Ok, so I've just got my copy of SR5 (been poor and running without for some time now), and I've noticed some huge changes in the way a lot of stuff, Matrix included, works. One of the biggest changes I've seen is how TMs work, with no longer having complex forms that are basically the same as programs, and now having basically their own set of rules. So I'm curious, based on the experiences of those who've played both SR4 and SR5, how do the new techies rate up to the old? I kind of get the impression that they still become the ultra-powerful hacking gods later on but are karma sinks while hackers are the money sinks. Other than that, I haven't had a chance yet to really get a feel for the new Matrix rules, and thus haven't quite got a feel for the new TMs.

TMs in SR5 are pretty suck-ass. There is no aspect of being a Matrix specialist where they are better than a mundane decker in SR5's rules. The overwhelming consensus is that they're straight busted in the new edition and you're better off playing a regular decker. You'll pay less in chargen resources and generally feel better about yourself.

I tried building a hacker and a technomancer not long after the SR5 core book came out, trying to make them comparable matrix masters. I never finished either of them because the mundane human hacker character was coming out so much better than the elf technomancer. If I was to ever play one of them in a game I would have chosen the hacker over the technomancer, hands down. With the supplement books & errata that have since been released I'd still go for the hacker.

Well, that sucks. Is there any point at all to TMs then? Other than the ability to have much less worries about GOD and noise and so on, that is.

most of what you need to do as a technomancer will still involve regular hacking, so i wouldn't even say less to worry about as far as OS/GOD and noise is concerned.

with that said, i will say that there is *one* area where i cannot agree that hackers are better than technomancers. technomancers are *much* stronger at supporting someone who is actually good at what they do in the matrix. if you are a hacker you want to become best friends with a technomancer. sprites and complex forms are really quite useful for making someone else truly excel in the matrix (and can even be decent outside of the matrix if we're talking about machine sprites only).

So in short it means technomancers are sidekicks Hero Support.

Well, it seems to me that CFs can help work around those issues. Like Resonance Channel can be used to get around noise issues, or Puppeteer to make something else (like the deck of the spider at the facility you're dealing with) do the hacks for you. Plus Transcendent Grid helps get around the whole "crossing grids" issue. I mean, yeah, still looking at it, it feels like TMs got nerfed a TON, which makes me sad. I've always liked the decker/TM types (which sadly makes me unpopular with a lot of groups because it ends up leaving them nothing to do while I'm in the matrix), and thought that TMs could be something awesome. Now... meh.

datajacks and programs help deal with noise far cheaper in chargen resources, and don't make you feel like you just got punched in the face. rebooting your deck after hacking something to clear OS if you don't need constant access to whatever you hack after hacking does the job just fine without making you feel like you just got punched in the face by a troll (no seriously, did you look at the fading code on it? you probably need at least rating 4 to keep enough hits to do *anything* at all against even the crappiest systems, and that's already 8 points you have to resist).

and not having to sustain a CF that gives you -2 to all actions (the same as crossing a grid) does a equally good job of dealing with the grid penalty, but again, costs vastly fewer chargen resources. heck, just flat out most likely having a higher dice pool helps more for that matter.

basically the only technomancer build anyone has found that works at all is called in some places the "petnomancer". and mostly consists of registering a bajillion services constantly during downtime on the strongest sprites you can reliably manage (mostly machine sprites, again, they're great at supporting your team in the meatworld). with a stable of sufficiently high rating sprites, you can be almost as good as a hacker, with a few unique tricks, at the expense of burning so many resources on hacking that you basically can't function at all outside of the matrix.

having said all that... they work a heck of a lot better with alternate chargen systems (still not well, just better), and if you're not playing official games lots of people seem to use houserules to help them out.

but yes, technomancers basically needed some nerfing (if you only cared about the matrix, there was no competition), but they got way too much of a nerfing in combination with hackers getting a bit of a buff in some ways, and kept every last one of their disadvantages.

Not saying they didn't need a nerf. After the release of Unwired, with all the new echoes giving the ability to have 4 IP in meatspace and 5 in the 'trix, plus everything else, they were ungodly OP. But as you say, this is a step too far. Especially with the complete remake of how the matrix works, removing ranks for programs, etc. and just in general nerfing all around.

If they had unlimited karma, sure, they could have all of those IPs. But just because it was POSSIBLE doesn't mean it was LIKELY. Folks focus so much on the theoretical unlimited advancement of technomancers while ignoring the fact that most campaigns will probably never last that long.

Exactly... Though to be fair, Technomancers were pretty powerful right out of the box in SR4A. Nothing that you could not contend with, though.

An adept at character creation could have 4 IPs in meatspace, and a hacker could have 5 IPs in the matrix at the same time. A technomancer couldn't match the adept's 4 IPs until after 4 submersions (44 to 70 karma), or the hacker's 5 IPs after 2 submersions (18 to 29 karma), or in total somewhere between 77 to 123 karma, and that's assuming said technomancer started at Resonance 6.

Heck, an adept hacker that sacks some Magic at creation could do both right out of the box, but the technomancer can't.

