Telion:
There's only one hacking skill I can think that a rigger like that probably should have. Cybercombat so he can defend himself from an enemy decker that's bust past his drone's firewall. Also, I'd say that Ewar is an important skill for riggers as it's used for encryption, links, and things like jamming on the fly.

Even then he could outsource some of that to a bodyguard 'decking agent'. Agents can help out in that regard, even for stealing drones.

Falconer:

I'll agree, but I had meant to refer to the direct connection of vehicles or the vehicle rigger, as not needing any hacking skills. The lack of a wireless connection is pretty safe at that point. Otherwise if you have a few drones and don't leave your network running often, you should be fine without too much invested. I start considering it more when I use the drones tactically, or in a way to cover multiple areas at once.

As for cybercombat I don't use it very often, I'd rather buy encryption some agents and such, if they get by that, they got more skill than I'd have invested so its time to shut down parts or all of the network. Its a pain but I typically plan to skill up that later on in character development when given the choice.

Real quickly (I should already be sleeping), I just want to toss this out there.

Everybody keeps saying stuff like "hackers should be taking over drones, breaking into drones is the hacker's job."

In previous editions, and thus where the concept of a rigger and what they do comes from, "hackers" couldn't affect a drone unless they walked up to it and plugged their deck into it. Riggers had extensive rules for dueling it out for control over a particular drone. Fight the other rigger, win control and do things with/to it.

I'm not saying I want that to be the hard cold fact of SR4. What I am saying is that before you start talking about what is and isn't a rigger's job, you need to take into account that SR4 is not where all of these concepts originate for a lot of us.

(And yeah, using a lot of optional and advanced rules, there were cases where some SR4ish stuff could be pulled off in SR3; I'm talking about core concepts here, though.)

edit to include:

We just wrapped our 2nd session. Before we got started, I ditched a pos quality and picked up Hacking (Vehicles) with the points, because it was required for my concept. We had the first and second sessions to tweak and fix characters to match concept as closely as possible. So now I'm quite a bit happier with him. I'll likely pick up some agents and software to handle other stuff, but the inability to hack another rigger's drone was just ridiculous to me.

Well, this thread pushed me to look at making sure I have my rigger built should my current character die....

I'm not 100% sure what most people consider a rigger, but in my mind the following describe a rigger.

Mechanical Tinkerer
Driver
Drone Controller
Drone Hijacker

When I consider a Rigger and hacking, I look at a Rigger's needs for hacking limited to defensing against aggressors and hijacking drones or other devices. When I compare the differences between a Decker and a Rigger, I consider the Decker to be subverting entire security systems, while Riggers subvert, disable, and/or take over specific devices. A Decker has a better understanding of the virtual aspects, while Riggers are more adept with the Physical aspects. Maybe my perceptions are wrong, I do not know.

Making a good Rigger seems very difficult, or at least a very tight build. I can't see most Rigger PCs not having their own personal vehicle, so you're already looking at using at LEAST 25,000:nuyen: on that. You're going to have one or two pimped-out drones specifically for jumping into, which will probably cost 10,000:nuyen: apiece. Other drones to support your primary drones, other team mates, and the mission in general are going to run you a bit of money as well. Throw on top of that the augmentation costs, and I can easily see most Rigger PCs having to use the entire 50BP for resources, and most likely being unable to use less. I think this is one of the archetypes where you have to spend under your 200BP allotment for attributes. At least you can safely sacrifice Charisma, Strength, and Agility. The Cracking and Electronics Groups are valuable, and depending on location the Mechanic skill group can also be useful. Personally I would have liked to see a Vehicle Skill group that consisted of at least Pilot: Anthroform, Pilot: Groundcraft, and Pilot: Aircraft if not including Pilot: Watercraft or Gunnery as well. Actually, having those three pilots in a skill group would give Riggers a little more wiggle room, since those are the three biggest types of Drones.

