Technos can get programs with program options. Technos can emulate skillsofts into complex forms and then learn them with karma, this includes program options/ratings. If a techno emulates a skillsoft with the overdrive program option, do they only suffer the distraction downside (since it can't damage their biowireness?)

well if the technomancer is stupid enough to learn a skill soft with a flaw, he could damage is bioware (stun damage in case of having glitch and lethal in a botch)

since is bioware is in his nervous system the damage goes in directly - ouch.

Considering the Techno's inherent immunity against malware and software bugs, I'm afraid he'd suffer no consequences, keeping this in line with the basic concept of technomancers in Unwired (which would be invincible Neo).

What with all CFs being active all the time, "just the distraction modifier" works for me.

He'd need to choose which skillsofts were loaded into his Biowire system though. So, only while he had his Pistol skillsoft in the biowire would he have the distraction penalties... Unless you think that they could run all the skillwire programs they know at once as complex forms.

There's no processor limit regarding ordinary CFs, so yes, I think they can.

Well, people did ask for the technos to be un-gimped.
Be careful what you wish for.

Next question, its a threading test to emulate the skillsoft. If the techno gets more hits on that test than the rating of the skillsoft, can they learn rating 5+ skillsofts?

ok, ok, I am seeing something really wicked coming this way...

Clarifications? Help?

Cheers,

Max

No, because the test converts the existing software. Net hits gain you nothing.

I don´t think this echo is overpowered. All CFs should run all the time, no need to gimp that. The limit of (submersion grade) on the skillwire system is very hard, as you can´t spend edge. Submersion grade 8 and a support operation service on your skill CF seems hard, but is absolutely nothing compared to the stunts of initiate degree 8 mages or deltaware samurai.

The more relevant in-between levels will see the TM cover for his chargen limitations. Everyone with the money can now run eight Pluscode-3 rating 4 skillsofts at once on skillwires of rating 4. The TM will need the skillsofts, 32 karma, and a submersion grade of 4. Do the math on the skillwire system and lost resonance.

Except, for a measly +1 karma per skillsoft, the technomancer can buy them with DIMAP which is a rather cheap (4k, +2 availability) option to tack onto all of those skillsofts. When the techno memorizes them, he now gets the skill with edge use, at up to rating 4. So, for a cheap 16k, and 5 karma, technos can essentially learn any skill at rank 4, and have full edge use with it also.

Edit: This is after reaching submersion 4. Of course, technos seem to benefit more from submersing more (or using the option to find echoes) than they do from actually raising their resonance rating.

Qualify "edge use". "Rerolling a failure" is often "rerolling because the net hits are not sufficient". Can´t do that with DIMAP, as you have a success. "Failure" is pretty much limited to success tests with insufficient hits, and opposed tests on defender wins. As opposed to normal edge use, you reroll the whole test instead of just the misses.

"Failed test." If the test is threshold 4, and you got 3 hits, you fail the test, and thus, could use edge to reroll your non-successes to try to get that last success.

No. You could reroll the test, not reroll misses. The DIMAP option even stresses that this is an exceptional use of edge, added emphasis compared to the skillwire expert system.

So, slightly worse off than regular edge usage, which is still hardly a disadvantage considering you can learn level 4 skills for 12,000 nuyen and 4 karma, 13,000 and 5 karma with DIMAP.

Not to mention re-rolling the test still would negate glitches/critical glitches, so thats the primary use for edge there.

Yeah, skillwires are very good. My argument is that you are paying 4 karma for a skillsoft rather than a skill.

I find the loss of all hits on a reroll very limiting. Rolling a dicepool of 9 + edge, one method has three expected hits, the other five. A skill rating of one will often be better than the skillsoft at rating 4, if you have edge available, and costs no money.

Oh? Lets see... 1+normal attribute of 5, = 6 dice. Expect 2 successes, reroll 4 dice, 3 successes total. 4 + 5 = 9 dice, expect 3. Seems fairly even to me, particularly since skillsoft/biowire are for the skills you aren't going to be super amazing in, more for the ones you'll just pick up for utility since they're so cheap and easy to get. Also you don't HAVE to learn it, you can just buy all the softs, and emulate them on the fly, as long as you've got them in storage. (Sucking up that thread sustaining penalty for doing so of course)

But at the end of the day, DIMAP and the expert system do the same thing - the expert system just saves time and money at the expense of essence.


Of course, it is still much better than having no kind of second chance at all.

