Shadowrun 4e newbie questions

[Stahlseele]

Seeing how hacking is not attribute+skill+/-modifiers but comlink attribute+program+/-modifiers if i remember correctly, yes, pretty much.

[Longes]

Seeing how hacking is not attribute+skill+/-modifiers but comlink attribute+program+/-modifiers if i remember correctly, yes, pretty much.

It's actually Skill+Program+Modifiers.

[Username17]

Seeing how hacking is not attribute+skill+/-modifiers but comlink attribute+program+/-modifiers if i remember correctly, yes, pretty much.

It's actually Skill+Program+Modifiers.

And Agent Rating can sub in for your skill, so Stahlseele basically got it right.

-Username17

[Silent Wayfarer]

So basically, if I have about 20k of spare cash I can add a broadly functional hacking spec to just about any character. And then with a good pool I can build/code some good hardware/software and become god of hacking except for technomancers?

Also, I have a former friend who was going on and on about how technomancers were the best combat badasses because they could get permanent IPs via initiation (the Acceleration echo). Sounds like bullshit, though.

[Longes]

You'll need quite a bit more cash for that (something like 100k for a decent setup), but basically yeah. You won't be able to code/hardware stuff though, because those actually use your attribute+skill.

[Longes]

Also, I have a former friend who was going on and on about how technomancers were the best combat badasses because they could get permanent IPs via initiation (the Acceleration echo). Sounds like bullshit, though.

Yeaaaaaah, no. Technos can get permanent IPs equal their matrix IPs via four initiations, and also get skillwires along the way. But that's a stupid thing to do. At that ammount of karma PhysAd will just laugh at you, and StreetSam will spend on that karma on having all the skills and will also buy augmentations.

[Silent Wayfarer]

Also, I saw something about hacker adepts in this post.

The reasons SR4 Mystic Adepts are not that good have to do with pricing and scaling. You're splitting your magic attribute, which gets worse and worse the more magic attribute you have and thus the higher marginal cost your magic attribute has. It's somewhat excusable to trade 3 dice from your spellcasting and conjuring to have some side powers, but four initiations later it's going to suck to high hell when you're five dice behind. As you go on, you get farther behind numerically and your marginal costs for improvement become farther and farther out of sync with what other characters are paying. Having 3 dice instead of 6 coming from your attribute is livable, but shilling out for your 3rd or 4th initiation to go from 4 dice to 5 is bullshit

The other big thing that trips up Adepts is that most Adept powers are bullshit. The authors were so deathly afraid of Adepts actually being good at kung fu that all kung fu related powers cost way more than there is any possible justification for. Often by a factor of 2, 8 or even more. Being able to shoot fire from your hands like Ryu is kind of neat, but compared to "knowing Power Bolt" or even "owning a hand gun" it's not actually that special. Even paying a quarter of a power point for that would be hard to justify, but go ahead and look at how much it costs to get Elemental Strike and Distance Strike. Just go ahead and look that up and cry.

Making an effective Adept character is actually deeply unintuitive. You hyper specialize in the niche powers that are actually good - usually by stacking with cybernetics and equipment in weird ways that allow you to exceed dicepool limits for non-Adept characters in narrow fields. The Adepts that people actually talk about being effective characters are things like the Pornomancer and the Hacker Adept. Nine times out of ten if a player wants to play a mystic adept it's because they want to play a sorcerous martial artist or they are deeply attracted to generalization. That doesn't work out well when the martial artist powers are overcosted shit on a plate and the powers people drool over are expensive ways to hyperspecialize.

If you wanted to fix the Mystic Adept, first of all you'd want to drastically cut the cost of most Adept Powers. Secondly, you'd want to have the Mystic Adept be behind in Adepting and Magicianing by a fixed amount. Tell them: you have 5 points of penalty to distribute between Magicianing and Adept Power, and you have to put at least 1 penalty point in each. You have a single magic attribute, but your magicianing and adepting both treat your magic attribute as being lower by that fixed amount you select at character generation.