I don't know, Riggers just seem to be a very tight built in 400BP without a lot of room for variation. True a Rigger does provide a lot of versatility with their drones, infiltration, medic, combat, and surveillance. He provides a very, very good driver. He provides limited hacking ability, he probably won't be able to beat a dedicated Decker or high level security systems, but he should be able to stall or hold them off. The rigger I have in design has his attributes stated out, skills, 250k slated to resources and a net -25 from qualities. I only have one skill from cracking right now. I'm sitting at 373 BP without having picked edge or contacts. Switching that skill to the group at the same level puts me at 391BP. If I do just electronic warfare, and Hacking(Vehicle) so that they are at the same level I have 379BP. I mean, it looks like using BP good Riggers are mostly going to be different based on their qualities. Maybe an attribute or skill adjusted by a point here and a point there. 21 points for Contacts, Edge, and other skills I would want to pick up, and this is as a human....

It seems to me, and I'm not going to say I'm all knowing here but why even worry about making a rigger anymore- I can make a pretty sweet street samurai, buy a cheap commlink, some equally cheap drones and use them as one shot back up. Instead of just being a street sam, I can be a street sam with a few Steel Lynx, and a Guardian or two.

If I'm smart enough to control when I engage, and where it won't even matter if the opposition manages to subvert my drones. Add in I can sever communication with my drones and leave them on a pre-programmed firing pattern...and well it's kind of funny.

Just a side note... If anyone is interested...

The equipment list posted earlier in the Thread Topic included most things that a Very Good Rigger would want... stated out it would cost about 3.2 Essence and 270,100 for all gear except the Comlink and Programs... You could of course use less than the maximum on some fo the Tech, and ditch the Reakt to fit in your programs and comlink as well for just at 250,000 Nuyen but you would not have much in the way of drones/vehicles at that point (maybe a few)...

Just wanted to give an FYI for completeness

Thanks

you know, i see this kind of thing come up fairly often. and every time i point out the same thing:

the pilot skills are already skill groups, the devs are just feeling so ridiculously generous that they don't even charge you skill group cost for them. allow me to demonstrate: odds are, you're pretty decent at riding a bicycle. would you say that experience in riding a bicycle is significantly beneficial when it comes to driving a car? a bus? a tank? a hovercraft? a train? a unicycle? do you feel that it is reasonable to suppose that ability to operate, say, a blimp, would carry over equally well to an airplane, a jetfighter, a helicopter, and a vectored thrust vehicle? do you consider the ability to operate a sailing ship and a battleship to be linked to the ability to pilot a submarine, a rowboat, and a tugboat? do you think that piloting a 4-legged jumping vehicle is basically identical to piloting a 2-legged walking vehicle, an eight-legged vehicle, a vehicle with no legs at all that slithers like a snake, and so on?

these skills already cover a huge area. most of them would have been at least half a dozen skills if not more under previous editions of shadowrun. they are already ridiculously cheap, and even a single skill can let you drive a significant number of largely unrelated vehicles. they don't need to be made even cheaper, they're quite inexpensive already.

Your option.

Though when I build my specialist Rigger that sweeps in, hijacks your pre-programmed drones, then uses them against you, I will kindly remind you why it pays to have specialists. Oh, and that first moment you glance at your AR to reassign your drones in the middle of a firefight, pay no attention to the automatic fire taking advantage of your lack of attention to the scenario unfolding around you.

Oh I agree, that's why I mentioned using them as a one shot, disposable option when I can control the terms of engagement.

Not exactly a good argument for 'why bother making a rigger?'. More like, how can I have some additional fire support if I am a gun bunny?

I can't disagree with that. I was just looking at one possible option.

I do not see that as a possible option or alternative to having an actual rigger. I see it more of accessorizing a combatant. If all you need is a couple of dog brain turrets following you around, then fine, yeah, that will work. Replacement for a rigger? Not a chance. If you are dead set on believing the rules not being good for making a rigger, then just do not make one, but I find it a little brash to go around saying 'why bother?'

