I've recently started playing a drone rigger and was hoping for some tips and tricks i could use. You know best drones to use, how to mod them out and especially tactics. Also scince this is my first time playing one some common knowledge about things i should do and things i need to watch out for would be gratefully appreciated.

Where is your character? What kind of game do your group preferr (action, less controlls, paranodic security)? Because without such informations we can't give you advices. In some groups a few drones, which will look like every other drone in the city will work best, but some groups will get no problems about getting some really heavy combat drones into the action.

So just give us some informations, how you will like to play and how not.

Greets,
Coldan

hey!

lets see,
1)remember to upgrade the Matrix attributes on vehicles and drones (default is usually 3). Pilot ratings replace system and need to be upgraded too. also sensors are often overlooked. check arsenal 2nd printing for sensor upgrading.

2) think about what purpose a drone will serve and get autosofts and mods accordingly (covert-ops+ruthinium polymer makes a good infiltrator) Also, check acceleration and speed. the step van can be pimped out, but its as slow as molassas.

3)Full riggers are almost full hackers. you'll need almost all the programs and beefed up hardware as a hacker to protect your own network. focus on defense. firewalls ,encryption, etc..

4)think about what kind of rigger you want to be, because its a huge area to cover, driving and mechanic skills, Electronic and hacking skills, are you gonna control an army of tanks and choppers? or bust through security with a screwgun and wire clamps?

just some thoughts off the top of my head

It all depends on how you want to play your drone rigger. Is he more like a mastermind that controls a robotic army from the safety of his hideout somewhere? Is he a puppetmaster with his drones providing the close support in order for hime to accomplish his goals? Is he a vehicle rigger that uses a drone as a stand in when the team enters the facility they are doing a run on? Each type of drone rigger needs to have specialized drones for each. That being said there are some basics you should look at:

• Make sure to buy decent autosofts for your drones (and get the approriate autosofts for the drone's role, like a high manuverability for spy drones and high targeting for attrack drones)
• Take care of your network first, max out your firewall, signal, and encryption programs. Try to keep other hackers out at all costs.
• EW is always your friend.
• Don't worry about "traditional" hacker programs like attack. Be more worried about rigger based programs like Scan, Defence, Encryption, Decryption, EW, and such.
• Invest is a Medium or better lifestyle especially if you want to be a mastermind rigger.

Here's a suggestion I gave in another thread when someone was asking how to create a "pure" Drone Rigger that didn't want to do any of the "Hacking stuff."

This type of character is certainly viable. Get a Commlink with good Signal, Firewall, and System (and Response for that matter, just get a really good all around Commlink). Stealth, Encrypt, and Command are your "big" programs that you want as high as you possibly can. Operate your drones either by giving them orders to follow Autonomously, or in Remote Control mode, which is where you control them directly without actually "jumping in" to any one of them. In Remote Control mode you use your skills, but sub your Command program for all attributes. If your GM allows it (and there's no reason he/she shouldn't) take the Code Slinger Quality for the Control a Device action. When operating a Drone in Remote Control mode, every action is considered a Control a Device Matrix Action. Also, if you run Hot Sim in full VR you'll get the +2 bonus for all of those drone actions as well (you can still be in a "captain's chair" mode in full VR) in addition to your +2 from Codeslinger for a total of +4 to all actions where you directly control a drone.

Slave all of your drones to your Commlink, even if they're acting autonomously. This will force any intruding Hacker to hack your Commlink first. Tell your GM that your Encrypt program is set to re-Encrypt all your communications at the beginning of every round (every 3 seconds). This means that a Hacker needs to make a new Decrypt Test (called Initiative Cryptanalysis in SR4A) Test every round, giving them only 1 round to crack your Encryption, and Hack their way into a Drone or Spoof it to cause trouble before having to start all over again. Very frustrating.

Finally, buy the best Agent that you can and load it up with Analyze, Armor, and Attack or Black Hammer (depending on how lethal you want to be). Set the Agent to constantly scan your Commlink for signs of intrusion. Buy a separate but good Analyze program for you Commlink and have that constantly scan for intruders as well. A good Biofeedback Filter, Armor, and Attack program for yourself wouldn't be a bad idea. You'll need ECCM too but not at a super-high rating if your Commlink has a good Signal rating (ECCM 3 should be enough if you have Signal 5 or better).

From there your Drone loadout is all about what you actually want to be doing with it. There are drones that are good for stealth and drones that are good for combat. Load up those attack drones with an LMG with EX-EX rounds, lock on sensors, and start Full Auto bursting your problems away.

There's only two small problems with this.

1) You need a low level agent to handle the continuous re-encryption, since initiating encrypting is a simple action, and Encrypt programs aren't autonomous.

2) This won't work unless you've either updated to SR4A, or never adopted the encryption rules from Unwired.

The Encryption rules in Unwired are very specific about what must be done to re-encrypt a connection, and it involves a simple action to Log Off the subscription, a complex action to Log On the subscription, then both nodes to take simultaneous simple actions to start encryption. Admittedly, low level agents programmed to repeat the sequence of actions could accomplish this, but the end result would be your connection only being encrypted between the last action of the agent's last pass, and the first action of the agent's first pass of the next turn, and the connection would only exist between the end of the agent's second pass and the beginning of the agent's next first pass.

During the meaty part of the combat turn (The first pass, where everyone goes), there's no communication between the rigger and his drone, meaning that a spoofed command to break the sequence has a better than average chance of hitting the drone at a point where it isn't communicating with the node that it's slaved to, and the only protection you have against being spoofed with a command to halt re-encryption is its' own crappy firewall.