---

Aspected Magicians were really important back in the days of Priority Systems. If you wanted to cast spells but couldn't afford an A priority, you could be Aspected Sorcerer and then you got Sorcery and Astral Perception but not Projection or Conjuring. The original nomenclature in the Grimoire was way less clear than that (it talked about "Physical Adepts" and "Magical Adepts"), but by 3rd edition it was clear enough.

There are "rules" for them in Street Magic, but no one uses them because they are absolute garbage. I had quite an argument when that garbage got proposed. It was so obviously unplayable that I correctly told people that no one would even use them and the setting would be lessened. One of several instances where things would be better had they only listened to me instead of digging in their heels and insisting on using their bad ideas from half baked first drafts.

-Username17

Combined with Mind Over Matter (LOG=>AGI), could you make a pretty decent JOAT skillmonkey?

I'm asking because I might be making a new character on account of my GM being a cock about letting my face do her job.

[Longes]

Yes. MOM (AGI) adept is the best adept, because he is magnificent at both Logic and Agility skills even untrained, and Logic is easier to buff. Plus all your Agility-linked skills become Logic-linked, so PUSHED workes on them.

[Username17]

Technomancers are as written unplayably bad. But they are unplayably bad in a way that makes unbelievably powerful at many actual tables. The first issue is that Technomancers cannot get all the programs. There is a maximum number of forms they can have, and it's a lot smaller than the whole list. Since many of the challenges in the Matrix are in the form of "Insert Program A into Tab A or GTFO," if you don't have the entire list (or at least almost the entire list, you don't need Blackhammer or Databomb for anything), then you automatically lose the Matrix if and when the MC puts the requisite challenge type in front of you.

But here's the thing: it's not even fucking possible to play the Matrix out with all the die rolls and checks the rules call for. It would seriously take tens of thousands of die rolls just to map out the topology of the Stuffer Shack. That's not even an exaggeration. Rules as written would require tens of thousands of die rolls. So whether people think they are running rules as written or not, what they are actually doing is glossing over somewhere between 99.99 and 99.999% of the die rolls and checks the Matrix calls for. What is left on the table to do at that point is anyone's fucking guess.

What Technomancers can do is to specialize in a small number of matrix numbers and make them very very high indeed. If your MC simplifies the game in a way that allows you to dominate things with a short list of matrix numbers that happen to be very high, then Technomancers are broken the other direction.

Now let's talk about Riggers. Riggers are better than you. There's basically no limit to the amount of firepower they can put down, and even a half assed Rigger offensive is more bigger bullets than the rest of the team combined. Now, a lot of people put informal nerfs on Riggers and their robot armies. A usual one is to just sort of not have an unlimited number of attack drones operating semi-autonomously, and limiting the Rigger character to "just" being hopped into a disposable machine gun drone that is cheaper and better than the Street Samurai. But Technomancers get Machine Sprites. Those can, explicitly, hop into death machines too. So if you're playing with informal limits on Rigger firepower, the Technomancer Rigger can absolutely register some Machine Sprites and send them into battle. It's not a huge upgrade on what a normal Rigger can do by RAW - it's just five slightly super drones and then however many semi-autonomous murder machines you can afford. But if you've set the semi-automous to zero, the five slightly superior murder machines is still considerably more firepower than the rest of the team combined.

Technomancers are garbage by RAW. But they happen to slide through some very specific cracks such that if people are holding the game together with mind caulk in some reasonably common ways, the Technomancer can and will razorcock your game in the eye. The people who gibber about how broken and overpowered Technomancers were in their games are not lying.

-Username17

[Longes]

Woah, Frank. You are wrong. Very, very wrong.

