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chase
I just started playing a Technomancer. I've run about 4 sessions now and have yet to find anything really cool to do yet! The only thing my skill set had been useful for is opening a door and a safe.

I know I can hack smartguns and drones But we have yet to come in to a situation were is wasn't a better idea to shot first hack later.

So I was hoping to get a few stories of some thing cool your Hacker/Techno has done in a game. The more information the better. I know that a hacker can be a great part of a shadowrun team. I just want to figure out how.

I love the Unwired book. IMO I think it has some of the best fluff ideas in the game. Over all however I feel the hacking rules are some of the hardest to learn and play in the game.
Bigity
One time my decker helped complete a run while sitting in his anchored boat using a satlink in stealth mode.

True story.



What can't they do these days really? wink.gif
LostProxy
I rammed a pick up truck into a Force 8 Earth elemental that I had thrown a remote detonated HE grenade into. The truck was some random guys I had hacked and then sent at full speed into it. Pick up truck ramming damage + grenade causing car to explode on impact = GM not even doing the damage. He just ruled that it got blown to shreds.
Neraph
I had a player of mine hack a guy's car and stole it. Doesn't sound like much, but it was a really nice car, and they got away scott-clean with it. He ended up installing security systems in it and upgrading its firewall so it couldn't be stolen back/again.

I also had a player who had a TM contact. He got a registered Sprite with some services for a 'run. The sprite hacked the facility they were going in to, edited camera feeds, ended up redirecting the HTR call to a different address, and hacked and then crashed an empty commuter helicopter into a parking lot for a distraction for the group to get away.

This sprite came from a TM who was an oldie's nerd, so it looked like a modern chibi anime character. He would appear by entering someone's AR feed out of the corner of their vision and saying "Yyyyeeeeeeeees?" in a deep and wierd-ish voice (like this guy, only deeper). Once he (his name was Pipp) appeared by doing that from someone's shoulder and they freaked out (startled them) so Pipp fell off the person's shoulder, did the 2-3 second in-air pause thing cartwheeling his arms, and fell into the ground belly-flop style, made the Super Mario entering-a-pipe sound and sank into the ground for a couple seconds. Another time they heard the muffled "Yes" greeting as he came out, feet first, from someone's chest.

The group, when they asked for a diversion from some 'Star that had started showing up (they were on extraterritorial grounds at the time, but the only exit was through "normal" Lone Star grounds), the sprite asked if they wanted him to kill the cops (and his eyes got all anime scary - hard lines and angry looking). When they said they didn't want the extra heat from the bodies, Pipp responded all chibi-big-wet-nearly-crying-eyes with "Good, because I'm afraid of GOD" (a reference to the Grid Overwatch Division, who would definately have traced him if he caused the death of two 'Star officers by hacking the 'grid). He ended up becoming a Free Sprite that the group used.

A bit later the payment Pipp wanted was a registered sprite so he could compile it (IIRC... eat it and gain skills/rating/ect). When he got paid Pipp sat there chewing the other sprite with the other sprite's legs sticking out of his mouth with the big anime happy eyes being vocally joyful at eating - "MmmmmMMMMMMMmmmmmmMMMMMMMmm..." The group was creeped out. And it was awsome.

EDIT: Oh, and when asked how many tasks Pipp owed, or whenever Pipp had to count or show something numerically, he'd always raise one hand with one finger like showing only one thing but his index finger would split into whatever number he needed, kind of like the scene from Bruce Almighty.
Yerameyahu
Sounds like the sprite was a vastly more interesting and important character than the PC. wink.gif
KarmaInferno
After hacking a car's auto-nav system to determine were it'd been in the past few days, my decker went around to where the rest of the team, unaware of what I'd done, were interrogating the driver, screaming at him to tell them where he'd taken a passenger.

I walked up to the driver, grabbed his forehead, and closed my eyes for a few moments.

I said, "Hmp. I got what I need, the target's at X location. Let's go."

Then, to the hapless driver, "And you'd better get a doc to look at that tumor. Looks kinda nasty."

