Which in your opinion is better for a runner group of three. A hacker with the ability to gain alot of cyberware and buy better equipment, the technomancer with the ability to create complex forms on the fly, or the AI who lives in cyberspace but cannot leave?

Group of 3? Hacker. Its the most versatile of the options. Its easy to be a hacker, and still have the skills to infiltrate with the other members, and still hold your own in a physical fight thanks to ware.

Depends on who the rest of the team is, but my gut says go with the Decker so you have a backup Sammy.

Hacker. Can fill in another role or two more easily than the TM, and much more easily than the AI can.

i agree, for a three person team, you want a hacker. if you want a little bit of technomancer-y goodness, consider having a technomancer contact who registers sprites and sells their services

One more vote for the hacker, unless you are using the karma-based generation system. In that case I would suggest an augmented technomancer.

A TM rigger if done right can wipe the floor well till your GM gets round that problem. Now I would go with a TM (but I like RPing TMs). Now hacker can be cyber to the gills skill wireds ect ect. A TM can get some really nice echos and take so cyber for really really nice bouses but that dose eat and your resonance. You can have 5IPs control rig and boosters as well as all the hacking gen and (nano-)cyber for +5 on logic skill when not stressed +5 when jacked in to a drone +2 when hacking (IIRC) the list goes on pick up a datajack to store stuff on and a datalock to store the high value stuff on with a pladdin or tank sprite and strong encryption datalock you can call that data safe that you are. Theses more stuff like that but you can see how a TM rigger can wipe the floor in that area. Now do you what other that 'trix you've got in the group? That will help pick the best build type.

TM rigger can't hack as well as the hacker. Hacker samurai can hack and shoot.

It comes down to the usual wisdom about the three. The hacker's going to be better right away, but has caps that the technomancer and AI do not have. By the same token, the fact that the hacker can't get much better allows her to branch out more easily into other roles.

On the one hand, if you've only got a three-man team, you're going to want to be able to cover as many roles as possible. On the other hand, your GM should be giving you runs that can be handled by the team you have, so do what you like.

I wouldn't take a decker, though. You'd have to keep running up to drones and other devices and plugging in your cable. Hackers are far more convenient to play, I think.

That presumes karmagen *and* Initiation permitted at character creation. If you're playing a stricter game, you can't start the game as an initiate, so no Echoes at the start. Which sucks, I know; without some of those echoes, otaku are way underpowered and near-helpless.

This does bring up a question: Under what circumstances would an Otaku or AI be significantly better than a normal decker? It seems like since the first two are mostly worthless outside of the Matrix, the everyday Decker would be the better choice just about every time.


And once again, the caps become something of a myth. By the time the otaku has exceeded the decker's caps by a comfortable margin, you've already exceeded the average karma level of a campaign.

Technomancers can hack any node on the fly if they have a registered sprite on call. This ability starts around resonance 4, maybe 3. There is something to be said about an effective Stealth rating of 10 (Specifically, a dp of 12 will only detect this (comparativly weak) TM with a chance of 25% on the second attempt.) The absysmal efficiency of buying less than resonance 5 at BP-chargen time is their only problem. If you take resonance 5, you definitly get something in return.

The hacker is different; a weaker stealth is compensated for by massive advantages in cheap, always-on boni, and an easier time branching out.

In a team that is big enough to allow for highly specialized characters.

In cases where the TM can concentrate entirely on matrix tasks and drones (probably including a full immersion lifestyle), which usually goes hand in hand with the first point.

Probably also if he starts with a sprite bond, has enough downtime to reassemble the sprite to no good and can therefore save up on CFs, as he will get them later through his networking bond.

Or if the player somehow manages to take advantage from his superior matrix skills in most physical situations.

Building a TM who focusses on non-matrix tasks, delegating the matrix work to spites, might be the best approach for a TM in a three piece.
If he chooses to be a technoshaman, he might be able to double as a face and would have the machine sprites to add to combat situations with drones.
But this would be easier -and probably more effective- with a hacker, especially a hacker adept.
Branching out with a TM is tricky and requires most efficient use of sprites to yield viable results.