Technomancers have all the programs, all the time. They can thread up any program at will, and a properly built technomancer will easily thread up level 6 programs. In addition to that, a technomancer will spend his chargen BP on having five most important programs (Analyze, Command, Exploit, Spoof, Stealth) and will run with those on rating 12. In addition to that, one of the Echoes removes the sustained threading penalty when bought twice, which means that a Technomancer always has all programs at high ratings. Technomancer is an undetectable god in the matrix, laughing at puny hackers with their toys.

However, Technomancers don't have enough BP left to actually buy anything non-matrix related. Their physical stats will be crap, and their skills will be crap. The only meatspace thing Technoes can do well is being Faces, and that's because Charisma is glorious and Emotion Recognition Software is broken. And they can also be Riggers.

EDIT:
I forgot to mention. Technomancers are the glorious Command Rigger master race. The downside is that it takes a Complex Action for them to do anything. The upside is that they are rolling drone's Attribute + their own Command rating. Which is 12. Unlike a rigger, Technomancer doesn't need Stealth, Gunnery, Pilot (Whatever), Swimming, etc. Technomancer just has Command 12.

[Username17]

Technomancers have all the programs, all the time. They can thread up any program at will, and a properly built technomancer will easily thread up level 6 programs. In addition to that, a technomancer will spend his chargen BP on having five most important programs (Analyze, Command, Exploit, Spoof, Stealth) and will run with those on rating 12. In addition to that, one of the Echoes removes the sustained threading penalty when bought twice, which means that a Technomancer always has all programs at high ratings.

You're talking the science fiction future when you have over a hundred karma to spend. An actual Technomancer you might actually play does not have two Echoes or even one Echo. He's a starting fucking character and can't do any of that shit. And while yes, having a Stealth of 12 is a possible thing, and completely breaks the game in half, you can also be required to do any of a number of other things and as a starting fucking character, that is the end of your mission.

Technomancers, by RAW, never get to the bizarre super future where they can thread temporary copies of forms that are good enough to get them through if the MC demands that they pull out a Sniffer, Track, or Defuse lest you automatically fail the mission. Because the first time that demand gets made is the first run, and that is fucking that.

-Username17

[Longes]

Technomancers have all the programs, all the time. They can thread up any program at will, and a properly built technomancer will easily thread up level 6 programs. In addition to that, a technomancer will spend his chargen BP on having five most important programs (Analyze, Command, Exploit, Spoof, Stealth) and will run with those on rating 12. In addition to that, one of the Echoes removes the sustained threading penalty when bought twice, which means that a Technomancer always has all programs at high ratings.

You're talking the science fiction future when you have over a hundred karma to spend. An actual Technomancer you might actually play does not have two Echoes or even one Echo. He's a starting fucking character and can't do any of that shit. And while yes, having a Stealth of 12 is a possible thing, and completely breaks the game in half, you can also be required to do any of a number of other things and as a starting fucking character, that is the end of your mission.

Technomancers, by RAW, never get to the bizarre super future where they can thread temporary copies of forms that are good enough to get them through if the MC demands that they pull out a Sniffer, Track, or Defuse lest you automatically fail the mission. Because the first time that demand gets made is the first run, and that is fucking that.

-Username17

Threading is a non-action. So, our imaginary technomancer goes on a run. He has [Analyze, Command, Exploit, Spoof, Stealth] 6. He threads Stealth as high as he can. Now he is more stealthy than a hacker will ever be. He encounters an encrypted file and needs to decrypt it. He threads Decrypt 6, and decrypts the file. At this point Techno has two forms threaded, and is taking -1 die penalty to all his matrix actions. Oh noes. Once he decrypted the file, he sees a databomb and wants to disarm it. He spends a non-action to drop Decrypt and spends a non-action to thread Disarm 6. All while maintaining Stealth higher than hacker can ever have.

That's the difference between a Technomancer and a Hacker - Technomancer can have any program that was ever written in any book, at any time. He'll be struggling if a demand to simultaneously run multiple rare programs appears, but that's it. When the run demands Sniffer, the Technomancer just has Sniffer, at as high level as he can safely thread.

