[Csjarrat]

Hi guys. been reading a lot of threads recently about how bad technomancers are and its inspired me to try and squeeze as much mileage out of one as possible. Now i've never played as a TM under 5th (and only done one mini-run under 4th) so I need your help for tips and tricks on this build.
I was torn as to whether to take the natural hardening or focussed concentration on this guy, but with a strong CHA attrib I was also considering first impression for a viable secondary skill. thoughts?

I haven't resorted to dumpstatting anything, have decent mental stats for a 5/6/5/5 living persona and dice pools of 10-14 for the majority of my hacking stuff, whilst maintaining secondary skills of medic at 11 dice + face at 7 dice.
I've found this to be a very very hard character type to build as you need both good skills, good attribs and decent special attribute rating as well!
cheers in advance;

[spoiler]
Technomancer 5e:

Priorities:

A: Attribs (24)
B: Resonance (res4, x2 R4 resonance skills, x2 complex forms)
C: Skills (28/2)
D: Meta (Human, 3)
E: Gear (6,000)


Attributes: (24)
BOD 3 (+2)
STR 2 (+1)
AGI 3 (+2)
REA 3 (+2)
CHA 5 (+4)
LOG 6 (+5)
INT 5 (+4)
WIL 5 (+4)

RES 6 (+2)
ESS 6
EDG 3 (+1)

Qualities: Codeslinger: (Hack on the fly +2) -10 karma
           Natural Hardening (+1 biofeedback filter) -10 karma
   
           Mild, Common allergy: Dogs +10 Karma
           CodeBlock: Jam Signals +10 Karma
           Distinctive Style: Neck Tattoos +5 karma
(total of 30 karma to spend)
_______________________________________________
Skills: 28/2

Groups:
Influence 2

Individual:
Compiling 4 (free)
Registering 4 (free)
Hacking 6
Cybercombat 5
Ewar 3
Computer 3 (Matrix perception +2)
Software 5       
Perception 2
Pistols 2 (revolver +2)   28

Karma: (8 spent)
Hardware 1 (2 karma)
First Aid 1 (2 karma)
Disguise 1 (2 karma)
Forgery 1 (2 karma)

______________________________________________

Complex forms:
Diffusion of Firewall (free)
Resonance Spike (free)
Static Bomb (4 karma)
Static Veil (4 karma)
Cleaner (4 karma)
Resonance Veil (4 karma)   16 karma spent, 14 remaining


Gear: 6,000 + 6 karma = 18,000
______________________________________________
Electronics:
Renraku Sensei Commlink 1,000 (DR3)
-Fake SiN R2 5,000
-Fake Gun License R2 400

Glasses R4: 400
-Flare comp +1 250
-Low Light +4 500
-Vision enhance 2 1000     2,100

Headphones R3: 150
-Sound Filter 1 +3 250
-Audio Enhance 2 +2 1,000  2,500 
                                        9,900
______________________________________________
Armour + Weapons:
Taurus Omni 6   300
(integral laser)
-Image scope 300
-Speed loader 25
-Concealable holster 150      775

Armour vest (arm 9) 500
Clothing 20

Helmet 100
-Radio Signal scanner R6 600
-Image Link 25
                             1,795
______________________________________________
Misc:
Dodge Scoot 3,000
low lifestyle (1 month) 2,000
Medkit R4 1,000 
20 rounds regular ammo (heavy pistol) 40
20 rounds regular ammo (light pistol) 40

                                     total = 18,000
----------------------------------------------
Contacts: (cha x3 = 15 pts)

Fixer 2,3
Mage 3,2
Info broker 1,4

----------------------------------------------
Knowledge skills: (Int + log x2 = 22)
English N
[/spoiler]

[Longes]

Here's my bucket of thoughts, in no particular order.

focussed concentration

Focused concentration is worthless for the Technomancers. There are no CFs that are worth sustaining at level 1 or 2.

Diffusion of Firewall (free) - the only Diffusion worth taking for solo TM.
Resonance Spike (free) - worthless. It's strictly worse than Data Spike (with the exception of not raising your OS)
Static Bomb (4 karma) - meh. Just use Hide action.
Static Veil (4 karma) - meh. Just use Cleaner every 15 minutes.
Cleaner (4 karma) - ok.
Resonance Veil (4 karma) - it might be good, but I have no idea as to what you can use it for.

Cybercombat 5
Software 5

I'd recommend taking Cybercombat 4, Software 6. Cybercombat kills you horribly, so you should avoid it. Software is used for Threading.

Why do you have one pistol, but two types of regular ammo?

