Hermatics don't see totems either, but I think the comparison still stands. If we drop all the additional fluff and get down to the core issue.

SR is nicely balanced in that almost every activity can be performed by both awakened and mundane alike, using mana or cyber. Just like cyber interfacing is split into Mind (Deckers) and Body (Riggers), magic is internal/external, mind/body, mage/adept.

If, in outlook on how they do their thing

Hermetics/Shamans = Otaku

then maybe

Adepts = Magical Riggers

Another approach could be that Magical Riggers can only use adept powers that directly mimic cybernetic enhancement (inc. Reflexes etc) and allow skill increasing powers to include the B/R skills. These guys are serious mech-geeks who love their toys and when they talk to them, they listen.

Just like Hermetics don't see their magic coming from totems either.

Otaku are extremely analogous to magical characters.

Deep Resonance = Awakening
Cyberadepts = Hermetics
Technoshaman = Shamans
Living Persona = Astral Form
Sprites = Spirits
Submersion = Initiation
Echoes = Metamagic
Complex Forms = Spells
5 Channels = 5 Categories of Spells
Fading has simularities to Burning Out, but is not truely analogous

Add to the fact that there is no such thing as a Mage Otaku...

While we can not for certain say they are magical, I believe there is a very strong case utilizing inductive logic.

Am I correct in thinking that in the creation rules Otaku are expressly forbidden from having any awakened abilities? The only other runners this line of thinking applies to is awakened characters who can only have one style of magic. Otaku interface to the matrix in a "magical" way, ie no cyberdeck. So their "magic" only works in mind and matrix.

On another note

Perhaps I've wedded you too closely to the idea that a migger would just be a form of adept. How would you implement a otaku-type character who connected to machinery instead of computers, instead of inherent "supernatural" abilities replacing a cyberdeck, they replace the VCR. And were Decker=Otaku=Magician-like, surely Rigger=Migger=Adept-like, where meta-magic/echoes relate to addtional VCR add-ons.

A program carrier still requires a MPCP, it does not use a living persona. The MPCP program ratings are also directly limited by BODY, INT, etc.

Otaku and program carriers are as similar as my laptop is to a cyberdeck.

And just how much does it cost a seriously nerdy child who develops into a Otaku to directly interface with the matrix? They can independently connect their naked brain to an entirely different reality made up from billions of individual parts, but need little more than a datajack.

Why would you need cybermancy to "feel" a machine made from thousands of parts that are assembled in a similar manner to a body and are attached to you through a device that is specifically designed to generate human nerve impulses?

You are correct, but it is never said why. I helped write, or wrote, many of the otaku rules, and I know I always left it intentionally ambiguous.

Otaku should seem magical, while never actually being explicitly said they are magical. This is deliberate, to show where the line blurs and how it is possible that science that isn't totally understood can seem as magical as magic is in the Sixth World.

Are otaku magical? Maybe, maybe not.

Back to the original question, it is possible that there could exist an otaku-variant that revolved around rigging instead of decking. The main problem with it would be that rigging is much more hardware-intensive than decking, so many of the things otaku excel at by living in a purely software world, wouldn't extend to an otaku-rigger, which is still very dependent on the vehicle/drone it is controlling, which exists in a physical world.

EDIT: Herald brings up a point about some of the SURGE abilities, which otaku can get, but Awakened characters can not. Also consider that otaku have same decreased change of SURGE affliction that Albinos do, and there's nothing magical about albinos.

Otaku may not spend any build points on magic abilities, there is however one little "bug" in the rules: As unlikely as it may be: an Otaku-Character can SURGE and receive both the dual-natured flaw (inherent magical trait) and / or the astral perception trait (limited but actually magical activity)

I'm at a loss as to how rigging is much more hardware intensive than decking. Admittedly the essense cost for a VCR is massive, but where is the rest hardware?

Given that things such a RCD would still be needed to communicate with remote devices, surely the remainder of the hardware aspect comprises of a VCR to interface with the simsense signal generated by the rigger adaption fitted to the machinery. Doesn't this mean that they would be interfacing with a "software world" as well, but with most of the I/O done through the limbic system?