As far as the AI is concerned, with piloting origin and a good drone body, one could be a decent combatant, but this would hardly be possible without karmagen.

So all in all, my money's on the hacker, too.

My vote is going to the AI. While I agree the hacker is better than the TM, mainly because you can double as the face or a backup sammy, I think the matrix is going to bog down the "fun" of your game. I think you'll get the maximum fun out of SR4 if you leave the matrix details to an NPC/AI, unless the whole group goes into it together.

Ok so here is a question that will help to no end what car gen rules can you use? Karma is the best bet for a TM with cheaper low level skills you can if or GM inpetrits the rules this way use boith hacking skills eg programs and agents and TM skills but not at the same level. Though I know some people on DS read RAW to allow that already me included so lets not reopen this debate. AIs in my eyes can be quite weak but I've only played one in a one shot so I'm yet to make my mind up.

And the last question how quickly will you gain karma?
often will you play?
what will be length of campine?

a long game play regularly will mean or with high karma rewards will make a TM or AI will come into their own but shot or low paying game a hacker is likely the best bet.

I think he's asking for a PC, not having an AI NPC handle the matrix stuff.

And i wouldn't want to leave the matrix stuff to NPCs anymore, anyway.
We had decker or otaku PCs even back in SR2 instead of the usual "leave it to the GM" routine- and now that you can easier integrate the hacking parts, chopping them up into neat little bits taking up a few minutes each instead of making a seperate run out of them, it works much better to integrate a hacker into the team.

Matrix stuff has become so important now and offers so many possibilities, i just wouldn't want to outsource that.

The matrix is pretty simple, once you have figured it out. I´d hope that this thread is helpful doing just that.

Hacking a node is mostly done within two opposed dicerolls, spoofing an order takes just a complex action. No need to exclude a whole dimension of the game world because of that. Even a system on full matrix alert can come down to occasional detection rolls by IC rating 4. The reaction the team has to deal with are the physical security assets that are also alerted, once the hacker is known to be onsite.

CharGen is done with point based system
There is a Hedge Witch for magic
An ex- Lone Star SWAT with all his goodies from Lone Star still might be a ghoul still up in the air
and we are meeting once a week and average karma per session

Hope that helps

Thanks Ryu helped alot

While I agree in theory, in practice, matrix seems to bog the game down for everyone else not in the matrix. Its few and far between the GM that resolves matrix stuff in a couple minutes...now if the OP has this down pat, I'd change my vote to hacker, otherwise, I'd just leave it up to an NPC AI and handwave a bunch of the details to keep the game focused on the "fun".

Hedge witch?
Good to hear that, probably the best jack-of-all-trades tradition besides Voodoo.
And posessing plant spirits with Invoking...pure goodnes.


One more point for the hacker :
Your mental attributes aren't that important- so you can easily be an ork or a troll, giving you an excellent basis for a matrix/combat hybrid.

If you're a troll with skillwires, it's really easy to be a sam and hacker at the same time.
Just be sure you don't have to do the hacking and fighting at the same time (even though that is theoretically possible using AR).

For this team, an adept decker/face might be a good combo, if a little complex. An otaku/face could work as well; buy up your charisma, get an emotoy, and summon a Force 5 Machine Spirit to use Diagnostics on it. That gives you +11 dice right off the top.

I did misphrase my question, though. Under what circumstances would an otaku or AI be a better choice for a starting team than a straight-up decker? I think I just hit on one, although I don't know how a decker adept/face combo would work in play. Advancement doesn't matter-- it's been established that by the time the otaku earns enough karma to significantly exceed the decker's top scored, you'll have gone past the karma level earned in a normal game.

One point for the hacker: Assuming they share programs, a hacker means cheaper maintenance costs for pirated programs for the team, since 3 people will share the costs, instead of 2.

But some one can just buy cheap drone and give the profession software. Solves all you programing needs having a bot army do it for you keeping it up to date and upgrading it. For some reason you can give agents that.

I created a runner team of 3 NPCs, but they were a 1-man army. To my surprise, they worked pretty well.