base, after the the deed is done. There should be no alert.

3.) That kind of Stealth really buys you time on hacking attempts, the penalty is nothing. You might suffer a -2 twice, but you get to roll your basic pool another time. Which will likely start at what, 12 dice? I consider +8 dice on Exploit an advantage.

Solution: Tone TMs down to Resonance 4 (only fair under the karma system), or houserule. I would prefer a working houserule, since it could leave more freedom for the player.

1. What happens if you run across a chokepoint or killing jar?
2. That may or may not work, if there's patrolling IC about.
3. Your solution would only give +8 on Stealth, which is only 2 over what a well-built decker would have, anyway. To get that Exploit, they'd need to thead and sustain another program, which would result in no bonus to stealth *and* -2 to the Exploit in relation to a equivalent decker.

Bottom line: except for a handful of super-specialized one-trick-ponies, I have yet to see an Otaku do anything that a decker cannot. Which is the point: they're hardly matrix gods, nor are they likely to ever become so. In fact, on the balance of it all, they're rather inferior to deckers.

1. No problem for the TM. High-end Chokepoints limit stealthy TMs to two rolls, and stealthy hackers to one. (And my solution is for a baseline TM, want me to bring Paragon, Codeslinger quality, Resonance higher than 6, and sprite ratings higher than 5? We might be talking "at chargen" here)
(Hacking 6 (Exploit +2), Exploit CF 6, Hot-Sim 2, "The Black Hat" +1, Code-Slinger +2 = 19 dice. Or 17 dice per attempt while threading stealth. 34 dice against an analyse 6, firewall 6 node, with a 7% chance of being caught. Possible at chargen.)

2. Patrolling IC isn´t worse for TMs than for hackers. Threading is on the instant you want it, so they actually fare better at avoiding it.

3. Sorry, could have been clearer. See 1). The TM might! have less dice for Exploit, but the full pool (minus sustaining mod for threading stealth) is rolled twice even before there is danger of detection.