[Username17]

Your threading pool is Resonance + Software. Since Software is not a skill that does any of your cool Technomancer bullshit, it is at most 4. Resonance is hard capped at 6, and softcapped at 5 or even 4 if you took any cyberware at all. You can't even get reliable specialization on the software, because specialization is by utility type rather than by the fact that you want it for threading.

It's a special attribute dicepool, which means that available bonuses run between "fuckall" and "nada." Your threading pool is somewhere between 7 and 12 dice, averaging between 2 and 4 hits. Threading a CF at 6 requires 6 hits. No, you fucking do not and cannot reliably thread rating 6 programs as a starting character. That is 100% not something that happens.

In the bizarre science fiction future where shit has gone crazy and the Technomancer has well over a hundred Karma to spend, sure. There is in fact no hard cap on Resonance for advanced characters, and wit h enough karma under your belt, then eventually you could throw around the 18+ die pools required to semi-reliably pull a rating 6 CF out of your ass. Or fuck, you could buy all the programs your own damn self, because the limits on knowing all the CFs go away once you have apparently near limitless karma to wipe your ass with. But anyone who claims that they have or even could do any of this bullshit with a real character is pulling your leg or deliberately misreading the rules.

-Username17

[Longes]

Your threading pool is Resonance + Software. Since Software is not a skill that does any of your cool Technomancer bullshit, it is at most 4. Resonance is hard capped at 6, and softcapped at 5 or even 4 if you took any cyberware at all. You can't even get reliable specialization on the software, because specialization is by utility type rather than by the fact that you want it for threading.

It's a special attribute dicepool, which means that available bonuses run between "fuckall" and "nada." Your threading pool is somewhere between 7 and 12 dice, averaging between 2 and 4 hits. Threading a CF at 6 requires 6 hits. No, you fucking do not and cannot reliably thread rating 6 programs as a starting character. That is 100% not something that happens.

In the bizarre science fiction future where shit has gone crazy and the Technomancer has well over a hundred Karma to spend, sure. There is in fact no hard cap on Resonance for advanced characters, and wit h enough karma under your belt, then eventually you could throw around the 18+ die pools required to semi-reliably pull a rating 6 CF out of your ass. Or fuck, you could buy all the programs your own damn self, because the limits on knowing all the CFs go away once you have apparently near limitless karma to wipe your ass with. But anyone who claims that they have or even could do any of this bullshit with a real character is pulling your leg or deliberately misreading the rules.

-Username17

Your Resonance is always 6, because it caps your program levels, and determines chargen program maximums.

Threading is a non-action. You can discount hits down to zero to avoid Faiding damage. You can just keep rerolling Threading test until you get the rating you want.

[Username17]

Threading is a non-action. You can discount hits down to zero to avoid Faiding damage. You can just keep rerolling Threading test until you get the rating you want.

The amount of mental gymnastics required to come to that conclusion is certainly impressive. The rules, of course, do not support that claim in any way, and also anyone attempting to do that at a real table would be laughed out of the room even if they did. This is not a serious claim. Every single thing you just said is so alien to any version of the game as it is written, thought of, or played anywhere that I am at a loss for words.

We're seriously at Pun Pun levels of "it doesn't say I can't make up new abilities that are wildly out of line with the guidelines and common sense." No. Just: No.

-Username17

[Silent Wayfarer]

Brief tangent: why is MBW considered bad? It gives a huge passel of benefits for the same Essence cost as an equivalent rating of WR.

By the same token, are Synaptic Boosters really that good? Granted they give IPs and Reaction at a miniscule BioEssence cost, but the nuyen price is ricockulous. I mean, I wouldn't turn up my nose at +2 REA +2 IPs for 1 Essence, but the 160k price tag makes me think twice.

[Stahlseele]

Doesn't show up on anything but the most sophisticated genetests and much more importantly, simply saves much more essence than the equivalent cyberware would even on delta grade probably and costs less than the cyber on deltagrade would . . what is not to love about synaptic accellerators?