This is awaiting a Word of God in the Unwired Questions Thread. Personally, taking the threading rules into consideration, I'd say 'yes, he can'.


Mages are pretty imbalanced too, I agree, though not as much as post-Unwired mancers ... and the Augmentation essence hole rule cripples the delta samurai pretty efficiently.


Two times Swap - comes with the first two submersions
unlimited sustained CFs - priceless

I'm pretty sure swap only works for the first threaded penalty. You thread one thing, you get -2 penalty, swapx2 reduces that to 0. You thread 2 things at once, you have -4 penalty, swapx2 reduces that to -2 instead. And so on.

Doesn't a technomancer, when learning a CF she is emulating, initially learn it at Rating 1? Then she buys it up normally?

No, emulation is an exception. P. 149 Unwired.

Huh. That does seem to be an extremely cheap way to buy skill-like ratings.

There is a cap of Submersion grade, though.

Which isn't that bad, considering you can get to grade 6 before you have to start spending karma on raising resonance.

it reduces the penalty. the penalty is -2 per threaded CF. if you reduce that by 2 points, you get -0 per threaded CF.

Watchful Guard uses the same wording...

Yes, except watchful guard goes on to clarify that it only negates the first penalty point. Swap does not clarify further, so with the way it is written, I'd have to agree that swapx2 reduces any and all threading penalties down to 0.

Technically, even Watchfull Guard doesn't tell us what happens at the third dodge.

Saying "meaning they can defend against two attacks between actions without penalty" is pretty clear. Only 2 attacks have no penalty. Otherwise, they would have said, 'meaning they can defend against two or more attacks between actions without penalty.'

Technically, no - the sentence lacks the 'only' as much as it lacks the 'or more'.

I wonder if that is intentional or a badly written...

It seems very overpowered.

Think of it as ONE sustaining foci that can sustain ALL spells a mage casts and sustain them regardless of force...

Technically one could make a TM that has no CF from chargen and gains two echoes and thread EVERYTHING and then has it active until someone shuts down his node...

After all, sleping doesnt turn the Complex forms off so they are always active.

VERY overpowered.

The standard rules step in and continue working as normal. Watchful guard modifies it, and says when it does. Beyond that, you use the regular rules.

Precisely. And since noone but another techno can shoot down a techno's node, he is all but invincible. This essentially makes the Techno both highly versatile, powerful, very karma friendly (if he has biowires and can learn rating 5 skills at 5 karma) AND trumps the mundanes in termas of broadness. Add to that acceleration, and all he really lacks is spellcasting and 8+ physical attributes (he'll have to do with a max of 7).

Are we talking straight out of the box here? Like you could do this with basic chargen?

No. To do that you would need to submerse... 2 times for swap x2, 4 more times for biowire and acceleration x3, and then spend karma learning your skills via biowire at a cost of 4 karma each. (Activeskills are limited to a max of 4, though, you could get personalized DIMAPed skills, and get to reroll failed tests and +1 DP for 6 karma per skill and 14k per soft.)

6 submersions is base:
1: 13
2: 16
3: 19
4: 22
5: 25
6: 28
For a total cost of: 123 karma. Plus the 4-6 karma per skillsoft.

Or, alternate rules, of 15 karma per echo, for 90 karma instead.

That only a Techno can harm another Techno's node is still an optional rule.

An echo that powerful seems wrong as there is no point for TM to even begin the game with ANY Complex Form and that kinda goes against the spirit of the rules.

I feel it needs an errata.

As i said before, compare that to a magician having a sustaining foci for ALL sustainable spells...Kinda broken.

No. See "tracking and hacking" and "hacking the biological node", p135f, Unwired. It is not an optional rule. "The Resonance Difference" is essentially making the Technomancer immune to anything else.


I agree, so do I. But from other very powerful echos like Biowires and Acceleration, I get the feeling that overpowering the techno was the authors' explicit intent, so I doupt there will be an errata on that echo, or others that are vastly tilting the balance of power against mundanes.

i would assume that if the technomancer has to sustain his complex forms actively, that sleeping will cause them to go unsustained.

still powerful, but not quite as insanely good.

I think that the swap echo is strong enough, allowing 1 free sustained form when taken twice. I don't think that it needs to be more powerful than that. I'd say, go ahead and interpret it that way if you'd like, I foresee errata coming to clarify it.

I would hope so. The text implies more my and Jaid's reading, though, than yours.

I didn't say it didn't. In fact, I supported it by contrasting it to the Arsenal text.