[deathwishjoe]

***RE-UPDATED***

So I've heard a lot of arguments and discussions about the viability of technomancers as opposed to standard deckers.  The following post is a challenge to all the character optimizers out there to show us what this new edition can do in relation to deckers and technomancers. I've always felt that all characters will need to contribute in combat no matter their archetype so there will be some meat space combat involved.  The idea is to provide a typical and level playing field between the two archetypes and see how well they compare against each other.  In order to prevent any sort of janky dice from skewing the results the best option I can think of is to use a large array of pre-rolled dice for the encounter and then pull the dice to be used for the roll from the pool at hand.  Since any player who attempts this challenge will have access to the same dice pool array it should limit the effects of luck on whether or not one succeeds or not. In order to participate in this challenge one simply needs to make a character that would fit under the decker or technomancer archetype and then run it through the below run posting your results.  Trying to game the system by say burning some dice by humming a tune and using the “perform singing” skill during combat as a free action is heavily frowned upon.  The pool of dice for yourself and another for NPCs is listed at the very bottom.  If you use up either pool just start over from the beginning. If both archetypes are somehow able to complete this run successfully then I will write another more difficult run and see how well that goes.  If there are any questions about the run or the set up please feel free to ask me.    Either way here goes nothing

After your meet up with the Johnson you are now 1000 nuyen richer with another 9000 nuyen upon completion and are as stuffed full of all the soy ribs you could eat.  The job is simple, waltz into one of Renraku's local subsidiaries, get to the top floor, access one of the research labs work stations to get a file name for the schematics on the new "Bust-A-Move II, now with twice the krumping action" and then hack the local Renraku host, locate the file by its name and then after removing the protections on the file copy it and turn it into the Johnson.

Physical security isn't slated to be very tight, although the Johnson did say to expect a few rent-a-cops in the meat world you might have to deal with.  Once you were in the host he suggested things might get a bit more difficult but that’s why he's offered you the job and not some know-nothing ganger or street sam for this job.

After a little bit of leg work you find the lay out of the building and get a decent idea of how to navigate the place. After hours there is a rent a cop at the front desk and 1 more per floor patrolling at any given time. 

Response times for knight errant is about 8 mins to the location from when the call is sent out.  security alarms and cameras are on all doors except the front entrance which is left open for late night deliveries and employees working overtime.  All security devices are hardwired to a commlink in the front office manned by one of the rent a cops and slaved to an offsite cyberdeck.  Each device is wired to the commlink using its only data port so hacking individual devices requires unplugging the device from the network or using a datatap.  You can tap devices with data taps but this will be rather difficult due to cameras angles and the way things are wired.  The Matrix security for the building security system is protected by an agent running from an offline location.  The agent travels through the matrix to each devices location and looks for icons inside the building running silent or for any of the devices to be disconnected from the network. 

You decide the best option for getting in is surprisingly through the front entrance where you will need to neutralize the guards and take an elevator to the top floor.  From the buildings security schematics you notice that one of the elevators seems to be set up to only go to and from the ground floor to the third floor were as the other elevators offer access to all of the other floors.  You also discover on the third floor commlink which will need to be turned on and accessed in order to get the file name of the schematics which are on the host under file protection.

Before neutralizing the guards you will need to hack the security cyberdeck via the commlink in the front desk in order to get access to the executive elevator and the camera feeds.  All of the devices in this office are run on the renraku grid.  The cyber deck is a novatech navigator with its asdf arranged in the following way, 4 3 5 6.  Its running a level 4 agent, armor and tool box.  The agent will send out an alert if any device is disconnected from the PAN and spends its time looking for icons running silent.  It will ignore icons that don't attack it or the devices slaved to it.

After disabling the cameras and gaining digital access to the executive elevator you stroll up to the front entrance in your best Cicero’s Pizza uniform with a large "soy"peronni pizza in hand. At the front desk you see two of the rent a cops chatting it up over cups of soycaff. One is seated at a receptionist’s desk and the other is leaning against a wall behind the receptionist desk to the right of the other.  The desk is about 20 ft. from the front entrance.  They nod to you as you enter the building and ask you who the delivery is for. 

They will not let the PC any further into the building and will try to contact whoever the delivery is for to pick up the food at the front desk. None of the player’s legwork revealed any names of people currently working at this late hour.  While the player should be able to surprise the guards with a little finesse there isn’t really a social option for getting past the two of them.   The one sitting will try to use the desk for cover and the one standing will charge the player and try to disable him with his stun baton if provoked.

Professional rating 2 corporate security with armored vest (9) and no sub machine guns. 
B A R S W L I C ESS
4 4 4 3 3 2 3 3 6
Initiative 7 + 1D6
Condition Monitor 10
Limits Physical 5, Mental 4, Social 5
Armor 9

Skills
Automatics 3, Etiquette 3, Perception 2,
Pistols 4, Running 4, Unarmed Combat 3

Gear
Armor vest [9]
Fichetti Security 600 [Light Pistol, Acc 6 (7),
DV 7P, SA, RC (1), 30 (c)]
Renraku Sensei commlink (Device Rating 3)
Stun baton [Club, Acc 4, Reach 1, DV 9S(e),
AP –5, 10 charges]

The guards should be too busy fighting for there lives and trying to keep the shock of going from one boring night like any other to the most excitement either of them have ever had to call knight errant untill the fight is over.  If an alert is activated during the initial hack or due to the fight with the guards going poorly a call is sent out to knight errant informing them of a breach of security.  Keep track of the time at this point if they have been notified.  20 turns = 1 min and the response time is 8 mins.

It takes 2 turns to get from the security desk to the elevator. 
It takes 5 turns to for the elevator doors to open.
It takes 10 turns for the elevator to reach the third floor and open up enough to let you in. 
It takes 1d6 turns to find a terminal on the third floor you can access. 
And 2 turns to reach the elevator from the workstation

Upon reach the top floor of the building there is a single orc guard waiting in ambush.  He has taken cover behind a large receptionist desk and has taken a dose of jazz to up his game. 
B A R S W L I C ESS
7 4 5 5 3 1 3 2 6
Initiative 8 + 3D6
Condition Monitor 10
Limits Physical 9, Mental 3, Social 5
Armor 12

Skills
Automatics 3, Etiquette 3, Perception 2, Pistols 4, Running 4, Unarmed Combat 3

Gear
Armor jacket [12]
Colt Cobra TZ-120 [SMG, Acc 4 (5), DV 7P, AP—, SA/BF/FA, RC 2 (3), 32 (c)]
Renraku Sensei commlink (Device Rating 3)
Stun baton [Club, Acc 4, Reach 1, DV 9S(e), AP –5, 10 charges]

Unexpectedly there are no other guards or emplyees on this floor.  A brief search reveals the workstation commlink of the head developer for the prototype schematics you're after. after turning it on you can now hack the device.  It has a device rating of 4. the file is listed as one of the ones recently used in the history of the device and its not hard to tell which one is the file name you need. 

You can now travel via the matrix to the local Renraku Host.  The host looks like a large office building on the inside not unlike the one your meat suit is currently residing in.  there is a security spider and a patrol IC active on the host.  No other icons appear visible this late at night.  The patrol IC and the spider run matrix perception test to see if they can detect any icons running in silent mode. If you have marks on this host and aren't running in silent mode the Spider is immediately suspicious of your unfamiliar icon and will have the host deploy IC (which will ignore you since you have the host marked unless the spider says otherwise) and begin questioning you.  Since the spider in the above instance is aware of you and suspicious he counts as having taken the full matrix defense action if you try to surprise attack him.  A search of this host will locate the prototype schematics with an extended test threshold of 1 and a time frame of 1 minute.  Each success above the threshold halves the time frame.  The file is protected and also has a data bomb on it that will go off if the file is accessed; however the file will be undamaged in this event.  Characters are assumed to be smart enough to search for the data bomb but if a critical glitch occurs during the disarming, it will go off.  Once it’s protection is disabled and the data bomb is difused it can be copied and moved safely. both the file protection and the data bomb are rating 4. 

host rating 7
A 8
S 7
D 9
F 10
  Patrol IC
  Spider
  >> Black IC
  >> Sparky
  >> Killer
  >> probe