MBW has a bad rep from SR3 times and from the fluff alone.
From a pure crunch level, as of SR4, MBW should be selling better than sliced bread . . initiative/reaction improvements AND skillwires in one go? Versatility in a can right there. Does it still give + to agility/dodge too?

[name_here]

It's pretty much universally true in any system whatsoever that getting extra actions is stupidly valuable. That's why you have to pay Essence out the ass for Wired Reflexes and why Synaptic Boosters cost so much nuyen.

However, you can always get more nuyen while Essence is finite.

[Korgan0]

The bonuses that MBW gives you over standard WR really aren't that great. Anyone worth their salt is going to be using Gymnastics Dodge when MBW only gives a bonus to regular dodge, and the skillwire capability is pointless if you're already a badass, which as a PC, you are. One extra point of reaction per rating is nice, of course, but it might even be cheaper just to go for separate reaction-boosting 'ware.

[Silent Wayfarer]

Doesn't show up on anything but the most sophisticated genetests and much more importantly, simply saves much more essence than the equivalent cyberware would even on delta grade probably and costs less than the cyber on deltagrade would . . what is not to love about synaptic accellerators?

Well, that's true. I used it for "stealth" characters who have minimal augmentation (cybereyes and ears, enough to avoid suspicion) and it works great for that.

MBW has a bad rep from SR3 times and from the fluff alone.
From a pure crunch level, as of SR4, MBW should be selling better than sliced bread . . initiative/reaction improvements AND skillwires in one go? Versatility in a can right there. Does it still give + to agility/dodge too?

Yeah, +1 Dodge per rating, capped at the rating of actual Dodge rating x1.5. Of course Dodge is an overly specialized skill and doesn't benefit from synthacardium and stuff, but still... Also, it gives double the REA boost that standard WR does, in addition to skillwires and stuff.

The TLE-X is fluff now, though you can pick it up as a negative quality.

Also, skillwires are for versatility, mainly, so you can just slot an R1 hacked skillsoft and use just about any weapon with no penalties, leveraging a high Agility to pew better. At least, that's how I've used them.

[Whipstitch]

Brief tangent: why is MBW considered bad? It gives a huge passel of benefits for the same Essence cost as an equivalent rating of WR.

You need a 5 point Positive Quality just to push the Availability cap up to 20, which means that Move-By-Wire 2 has to compete with Wired 3, not Wired 2. Also, the "huge passel" isn't really all that huge and can be largely emulated through other means. The nicest benefit is the way you get 2 Reaction per point of rating, so if your MC does happen to throw out Availability ratings you can recoup some of the cost of MBW by dumping your natural Reaction score super hard. Also, here's another dirty secret for you: only people who are seriously cramped on points and are deathly afraid of melee combat ever really bother with the Dodge skill, since Gymnastics benefits from a wider array of 'ware and is useful for things other than combat. You can expect Samurai to instead combo Synthacardium 3 and Enhanced Articulation for great justice.

[Longes]

Threading is a non-action. You can discount hits down to zero to avoid Faiding damage. You can just keep rerolling Threading test until you get the rating you want.

The amount of mental gymnastics required to come to that conclusion is certainly impressive. The rules, of course, do not support that claim in any way, and also anyone attempting to do that at a real table would be laughed out of the room even if they did. This is not a serious claim. Every single thing you just said is so alien to any version of the game as it is written, thought of, or played anywhere that I am at a loss for words.

We're seriously at Pun Pun levels of "it doesn't say I can't make up new abilities that are wildly out of line with the guidelines and common sense." No. Just: No.

-Username17

Each hit scored on the test can be used to increase the rating of a complex form by one; if the complex form is created from scratch, start at Rating 0. The technomancer can choose to discard some of the hits he scores. No threaded complex form can have a rating greater than twice the technomancer’s Resonance.