Uhm, I'm not saying that.

Or rather I should say that I'm not seriously suggesting it as the only option, or the best-but rather as just an option. I get I mentioned it, but I'm not set in stone on it, rather it's just one possible option. (Which I think is actually a plus.)

I guess I'd better say this. I've reread through the previous post, and I think there's a miscommunication occurring here. This thread wasn't mean to say anyone and everyone could rig a vehicle better than a dedicated "Rigger", but rather to point out that the playing field has been considerably leveled, and now almost anyone attempt to rig. Combine that with tactical, and strategic advantage and makes the game even deadlier. I don't think of that as good or bad thing, only different.

For me, it comes down to this: in the SR3 main book, the "Vehicles and Drones" section which covers riggers is 27 pages, while in SR4, the "Rigging and Drones" sub-section is 2 pages. This says nothing about the quality of that content, of course, and it also doesn't inherently mean SR4 sucks in some way. It's absolutely intentional, completely planned: riggers are a subset of hackers, now, so their rules are the hacker's rules. This is exactly what most people wanted, and it makes most SR4 players I've talked to very, very happy.

But. For my tastes, this isn't enough. I, personally, want more. It is my preference that rigger-specific rules be more detailed, be less tied-up with hackers and hacking. That's what I, personally, would prefer, and it doesn't deeply trouble me that other people prefer more "streamlined" and "simplified" rigger rules. If I don't like the rules as presented, I can change them, or play SR3.

could you program your drone's pilot to accept only voice commands from you?

This is only about making the pilot skills cheaper in the sense that I have perceived that good Riggers are an extremely mistake-intolerant archetype to build. This translates to an inability to pick up other skills that you would otherwise take, requiring you to intentionally lower your attributes, requiring you to take +35BP worth of negative qualities, run with a bunch of skills at 1 and 2, or sacrifice on your drone fleet in order to take skills that are unrelated to Riggers. No other archetype that I have attempted to make has required me to invest as much BP into its core as the Rigger.

I'd almost say make a "rigger" skill group that consists of Pilot: Groundcraft, Pilot: Aircraft, Pilot: Anthroform, and Gunnery that is only accessible to characters with the "Rigger" positive quality. Make the positive quality 10BP, obtainable only at character creation, and grant 1 rank in the group.

Once again I reiterate that this isn't about making the skills cheaper. It's about making riggers more flexible in their character creation so that they start to look different based on more than their drone set and negative qualities. Of course YMMV in what you've seen for Riggers, but this is just my perception about a Rigger I made when comparing it to other archetypes I've made and archetypes of other PCs that I play with.

Let me put it this way, I assessed the cost of creating 6 archetypes that I could do quickly and easily, eyeballing what skills I would consider primary and which skills I would consider secondary as well as which attributes would be required, usings a Body of 4 for every archetype. Mostly since I'm unfamiliar with Technomancers and magic I ignored adepts, magicians, and technomancers. I set every primary skill to 4, every secondary skill to 3. I made two attributes 5, and two primary skills 5.

Decker:
Attributes: Logic, Willpower, Intuition, Body
Primary Skills: Cybercombat, Electronic Warfare, Hacking
Secondary Skills: Data Search, Computer, Software, Hardware, Perception

Face:
Attributes: Agility, Strength, Charisma, Intuition, Body
Primary Skills: Con, Etiquette, Intimidation, Negotiation
Secondary Skills: Leadership, Pistols, Blades, Perception

Infiltration Expert:
Attributes: Agility, Intuition, Charisma, Logic, Body
Primary Skills: Infiltration, Shadowing, Palming, Locksmith
Secondary Skills: Industrial Mechanic, Perception, Data Search, Computer, Con, Disguise, Pistols

Melee Weapon Specialist:
Attributes: Agility, Strength, Reaction, Intuition, Body
Primary Skills: Unarmed, Clubs, Blades, Dodge
Secondary Skills: Armorer, Perception