Security spider
METATYPE: DWARF
B A R S W  L   I  C ESS EDG
3 2 3 3 5 5(6) 4  2 5.0 2
Condition
Monitor
10 / 11
matrix initiative 8 or 9 + 4d6
Limits Physical 4, Mental 6 (7), Social 5

Active Skills
Cybercombat 6, Electronic Warfare 6, Electronics skill group 6,
Engineering skill group 4, Hacking (Hack on the Fly) 7 (+2),

qualities
Code Slinger (Brute Force)

Augmentations Cerebral booster (Rating 1), cybereyes [Rating 1, w/ low-light,
thermographic], datajack, skilljack (Rating 2), sleep regulator

Gear
Hermes Chariot cyberdeck [Device Rating 2, Atts 5 4 4 2, Programs 2], programs (Armor, Biofeedback Filter, Encryption, Hammer,Toolbox)
Typically run as A4 S2 D5 F4 until an alert is made where he switches to A5 S2 D4 F4 and then moves to A4 S2 D4 F5 if things start going badly.  typically has armor, biofeedback filter toolbox  and either encryption or hammer

Your dice pool                  NPC dice pool.
6,1,6,1,3,6,4,2,6,   6,2,1,1,3,3,1,2,3,
6,4,6,6,2,6,5,5,5,   6,2,4,1,1,5,5,1,1,
4,6,2,1,2,1,2,6,5,   1,6,2,2,5,6,5,4,6,
2,5,1,1,5,1,3,4,2,   4,3,6,3,5,1,5,1,2,
2,5,1,2,3,5,6,4,6,   2,1,5,4,3,2,1,5,5,
3,5,3,1,5,1,4,3,4,   2,6,3,2,3,3,5,2,3,
6,1,2,5,5,4,3,1,6,   6,3,5,2,6,3,5,2,2,
3,2,5,6,6,5,5,2,5,   1,5,1,6,2,3,3,2,5,
4,5,5,1,5,6,2,5,6,   3,1,2,6,5,1,6,5,4,
3,3,2,1,5,1,6,5,1,   6,6,6,4,1,2,1,1,2,
4,3,3,4,6,1,3,3,6,   1,3,4,1,4,3,6,1,1,
2,6,2,4,4,4,4,4,3,   4,4,6,6,1,4,6,4,1,
6,1,3,3,2,4,6,3,4,   5,2,1,1,1,6,4,4,5,
1,2,1,3,5,6,6,2,2,   1,3,5,5,2,2,6,3,1,
5,4,5,2,4,5,5,5,4,   1,6,5,4,3,1,4,5,1,
4,5,4,2,6,1,2,1,2,   5,1,6,3,2,4,4,1,1,
1,1,1,4,1,2,6,6,5,   3,1,3,1,3,3,2,4,1,
2,5,5,3,1,1,5,2,6,   6,2,6,1,3,1,5,6,6,
5,3,3,4,6,5,6,6,3,   4,5,1,2,6,5,4,6,2,
2,2,5,2,3,1,2,1,3,   4,2,3,4,3,4,1,2,6,
6,4,5,6,2,4,2,6,1,   5,6,6,4,1,3,3,4,4,
2,6,5,6,2,4,4,2,4,   5,6,3,2,5,6,6,2,2,
1,4,5,2,5,1,4,4,2,   4,3,6,6,6,4,4,3,3,
2,5,6,2,1,1,6,1,3,   3,5,5,5,1,4,4,6,4,
2,6,2,3,6,5,6,3,2,   5,6,3,5,1,4,1,4,5,
6,2,6,1,1,1,6,3,2,   6,5,2,5,4,2,6,6,1,
1,5,6,5,6,5,3,4,1,   1,4,3,3,3,3,6,5,2,
4,6,5,5,3,1,2,2,6,   4,1,1,2,2,2,5,2,6,
2,3,6,1,5,4,1,4,1,   2,3,3,3,2,6,1,5,1,
6,2,1,5,4,2,6,5,5,   3,5,2,2,6,1,3,3,4,
4,3,3,4,5,5,2,1,3,   1,6,3,6,2,6,1,1,5,
5,3,3,2,6,1,3,4,4,   3,2,3,5,1,4,3,6,1,
6,5,5,1,6,3,2,1,3,   2,3,2,2,6,4,1,5,1,
2,5,4,6,3,2,4,4,2,   3,3,6,3,5,3,5,6,5,
4,3,5,4,2,1,1,4,6,   1,2,4,1,4,6,5,6,2,
6,5,4,4,5,1,2,2,4,   3,1,4,4,3,5,5,5,2,
3,4,3,6,3,3,2,2,3,   1,2,2,2,6,1,5,2,4,
1,6,5,4,4,2,4,3,3,   6,2,2,2,1,4,5,1,4,
5,6,6,1,5,3,1,6,2,   1,1,2,1,4,6,2,4,2,
6,6,4,4,5,2,3,6,4,   5,1,2,1,2,3,6,1,1,
5,5,1,6,5,5,5,4,3,   4,2,2,4,6,1,4,3,5,
3,1,4,4,2,5,3,5,2,   2,5,6,3,3,6,6,1,6,
2,2,2,1,6,3,4,6,4,   1,1,6,1,5,5,4,1,4,
1,1,4,2,2,4,5,3,6,   1,1,2,1,3,6,6,2,3,
2,2,4,2,1,5,1,1,4,   3,3,6,1,5,3,6,3,4,
3,3,6,4,6,2,1,3,4,   6,6,1,3,1,4,4,6,3,
1,1,4,6,2,1,3,2,3,   5,3,5,3,2,5,1,5,6,
4,5,5,4,4,2,4,3,2,   6,2,5,1,6,2,2,6,6,
3,2,1,1,1,4,3,1,6,   6,6,1,4,5,6,6,5,5,

[TimTurry]

I am hoping someone would put a char through this, so I could learn more about matrix work.  When you do, Please add crunch (ex roll needed is Firewall(5) + Resonance(6) [mental 9] -> 11d6 got 4 successes)

[subgenius]

I agree, it should be interesting to see how a technomancer makes his way through these challenges. The decker should be pretty straightforward, but I just imagine it's quite a bit harder to "go solo" as a technomancer.

Oh, and don't forget to poison the pizza and get the guards to eat it 

[Yinan]

Maybe I'm gonna try this with my Technomancer this WE. Don't really have time before that.
I'm curious myself how he'll hold up... probably not very good but oh well ^^

[Xenon]

Game mechanic wise you basically have two hacker archetypes in SR5.

The dedicated hacker with serious investment in mental attributes, cracking and electronics skill groups and a persona with really high matrix attributes (including attack and sleaze).

The more physical AR hacker that invest in reflex increasing augmentations and physical skills such as sneaking and pistol/automatics in addition to decent mental attributes, a cyberdeck with decent matrix attributes and skilled in hacking and electronic warfare.

The dedicated hacker (which probably also include most technomancers as they can't (ab)use the physical direct connection exploit) is the hacker archetype we are used to from earlier editions. They hack from their apartment or maybe in the rigger van. More often than not they hack from hot-sim VR and have big enough dice pools to fight security Deckers and even endure a a few combat turns against IC. They are skilled enough to gain access to a host without (ab)using a physical direct connection and they can also extract pay data and doctor protected files even if the file is protected by a host. If a device is wired the team will connect a wireless data tap for him which let him hack the device wireless from a safe distance. His primary challenge is to fight host ratings and other Deckers.

The hybrid Decker follow their team into the hostile facility and is skilled and wired enough to pull his own weight in a firefight and sneaky enough to not draw unwanted attention. Doing almost all hacking from AR while on the move. Using the close proximity to establish physical direct connections to bypass host ratings and wired devices. But he is probably not skilled enough to fight security Deckers or extract host protected files. His primary challenge is to control devices while he and the rest of the team is breaking into a facility.

...waltz into one of Renraku's local subsidiaries, get to the top floor, access one of the research labs mainframes and get some schematics in an offline data store ...

In a shadowrun where you actually have a team of specialists then you would let the agile B&E expert place a data tap at the wireless OFF device inside the facility... then turn the data tap wireless ON... and voila! the long-distance-hot-sim-VR-technomancer-or-decker would have wireless access to the device no matter where in the world they are located(!)