So, even assuming you can't rethread multiple times per turn, you are explicitly allowed to discard hits to avoid Fading. In addition to that, you can use your sprites, which you summon for free to boost your program rating even higher:

Assist Operation: A registered sprite can add its rating to any single complex form used by the technomancer. This assistance lasts for a maximum number of Combat Turns equal to the sprite’s rating; a Rating 3 sprite, for example, can boost the rating of the technomancer’s Armor complex form by 3, for a maximum of 3 Combat Turns per task

[Username17]

Longes, I can follow your convoluted non-logic, but: No. Seriously, you're just obviously wrong. The Shadowrun Matrix rules have plenty of problems without making up new ones. The rules don't work without massive amounts of mind caulk, pulling extremely dubious and convoluted interpretations out of your ass to break the game in additional ways is just fuckery on your part.

This is a thing where you get laughed at. You're not going to get a serious response because you aren't making a serious proposal.

-Username17

[Longes]

Frank, what new rules do I make up? Now, I can't find where I read that threading is a non-action, but that doesn't actually change anything. Even if it's a complex action, you can spend those to retry. You are rarely pressed for time with the rare programs. Even if you follow informal contract to not rethread - you can spend an action to summon a sprite and have him assist you. You can somewhat reliably summon rating 4 or 5 sprites on your 12 dice (4 skill + 6 resonance + 2 specialty)

[Username17]

Frank, what new rules do I make up?

Do you honestly not understand what a bizarre chain of unsupported logical leaps you are making?

Just for starters, the rule for what kind of action Threading is or isn't doesn't exist. And even if it did specify that it was a non-action, things just like that (for example: passive Perception Tests) are normally not repeatable for credit. Certainly not repeatable within an action the average of 50.8 times you'd need to score 6 hits on 8 dice. Even if it explicitly says somewhere that it's a non-action, you're calling for being able roll the dice over fifty times more often than the game normally allows this sort of thing. And your only defense for this absolutely ridiculous interpretation is that it doesn't say specifically that you can't. That alone would get you laughed out of the room in literally every single game that has ever been played or ever will be played. It's simply not a serious suggestion.

But sure, you're willing to drop that piece of absurdity and just repeatedly mulligan between hacks. That wouldn't work for everything, in that sometimes you need a Track on fairly short notice, and sometimes you don't have 51 actions to twiddle your thumbs when it's time to defuse a data bomb. But even here your interpretation crucially depends on your ability to declare an extremely different hit cap after you roll and count hits. And... it doesn't say you can do that. It doesn't even really imply that you can do that, and nothing else in the game works that way. While I admit that there might be some GM somewhere who would let you mulligan away all your hits and suffer no fading if you didn't roll high enough, this is an incredibly dubious proposition and neither the RAW nor RAI is particularly on your side here.

And finally there's the bit on Sprite Tasks. Registered Sprites can boost your Complex Forms for a few seconds at a time. This is extremely powerful. However, Registered Sprites take a lot of downtime to produce. The exchange rate of hours of downtime to seconds of boosted CFs is obviously incompatible with sitting around rerolling threading checks for fifty actions straight. And let's be honest: it doesn't actually say anywhere that Registered Sprites can boost virtual Complex Forms that you don't actually have but are copying with Threading. It doesn't say you can't do that, but it doesn't say you can either.

But the real bottom line is that there isn't any physical property of the world that you are referencing here. You are making a pure game mechanics and accounting argument. Bloodzilla revolves around the fact that civilians and even household pets have the same Essence values as Shadowrunners. Hackastack revolves around the fact that your Persona specifically doesn't stop being active in the Matrix when you're in AR and choose to take physical actions instead of Matrix actions. But this is just numbers. The game doesn't specify a number and you're claiming that you can put in "infinity" with nothing to back that up besides your own giant brass balls. There is absolutely zero reason for an MC to accept your argument and absolutely nothing happens to the world as defined if they just stamp "denied" on your proposal.

-Username17