I walked off, with both the driver and the rest of the player characters staring at me.

smile.gif




-k
Socinus
During a run, my Technomancer couldnt do very much because of the security set up where we were so I was back in the hotel room sipping mojitos and looking for something to do.

We were supposed to follow but not kill a specific target, so I decided to have some fun. Using a FlySpy, I found the guy in the gym exercising and hacked into his cyberware suite. He had a balance augmenter and cybereyes. I set his balance augmenter to randomly reprogram calibration every five seconds and then deactivated his cybereyes. At the same time I hacked into the exercise bike he was on and started randomly adjusting the resistance. He leapt off the bike only to go crashing into the floor. He did manage to pick himself up, but not before banging into every wall in the place.

It's a baaaad idea to have me play a Technomancer and get bored smile.gif
CanRay
QUOTE (KarmaInferno @ Sep 13 2011, 11:30 PM) *
After hacking a car's auto-nav system to determine were it'd been in the past few days, my decker went around to where the rest of the team, unaware of what I'd done, were interrogating the driver, screaming at him to tell them where he'd taken a passenger.

I walked up to the driver, grabbed his forehead, and closed my eyes for a few moments.

I said, "Hmp. I got what I need, the target's at X location. Let's go."

Then, to the hapless driver, "And you'd better get a doc to look at that tumor. Looks kinda nasty."

I walked off, with both the driver and the rest of the player characters staring at me.

smile.gif
-k
Beauty, KI! Hopefully they don't think you're one of those evil mind-raping TMs or Magicians now, however. nyahnyah.gif
DMiller
QUOTE (KarmaInferno @ Sep 14 2011, 01:30 PM) *
After hacking a car's auto-nav system to determine were it'd been in the past few days, my decker went around to where the rest of the team, unaware of what I'd done, were interrogating the driver, screaming at him to tell them where he'd taken a passenger.

I walked up to the driver, grabbed his forehead, and closed my eyes for a few moments.

I said, "Hmp. I got what I need, the target's at X location. Let's go."

Then, to the hapless driver, "And you'd better get a doc to look at that tumor. Looks kinda nasty."

I walked off, with both the driver and the rest of the player characters staring at me.

smile.gif




-k

AWESOME!

I love it!

-D
Tiralee
Our Decker has the highest bodycount of our varied teams (Due to a stupid number of successes on his part and a series of horrible ones on behalf of gridsec, the metro traffic devision and every damn smartframe anti-intruder software that the cannon splatbooks insist that Seapple PD carry) after he hacked the traffic grid and reversed the traffic-flow.
...And raised drawbridges, sent a busload of nuns and kids into the sea, sent the rookie local traffic cops into Z-zone barrens, that sort of thing.

(In game, I had a body-count update every 30 minutes or so. The table giggled each time)

And he dropped a rotor-drone onto a crack house/blood spirit summoning lair. (SR3, so well before Drug CrtThe explosion and subsequent ammo cook off did a number on the block, but we escaped pretty handily. Did I mention he aimed to drop the drone on the ring of 'Star waiting for magical backup?

So sad...
-Tir
Neraph
QUOTE (Yerameyahu @ Sep 13 2011, 09:48 PM) *
Sounds like the sprite was a vastly more interesting and important character than the PC. wink.gif

That was a number of sessions over a handful of months with one session a week and I didn't talk any about the characters, just the sprite. The sprite was a direct result of the player's TM contact, so it was the pertinent information. IIRC Pipp is a R6 Crack free sprite.
Makki
We're in building with two surveillance drones flying around not yet spotting us. I hack one and make a ramming attack towards the other. Both crash.
Neraph
QUOTE (Makki @ Sep 14 2011, 12:40 AM) *
We're in building with two surveillance drones flying around not yet spotting us. I hack one and make a ramming attack towards the other. Both crash.

Similarly, the hacker in one of my groups hacked two flying recon drones for the facility they were on and had them ram the helicopter that was the HTR... One hit and made the helo crash, the other missed and the hacker made sure the crash command was still active. The drone then crashed into the wreckage of the helo.
Halflife
In terms of Hacker-ish things I trapped a megalomaniac AI in the node of a military command computer through careful timing of an Edge boosted Nuke coupled with my Face activating a botnet DDOS via a script that I had steganographically hidden in porn trid footage on his commlink.