Since the device is wireless OFF and not connected to the matrix it will be easy enough for anyone to hack once you gain access to it (since it can't be slaved to a host since hosts by definition only exist within the matrix to begin with)... this particular scenario will greatly benefit the second archetype (the on-premises-hybrid-AR-decker) over the first archetype (the long-distance-hot-sim-VR-technomancer-or-decker).

The first node of the network...

This doesn't sound very much like SR5 to be honest....

In SR5 there are no "nodes" or hosts within hosts.
You access the device, file or host etc. you want to access directly.
Without first hacking into a gateway / proxy / router / server -node and from there get access to other "nodes".




The facility might have an elevator device on the grid that might or might not be slaved to a host.

You can either attach a cable from your cyberdeck directly to the elevator which let you bypass host ratings, hack the elevator out on the grid (against host ratings - but there will be no IC out on the grid) or first hacking the device from the direct connection you get if you already are within the host.

A decker of the first archetype will probably hack the elevator on the grid, fighting host ratings. Possible using edge to not raise any alarms. Once he get a mark on the elevator he also have a mark on the host and can enter the host as a "legit" icon (and now he can hack other wireless security devices slaved to the host without fighting host ratings). He must do this close to the actual run since when he start to bend the matrix he will cause ripples that GOD will start to track... and he can't hack too many devices since his OS might increase for each time he perform an illegal sleaze or attack action. If he is forced to jack out he will have to fight host ratings again if he wish to enter the host anew.

A decker of the second archetype will probably go to the site and connect his cyberdeck to the elevator and thus bypass host ratings. Once he get a mark on the elevator he also get a mark on the host and can enter the host as a legit icon (and now he can hack other wireless security devices slaved to the host without fighting host ratings). The on-premises-hybrid-AR-decker doesn't really need to be a very skilled decker since he will bypass host ratings via direct connections through out the entire run.

A technomancer of the first archetype will probably go up early and hack the elevator (and the host it is slaved to) via the grid... many many hours before the actual run. Threading low level cleaner to reduce OS but still keep the mark. Once she get a mark on the elevator he also have a mark on the host and can enter the host as a "legit" icon (and now she can hack other wireless security devices slaved to the host without fighting host ratings). Several hours later, when it is time for the real run she will have marks on all security devices (such as cameras, drones, elevators...), traced all their physical locations (with real-time updates) and snooping all camera feeds and drone sensor readouts.

[deathwishjoe]

The challenge is an attempt to see how well deckers and 'mancers stack up to each other in what I would deem common situations we would see during actual play.  If technomancers can't stack up then hopefully this will be noticed by the game developers and well see some goodies come down the line in later supplements.  I remember looking over technomancers when 4rth edition was still very new and feeling like they were worse at char gen at hacking then standard hackers.  This was simply not true and really came down to my not understanding 4rth edition matrix rules.  a reasonably well designed technomancer even only using the main 4rth edition rulebook makes the matrix cry for its mommy in a corner.   Now I admit it took a few splat books to also make the technomancer decent in combat as well but that came with time and even some experience on my part when it came to optimizing characters.  I'm hoping that 5th edition will be similar to my experience in fourth.

The dedicated hacker (which probably also include most technomancers as they can't (ab)use the physical direct connection exploit) is the hacker archetype we are used to from earlier editions. They hack from their apartment or maybe in the rigger van. More often than not they hack from hot-sim VR and have big enough dice pools to fight security Deckers and even endure a a few combat turns against IC. They are skilled enough to gain access to a host without (ab)using a physical direct connection and they can also extract pay data and doctor protected files even if the file is protected by a host. If a device is wired the team will connect a wireless data tap for him which let him hack the device wireless from a safe distance. His primary challenge is to fight host ratings and other Deckers.

So as some sort of corporate goon in charge of matrix security I know I would want to have as much as I could if not all of the important company information stored on a host that was offline. Having important information connected to the matrix just seems to scream to hackers to "come and get me.  Pay data waiting." you would be like a red flag for any hacker organization who could pool its resources to cut through your defenses no matter how high the hosts matrix stats where.  I would almost suggest that if the goal for a Shadowrun was information on a host then by default if the Johnson is hiring a team of runners its offline. 

Now the wireless data tap tactic is a valid point.  .the team can run in and take out all the meat space guards or stealth their way in and install the data tap for the hacker allowing him to hack from the comfort of his apartment or the riggers van.   However there are indeed precautions that a corporation can take here as well.  the data tap still uses a wireless connection which can be hindered by wireless inhibiting wall paper or paint or stopped completely by a Faraday cage.  This would then be countered by using some sort of large cable as an antenna attached to the data tap you could roll out to the other side of the Faraday cage.  maybe it could be rolled to another floor or out a window.  The downside to this tactic is that guards are very likely to notice a new wire roll across the floor they normally patrol and a cord that long wouldn't be easy to hide very well.  This means the guards have to be eliminated before the tap and antenna can be installed.  This also more then likely gives the high threat response team more time to get on location and take the team out. 

Now from a GM stand point I would allow the paranoid agoraphobic hacker to use the rest of the team to install a data tap for him allowing him to work from home but after a few runs I would feel obligated to throw a wrench into the plan and try to make the hacker come along with the rest of the team.  If the hacker is nothing more then a liability in a firefight then at that point you might as well not have a hacker on the team. 

Since the device is wireless OFF and not connected to the matrix it will be easy enough for anyone to hack once you gain access to it (since it can't be slaved to a host since hosts by definition only exist within the matrix to begin with)... this particular scenario will greatly benefit the second archetype (the on-premises-hybrid-AR-decker) over the first archetype (the long-distance-hot-sim-VR-technomancer-or-decker).

I'm sorry I'm not as familiar with the rules for 5th edition as I was for 4th edition, but where is it written that all hosts must be connected to the matrix?   

This doesn't sound very much like SR5 to be honest....

In SR5 there are no "nodes" or hosts within hosts.
You access the device, file or host etc. you want to access directly.
Without first hacking into a gateway / proxy / router / server -node and from there get access to other "nodes".

To be honest your right.  The idea for the system comes from some examples listed in 4rth editions Unwired book.  However I expect similar examples of matrix security to be shown in any upcoming matrix splat book. I feel having a multi-tier defense protocol system like this seems like it should fall under basic matrix security design.  Aside from the costs why shouldn't I be able to have a host that is only connected to one other host and requires multiple security authentications in order to access.

While the rules don't explicitly point it out and say that yes this is permissible I'm not aware of anywhere the rules say this cannot be done anymore. I feel however that while I have taken a bit of creative liscence with the rules in this area it does indeed pose a challenge for prospect hackers to work through.

A decker of the second archetype will probably go to the site and connect his cyberdeck to the elevator and thus bypass host ratings

While as a GM I would allow this, because the host rating is at 4 I dont see any reason why the device rating for the elevator control unit cant be 4 as well.  It would bypass the IC on the host I suppose but I'd also require a hardware test to open up some sort of panel to get to the device which could also set off an alert.  I'll adjust the original post though with an update to reflect this possibility.

hack the elevator out on the grid

While the host would have access to some sort of internal wireless network allowing communication between the guards I really dont see a need for the host to be connected to the matrix as a whole.  In fact from a security stand point I really don't want it to have a presence on the matrix.  I would ideally set it up so that by utilizing chains of low power wireless signal repeaters (which I realize haven't been introduced yet with this new edition) and wireless inhibiting wall paper making it impossible to access the host off company property and very difficult outside the building if not impossible as well. 

The way I see it there are 4 primary challenges to overcome. 

1. first challenge is the question of whether or not your character can take two surprised un-augmented mooks down.  This should be pretty easy for anyone who has put forth any sort of effort into making sure the character can contribute in a fire fight. 

2. the next portion asks can the character hack a low level host or device in order to access the elevator.  If this poses a problem you probably need to work more on making a better hacker cause you suck at it. IMO a respectable hacker should be able to do this sort of thing with ease and be able to do it repeatedly.

3. Then the one guard on the third level asks can you go toe to toe with a mook whose ready for you, armed to a moderate level (SMG rather then pistol and better armor) and is using a solid amount of initiative enhancers?  while not as powerful as an optimized street sam he should pose a solid physical threat to be dealt with.  If you can take out this level of power in a firefight then if your out on a run and your team gets hit by another team of runners or something comparable you will definitely not be a liability and should even assist quite a bit in the fight. 