[JmOz01]

For what it is worth

I think I would change the priorities on resonance and skills.  Then move some skills around put 5 groups in your hacking group, pick up etiquette and persuasion instead of influence and also pick up the compiling skills you want,  This will give you about 10 skill points ( or 8 karma and 6 skill points).  Your hacking is down one skill point and you loose leadership skill

Then I would move one edge into resonance (This will maintain where you were)
  you  can spend some of the saved karma from skills to keep all of your complex forms or drop 1

[Crunch]

Resonance Spike (free) - worthless. It's strictly worse than Data Spike (with the exception of not raising your OS)

Check with your GM, but there's absolutely no text indicating that a target is alerted to Resonance Spike whether it's succesful or not.

Based on the fluff description I have it report as glitches or bad code, unless it's used directly against an enemy persona in which case they know that they are under attack, but finding the source can be challenging.

[ZeConster]

Static Veil (4 karma) - meh. Just use Cleaner every 15 minutes.

Having to use Cleaner an average of 7 times (that's 7 Combat Turns, 14 dice rolls, and an average of 0.6 Fading damage) every 15 minutes will get old fast (and if you use Cleaner at Level 2, you'll get about 80% more Fading damage for the same amount of Overwatch Score reduction). Static Veil is ideal for longer runs, or if you're acting as support for a dacker.

[Csjarrat]

Resonance Spike (free) - worthless. It's strictly worse than Data Spike (with the exception of not raising your OS)

Check with your GM, but there's absolutely no text indicating that a target is alerted to Resonance Spike whether it's succesful or not.

Based on the fluff description I have it report as glitches or bad code, unless it's used directly against an enemy persona in which case they know that they are under attack, but finding the source can be challenging.

this was my understanding and the reason for why i took it. still not quite understood techno's yet so thanks very much for the input.

Here's my bucket of thoughts, in no particular order.

focussed concentration

Focused concentration is worthless for the Technomancers. There are no CFs that are worth sustaining at level 1 or 2.

Diffusion of Firewall (free) - the only Diffusion worth taking for solo TM.
Resonance Spike (free) - worthless. It's strictly worse than Data Spike (with the exception of not raising your OS)
Static Bomb (4 karma) - meh. Just use Hide action.
Static Veil (4 karma) - meh. Just use Cleaner every 15 minutes.
Cleaner (4 karma) - ok.
Resonance Veil (4 karma) - it might be good, but I have no idea as to what you can use it for.

Cybercombat 5
Software 5

I'd recommend taking Cybercombat 4, Software 6. Cybercombat kills you horribly, so you should avoid it. Software is used for Threading.

Why do you have one pistol, but two types of regular ammo?

-thanks for the analysis of the CF's. which (if any) would you recommend out fo the choices available?
-will change the skills around, after having a good read, it seems like you'd use software a lot more than cybercombat so thanks for that
-two types of ammo is because the taurus can use both heavy/light pistol rounds. SA with light ammo, or SS for +1DV -1AP. never hurts to be flexible :-)

[Longes]

-thanks for the analysis of the CF's. which (if any) would you recommend out fo the choices available?

Here's my Complex Form analysis 2.0

• Cleaner - the only way to modify OS, which makes it interesting. The problems: it's Permanent, so you need to Sustain it Level turns. That makes Cleaner unusable in combat situations.
• Diffusion of Firewall - the only decent Diffusion. The problem here, is that you need to thread it at the high level to get benefit - minimum of (Average defender's hits + 2 (Sustaining penalty) + 1 to get benefit). Assuming DR3 that mean you need to thread it at Level 5. That's 6DV fading.
• Diffusion of Data Processing - you are better off spending your time killing the enemy, rather than modifying his Initative
• Diffusion of Attack - don't get attacked. You are a technomancer - attacks kill you horribly.
• Diffusion of Sleaze - waste of time. Enemies don't have OS, and if you see them, then they have already failed their Sleaze.
• Editor - meh. Its only benefit over Edit is speed. I'm not sure that's worth 4 karma. Oh, and it's Permanent too.
• Infusion of [] - best used on the friendly hacker. Infusion of Firewall and Attack are the only good Infusions, because the other two only increase limits. You are better of asking a Mage to cast Improved Attribute on you.
• Static Veil - just use Cleaner every time.
• Pulse Storm - decent debuff, if the target doesn't have much Noise reduction. IMHO, it's better than Diffusion
• Puppeteer - I can't find the situation where using Puppeteer would be better than using Hack On The Fly + Control Device. The Fading is increadibly high, and you'll never succeed against anything interesting. For example, against DR3 lock you'll be rolling Software 6 + Resonance 6 + Specialty (Threading) 2 [Level] vs DR3*2 -> 14 [Level] vs 6. To get Complex action without using the Edge you'd need to thread it at the Level 5 minimum. That's 9DV Fading. Against a goddamn lock. Against Willpower 4 Firewall 5 decker you'll need at least Level 6
• Resonance Channel - don't thread it at the level lower than 3, or your benefit would be lost to Sustaining Penalty. Getting Datajacks or Satelite Link is a cheaper and more reliable way of reducing Noise
• Resonance Spike - don't. Data Spike FTW.
• Resonance Veil - I have no idea what can you use it for.
• Static Bomb - if situations where multiple icons have spotted you are common - it might be good. Otherwise use Hide.
• Stitches - bleh.
• Transcendent Grid - Sustaining penalty makes it not worth the time. The only time where it's worth threading is when you are on the Public Grid, but the enemy is somewhere else. Otherwise you trade -2 for -2
• Tattletale - horrible. Absolutely horrible. It's Permanent, so you need to Sustain it. It only works on targets with OS, so most enemies you'd want to use it on (like Spiders) are out. And the effect is negligible. Threading at Level 10 gives you 8P Fading, in exchange for possibility of increasing target's OS by 10 over the next 10 turns. This is garbage.

