I haven't had a chance to read through or purchase system failure yet sadly.

Here's the way I see it Hahnsoo.

Why doesn't the Technomancer have cyberware? Well I can see atleast one reason that has nothing to do with theme. Virtualy everyone complains about sample characters not being built efficiently or effectively. Would it be effective or efficient to get a technomancer cyberware? For the most part no.

Story wise right now hahnsoo Technomancers are left open. That is to say, there is so little known about them ICly that one can not make the blanket statement that all technomancers are from the crash. We aren't told if they can awaken after the crash. By metagaming one can assume they can referencing my earlier thought about this that blakkie hit me with a metagaming fish for.

Essentialy what we've learned about technomancers is what the rumors and generaly what people know of technomancers. That some otaku, and some people who were on in the crash of '64 became technomancers. We know their brain chemestry is changed as well.

We know that atleast one corp believes that you can possibly activate someones latent technomancer powers surgicaly.

We do not know what happened to the otaku who didn't become technomancers in the crash (since one can extrapolate from the statements made in the BBB that not all otaku became technomancers, or atleast through the crash). We don't know what happened to the otaku who 'faded'. Prehapse they became technomancers? We don't really know enough to make any of the judgements or blanket statements that everyone is makeing about them.

That's not the impression that I got from the technomancer section in SR4. Story-wise, otaku are left open, with many questions surrounding their origins (as they've always been). However, the origins of the technomancers are pretty specific: they are the folks who survived the Crash while jacked in. Insofar that it is all fiction, sure, it is open... up until 2059 in the Sixth World, we didn't know that AI can create otaku that don't fade, but Mirage is able to do this (you can thank Lisa Smedmen for that one). We don't know that something similar can manufacture technomancers de novo because we are only given the SR4 text.

But that's the tricky thing about canon: until we get new information, it isn't part of the canon. That doesn't mean that one can't speculate about it (which many people have and will continue to do so). That doesn't mean that your or my game world cannot be different (in our game world, technomancers require a wireless link of some sort to "do their thing", and they can take minor Essence losses without losing Resonance). What it does mean is that until FanPro conjures up some more text for us to read, the canon is what's in the book at face value.

There are no words in SR4 that say "There are the Crash victims and the otaku, but these aren't the only technomancers." The language states that technomancers are the ones that have spawned from the Crash and the old otaku who have changed with the new Resonance. Any other explanations are personal speculations and opinions. There are a lot of unanswered questions left from the canon, but there are also a lot of folks are stating their personal speculations and opinions as facts, and I believe this to be detrimental to the discussion.

In other words, one can't make a blanket statement that says "There are post-Crash technomancers that appear independently of the Crash or being an otaku", because there's simply no evidence for it.

Well, if there were spontaneous otaku pre-Crash, than it stands to reason that whatever lead to their development prior will continue to develop them post, only as Technomancers.

Well the only thing that we know in cannon from the BBB is that they are just starting to become more than just rumors. So far they seem to be former otaku and those that have been in the crash. So far. But there is very little known by anyone regarding them so who knows.

Maybe the Deep Resonance has taken residence in the technomancers, sorta like a Sprite doing the electron storm ability.

From the impressions i've got. There is no more 'Deep Resonance' so to speak. There is instead only the Resonance. The whole crash thing causing it to shift and change, hence why theres no fading with age anymore.

As far as I can tell, the only source of technomancers without datajacks is the sample character, and throughout the history of SR, sample characters have consistently disobeyed the actual rules...

Also, regarding discussions of radio-transmission and technomancers - it is possible to 'manipulate' existing signals to a certain degree by introducing interfering and blocking structures (just as you can bend, redirect and refract light by using prisms, mirrors). Of course, this cannot be done with enough accuracy to radoically change them, and it is quite a stretch to assume technomancers can accomplish this using only their brains...but it also says in SR4 that both magicians and scientists are at a loss of explaining the technomancer's abilities - and if science of 2070 can't, I think we can debate theories for ever.

In my mind, there are four feasible explanations:
1) Their radically altered brain structure can somehow create radio waves.
2) They are using magic.
3) They can somehow alter existing radio signals with in a certain radius to such a degree thatr they are finely manipulating the matrix.
4) They are interacting with the resonance, which can somehow sense the subtle workings of a technomancer's brain and affect changes in the matrix accordingly.

All of these explanations are dodgy and dissatisfying, but there are a number of other things that are as well...

You know, I was all ready to gear up for trying to crack the Technomancer "problem", work out a better and better theory until I'd had it all worked out, when I went back to the book, read closely, and saw, not unlike snowRaven, that yeah-there IS no explanation. It says in the "BBB" that they can't figure it out either in 2070. In which case, screw it. It may be a trite way to write things off (for detail sticklers), but, for those of you who really are splitting hairs and getting migraines over Technomancers, it stands to reason that in the world of Shadowrun, I'm sure a bunch of fictional scientists are probably yelling at each other over the same crap. Ah well.

*hands mfb a badge that reads "honorary grumpy sr scientist"*

so how do the technomancers figure into the drop bear conspiracy?

There is no connection. Move along, nothing to see citizen.