4. While I realize the last portion of the challenge bends the rules as they currently are I strongly suspect that such things will be implicitly allowed in later books.  I pulled some of its inspiration from one of the free Denver missions available for 4rth edition (I don't remember which) which had an Ares? server one could hack with outrageously high stats.  most of my hackers with rating 6 stealth programs couldn't get in reliably  where as the technomancer with his stealth threaded to 10 or so could slip in quite easily.  The tiers on this portion will allow us to more accurately measure those who fall short of the most difficult "node" and hopefully give us a better comparison between the two archetypes.  With out having a ton of experience designing matrix challenges in this edition and how tough they should be to push characters, my hope is that this one will pose a challenge to both deckers and technomancers but we will see shortly.

I've explained why I think hackers need to be able to contribute to a fight and why I feel a hacker that can go on location during a run is superior to one that stays in a van or at home during the run.  The corner cases that require a hacker to be there I feel will pop up enough to warrant having this ability.  This will also possibly put to rest one of the primary arguments against technomancers in that deckers can contribute in a fight due to being able to afford more cyberware and essence loss. 

I've also gone over each portion of this challenge and why I put it there in the first place.  I feel that any rules bending I have done have only been to provide a better challenge and more accurate comparison of power level.  I ideally would want others with some experience playing one archetype or another to make a character and run it through but if there aren't any takers I suppose I'll make a decker here sometimes next week and run him through.  If that goes well I have some ideas for a technomancer I will try after another short waiting period to see if anybody in the community wants to try it out.

[8-bit]

Since the device is wireless OFF and not connected to the matrix it will be easy enough for anyone to hack once you gain access to it (since it can't be slaved to a host since hosts by definition only exist within the matrix to begin with)... this particular scenario will greatly benefit the second archetype (the on-premises-hybrid-AR-decker) over the first archetype (the long-distance-hot-sim-VR-technomancer-or-decker).

I'm sorry I'm not as familiar with the rules for 5th edition as I was for 4th edition, but where is it written that all hosts must be connected to the matrix?   

In SR5, hosts exist only in the matrix. Think of them as enormous semi-autonomous programs that provide security and ease of access by linking together devices. They aren't based in the real world, they are literally just matrix code.

This doesn't sound very much like SR5 to be honest....

In SR5 there are no "nodes" or hosts within hosts.
You access the device, file or host etc. you want to access directly.
Without first hacking into a gateway / proxy / router / server -node and from there get access to other "nodes".

To be honest your right.  The idea for the system comes from some examples listed in 4rth editions Unwired book.  However I expect similar examples of matrix security to be shown in any upcoming matrix splat book. I feel having a multi-tier defense protocol system like this seems like it should fall under basic matrix security design.  Aside from the costs why shouldn't I be able to have a host that is only connected to one other host and requires multiple security authentications in order to access.

While the rules don't explicitly point it out and say that yes this is permissible I'm not aware of anywhere the rules say this cannot be done anymore. I feel however that while I have taken a bit of creative liscence with the rules in this area it does indeed pose a challenge for prospect hackers to work through.

The reason why a host cannot be only connected to another host is that they are based entirely in the Matrix, and therefore have no physical location. I'm not familiar with SR4, but with SR5, you can literally log onto a host from anywhere in the world with no noise penalities due to distance since there is no physical distance between you and the host. Everything in the Matrix is technically connected to everything else in the Matrix, you can access any device from any other device, although you might get penalties due to noise, have to fight through protection, etc.

If the host is running silent, it uses it's sleaze rating, it doesn't mean it's impossible to spot. If a hacker knows it's there and spots it, then the hacker can try to sleaze a mark onto it. Of course, if a host is running silent and meant to have no marks, as soon as it notices that it has a mark, the hacker's stealth has been compromised and the host starts taking serious defensive (as well as offensive) measures.

Currently, the only way to beef up defenses is to have a higher rating host. However, if you want to take some liberties, what you can do is have the host be Admin only. Currently, 1 mark = user, 2 marks = Editor? (some middle tier level of access), 3 marks = Admin, and 4 marks (which is impossible to get without being the owner) = Owner. If you really want to make is impossible, you can make it so you have to be the Owner of the host to access it, which would mean that someone would have to pull data out of the host to make is accessible. However, that is pretty unfeasible. If you make it Admin however, you need 3 marks to even get into the host, which means your OS is gonna start to rack up if it's a higher level host, and if you fail your sleaze test? Well then, the Host notices you, get's a mark on you, and you literally cannot enter it without IC being launched, which makes it rather hard to hack (although, technomancer sprites might mess some of that up). Note however, that this is a seriously extreme representation that is not even defined in the rules. However, this is understandable, as it basically makes it so that only people who are supposed to access the host can access it. This kind of host is not something you hack at Chargen; this kind of security is probably reserved for AAA Megacorporation Headquarters or some trillion nuyen experimental facility.

A decker of the second archetype will probably go to the site and connect his cyberdeck to the elevator and thus bypass host ratings

While as a GM I would allow this, because the host rating is at 4 I dont see any reason why the device rating for the elevator control unit cant be 4 as well.  It would bypass the IC on the host I suppose but I'd also require a hardware test to open up some sort of panel to get to the device which could also set off an alert.  I'll adjust the original post though with an update to reflect this possibility.

Sure, the elevator control unit can be at rating 4, which is ridiculously high for such simple usage of a device. If someone is that paranoid about being hacked, they make it so that you have to access it wirelessly through the host. Also, you don't have to open up some sort of panel (unless they're paranoid like I said), since every single device has a universal adapter port that can be accessed by someone with a datajack (which isn't useful for technomancers, and there isn't skinlink in this edition, sure you can use trodes, but it's not the same).

hack the elevator out on the grid

While the host would have access to some sort of internal wireless network allowing communication between the guards I really dont see a need for the host to be connected to the matrix as a whole.  In fact from a security stand point I really don't want it to have a presence on the matrix.  I would ideally set it up so that by utilizing chains of low power wireless signal repeaters (which I realize haven't been introduced yet with this new edition) and wireless inhibiting wall paper making it impossible to access the host off company property and very difficult outside the building if not impossible as well. 

I know I went over this earlier, but a host is not a device. It has 0 presence in the physical world. It is a collection of software that exists in the omnipresent Matrix, so it can be accessed from anywhere in the world, as long as you don't mind not being able to hack something in it's WAN to get easier access. I have no clue how it worked in SR4, but in SR5, there is no seperate places on the Matrix. Sure, there are grids, but grids can always be hacked onto, as they need to be able to connect to the rest of the matrix to perform even the most routine of operations. If you don't want it to have a presence, have it run silent. It works just like a character does. However, a low rating host is meant to be hacked into from a game viewpoint. Otherwise, what's the point of having a hacker? Might as well just blow buildings up to get through your runs, er... some people do that anyways. If you really, and I mean really, want to be super paranoid and hard to hack. Make every single damn thing in the building wired. However, you don't get a host to defend stuff, and people can tap a wired connection anyways. Hosts are generally considered more secure.

The way I see it there are 4 primary challenges to overcome. 

1. first challenge is the question of whether or not your character can take two surprised un-augmented mooks down.  This should be pretty easy for anyone who has put forth any sort of effort into making sure the character can contribute in a fire fight. 

All right, just about anyone can do that with an assault rifle. Need to have 2 action passes at least, but not difficult.

2. the next portion asks can the character hack a low level host or device in order to access the elevator.  If this poses a problem you probably need to work more on making a better hacker cause you suck at it. IMO a respectable hacker should be able to do this sort of thing with ease and be able to do it repeatedly.

Yes, a hacker should be able to do this easily. However, I should note that unless you make the elevator's universal access port hard to access, they can just hack it directly (well, not a technomancer, but you get the idea). A low level host should hopefully not stop people, unless you build a different technomancer build.

3. Then the one guard on the third level asks can you go toe to toe with a mook whose ready for you, armed to a moderate level (SMG rather then pistol and better armor) and is using a solid amount of initiative enhancers?  while not as powerful as an optimized street sam he should pose a solid physical threat to be dealt with.  If you can take out this level of power in a firefight then if your out on a run and your team gets hit by another team of runners or something comparable you will definitely not be a liability and should even assist quite a bit in the fight. 