Ranged Weapon Specialist:
Attributes: Agility, Reaction, Body
Primary Skills: Pistols, Automatics, Longarms, Heavy Weapons
Secondary Skills: Throwing Weapons, Perception, Armorer

Rigger
Attributes: Reaction, Agility, Intuition, Logic, Willpower, Body
Primary Skills: Gunnery, Pilot: Groundcraft, Pilot: Aircraft, Pilot: Anthroform, Electronic Warfare, Hacking
Secondary Skills: Hardware, Software, Computer, Automotive Mechanic, Aeronautical Mechanic, Cybercombat, Perception

Decker: 230 BP
Face: 276 BP
Infiltration Expert: 312 BP
Melee Weapon Specialist: 258 BP
Ranged Weapon Specialist: 210 BP
Rigger: 376 BP

Now those are BP costs, eyeballed, for 6 archetypes before gear, qualities, contacts, further attribute increases, edge, or other skills and specializations. This is just the BP cost for the character to perform good in all aspects of their "specialization". As others have said, you can sacrifice certain aspects to be a dedicated rigger, and you can probably tweak the 4/3 bases to save a few BP here and there, but you have to acknowledge that these are all archetypes built to the same standards. While you could take points here or there from the Rigger, you can also do that with many of the other archetypes as well. From the lowest to Rigger is 166 BP. Somewhere between 1/3 and 2/5s of that is the difference between the Rigger and 2nd highest at 64 BP. I believe there is an exceedingly higher barrier for Riggers compared to other mundane characters (I do not know how they compare to awakened characters or technomancers). By having the Vehicle skill group I suggested and that Rigger positive Quality, it brings that down to 352 BP from 376 BP.

As it is, almost all of the Rigger's versatility is bound up in having a drone with the appropriate autosoft. Drones can be hijacked, they can be jammed, and they can be disabled making them potentially useless. So while the Rigger does have awesome versatility, it's also at higher risk of being unavailable compared to characters who actually have the skill, where they only lose the ability to perform it if they are unconscious or dead. I understand your point about Piloting already being grouped together, but my desire is for Riggers to look different beyond just their drones and qualities.

Blow up my drone, steal it, whatever, it's not the same as if you blew me up or stole my body. I can just get another drone. Can you get another you?

It's about the choices you make, each one is different, and does different things. Versatility, specialization, generalization, you have a set amount of resources (400 BP) and you need to make some choices. Is this bad, that's an opinion you can have.

Rigging is not just about drones. There are other vehicles.

I'm jumping into this argument a bit late, but the people talking about the "core skills" for a Rigger I think are trying to do to much too quickly. I've been playing a rigger under missions and, I admit, it was very tough to create someone who could work under 400 bp restrictions. Especially when his "tooled out ride" cost him almost 100,000.

I think that people are too rooted in the old system when it comes to wanting all the pilot skills and jumping into every drone you own. In my mind you really only need one pilot skill all your own, for the drone you want to be in. I sort of think of the drone I tend to jump into as my shell, and my other drones are merely my assistants. Load them up with decent enough pilots and maneuver softs and you don't ever need to worry about piloting them yourself.

Granted, the ability to stock up on the right autosofts and pilots is what makes people think that hackers can do the job just as well, which, to some degree they can. Anybody can, if they choose, spend the vast amount to resources to create a well programmed drone brigade. Only the hacker and rigger should have the resources to defend the drones when they get under attack from hostile wireless foes however. And even then, it is likely only a rigger who can fully utilize the family of drones he has created for jumping into, because of the extra skill points he put into piloting and gunnery.

If you created some sort of cheaper way to be a rigger, then every one who wanted to dabble would have drones and be able to protect them...that doesn't seem to be a good solution to me.

Better late than never! Pull up a chair, get a beer. Now then...