[ZeConster]

Again, I strongly disagree with your analysis of Static Veil. Static Veil at level 2 (the highest you'll ever have to Thread it) has a Fading Value of 1 (0.0116 post-resist Fading on average with 11 dice), while having to use Cleaner at level 1 2d6 times every 15 minutes will require 2 x 2d6 dice rolls and give you 0.61 Fading post-resist on average every time (and that's not counting the added complexity of Technomancers not having Baby Monitor unless they use an Echo on it, meaning they'd have to use Check Overwatch Score if they're using it on themselves, or have to use it 9 times to be more than 80% certain they've wiped it all out).
All in all, Static Veil isn't nearly as useless as you think it is, especially so if you don't want to bog down gameplay with "I make 7 Threading rolls and 7 Fading Resist rolls now". And of course, if you use Cleaner at a higher level, the average post-resist Fading you take will increase to the point where wound modifiers are likely to occur after 30 minutes.

And for a technomancer that acts as backup to a decker, Diffusion of Attack also gains some value, and although the decker can use Baby Monitor to verify their Overwatch Score, Static Veil still has some value, especially if you also commit illegal actions occasionally (since you trade a sustaining penalty of -4 for not having to use Cleaner 2x2d6 times every 15 minutes, which is almost once per minute on average).

[Longes]

Again, I strongly disagree with your analysis of Static Veil. Static Veil at level 2 (the highest you'll ever have to Thread it) has a Fading Value of 1 (0.0116 post-resist Fading on average with 11 dice), while having to use Cleaner at level 1 2d6 times every 15 minutes will require 2 x 2d6 dice rolls and give you 0.61 Fading post-resist on average every time (and that's not counting the added complexity of Technomancers not having Baby Monitor unless they use an Echo on it, meaning they'd have to use Check Overwatch Score if they're using it on themselves, or have to use it 9 times to be more than 80% certain they've wiped it all out).
All in all, Static Veil isn't nearly as useless as you think it is, especially so if you don't want to bog down gameplay with "I make 7 Threading rolls and 7 Fading Resist rolls now". And of course, if you use Cleaner at a higher level, the average post-resist Fading you take will increase to the point where wound modifiers are likely to occur after 30 minutes.

And for a technomancer that acts as backup to a decker, Diffusion of Attack also gains some value, and although the decker can use Baby Monitor to verify their Overwatch Score, Static Veil still has some value, especially if you also commit illegal actions occasionally (since you trade a sustaining penalty of -4 for not having to use Cleaner 2x2d6 times every 15 minutes, which is almost once per minute on average).

Complex Forms aren't free. You have to pay for every single one of them with priority or karma. Having both Cleaner and Veil isn't very smart, because other forms are useful too. Thus, I prefer Cleaner as the more flexible form. Static Veil only blocks the OS you get from time.

[ZeConster]

In my opinion, having both gives you a tangible advantage over only having Cleaner, so it's definitely worth considering.