Starting to get a little heavy with your expectations here. Can you go one on one? Sure, why not? He has less stuff than you and you have roughly the same Physical Boxes. However, as a test for a Decker/Technomancer, that will be all your doing. I would rather have a hacker who can brick people's guns, shut down their security system, and protect my stuff. If they can take out a guy, then great, that's swell. That's the point of having a whole team, rather than one man. If my team gets hit by another set of runners, I want my decker standing way in the back, preferably in some armored vehicle, where they can brick my enemies' guns, protect our own PANs and in general perform Cybercombat. Oh, and destroy those rigger drones, because that technically gets rid of extra guns and combatants without firing a bullet. Nonetheless, I agree that any hacker who doesn't have the ability to shoot a gun is a bad hacker. Just realize that they have better things they can do.

4. While I realize the last portion of the challenge bends the rules as they currently are I strongly suspect that such things will be implicitly allowed in later books.  I pulled some of its inspiration from one of the free Denver missions available for 4rth edition (I don't remember which) which had an Ares? server one could hack with outrageously high stats.  most of my hackers with rating 6 stealth programs couldn't get in reliably  where as the technomancer with his stealth threaded to 10 or so could slip in quite easily.  The tiers on this portion will allow us to more accurately measure those who fall short of the most difficult "node" and hopefully give us a better comparison between the two archetypes.  With out having a ton of experience designing matrix challenges in this edition and how tough they should be to push characters, my hope is that this one will pose a challenge to both deckers and technomancers but we will see shortly.

In this case, a rating 4 host is most likely a cakewalk. I have seen a decker do his thing, and it took about a rating 6 host (this guy is straight out of chargen, and it wasn't even the most optimized) to pose a challenge. Technomancers are very hard to balance on the priority table, and the main problem is that you need to thread really creatively to do stuff. For example, a decker can hack with his dicepool of 16-20 against a host, and with his cyberdeck having his Sleaze at 7, he can count 7 hits. The technomancer can hack with his dicepool of about 12-16, but can only use a number of hits equal to his Sleaze, or Logic in this case. If he doesn't have a good Logic, well, tough luck. The technomancer can turn to another place if he wants to; Sprites. He can supercompile a Sprite that can hack extremely well, but there are a couple of problems. First, limited amount of tasks they can have, so a limited amount of stuff you can use them for. Second, fading. A level 10 Sprite will cause you somewhere around 6-10S fading, resist with Resonance + Willpower. Granted, it can be less fading, but it's still annoying and still applies wound penalties and such.

I've explained why I think hackers need to be able to contribute to a fight and why I feel a hacker that can go on location during a run is superior to one that stays in a van or at home during the run.  The corner cases that require a hacker to be there I feel will pop up enough to warrant having this ability.  This will also possibly put to rest one of the primary arguments against technomancers in that deckers can contribute in a fight due to being able to afford more cyberware and essence loss. 

I've also gone over each portion of this challenge and why I put it there in the first place.  I feel that any rules bending I have done have only been to provide a better challenge and more accurate comparison of power level.  I ideally would want others with some experience playing one archetype or another to make a character and run it through but if there aren't any takers I suppose I'll make a decker here sometimes next week and run him through.  If that goes well I have some ideas for a technomancer I will try after another short waiting period to see if anybody in the community wants to try it out.

I think this challenge is a very interesting concept, but maybe it's just me, it seems the Technomancer will probably lose every time. Decker's have a limit that they reach after a while, and eventually they have to have obscene amounts of money to get farther, however, at the beginning they seem to be stronger. The Technomancer, on the other hand, can become nearly infinitely powerful, provided they are given a ton of Karma. To me, it comes down to this. If you want someone who is really good at pretty much everything in the Matrix, and can still interact reasonably well in the meatworld, you get a decker. If you want someone unique and interesting to play because of his/her connection to the Resonance and all the cool stuff that comes with it, you get a technomancer. Technomancers can be really good at a few things in the matrix, while still being useful in the meatworld, or they can be pretty damn good at almost everything in the Matrix, but really useless in the meatworld. Now, maybe if you put a lot of karma into a Technomancer, you can do well, but at character creation, I just don't see it happening.

Perhaps I don't have a good understanding of technomancers, and someone can prove me wrong. Hell, someone prove me wrong, this is something that bothers me and is on my mind. Until we get an in-depth Matrix book, I just don't think this sort of challenge can be conducted reasonably. These are my views, but I wish you luck in your challenge.

[Ryo]

Technomancers have a few fundamental problems with them that make them inherently worse than deckers in 5th edition. Sadly, you will not find a repeat of how it worked in 4th. As written, Technomancers are just bad.

The most crippling problem Technomancers have is the priority system itself. They are priority starved, needing three high priorities to be built effectively. A Technomancer needs high Resonance to be a technomancer at all, needs high Skills since they need three skill groups to be competent both at normal hacking and using sprites, and needs high Attributes because their Matrix attributes are equal to their Mental attributes, requiring them to beef up 4 attributes as high as they can. You're hard pressed making a technomancer that is even good at being a hacker, let alone able to also function outside of the matrix.

Comparatively, a decker only has two high priority needs: Skills and Resources. As long as he can get two skill groups worth of skills and enough cash to afford a deck, he has free reign over what to do with the rest of his priorities. And high resources naturally lets him mitigate sacrificing Attributes a bit, since he can grab numerous augmentations to bring his stats up with his spare money.

The second big issue Technomancers have is a complete lack of ways to deal with Noise. A decker can come out of character creation with 3 points of Noise cancellation from the Signal Scrub program and a wireless datajack. Technomancers have zero means of doing the same. None. The best they can do is get Signal Scrub as a resonance program, which takes submerging for an echo. And if you use the book by RAW, that costs a minimum of 30 karma, for something that costs a decker 80 nuyen. (Obviously its a typo that badly needs errata, but even 13 karma for an 80 nuyen program is nonsense.)

The third big issue Technomancers have is that they aren't allowed to form PANs, making them pretty useless as a defensive hacker protecting your team's gear. This is just a straight up nerf from 4th, and was totally unnecessary.

And the fourth big issue technomancers have is an inability to form a Direct Connection. Every cyberdeck, control rig, commlink and datajack comes with a built in retractable plug for Direct Connections, and technos get no ability to duplicate this. And this is a big deal, since Direct Connections let you bypass noise as well as ignore the firewall of a master while hacking a slave. And while a Data Tap is one way for a technomancer to get access to a wirelessly inactive device, it does not grant a Direct Connection over wireless: you have to be directly connected to the data tap to be directly connected to the device it's plugged into.

So in conclusion, Technomancers will have smaller dice pools off the bat out of creation, because they have less points to spread around in all the things they need to get. They will have lower limits out of creation, because their limits are equal to their mental attributes, and they can't Reconfigure like a decker, nor load the +1 programs, to set their limits higher on the fly. And they will also tend to have higher dice pool penalties on top of that, because they can't do anything about noise.

The only way to really build a successful Technomancer is to completely ignore the Cracking group and rely entirely on compiling sprites and using complex forms.

[Xenon]

...stored on a host that was offline...

A Host only exist within the Matrix.
By definition you can't store a file in an "offline" Host.

You can store a file on a wireless OFF device.
There are actually specific devices designed for this,
SR5 p. 440 Datachip:
For occasions when you want to transfer data by physical means—like bringing the project specs on the competition’s new cyberdeck to Mr. Johnson in person at the meet—a datachip can hold enormous quantitites of data in a small finger-sized chip, accessible by any electronic device. Datachips have no wireless capability, so you need to plug them into a universal data connector (found on any device) if you want to read or write to them.

But even a wireless OFF, Throwback device or a Datachip have a Universal Data Connector that you can connect to and get access to the file. And unlike a file that is stored "on-line" in a Host, the file in a device will only defend with owner ratings instead of (the potentially much higher) Host ratings.

...the data tap still uses a wireless connection which can be hindered by wireless inhibiting wall paper or paint or stopped completely by a Faraday cage. 

This is true.
And in situations like that you rather want an on-premises-hybrid-AR-decker over a long-distance-hot-sim-VR-technomancer-or-decker (a wireless OFF device, a Throwback device or a Datachip cannot, by definition, be slaved to a Host so hacking it will be relatively easy as the File will only defend with owner ratings).

