OMFG I litterally bursted out laughing reading this you need people to pick up the slack, accidents can and will happen plans will go to drek seen runs turned a complete 180 when the decker got fried. then the rigger who had some hacking skill got in and saved the runs bacon or the rigger got shot and at least someone knew how to drive. Im sorry but even SWAT teams cross train
Precisely our point. The rigger (primary) knows how to do a little decking (secondary). The street samurai (primary) knows how to drive a truck (secondary). The mage (primary) can bargain pretty well (secondary). The point that was made about the original character, Rooks, was that he's nothing primary - he's ALL secondary, and nobody's going to hire a nothing-but-secondary guy unless they literally can't get a specialist (i.e. a standard primary/secondary character) on short notice. I WILL say that someone like this should have a lot of contacts, a lot of fixers on his speed-dial, so that he is (or becomes) the go-to guy when you absolutely need someone in 30 minutes or less. He isn't unplayable, he's just in a relatively weak negotiating position, especially when it comes to a team.
I DO know whereof I speak. Hawatari (of
Pananagutan) started out - and continued - pretty much as a generalist. She was very good with a blade, and pretty good with a pistol, and could facetime somewhat, and had a classical 'security' education (meaning a little bit of Arcana / Magical Background knowledge), and she was not bad on a motorcycle, and and and and and. She became the center of the group not because she was 2nd Best at almost everything (which she was), but because she had the knowledge base to see how magic could interact with drones, or the matrix support a HAHO insertion, or whatever; she was the Mastermind. And the only reason she wasn't the best at close combat was because Isamu (seen in the early 'modern' chapters) was almost nothing BUT a swordsman, and an adept to boot.
Such characters can be the most fun to play - but you
really have to know what you're doing, and you often have to be able to enable the other PCs into doing an even better job with you than they would without you.