Simply: no. Except of course if you have no Karma limit to keep.

SYL

chargen technomancers *were* OP in SR 4. but it had nothing to do with IPs.

they were ridiculous because you could, for example, thread your stealth up to 12 (or more practically about 10) and then stack on a registered sprite supporting the CF to get up to 18 (again, more practically you didn't want to soak fading on threading 6 hits). which meant almost no system had a hope of detecting you.

or do the same with command and roll something like 30 dice on most tests they do with a drone (codeslinger in control device, gunnery ballistics specialization, remote operation specialization in vehicle skills), hot sim bonus, and I think you could cram a bit more in potentially).

or create a doomsday one-shot technomancer by threading attack up to ridiculous levels.

or thread a custom-designed psychotropic attack as needed for every situation.

and they could get huge karma breaks on submersion by joining a group (which included no-strings-attached temporary groups that just want to submerge) and feeding a registered sprite to a free sprite, thus gaining access to some very powerful echoes (note: the cool echoes are not the ones that give you meat IPs in general. the good echoes let you do stuff like create widgets for yet another +3-4 bonus to everything you do in the matrix, or get a floating echo that you can trade around your submersion group, , etc).

like I said, they needed some nerfing. if you wanted to be the master of the matrix and don't mind being absolutely awful outside of the matrix, technomancers were crazy good. it was a definite problem.

but you still needed a ton of karma to make it work, and you were generally awful in any situation that wasn't solved in the matrix.

but they went overboard. they took away all the powerful options, kept the huge karma costs, kept all the drawbacks of being a technomancer, took away the ability to function the same as a decker, and left you unable to protect anything as a technomancer.

so now you get an extremely expensive option that doesn't do well in or out of the matrix. except in the field of supporting an actual hacker. like I said, they do that really well.

Sadly, that seems to be their overall approach to anything that was too powerful in SR4; instead of simply fixing the problem, they indiscriminately bash the whole works with a nerf bat, to the extent that it is often simply unplayable. They did the same thing with SURGE and the sensitive system flaw, both of which could have been fixed with a few simple changes.

nah, mind control spells are honestly probably worse. if you can cast at a high enough force, your victims get one roll to resist and are then yours to do with as you please until you decide to let them go.

Actually, in both SR4 and SR5, the target gets to spend a complex action to reduce the spellcaster's net hits. Mental manipulations are not really good for long-term control, more for quick things like "Shoot your buddy" or "Enter your security code for this door". SR5 makes them weaker in one way (resisted with two mental Attributes, and get the roll to reduce the caster's net successes every turn rather than every (Force) turns), stronger in another way (the target uses the rules for noticing magic to be able to tell they were mentally controlled - unlike mind probe, which is obvious to the target).

"While the spell is
sustained, the target may take a Complex Action on
their turn to resist by making a Logic + Willpower Test
with a dice pool penalty equal to the spell’s Force;every
hit the target gets reduces the caster’s net hits by 1"

"The spell
ends when your net hits are reduced to zero."

so yes, resisted with two attributes, but if your log + wil is 6 dice and i cast the spell at force 6, you are rolling 0 dice after your first, initial roll.

which is to say, you don't actually get to resist at all beyond your first attempt if i cast at high enough force. you're mine to do with as i please until i'm finished with you unless you block the entire spell in the first place, and you will never break free unless you have edge; if i feel like controlling you for the rest of your natural life (or, more likely, until you walk through enough wards) and have the means to sustain the spell for that long (ie quickening or a sustaining focus; considering how disposable your minions are likely to be, i recommend the focus which can also be used for other manipulation spells), i can do so. and you might not even notice. it's only force 5 for standard corporate security, gangs, regular thugs, and most mundane animals. a little bit more can buy you permanent lieutenants or superior minions. force 6, for example, is useful for a variety of paracritters (some can be obtained with a mere force 5 as well).

so yeah, mind control got slightly nerfed in a sense (two attributes to resist instead of one)... but in another way, it became possible to make it truly permanent.

likewise, while direct combat spells got nerfect, indirect (particularly AoE) got a buff. frankly, most magic really didn't get much worse, if at all, compared to the rest of the world.

You're right. I missed the implications of that little bit there.

FTFY.


Listing one-trick-pony moves and somehow stating that TM's were "OP" because of that is largely meaningless. We can one-trick-pony 200+ armor from chargen, or dozens of dice to shoot someone, or Magic 14, or any number of things with optimizing. The fact that optimization exists does not make one thing or another "overpowered." When it can do all things simultaneously it becomes overpowered.

18 stealth does let you do an awful lot of things in SR4 matrix. 18 command before skills and miscellaneous bonuses lets you do pretty much anything you please in terms of rigging.

a chargen technomancer can do a lot of scary things while still being perfectly good at general matrix tasks in SR4. like, crazy scary things. there is no special stuff required to just start off with the ability to brainhack anyone connected to a sim module with whatever behaviours you want. the only special resource to start off with the ability to thread a CF to 18 was to start off with that CF at 6, which was heavily encouraged anyways. and it just got more and more scary with submerging, which you could do for the first time at something like 7 karma pretty easily if you started off with the right contacts.

those technomancer builds are not so much one-trick ponies as they are general technomancer builds with a few extra tweaks to let them do crazy stuff.