However, Pay Data can also be Protected and stored in a Host.
To get a mark on a file in a Host you need to fight Host Ratings (which might very well mean an opposed test pool of double digits!). To Crack the File Protection you need to use an Attack action. Once successful the Host will automatically know it is under attack and will now launch IC and it's Patrol IC will start to search for the "Icon that attacked the File". If you are not running silent by now you will automatically be spotted. To Edit the file after you got a mark on it and cracked the protection you need to fight Host Ratings again(!). For situations like this you rather want a dedicated long-distance-hot-sim-VR-technomancer-or-decker as an on-premises-hybrid-AR-decker don't have near the dice pools to accomplish this unless they get lucky (have a lot of Edge to use) and/or it's a low-ish rating Host.

...where is it written that all hosts must be connected to the matrix?   

SR5 p. 216 Host:
A self-contained place in the Matrix. Hosts have no physical location, as they exist purely in the Matrix cloud.

While as a GM I would allow this, because the host rating is at 4 I dont see any reason why the device rating for the elevator control unit cant be 4 as well. 

Can, yes. But rather unlikely.
A host with rating 4 would just be a Low-end commercial, private business, public libraries, small policlubs.
An Elevator Device slaved to a rating 4 host would probably be a rating 2 device or so.
(device ratings only goes up to rating 6 and host ratings goes all the way up to 12).

A device with rating 4 would be a high-end betaware security device.

Also,
A device with device rating 4 would defend with 8 dice
A host with host rating 4 would defend with 8-11 dice

[Xenon]

The most crippling problem Technomancers have is the priority system itself.

You could build a technomancer that skip sprites and threading and just play it like a decker (not sure why you want to do that since sprites and complex forms are awesome sauce, you you could). She would need to invest into mental attributes, but if you don't plan on using complex forms or sprites you don't even need more than a moderate resonance attribute.....

Also,
Investing into mental attributes post chargen both increase matrix attributes and mental attributes at once.
...and a decker can't really expect to ever earn enough money to get better matrix attributes.

(Another option to "save" karma is by dumping charisma and use some of the Karma to buy Focused Concentration and sustain Infusion of Attack; for times when you need a higher attack rating)

The second big issue Technomancers have is a complete lack of ways to deal with Noise.

Noise is an issue, yes. But I don't agree that they completely lack ways to deal with it...
They might have access to Resonance Channel which can be used to reduce noise due to distance.
They might have access to Transcendent Grid to remove the negative dice pool penalty due to public grid and/or working cross grids.

The third big issue Technomancers have is that they aren't allowed to form PANs

Nothing that stop a TM to form a PAN on a device rating 6 commlink....

(and by RAW it is actually not crystal clear if a decker can use his cyberdeck as a master device in a PAN when he form a persona on it since the cyberdeck device icon will be replaced by his persona icon and a persona of a decker cannot be a master of a PAN anymore than a living persona of a technomancer).

And the fourth big issue technomancers have is an inability to form a Direct Connection.

This is a real disadvantage that make TMs unfit to be a on-premises-hybrid-AR-decker.

But compared to a dedicated long-distance-hot-sim-VR-decker the dedicated long-distance-hot-sim-VR-technomancer doesn't really have any disadvantages (as Physical Direct Connections does not help you when Marking, Cracking and Editing files located in high rating hosts - which is what a dedicated decker will have most challenges with anyway)

Actually quite the opposite. One thing that a long-distance-hot-sim-VR-technomancer have that make her unique is that she might have access to the complex form Cleaner. A TM with that complex form can thread low level Cleaner to stay ahead of GOD while she gain marks on virtually all devices, snoop all cameras and drones and trace the physical location of all security guard PANs in the entire facility... Hours before the actual shadowrun(!) A decker can only keep his marks for an hour or two (less if he want to mark, trace and snoop multiple devices and GOD will pretty much always manage to converge on a decker before he manage to mark, trace and snoop all devices in a facility).



Something a TM can do that a Decker can never hope to achieve is to hack 3 marks on a rigger's vehicle, use puppeteer to force the rigger to leave the captains chair and then use Mind over Machine to jump in. Since a rigger don't have an attack attribute and since jumping in is the highest control order there is nothing the rigger can do to force the TM out of his own vehicle or even issue any commands at all to it

...And while a Data Tap is one way for a technomancer to get access to a wirelessly inactive device, it does not grant a Direct Connection over wireless: you have to be directly connected to the data tap to be directly connected to the device it's plugged into.

True, you don't get to bypass master ratings when hacking a wireless OFF or Throwback device with a wireless Data Tap, but then again a wireless OFF or Throwback device will not be slaved to a Host (since Hosts only exists within the Matrix). So odds are you will not need to fight huge double digit dice pools when hacking wired security anyway (the big advantage of bypassing master ratings is quite diminished when you are specifically talking about wired devices).

But yes, wired security combined with wireless inhibiting wall paper or a Faraday cage will force the hacker on site and for this a on-premises-hybrid-AR-decker would be a much better option than both a dedicated long-distance-hot-sim-VR-technomancer or a dedicated long-distance-hot-sim-VR-decker.

The only way to really build a successful Technomancer is to completely ignore the Cracking group and rely entirely on compiling sprites and using complex forms.

I would not say this is the only way to successfully build a TM, but yes, this is another viable option (which might be quite fun actually).

Other odd examples we seen here on the forums that also seem to work quite well include the mastermind / technomancer hybrid that use sensory input from various devices, hot-sim VR initiative and multiple Leadership rolls to guide and buff her team.

[Ryo]

You could build a technomancer that skip sprites and threading and just play it like a decker (not sure why you want to do that since sprites and complex forms are awesome sauce, you you could). She would need to invest into mental attributes, but if you don't plan on using complex forms or sprites you don't even need more than a moderate resonance attribute.....

That would still be a much worse hacker than a mundane decker, as deciding to forgo sprites just saves you from having to purchase one skill group. You skill need high Skills to get both Cracking and Electronics, and you still need at least Resonance C to be a technomancer at all.

Also,
Investing into mental attributes post chargen both increase matrix attributes and mental attributes at once.
...and a decker can't really expect to ever earn enough money to get better matrix attributes.

I heartily disagree with this being an advantage. It's a karma sink.

First and foremost, lets look at the best possible combination of matrix attributes available to a Technomancer. A typical human Technomancer can have an array of 6 5 5 5, with their 6 placed wherever they deem most important. Maybe they max Intuition because they want 6 sleaze, or maybe they max Logic because they want to improve the majority of their rolls, and end up with a 6 in Data Processing. Or maybe they stick it in Willpower for 6 Firewall. Whatever the case may be, they have 6 5 5 5, and cannot reconfigure these at all. Other possibilities are 7 6 5 5 for an Elf, with the 7 in Attack, 8 5 5 5 for an Elf, with an 8 in Attack, 7 5 5 5 for a Dwarf, with the 7 in Firewall, 6 6 5 5 for the Dwarf, with one of the sixes in Firewall, 7 6 5 5 for the dwarf with Exceptional Attribute allowing for that second 6, 8 6 5 5 for the Elf using Exceptional Attribute, or even 9 5 5 5 on the Exceptional Elf.

No matter what metatype or Exceptional Attribute combo you go with, you're most likely going to end up with your highest possible matrix attribute being a 7, with everything else at 5, with maybe a 6 in there. If you're gung ho about Attack, you can get a 9, but only in Attack. The 7 can only be Attack or Firewall, and none of these attributes can be reconfigured.

By contrast, a starting Decker can have a Sony CIY-750, with an array of 7 6 5 4. However, he also has +1 programs available to him, so he can increase any of those attributes by 1, or if he wants to use all four of his program slots for higher attributes, all of them, giving him an array of 8 7 6 5. He can also put those numbers anywhere he pleases. Need an 8 in Sleaze right now? No problem. Specifically in the case of Sleaze, he also has access to Exploit, which lets him go up to a possible limit of 10 on Sleaze at character creation. It is physically impossible to achieve that with a technomancer, as no metatype gets bonuses to intuition, and even if they were willing to sacrifice resonance for augmentations, there are no augments for Intuition.