In one of our runs an individual had briefly kidnapped and installed an experimental nanite-based stirrup system in some civilians and was using them to commit crimes and my carefully timed and aimed jamming devices were the only thing that stopped our gunbunny from tearing the "innocent" civilians to shreds.

I always found that the epitome of being a hacker was control over the situation and an absurd amount of pre-planning, backup-planning, and as much information as possible.



Also, I once chucked the beating heart of Rasputin into the mouth of a rampaging paracritter in the Crypt of St. Basil's Cathedral in Moscow. biggrin.gif
CanRay
QUOTE (Halflife @ Sep 14 2011, 10:16 AM) *
I always found that the epitome of being a hacker was control over the situation and an absurd amount of pre-planning, backup-planning, and as much information as possible.

Also, I once chucked the beating heart of Rasputin into the mouth of a rampaging paracritter in the Crypt of St. Basil's Cathedral in Moscow. biggrin.gif
Deckers/Hackers in Shadowrun: You're Batman, with a firearm. That's how you gotta play it. nyahnyah.gif
Miri
QUOTE (Neraph @ Sep 14 2011, 12:18 AM) *
IIRC Pipp is a R6 Crack free sprite.


So.. does it use dope.. smoke reefers? Whats it on man? smile.gif
CanRay
QUOTE (Neraph @ Sep 14 2011, 01:18 AM) *
IIRC Pipp is a R6 Crack free sprite.
QUOTE (Miri @ Sep 14 2011, 10:24 AM) *
So.. does it use dope.. smoke reefers? Whats it on man? smile.gif
Well, it's a Crack Sprite, so likely NovaCoke. nyahnyah.gif
Blog
Needed to capture a vehicle (or rather the occupant inside); bad thing was some yaks also wanted the occupant. I hacked a van and sent it to ram into the people that were trying to cut the doors off (being careful to not hit the target vehicle)... Well there was this razor wire fence that the vehicle had to go through first. The sprite worked its magic and go through with ease, but a good sized chunk of the fence got stuck on the van as well. We were not sure how the rules worked for using a fence as a flail on a vehicle but needless to say most of the people that didnt get out of the way of the speeding vehicle/flail were not in good shape.

Other time we wanted to get a janitor off of a secure transport (shift exchange bus between archology and the facility) We figured a janitor would have the best knowledge of interior floor plans to mind probe. The plan was to have a small accident (emphasis on small) and have him just disappear for 15 min or so then turn up nearby while there is still confusion. Vodoo shaman had a spirit ready to jump in and provide Armor and protection to him, I hacked the bus, threw a sprite in and told it to crash it. In hindsight I was not very clear in my instructions as it tried to crash the vehicle to the best of its ability.... Needless to say the small accident turned into a meat grinder, lets not forget that it went through a barricade and support structure for a residential complex... The janitor barely survived, we got our info then unfortunately had to execute him as there is no justifiable way to have had him survive considering the meat paste everyone else was.

I never meant to be a mass murderer.... things just usually ended up that way.
CanRay
The Hacker in our group found out about a "Back Door" into Lone Star security (I ran in 2070) that was in every squad car. So, the group had the idea of getting him into the back of the squad car (Easy enough, he was wanted on International Espionage charges), cut a hole between the back seat and the front of the squad car, and get a microdrone to carry a datacable to the port in the car's terminal. He pulled it off greatly, literally with both hands cuffed behind his back!

One problem: How to distract the cops after he's in the car. Too bad a critical glitch on a "Street Gang" knowledge roll told them that the Halloweeners would be great in that role! ... They decided it was cocktail hour.

Suddenly, it became a race to get through the back door before the biomonitor in the cop's outfits/cybernetics reported them as unconscious or dead and locked down the vehicle!

