[Herr Brackhaus]

Good point, FasterN8. That is incredibly good value for money, though. A 14 dice pool opposed by Willpower and device rating with net hits added to your attack for a measly 35.5k nuyen? Cyberware pales in comparison.

Alternatively, add 3,600 for a Rating 4 pilot program, another 16 for a DR4 RCC, another 500 for the R4 EW, and another 6k for 3 more fly spy drones, for a 19 dice pool EW test. That's pretty crazy right there, especially when combined with Noizquitos and their OP penalties

In short, Target Device is awesome! Scratch the paint off of those Missions riggers, boys and girls...

[FasterN8]

     The problem comes when adjudicating how the bonuses add to meat targets.  The swarm is targeting the icon and not the metahuman (unless they're a technomancer?).  We'll assume it doesn't have to find the icon it's targeting first because ( b/c a friendly tagged it with a tracker round).  So the adjustments the swarm is feeding the shooter's smartgun are all about how to hit that tracker round stuck in the guys hip or arm or wherever, not necessarily the center of mass like a proper weapon attack would. 

Does the quality of the tracker round hit matter then? 
Maybe the net hits on the tracker round shot should be a limit for the Target Icon test?

[Herr Brackhaus]

For sure, there's a lot of gray areas here. What happens if you target someone's smartglasses, or their commlink, or their wireless underwear...

This definitely seems like it was aimed (hah!) at being used on vehicles or drones, but there's nothing stopping someone from targeting an RFID tag placed square on the back of a metahuman. With how abstracted combat is, the GM is going to have to make a call on how targeting something other than the metahuman itself translates into hitting your target.

[FasterN8]

Attacking through walls have never been easier. A really good decker or rigger could entirely negate the -6 Blindfire penalty, and a reasonably good one could feasibly halve it.

First off, I think this is a fantastic use of Target Device, esp to mitigate blind fire penalties, but my question would be this:
      If the icon is not traced to begin with how do you know where to point the gun?  We've always played blind fire as needing to know (or guess) where the target is first and IF you're right THEN you get the -6 penalty to shoot at them (otherwise you're just attacking a piece of wall).  Generally this required the Decker to trace the icon on the other side of the wall first. 
         But if this action gives smartgun bonuses without requiring a trace, could it be used as a single-action mark-less way to localize icons that are close by?  Super powerful if so.

[Herr Brackhaus]

         But if this action gives smartgun bonuses without requiring a trace, could it be used as a single-action mark-less way to localize icons that are close by?  Super powerful if so.

Agreed on how powerful this could be. I'd personally say that RAW allows this to be used on any "wireless-enabled device you’ve spotted on the Matrix", which is ludicrously powerful. For my table, you'd need some form of sensors or eyes on target, or having traced the icon with the Trace action.

This gives recon riggers an advantage as they could effectively triangulate a position (spot target with EW within sensor range, send targeting data to other team members), and deckers a way to remotely assist (trace icons physical location, send targeting data). But this is my personal interpretation, and not what it seems like RAW might allow.

[Jack_Spade]

All these ambiguities go away if you consider what I posted earlier:
It's not about position but about direction change. You still have to see the target, but you get an aiming bonus to correct for target movement.

[Herr Brackhaus]

All these ambiguities go away if you consider what I posted earlier:
It's not about position but about direction change. You still have to see the target, but you get an aiming bonus to correct for target movement.

That's just it, though, I'm not sure you do. I mean, as a table rule that's perfectly viable, but I've no idea if that's the intent behind the rule. I like the idea of  having riggers and hackers be target spotters, essentially, but blindfire is specifically used to fire at a target you have some idea of where is. So I could go both ways, personally, and I'll just say that I think it's a real shame there is such ambiguity behind this one.

[adzling]

Well there are always limits to every action attempt in Srun.
So there should be some limits here as well.

I would treat this like a teamwork test for the shooter.

In which case the higher of the Target Device executor's [Data Processing] or the shooter's [shooting skill] would be the max bonus that can be conferred to the shooter.

By ruling it a teamwork test it also removes the chance of shenanigans from adding in yet more dice from, for example, a Machine Sprite in the shooter's smartlinked weapon.

I would also rule that you would need to have previously spotted the icon (says so in the description) and:
1). If in AR be able to see the icon's hardware in meatspace.
or
2). If in VR then you must perform a trace icon action first.

The benefit of terming it a teamwork test is that you immediately put a stop to exploiters attempting to stack Machine Sprite, Target Device, Analyze Device etc.

[Tinkerbell]

Do you need to use the Target Device action? I guess I should be possible to have a tag with an ARO showing it's location - which would result in the same effect?

[PiXeL01]

Yes you would need to. As I see it the action isn't only to target the device but also coordinate and relay all the information to everybody on the RCC network.

[Tinkerbell]

At out table things like sharing informations to everybody using the matrix can be done by everybody with basic computer knowledge without any additional test, because we think that this woud be very easy to do. We share video or audio streams from cyberware or a drone to everybody in the team for example.
Another example for this is our decker hacking the comlink of the target person and placing an ARO, so everybody can see the target persion in AR/VR, making it nearly impossible loose the target person during a chase or tailing.
Are we playing this wrong? Do you need to do a test for this?

What would Target device do additionally to marking the target with some kind of ARO and giving the location informations to the attacker? Where does the bonus come from? (Beside of just beeing rules I want to imagine how this could work in real world.)
When using target device on drones or vehicles I could imagine that you can get even more informations like the next movement command the drone will execute with Target device - but in case of an stealth tag - how would you explain the bonus?

[Jack_Spade]

If you want to aim true, you don't want to know where the target is, but where it will be once you have fired. Knowing direction and speed of your target greatly improves your chance to send your bullet where you want it.
The device is pinged by y all the surrounding matrix devices so your device can calculate from the delays where it goes and how fast, giving your sensors additional telemetry to correct your aim.

At least that's the explanation I use at my table 

[FasterN8]

Do you need to use the Target Device action? I guess I should be possible to have a tag with an ARO showing it's location - which would result in the same effect?

If you're using your own tag or tracker round, then no, you definitely wouldn't need to use Trace Icon first, but if you were using it on an enemies commlink or cyberware, then I think you'd definitely need a trace or visual contact before you could reasonably benefit from Target Device.