Now, what about your comment about increasing the matrix attributes with Karma? Well, let's assume you're a Human with Exceptional Attribute to get 6 6 5 5. First thing you want to do is get your 7 and then get 6s across the board. That costs you 95 karma. But 7 6 6 6 isn't good enough, The decker basically had that at creation with his Sony CIY-750 running two programs. So you start submerging, getting each of the Upgrade echoes twice. that puts you at 9 8 8 8, and costs another 183 karma to get to Submersion Grade 8. But wait, your grade maximum is equal to your Resonance attribute, so you can't get to 8. Then let's give you the benefit of the doubt and assume you started at Resonance 6, and add the cost to get to 8. That's a total of 258 karma, plus the 90 you already spent on raising your mental attributes, you've now spent a total of 348 karma.

Going by the Run Rewards table, the average run will net you 5 karma and between 9,000 and 21,000 nuyen. So lets go with an even 15,000 nuyen per run. By the time you've earned 348 karma, you'd have earned 1,044,000 nuyen. That's enough to buy a Fairlight Excalibur with 220,750 to spare, not counting the cost of fencing your old deck. So while you have attributes of 9 8 8 8, the decker can now have 10 9 8 7 with 2 program slots to spare on anything else. If he tosses Exploit into the mix, he can have a Sleaze of 12 on Hack on the Fly. Not to mention the decker also earned 348 karma, and he didn't have to blow it all on raising his matrix stats. So he now has the Cracking group at 12, with 63 karma to spare. Assuming he started the game with Logic 6, Intuition 5 and Willpower 5, He can upgrade Intuition and Willpower to 6, and then buy a rating 3 cerebral booster with his leftover cash to get Logic to 9. He's now throwing dice pools of more than 20 dice on just about everything, with a limit in the double digits.

And that's assuming the GM never throws the decker a bone and lets him steal a higher level deck off an enemy decker. It is always easier to get nuyen and gear than it is to get karma.

Noise is an issue, yes. But I don't agree that they completely lack ways to deal with it...
They might have access to Resonance Channel which can be used to reduce noise due to distance.
They might have access to Transcendent Grid to remove the negative dice pool penalty due to public grid and/or working cross grids.

And neither one of those deal with the most common way you'd get noise; just by being in a high noise area. The default assumption for noise in Chicago, where Missions is being run right now, is 2. That's a 2 dice pool penalty that Technomancers can do nothing about, in the current official shadowrun campaign.

Nothing that stop a TM to form a PAN on a device rating 6 commlink....

Nothing to stop everyone else on the team from doing that either. Deckers are still innately better at being the head of a team PAN, not only because they can get higher firewall, but because they have access to Wrapper. Running all the gear on the team silent might draw attention, but making all their smartguns look like credsticks is a lot harder to spot.

This is a real disadvantage that make TMs unfit to be a on-premises-hybrid-AR-decker.

But compared to a dedicated long-distance-hot-sim-VR-decker the dedicated long-distance-hot-sim-VR-technomancer doesn't really have any disadvantages (as Physical Direct Connections does not help you when Marking, Cracking and Editing files located in high rating hosts - which is what a dedicated decker will have most challenges with anyway)

Actually quite the opposite. One thing that a long-distance-hot-sim-VR-technomancer have that make her unique is that she might have access to the complex form Cleaner. A TM with that complex form can thread low level Cleaner to stay ahead of GOD while she gain marks on virtually all devices, snoop all cameras and drones and trace the physical location of all security guard PANs in the entire facility... Hours before the actual shadowrun(!) A decker can only keep his marks for an hour or two (less if he want to mark, trace and snoop multiple devices and GOD will pretty much always manage to converge on a decker before he manage to mark, trace and snoop all devices in a facility).

Cleaner is not nearly that good, and if you're trying to hack all the things, it will not keep up with the overwatch you're generating before you knock yourself out from Fading. Static Veil is more decent, assuming you have Focused Concentration to prevent yet another -2 penalty on all your dice pools.

Something a TM can do that a Decker can never hope to achieve is to hack 3 marks on a rigger's vehicle, use puppeteer to force the rigger to leave the captains chair and then use Mind over Machine to jump in. Since a rigger don't have an attack attribute and since jumping in is the highest control order there is nothing the rigger can do to force the TM out of his own vehicle or even issue any commands at all to it

There are plenty of things Technomancers can do with Puppeteer that deckers can't do at all, but that's one complex form that is more likely to blow your own brains out than to actually work. If you get lucky on dice rolls and actually pull off Puppeteer, good for you. Doesn't change the fact that every other aspect of the technomancer pales in comparison to the decker.

True, you don't get to bypass master ratings when hacking a wireless OFF or Throwback device with a wireless Data Tap, but then again a wireless OFF or Throwback device will not be slaved to a Host (since Hosts only exists within the Matrix). So odds are you will not need to fight huge double digit dice pools when hacking wired security anyway (the big advantage of bypassing master ratings is quite diminished when you are specifically talking about wired devices).

Nothing stops it from being slaved to another device in the building via the wiring, like a central server based on a Fairlight Caliban with a device rating of 7. 14 dice on resistance is still a pain in the ass.

I would not say this is the only way to successfully build a TM, but yes, this is another viable option (which might be quite fun actually).

Other odd examples we seen here on the forums that also seem to work quite well include the mastermind / technomancer hybrid that use sensory input from various devices, hot-sim VR initiative and multiple Leadership rolls to guide and buff her team.

Only way that still resembles being a hacker. You just have your sprites do all the hacking, and support them with complex forms.

[deathwishjoe]

So I have to say I'm very disappointed in the new matrix rules.  If anything I feel like the matrix is less secure now in this edition then in the previous edition.  I'm sure with them bringing decks back as a thing that several low end hackers dropped out of the game since they couldn't afford a new shiny deck costing several hundreds of thousand dollars but any really good hacker in the world probably had enough in savings to buy one right off the bat.  And certainly while technomancer may have had a bit of a learning curve with the new matrix protocols but I don't see the changes causing any of them to retire.

Now under the previous matrix rules one could have a virtual environment guarded by IC and spiders that could only be accessed on company property.  Your company employees get the added productivity benefits of working on there projects in VR.  Faster initiative means more work done in an hour then in meat space not to mention a few employees using hot VR for an extra edge to try and get that upcoming promotion. All of the important company data would be highly secured on sight with as much physical and matrix security as you wanted to put into it. 

If an Ares executive wanted its research protected it could put it all on a high end military grade node with several combat trained spiders and black IC that can only be accessed after going through a fortress guarded by an on site high threat response team, security riggers using drones and turrets, paracritters like hell hounds and highly trained corporate security guards.

sure a team of shadow-runners could conceivably breach your secure fortress and a hacker could steal whatever paydata was on that ultra violet node but dam,.it would take an epic team to pull it off and even then there would be alot of luck involved. 

Now with hosts being always connected to the matrix and part of the matrix "cloud"  there doesn't seem to be any comparable way of defending ones information while still having a virtual environment for employees to work in.  Now I can kind of see how having the hardware portion of hosts spread across the matrix with what I would suppose are multiple if not enumerable back ups would make the matrix as a whole more difficult to take down or be damaged by malware or crazy rogue AI's.  while the matrix as a whole is possibly more secure from these crazy corner case threats of apocalyptic nature I would venture that corporations have much more to fear from relatively small groups of skilled hackers working together and stealing your data. 

with out admittedly having actually run the numbers I feel a few really good hackers with solid equipment backed up by technomancers buffing them with complex forms and sprite support could raid a rating 12 host raping and pillaging the place until anything and everything they wanted was copied.

I do have a few ideas that might provide hope but there not looking very useful at the moment.   

I thought possibly that I could use the noise rules to limit access to a host.  Maybe surrounding the corresponding physical location of the matrix location where the host resides with the Faraday cage. this would require the hacker be on the inside of the cage in order to access the host.  However with the source of the software that represents the host not being inside the cage as well and wireless signals not being able to penetrate the cage means there can be no host inside the cage. 