Tension gripped the table as he got the hack done just in time for one cop's last bumpity-bump of the heart, and dumpshock kicked in.
Prime Mover
One of my players routinely hijacks autocabs to use as street level missiles. Loves to hack security riggers and feed them seriously messed up sensor data. When a run starts going pear shaped he'll make sure 9-11 gets swamped with officer down calls on the other side of the city.
squee_nabob
I played a TM to prime runner and my 2 best stories are:

1) Anytime I walk around in my Wuxing Hussar drone, and pwn people with a Lonestar Flash Flood Water Cannon. I explain they are “rioting” and then paste them. It always makes me giggle. It’s also bullet resistant.

2) Once I went on a Resonance Realms search to find a Free Sprites Source Code so I could register him, force him to go to a node, and then destroy the device generating the node.
Neraph
QUOTE (Prime Mover @ Sep 14 2011, 11:15 AM) *
One of my players routinely hijacks autocabs to use as street level missiles.

Three words: Grid Overwatch Division.
HunterHerne
QUOTE (Neraph @ Sep 15 2011, 01:40 PM) *
Three words: Grid Overwatch Division.

All hail G.O.D.
Tymeaus Jalynsfein
QUOTE (HunterHerne @ Sep 15 2011, 01:35 PM) *
All hail G.O.D.


Always Remember, G.O.D. is Watching...
chase
Thanks for all the good input!

One thing I haven't been doing is treading, I really should be doing that more often.
I love the resonance realm and submersion stuff in the books. I really hope they do more with the dissonant Technomancers as some kind of bad guys/group.

Like so much of shadowrun it's just cool as hell.

Also what happen to Puck? smile.gif
Neraph
QUOTE (chase @ Sep 15 2011, 05:53 PM) *
Thanks for all the good input!

One thing I haven't been doing is treading, I really should be doing that more often.
I love the resonance realm and submersion stuff in the books. I really hope they do more with the dissonant Technomancers as some kind of bad guys/group.

Like so much of shadowrun it's just cool as hell.

Also what happen to Puck? smile.gif

AFAIK Puck was brain-sliced. Some adventure or another revolves around him, but I don't use modules so I'm not 100% on that.

I've been working on something about a dissonant free Sprite using its abilities to be functionally similar to a virus with the added caveat that he hacks normal people's brains and takes them over similarly to Inhabitation Spirits. I've been putting in ridiculous amounts of OT at my actual work though so no idea when I can get to this.
Chance359
During a CMP, my hacker managed to breaking to a KE security host that had all of the personal protection information on it. With it we were able to get our target to ditch his protective detail and come to us. We also used it to get access to his underground parking garage and even make the KE guards around him surrender (gave face the go codes and he used them to trick the guards into thinking this was some internal security matter).
ggodo
I had S-K send my players to the moon to fight a dissonant Technomancer and his paragon: Insane Wolf. The techno and sprite took over all the drones on the base, which was actually an Orichalcum mine, killed most of the rest of the staff, and started writing creepy things on the walls with blood. The players found the Techno first, assumed he was a civilian, and defended him from all the attempts by Insane Wolf to rescue his primary follower in meat space. Eventually the party splits up, most of the combat heavy guys go to look for another civilian, leaving the hacker, a gunbunny, a mage, one civilian, and the Techno.

Hacker goes full VR to investigate why the drones went nuts, and Insane Wolf sends Machine Sprites in assorted mining drones while attacking the hacker in cybercombat. The mage and gunbunny get taken out by the mining fire hydrant drone after getting a few kills, the hacker gets beaten within an inch of his life before he smacks the sprite into bits, jacks out to find his defenders unconcious, the techno holding a bloody knife over the corpse of the other civilian. The hacker spends edge, defaults on unarmed combat to shock hand the the Techno, who crit fails his dodge and fails the save to not collapse. The the rest of the team arrives to find the hacker crumpled against the wall. "What the hell happened!?" "I got 'em."
DMiller
@ggodo - Wow that sounds like something I could see happening to our group. Our GM is pretty twisted. I love it!

-D
Hound
IMO Hacker/TM is one of the hardest roles for most people to get their heads around, especially those who are new to SR. I generally recommend a new group have at least one good Hacker contact, but skip it as a player character. That way, I can still use the contact to show them things that a hacker can do, without having to worry about them feeling left out/useless.