Really? I think I see the "Rigger" in a different light then, which is okay of course. I see the role of the Rigger as being the all purpose wheel man, able to adequately fly, drive or sail whatever we may need. I can certainly see a role for more specialized personnel, but I guess that depends on your game.

For instance in the last few games our Rigger has had to pilot a large fishing trawler, a commercial cargo jet, a step van, and a classic Dodge Charger. Add to this his drones, and well you can see where I start to wonder what happened to my traditional rigger!



I agree. I am trying to change though, to my credit! (I hope!)



See I tend to believe in multifunctional archetypes! I'm also used to getting more for my buck, so to speak, from the Rigger.



I'm sure this betrays both my age, and technical ignorance, here but I just have a hard time putting my faith in the tech here.



This seems less "true" (That's not the right word, but for now it will have to do-feel free anyone to suggest a better word.) in SR4.



But it is an available option. Not as secure, as Chrome Tiger points out, as a dedicated specialist-but under the right circumstances it could be that edge you need. I know I'd make use of one shot, disposable pre-programmed drones. Why not? As Dire Radiant points out you can always get another drone.

Obviously the right tool for the right job, but never discard a tool in the box folks!

1) you don't need all those stats to be a rigger. agility and reaction only help you rig if you're physically driving. logic is handy, but mostly useful for repair skills (not core to the rigger). willpower is handy for resisting dumpshock, but is not essential that it be ridiculously high.

2) you don't need to be able to drive every single vehicle that exists to be a capable, competent rigger. specialise. pick 1 type of vehicle, and specialise in that. you can have secondary areas where you're able to drive also, but you don't need to be able to drive every single vehicle at incredible proficiency levels.

3) you don't need to have amazing mechanic skills either. you can easily skillwire these, or even just have an autosoft for your drones to maintain themselves. you could even *gasp* just not have them at all, and rely on contacts (oh, the horror!). likewise with hardware.

also, i wouldn't place electronic warfare as high up as hacking (possibly even just ignore it entirely, but i'll humor you), but since i would place computer at that level (note: when in a system that you have an account for, you use computer, not hacking, for most tests. this always includes matrix perception tests, for the record)

there's a lot more stuff i could remove from your rigger than what i could remove from your other archetypes. heck, i'd add con to any archetype that doesn't have it, and probably infiltration to those that don't have it but are likely to have to go in by infiltration (which will be quite a few).

also, not including the true karma hogs of the system really isn't exactly giving you an accurate picture.

You can see it that way.

I look at it as opening up possibilities for riggers. A rigger samurai is very possible now.
And riggers were almost as bad as deckers. At least the vehicle combat was in sync with rest of the players. And it gets the rigger out in the open once in a while.

And SR 3 had way too many systems/game mechanics. As SR 3 went on it got crunchier and cruncher till there was hardly any background material. It was nearly impossible to keep track of everything as the GM. And it is bad for a GM to not understand the mechanics being used and having to depend on the player's... interpretation.

SR4 at least puts every thing on the same set of mechanics. So much easier to use and to teach.

One of the things that sold me the most on SR4 (after Edge and the unified mechanics) was how they changed the rigger vs security rigger/spider duel inside the rigged building. It was really clunky and just didn't make sense (IMHO) and a decker should be able to whip up an emulation program so that he can deck the system.


What the security rigger technology prevents that (read DRM). That would just make it a challenge and there is no technology that hasn't been defeated eventually.

You can see it that way.

I look at it as opening up possibilities for riggers. A rigger samurai is very possible now.
And riggers were almost as bad as deckers. At least the vehicle combat was in sync with rest of the players. And it gets the rigger out in the open once in a while (GM's need a chance to shoot at all the players every once in a while).

And SR 3 had way too many systems/game mechanics. As SR 3 went on it got crunchier and cruncher till there was hardly any background material. It was nearly impossible to keep track of everything as the GM. And it is bad for a GM to not understand the mechanics being used and having to depend on the player's... interpretation.