Now I do remember seeing a reference stating that some hosts had a set up that meant they could only be entered by doors as opposed to just touching the outer surface of the host to gain access.  This might mean that we could prevent access to the door of the host using the Faraday cage with out turning the location of the host into something that causes a 404 page not found error. In order for this to be an effective form of matrix defense certain rules would have to be in effect in the new matrix protocols.  The Faraday cage would by necessity not be complete as employees would need line of effect from inside the cage to the door of host.  This would also allow wireless signal to enter the inside of the cage and possibly allow matrix persona's to teleport inside the cage. Matrix protocol may allow this or may prevent someones persona from moving through a hosts icon. I'm not certain one way or the other.  If we combine the possibility that one cannot teleport through an icon to get to the door with the possibility that the host can control where people are deposited when leaving a host then the host could deposit certain persona's into a Faraday cage hallway leading to another host allowing the tier type architecture I described earlier.  However this is allot of ifs.

Finally I also remember some reference to another security feature not in the previous edition.  Namely archived files.  Unfortunately this was not fleshed out very well and will hopefully have more rules in the soon to be written hacking book. 

I currently have a few ideas of how a technomancer could be built to also be rather deadly in meat space but I am not certain how effective it would be at hacking afterwards.   

First and foremost, lets look at the best possible combination of matrix attributes available to a Technomancer. A typical human Technomancer can have an array of 6 5 5 5, with their 6 placed wherever they deem most important. Maybe they max Intuition because they want 6 sleaze, or maybe they max Logic because they want to improve the majority of their rolls, and end up with a 6 in Data Processing. Or maybe they stick it in Willpower for 6 Firewall. Whatever the case may be, they have 6 5 5 5, and cannot reconfigure these at all. Other possibilities are 7 6 5 5 for an Elf, with the 7 in Attack, 8 5 5 5 for an Elf, with an 8 in Attack, 7 5 5 5 for a Dwarf, with the 7 in Firewall, 6 6 5 5 for the Dwarf, with one of the sixes in Firewall, 7 6 5 5 for the dwarf with Exceptional Attribute allowing for that second 6, 8 6 5 5 for the Elf using Exceptional Attribute, or even 9 5 5 5 on the Exceptional Elf.

No matter what metatype or Exceptional Attribute combo you go with, you're most likely going to end up with your highest possible matrix attribute being a 7, with everything else at 5, with maybe a 6 in there. If you're gung ho about Attack, you can get a 9, but only in Attack. The 7 can only be Attack or Firewall, and none of these attributes can be reconfigured.

By contrast, a starting Decker can have a Sony CIY-750, with an array of 7 6 5 4. However, he also has +1 programs available to him, so he can increase any of those attributes by 1, or if he wants to use all four of his program slots for higher attributes, all of them, giving him an array of 8 7 6 5. He can also put those numbers anywhere he pleases. Need an 8 in Sleaze right now? No problem. Specifically in the case of Sleaze, he also has access to Exploit, which lets him go up to a possible limit of 10 on Sleaze at character creation. It is physically impossible to achieve that with a technomancer, as no metatype gets bonuses to intuition, and even if they were willing to sacrifice resonance for augmentations, there are no augments for Intuition.

I have a question on how important matrix attributes are versus the dice pools a character possesses.  with a matrix attribute being say 7 that requires on average 21 dice in the dice pool to meet the limit that the matrix attribute imposes on a character.  Can we even push a non awakened decker into the realm of that large of a dice pool or are we just being overly hopeful that we'll get allot of successes on a smaller dice pool?

There are plenty of things Technomancers can do with Puppeteer that deckers can't do at all, but that's one complex form that is more likely to blow your own brains out than to actually work. If you get lucky on dice rolls and actually pull off Puppeteer, good for you. Doesn't change the fact that every other aspect of the technomancer pales in comparison to the decker.

Puppeteer seems like it could be a very powerful complex form.  With a force 2 threading of the form you can get 3 marks on any device for only needing 5 fading to resist.  can we push the fade resistance dice pool of a technomancer up to 15 reasonably?  with the force of the complex form only being 2 wouldn't that also more then likely be stun damage after the resistance test?

Quote from: Xenon on Today at 01:45:49 PM

    Nothing that stop a TM to form a PAN on a device rating 6 commlink....


Nothing to stop everyone else on the team from doing that either. Deckers are still innately better at being the head of a team PAN, not only because they can get higher firewall, but because they have access to Wrapper. Running all the gear on the team silent might draw attention, but making all their smartguns look like credsticks is a lot harder to spot.

The technomancer can also use complex forms to increase the firewall rating of the commlink to something more respectable like 9 or even higher and use sprites to defend the device if needed.  the street sam can't say the same thing.  The one downside to this set up I see is that the dice pool to resist being noticed while running silent is based off of logic alone as the commlink doesn't have a sleaze rating.  The wrapper idea is pretty cool as well though.  One can always leave the wireless off until the team is ready to go in hot I suppose.  Isn't it a free action to activate somethings wireless capability?  I seem to remember reading that but I'm too tired ATM to look it up to verify. 

well I'm a going to bed its late and this post is long enough for now

[Xenon]

A rating 12 host defend and attack with 24-27 dice (depending on the hosts matrix attribute array). This include, but is not limited to,  Mark and Edit Files.

It is a free action to go wireless OFF (at least if you have DNI). To turn it back on require that you physically touch it (since it is now wireless OFF you can no longer control it wireless).

I would assume that it will take (at least) a simple action p(er device) you want to turn wireless ON. Possible more if there isn't a manual switch or button you can press so that you are forced to connect to it via universal data connector to turn the wireless ON.

[Xenon]

@deathwishjoe
From your posts it seem add if you are asking very much for hybrid decker.

A few viable combinations include, but is not limited to;
Physical Adept Decker
Hermetic Magician Decker
Street Samurai Decker
Breaking and Entry Decker

On the Decker-side you basically only need Intuition, Computer, Hacking, Electronic Warfare and a moderate cyberdeck. All the rest can go into your primary role.

And if you don't mind optimization you could even go with a dedicated decker skilled with 1h firearms such as pistols or automatics and get an agility 9 armored cyberarm for a solid 15 dice (or 17 with specialization). Pretty buff for a character that focus on mental attributes... Throw in a few armored used feet and a left hand. With an armor jacket and a helmet you are now looking at 26 armor...(!)

[deathwishjoe]

A rating 12 host defend and attack with 24-27 dice (depending on the hosts matrix attribute array). This include, but is not limited to,  Mark and Edit Files

So we take what I would think to be a medium sized organization of hackers and find the top three best hackers in the group.  Out of maybe 50 people in the group I would think we could find 3 people with 8 in the relevant skills.  As far as the stats we can bump those up temporarily by paying a few magicians to cast increase logic, willpower and Intuition on the three for an evening. for simplicity sake lets put those stats at 9.  the technomancers of the group spend time registering machine sprites so that they can use diagnostics on the 3 hackers cyberdecks douling the skill portion of the hackers dice pool with team work tests.  +2 for hot sim. We can also use a few iterations of the infuse matrix attribute from the technomancers to make sure we don't run into any issues with exceeding our limits.  We can also have a few nurses or paramedics with the first aid skill and biomonitors on hand to help with any matrix damage they take. 

8 skill
+8 team work from machine sprites
+9 stats augmented by magicians
+2 hot sim bonuses
=27 dice

for three people matching or exceeding the dice pools of the host I would think there is a reasonable chance of success on the mission.  There may be even more dice we could squeeze into the 3 amigos I've shown above but I suspect then we start to limit the number of hacking organizations who can ge into the thick of things.  As it stands I would suspect at least several dozen groups capable of pulling this sort of thing off in the fluff.  It would take a bit of initial investment but Im sure the payoffs would equal or exceed 100-1000 times the investment as long as you were the first one into to host cause once its been hacked the information would lose value rather quickly. 

And if you don't mind optimization you could even go with a dedicated decker skilled with 1h firearms such as pistols or automatics and get an agility 9 armored cyberarm for a solid 15 dice (or 17 with specialization). Pretty buff for a character that focus on mental attributes... Throw in a few armored used feet and a left hand. With an armor jacket and a helmet you are now looking at 26 armor...(!)

As GM we all have limits to the amount of optimization we are willing to accept in our games.  However when it comes to challenges like these I high encourage you optimize the character as much as possible. push the envelope and see what the game engine can do.   26 armor is indeed impressive but I think you might end up losing out on initiative bonuses this route.  The single cyber arm has always been one of my favorite pieces of gear for a character.