It's important to be very creative as a hacker. The gun bunny basically knows what his primary role is going to be in any given run (shoot things that move, blow up things that are in the way, etc.) but for hackers it is extremely variable. It also depends a lot on the GM, I hate it when GMs are like "well, the place you're breaking into is controlled by a cult of mages, so obviously there would be nothing important in the node." When you get down to it, things like door locks, security cameras and other sensors are always going to be the cheapest form of effective security, so basically everyone is going to use wireless tech in some way.

However, I never allow the hacking of cyberware, unless it is specially modified. It doesn't make any sense to make the actual function of cyberware wirelessly accessible. Anything that is DNI and has no reason to access the Matrix is immune to hacking in my games.

Also, Puck was a Technomancer who helped one of the nastier AIs at some point, or contributed to one of the Matrix Crashes, if I remember correctly.
Warlordtheft
QUOTE (Hound @ Sep 16 2011, 02:00 AM) *
IMO Hacker/TM is one of the hardest roles for most people to get their heads around, especially those who are new to SR. I generally recommend a new group have at least one good Hacker contact, but skip it as a player character. That way, I can still use the contact to show them things that a hacker can do, without having to worry about them feeling left out/useless.

Also, Puck was a Technomancer who helped one of the nastier AIs at some point, or contributed to one of the Matrix Crashes, if I remember correctly.


Hound, I understand that sentiment but IMO think it is best if the group start with one. You don't learn except by doing it. The key thing for a GM is to help the player understand their options.


PS: Last noted Puck was an MCT test subject.... dead.gif

PSPS:Where is Renny (who is in his 20's or 30's now) who used to live in a house on the matrix? And is Dr. Halberstein (who'd be pushing 80) still kicking?
CanRay
QUOTE (Warlordtheft @ Sep 16 2011, 08:41 AM) *
PSPS: And is Dr. Halberstein (who'd be pushing 80) still kicking?
Maybe, maybe not. He's in one of the early products for 4th Ed.

Let's see if you can find him. biggrin.gif
chase
I saw that Puck is in the new Street Legends Book (I was flipping through it at my local comic book store). I didn't pick it up but it looks like a really well put together book.

It's on the list! With a lot of other shadowrun books.

I wish they would release some of the older convention modules.
HunterHerne
QUOTE (chase @ Sep 23 2011, 03:10 PM) *
I saw that Puck is in the new Street Legends Book (I was flipping through it at my local comic book store). I didn't pick it up but it looks like a really well put together book.

It's on the list! With a lot of other shadowrun books.

I wish they would release some of the older convention modules.


Street Legends doesn't tell you anything about what happened to Puck, anyway, except to offer a cryptic message that he is no longer a captive of MCT and may be plotting something. There is also a connection to the old AI sotry line, but that is more or less the boogieman of the SR Matrix (at least IC)
scarius
one of the game i was running had the teams hacker lock down all signals going out of the target area and a 5 block radius, someone then called up lonestar and try to tell them what was up, the hacker redirected the call and answered it herself while having the call go onto a 3 second delay to the station cheif of loanstar, loanstar tryed to trace the call only to have the trace location tell them that the call was coming from the second in commands office.
lunavoco
I play Technomancer almost exclusively and I've found that it plays almost exactly like a mage from the White Wolf Mage: The Awakening games.

Give a TM time to build momentum and he'll steam roller everything. Surprise him though, and he's out of luck.

Example taken from a recent Con Experience: our party rolls into a drop off at an abandoned warehouse. There are two Street Sams outside waiting for us. As soon as we get out things get hostile and our gun bunny starts doing what he does best, spreading lead. We roll initiative. At this point I know what my role is: party buff. Don't forget the rules in SR4A about AR being used to give a bonus. I spend my actions "locking on" to the guards and passing that info to the gun bunny. He gets a +2 to his attack rolls. It's not much, but it's way better than most other things i can do. Shooting a gun with Agility + Pistols + Specialization = 6 - 8 is not a great option, and my body 2 - 4 makes gun fights really scary!