Compared to what I'm used to looking at, that's still a one-trick-pony. I hope you can consistently get 12 successes on a threading roll, by the way...

Perhaps a quick 0 Karma 400 BP TM build with the basic values (we dont need every single equipmetn details chipped out) with some "karma stations" like 100 / 250 / 500 Karma would be better to understand what one would consider as an OP starting TM with extreme capabilities in SR4. There may be a lot of lost knowledge when it come to the secret tricks of TMs. And yes, dont forget drain rolls please.

Something like:
Attributes
Skills
Important equipment
CFs
Sprites
Dice Pool für Hacking
Dice Pool for resist fading
Dice Pool for X etc
With 100 Karma he could do X, with 500 Karma he could da Y etc

SYL

That would be helpful, but that's farther away from the point of this thread.

you don't need to thread for 12 (and in fact, you can't do that anyways). you thread for 12 and use a registered sprite for the other 6 (in theory, you *could* even manage to get your CF up to 24, but i'm not about to suggest anyone try registering a rating 12 sprite registering a rating 6 sprite, on the other hand, will likely be unpleasant but possible).

And yet, there are plenty who would say that Binding Force 10+ Spirits is not only possible, but a necessity. Not a whole lot of difference, really. Though admittedly, there are better tools for the Mages than the Technomancers.

By the end, our Technomancer in 4th Edition was consistently Threading Stealth to a 15 or so, with no Sprites. And I did see him go to a 21 with a Sprite once. Long campaign, though, and well over 400 Karma. So, not really all that crazy, all things considered. The Hacker was still able to do things, though, that the Technomancer was not (both in and out of the Matrix). So really, it all evened out in the end.

AS we continue our 5th Edition Game, the Technomancer bypassed the Decker and has not really looked back much. Though the Decker was able to do things the Technomancer was not (Programs are a good example), he never really made the Technomancer feel unnecessary. Sadly, our Decker had to drop out because of Life, and yet there has been no loss of ability in the team. So, while there is some disparity between Technomancer and Decker, I do not see it as being all that significant, at least personally. Maybe in Missions it is more glaring of a separation than at the home table.

Now There IS a glaring difference between Technomancers in the Editions, but 5th Edition still is not fully matured like 4th Edition was... We will see as it moves along if any of that disparity is addressed.

I personally refuse to dump my gorgeous, fully mature significant other (4th Ed) for a new model just because she may be younger (5th Ed). Young girls don't understand the world properly yet - they don't have enough life experience to have intelligent opinions of even the basics yet. Everyone always romanticizes getting that sweet 18 year old until they realize that all they talk about is shoes, college fees, makeup, and getting drunk.

In other words, I'll continue playing 4th Ed until 5th gets not only more source material, but some errata for the wonky mechanics they have. Why leave an established, fleshed-out system for a fledgling one that doesn't have bells and whistles yet?

I fully agree with you on that one, Neraph. Sadly, our primary GM is not of the same opinion.

They don't even have to be 18 yet to be talking like that.Same reason people jumped on Windows 10 without pausing to read the EULA. Some people are of the firm and unshakable belief that newer is always better, and they must have it.

My experience was that out-of-the box SR4.5 TM's were overall, much weaker than comparable deckers. Sure, they could Thread up one big skill, but the drain and the lack of versatility would get them eventually. And deckers always had better meatspace abilities, because they had lower opportunity costs.

The exception were the "petnomancers". A TM with a decent stable of spirits was an unholy terror, especially if done right. Sprites were force multipliers, and in the matrix, they could eat the equivalent agents alive. Since Agent Smith was fixed, the best way to get a bunch of dangerous matrix combatants protecting you was sprites. Also, if you picked up a few drones, machine sprites could cover you physically as well. If worse came to worse, the Diagnostics power could turn anyone into a marksman.

The simple fix for TMs out the box as a house rule going around was to reduce Fade values by 2, this makes Complex Forms far more reliable to use regularly without completely removing the risk (and puts them in line with the risk-reward odds of Spells).

SR4 technomancers could afford to be plenty versatile in the matrix, even at chargen. you are correct about deckers having much better meatspace abilities, but a chargen technomancer could have most of their important CFs available to them, and could often thread the remaining programs at a low rating to dramatically reduce the risk from threading. and, in meatspace, you could mitigate their weaker abilities to some extent (as i noted above, getting extremely high dice pools with drones was a definite possibility even for a chargen technomancer).

but yes, having a stable of sprites (and why wouldn't you, all it costs is time) certainly made them even stronger. i don't think i'd make any distinction of calling them "petnomancers" though. the only reason it makes sense for the 5e build of that name is that the pets basically do all the work... in 4e, the technomancer is getting help from the sprites, but still does most of the heavy lifting. the sprites don't get an 18 stealth, don't get to have whatever psychotropic attack they want on a whim, don't get to have 18 command for massive drone dicepools or 18 attack for one-shotting just about any matrix entity, etc, in 4e.