SR4 at least puts every thing on the same set of mechanics. So much easier to use and to teach.

One of the things that sold me the most on SR4 (after Edge and the unified mechanics) was how they changed the rigger vs security rigger/spider duel inside the rigged building. It was really clunky and just didn't make sense (IMHO) and a decker should be able to whip up an emulation program so that he can deck the system.

What the security rigger technology prevents that (read DRM). That would just make it a challenge and there is no technology that hasn't been defeated eventually.

You can see it that way.

I look at it as opening up possibilities for riggers. A rigger samurai is very possible now.
And riggers were almost as bad as deckers. At least the vehicle combat was in sync with rest of the players. And it gets the rigger out in the open once in a while (GM's need a chance to shoot at all the players every once in a while and drones are an inadequate substitute).

And SR 3 had way too many systems/game mechanics. As SR 3 went on it got crunchier and cruncher till there was hardly any background material. It was nearly impossible to keep track of everything as the GM. And it is bad for a GM to not understand the mechanics being used and having to depend on the player's... interpretation.

SR4 at least puts every thing on the same set of mechanics. So much easier to use and to teach.

One of the things that sold me the most on SR4 (after Edge and the unified mechanics) was how they changed the rigger vs security rigger/spider duel inside the rigged building. It was really clunky and just didn't make sense (IMHO) and a decker should be able to whip up an emulation program so that he can deck the system.

What the security rigger technology prevents that (read DRM). That would just make it a challenge and there is no technology that hasn't been defeated eventually.

My issue with this whole thing is that asking a Rigger to be able to defend against a hacker and to take control of a drone that may be controlled by a hacker is quite a lot. At least in previous editions the rigger was going against another rigger.

If his team has a hacker, the rigger along with the rest of the team has a lot more options, if not, he must employ some drastic measures to protect himself. He can gamble and run the highest Analyze, IC, and encrypt that he can, but once the hacker gets through, his only real option is to shut everything down.

That's why I contend that taking over an opponent's drone is now in the sphere of the hacker. Hackers and riggers after a while will start to look the same, after all who is the best person to protect and control that fleet of drones than the hacker, and if you are a rigger how do you best protect and add to that fleet of drones than to increase all those cracking skills?

So where does the rigger stand in SR4? How does a dedicated gear-head concept survive in 2071 without turning into a hacker? In my mind you design and dedicate him to driving one vehicle at a time. He can have more than one vehicle, but they should all be something he can climb into and rig.

These discussions have also made me think of ways in which one can manage a drone fleet without the need for a wireless mesh. I think you can do it, it's very limited of course, but hey, nothing good comes without a price. My strategy would be the use of beam links and agent scripts.

For example you can have an inventory of different scripts planned out for your drone's pilot. Depending on the situation, you enact the various scripts. However all the scripts should have a time limit where the drone will then hold to wait for the next command, which will come by way of a beam link.

Anyway, wish I had more time to write this out in more detail...

I really do like this aspect of SR4. No need to remember a gazillion different rulesets for everything. Okay, so maybe not that many, but still. As the game world seems to meld together all of its technologies, as it sort of is in reality, it does make sense that the technology gets picked up by everyone. No longer is Billy required to just know how to drive a car in driver's ed, he is require to know how a little about how the computers in the car work. His skills and the gadgets he buys will be quite different than a character resembling my real world interests who buys cars, finds ways to eke the most out of them, replacing computers, engines, transmissions, suspensions, and learns exactly what the car will and will not do under duress. That is the best example of someone that knows how to drive, and someone that LIVES to drive.

So, really, you need to WANT to make a Rigger character or make another character type that just wants to drive things. Either is doable, but neither should be discounted. To say that it does not make sense to have a Rigger anymore is to say that you have a lot of faith in your Sam's abilities to dodge the T-birds involved in your not-so-clean getaway. As long as there is crime, there is a need for a dedicated wheelman.