How it should have gone: We roll into the meet and sit outside in the van for 5 minutes. The Gun bunny and everyone else on my team cools their jets for a few seconds. I do some thorough hacking and cracking. I see the potentially hostile street sams and break into their PANs, maybe plant a machine sprite or two. My favorite is to set up restart or lockup scripts on smart guns. When the dreck hits the fan i broadcast the command and all smart guns i've hacked restart. Nothing like shutting down return fire before it starts.

Alternatively, you can also set up false info to feed the smartgun's sensors. Don't forget that you can edit full trideo -on the fly- with decent edit rolls. Bad smartgun data should remove the smartgun bonus AND apply a penalty.

The problem with TM is that most things you -want- to do aren't expressly spelled out in RAW, but any GM who's primary concern is ensuring that the game is fun will be able to work with you.

PS: Threading: learn it backwards and forwards. Memorize it. I use it all the time.

(Edit: removed incorrect Eratta comment. Thanks Udoshi! Too many books, too little sleep.)
Udoshi
QUOTE (lunavoco @ Sep 23 2011, 09:10 PM) *
PS: Threading: learn it backwards and forwards. Memorize it. I use it all the time. Read the eratta on it. It uses Resonance + Compiling (Not Software, as per RAW.)


I don't believe there's errata for the core book. Like, that goes against everything catalyst has shown us. Link please?

Are you sure that's not a house rule?
lunavoco
Removed. I got schooled by Udoshi.
thorya
Our GM decided that all Lone Star Police had Doc Wagon Contracts and their biomonitors linked to their guns as well so that their weapons could not be used by someone else if they were incapacitated or in distress (mostly I think because our GM was confused and thought we would actually want to take and use L36's rather than our own weapons). The shit hit the fan on a run and we ended up cornered by a Lone Star Squad. Our hacker hacked all their biomonitors and suddenly all their weapons locked down. They decided that a "tactical retreat" might be in order and we got away. As an added bonus/screw you to Lone Star, five minutes after we were out of there, 6 or 7 armed DocWagon HTR trauma teams showed up at the scene and Lone Star got stuck with the bill.
Yerameyahu
That's a GM error. The guns can be bio-safety without being hackable in that way. smile.gif
CanRay
The Charisma 1, cyberpsychosis-suffering (And who knows what else he suffers from) hacker that I just played with had to be at a fancy restaurant (A steak house that actually served steak!), and had problems after problems relating to his lack of social graces. Luckily, he didn't go insane and try to kill everyone.

Leaving the restaurant, he asks the Maître D' how he liked "Dancing Queen", hacking the sound system to play that song, and only that song, increasing the sound level one notch every time. Starting at 2, and going to 11. Then reset all the security codes (He hacked Admin access) so they couldn't change it.

He'd already been banned for life...
AStarshipforAnts
My hacker occasionally doubled as Bait, since she was human and looked pretty vanilla. Long story short, the hacker got kidnapped and the team lost her. Before being drugged into unconsciousness, she put a copy of her agent into the car. After she came to in the middle of a pseudo surgery in an abandoned storage facility, about to have her head cut into, she panicked and called for the car (implanted comlink).

After the kidnapcar ran through the wall and flipped over onto about half the guards, she made a run for it. Also, she only had a flimsy surgery gown on, setting off the security systems and stealing all the nuyen from her kidnappers as she ran off.





Soon after, she had a terrible slap-fight with her hacker rival in an elevator. No one landed a hit for about ten-twelve rounds, and both had unarmed combat incompetence.
CanRay
Hacker Slappy Fight, I love it!
AStarshipforAnts
Eventually, they rolled out of the elevator and my hacker won by cheating with her taser. Even then, it took four rounds to land a hit. Then they both got scolded by a THIRD hacker (who's secret lair they came across) for fighting near sensitive electroni
thorya
QUOTE (Yerameyahu @ Oct 2 2011, 02:50 AM) *
That's a GM error. The guns can be bio-safety without being hackable in that way. smile.gif



Not surprised. We're all still fairly new to Shadowrun.
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