Autonav systems are described as adding their rating to your skill tasks as they include basic crash avoidance. Doesn't this mean that a riggers connection is more like start walking, sprint, dive left, turn head and point at target? Obvious the senses used are virtual, but so are the Otaku's and really, any cyber-sense that is not naturally posessed. So controlling a vehicle would be similar to posessing a new body. Moving around in physical world is something human have been practising for millions of years.

The remote devices the rigger is controlling. The vehicles, drones, security systems, etc. That's all hardware.

When an otaku is in the Matrix, it's all software, pretty much. Granted, actions like controlling slaves from the Matrix then touches into external hardware, but for a rigger they are all about that external hardware. Without a slave unit of some sort to control, whether it's a drone, vehicle, or security system, what is a rigger?

With the level of cyberware and common connections to machine and building I reckon its on the cusp. I've always seen cybermancy as a welding torch in terms of joining magic and tech, we're looking more for a needle and thread approach. As to obvious, we want any "magical" affects to be unseen, hence tackling it from an adept point of view. The "magical" effects are going to be limited to nervous system/senses emulating machine parameters only, much like the Otaku.

I wish I could, but I've always been a bit flumoxed by Otakus. If anybody has a nice suggestion for the rules, great, otherwise I think i'll have to jam it into the adept rules.

But their point cost is listed under the Race category. Hence, they are not magical, but a different race (or as much of a different race as a Ghoul or Shapeshifter is).

~J

Am I missing the point?

Deckers, Otaku, Riggers all live in the same world. Simulated reality, it just that a riggers simulation is very realistic.

The matrix is entirely made out of hardware, there is nothing that isn't hardware; it just has a software interface. Every effect produced in the matrix is ultimately generated by hardware.

The information feeds being presented to an Otaku and a rigger are the same surely, a simsense feed. As to what the sybolism actually relates to, surely it would harder to re-code a program symbolically than send a command at the speed of thought to increase the fuel feed to the engine by 50%.

Without matrix hardware to connect to, what is an Otaku?

Exactly about the fuel feed to the engine. An otaku can reprogram things entirely in the Matrix, but a rigger, at some point, has to deal with something in the real world. A car, a drone, a security system, it's something that has its own attributes not connected to the virtual ASIST connection. How fast a car goes is based on the engine in it, not how fast the ASIST connection is.

VCRs have a lot less effect on a rigger's overall performance than the cyberdeck has on a decker's. There are many other factors to a rigger, like the stats of the vehicle, drone, or CCSS system. Those stats (speed, armor, weaponry, etc.) are going to be the same regardless if a normal rigger or some kind of otaku rigger were controlling it.

No guarantee of this. Other than the Insect totems and Spider, there's nothing proving that totems aren't just figments of the imagination.

~J

Mainly just because the rules/canon don't support it. That said, there's no reason you can't do it in your own game. It's just hard to find a launching-off point from the canon, because there really is nothing in that area.

As far as rigger/otaku, I could hypothetically think of an otaku-type that was "different" from normal people in that its neural impulses were more adept at reacting to "remote senses" as opposed to its own body. This seriously strange individual could use just a datajack (or wireless connection) to "rig" vehicles, drones, etc. and would not suffer the usual penalties for doing so, and in fact could get the reaction and initiative bonuses normally associated to riggers with VCRs. However, there isn't much they could boost with their abilities, that I can think of, except those reaction and initiative bonuses. There just isn't much in the way of customizing rigging, except for the vehicles themselves. Which would use the same customizing rules that riggers use.

Such a thing doesn't really exist in canon right now, but I suppose it's possible along the same lines otaku are. They'd be really odd though, because while otaku have bizarre higher brain functions as a result or cause of their special decking abilities, rigging is purely lower brain. I'd imagine this would make these rigger-otaku extremely instinctual, almost animalistic, and possibly aggressive. There'd also be more risk involved; just like otaku are more vulnerable to attacks in the Matrix because of their personal connection to it, these would be more vulnerable to damage on their things they control, because of their close personal connection to it. If a drone they control is destroyed, it could even be fatal.

Interestingly enough, in a Shadowrun conspiratorial sense, these types of experiments might work better with subjects that already possess more powerful lower-brain functions than humans, like predatory animals...

Well, I never intended it to be a substitute.

That is the most logical reason yet (well, logical and non-incendiary) why such a concept is simply absurd.