[DMK]

A couple of quick thoughts, as I'm currently on toddler duty:

1) Resonance Spike is better then you might think at first glance. It is a Resonance Action, not an attack action.This has a number of interesting ramifications.
a) It doesn't rebound. You can't damage yourself using Resonance Spike except through Fading. I've done a sample TM vs Decker fight where the Decker bricked himself trying to use Data Spike.
b) As it's not an Attack Action, it can't be defended against with Full Matrix Defense. Which is huge. FMD is extremely important. (It played a major role in the fight I mentioned above.)
c) As mentioned, it does not increase OS.
d) As others have mentioned, it's strongly implied that detecting the use of Resonance Spike is difficult.

2) Transcendent Grid doesn't incur a sustaining penalty, because it isn't Sustained. Its official duration is I. The effect lasts for a minute per hit on the Simple Test. I rather like it. If you need access to the Renraku Grid, thread it at Level 5. You'll likely get five full minutes of undetected access, at a Fading of 2DV.

[Longes]

A couple of quick thoughts, as I'm currently on toddler duty:

1) Resonance Spike is better then you might think at first glance. It is a Resonance Action, not an attack action.This has a number of interesting ramifications.
a) It doesn't rebound. You can't damage yourself using Resonance Spike except through Fading. I've done a sample TM vs Decker fight where the Decker bricked himself trying to use Data Spike.
b) As it's not an Attack Action, it can't be defended against with Full Matrix Defense. Which is huge. FMD is extremely important. (It played a major role in the fight I mentioned above.)
c) As mentioned, it does not increase OS.
d) As others have mentioned, it's strongly implied that detecting the use of Resonance Spike is difficult.

Was that the run where people kept shouting at you (correctly) that hacker should have just done the job, instead of fighting the technomancer? 
a) You would however damage yourself through Fading, even on successful attack.
b) (Software+Resonance[Level]) vs. (Cybercombat + Logic[Attack]). On the hackers side, he benefits from marks and programs, and his limit is probably higher. He is also likely to have Cerebral Booster, but unlikely to have high Cybercombat.
c) Yep.
d) And I still stand by my position, that the victim would know that he is under attack from an unknown source. Matrix damage doesn't happen by itself.

2) Transcendent Grid doesn't incur a sustaining penalty, because it isn't Sustained. Its official duration is I. The effect lasts for a minute per hit on the Simple Test. I rather like it. If you need access to the Renraku Grid, thread it at Level 5. You'll likely get five full minutes of undetected access, at a Fading of 2DV.

My bad.

[DMK]

Was that the run where people kept shouting at you (correctly) that hacker should have just done the job, instead of fighting the technomancer? 

Ah, you're over on Dumpshock too huh? Yeah, that was the one. If I were feeling less lazy I'd link the thread here for the curious. But the fight was the whole point. I never claimed that fighting was the best way to go, but it's certainly a not unfeasible way. Especially when your Decker has Codeslinger: Data Spike. That says something about a guy, ya know?

a) You would however damage yourself through Fading, even on successful attack.

Quite possibly. I would never claim that Resonance Spike is great, just that it's not as bad as portrayed in this thread.

b) (Software+Resonance[Level]) vs. (Cybercombat + Logic[Attack]). On the hackers side, he benefits from marks and programs, and his limit is probably higher. He is also likely to have Cerebral Booster, but unlikely to have high Cybercombat.

Depends on the Decker, really. The guy I've put together has a high Cybercombat because, hey, Codeslinger: Data Spike. Also, I see real value in Skill Groups for Deckers, so I kept them together. Cerebral Boosters are very, very nice. I'm actually planning a "100 karma later" followup, and I'm even thinking of giving the TM Cerebral Boosters 3. 30 karma (to restore Resonance to 6) for +3 Logic/Data Processing/Matrix Initiative? Worthwhile, I think.

And while benefiting from Marks & Programs is very nice, you have to get through first. And going up against a decent Matrix operator (TM or Decker) going into Full Matrix Defense you're more likely to hurt yourself with Data Spike. At least at chargen. Later it gets a little better, but you're still not guaranteed. The major takeaway I got from that thought exercise I did is that Matrix Combat is extremely risky.

d) And I still stand by my position, that the victim would know that he is under attack from an unknown source. Matrix damage doesn't happen by itself.

You may very well be right on that point. I need to give it more thought when I'm not distracted by a 3-yr old.

[Nico]

You have to add 13 karma to that for submerging. Losing essence decreases your maximum resonance/magic, not just the current rating. It's on page 250.

[DMK]

The guy was submerging already anyways, which is why I didn't count it. My preliminary plans are to have him get two Submergence Grades: the first for Overclocking, the second to improve his Firewall. I'm not completely sold on the Firewall increase, but I'm still leaning that way. Overclocking is a no-brainer imho.