[I_AM_ZHOUL!!!]

I should note I don't actually *have* Cybercombat, and only have Hacking on 1 - because, as it turns out, Hacking 2 isn't worth it since we háve a good decker for that stuff - me being able to assist is nice, but it's almost never worth doing it on my own. Neither is Cybercombat since I don't have an attack dongle anyway. My point was that there are concepts that can prove your

an Rating 6 Agent in a Virtual Machine with an Attack Dongle will be a better secondary hacker than you as a PC ever will.

wrong. It doesn't have to cost that much to be a secondary "decker"; not much more than, say, secondary street sam. Although secondary street sam is probably more useful.

You are still not as good as the Agent. Why??? Cause you would have to be spending your actions to do what he is doing. He is doing those actions for me, I am still doing my job. So the Agent is a force multipler to the party as opposed to your being a force decrease in the same scenario. So maybe at times you could equal him & but never add like he does.

[Jack_Spade]

@I_AM_ZHOUL!!! and Top Dog

[shamelessplug]Might I interest you in an Agent-Cluster? A fully autonomous system that can compete with medium level deckers for under 100.000 NY[/shamelessplug]

[JackVII]

A TM has a limit - namely, 0, as a TM can't run programs (except as Echo's, in which case they're fixed).

The idea with taking Virtual Machine is that the Technomancer gets 2 program slots to fill, as they wish and dynamically, with regular programs. (As Novocrane said, most people agree they can't do that).

Ah, that's why I didn't get it. I didn't realize we were involving crazy talk. I was approaching it from the understanding that TMs can't run programs at all, but can take as many program Echoes as they want (even if it is a generally terrible idea), they don't have a limit to those (I'm surprised it isn't limited to Resonance or something). I've got to find that thread, I would love to read the rationale for VM working for TMs. I mean, even just from a game balance perspective it's silly (then again, so are TMs).

[Senko]

It does raise the question if your playing as a secondary decker which would be a better investment of your money. A comlink with attack/sleeze added or just shelling out the cash for the cyberdeck. Lets use this one as our sample upgrading the blue defender to a transys avalon its only another 3k for a total of 54,500.

Transys Avalon with attack/sleeze (purchasers choice)
DP: 6
FW: 6
A/S: 4

if your willing to damage it you can add the other attribute to have . . .

DP: 6
FW: 6
A/S: 4
A/S: 2 + Irremoveable matrix damage from jamming things in.

Either way it can run 6 programs all at once which gives you the option to further improve those stats by another 1 at a value of 1 program each so you could be looking at DP: 7, FW: 7, A/S: 5, A/S 3.

For the same price range you can buy the entry level deck.
MCD-1
4/3/2/1

Soooo the question becomes what's better . . .

1) Undamaged comlink with attack/sleeze options.
2) Damaged comlink with attack and sleeze options.
3) Undamaged cyberdeck with attribute switching and freedom to add more mods.

Versatility vs power hmmmm I wonder how easy the dongles are to switch looking at this. If you have the cash you could have a 7/7/4 comlink where switching a dongle changes it from attack to sleeze with the power to run 6 programs while all the equivilent price (80kish) have at least one 1 in their array and can only run a few programs. Its actually looking somewhat tempting.

[Rooks]

How you getting a commlink with attack sleaze actions without an attack dongle and a EvoTech Himitsu, personally I go Transys Avalon for spotting defending slave the EvoTech Himitsu running silent and attack dongle if I need it

[Senko]

Modifying the base unit.

A dongle can add either attack or sleeze while a device modification can add the other attribute at a rating of 1. You can then improve that as a further modification to 2 * the new attribute rating however doing causes 2 permanent and irrreparable points of matrix damage to the device.

So basically you can spend 48k odd nuyen to buy a dongle with an attack/sleeze rating of 4 then use parts to modify the device to have 2 points of matrix damage and the other rating at 4 as well. Of course if you only want cheap and one attribute don't bother buying the dongle at all just get ahold of the parts and modify the commlink you'll save thousands of nuyen and your commlink only suffers 2 points of matrix damage in exchange.

[Darzil]

Either way it can run 6 programs all at once which gives you the option to further improve those stats by another 1 at a value of 1 program each so you could be looking at DP: 7, FW: 7, A/S: 5, A/S 3.

Where are you getting the ability for a commlink to run cyberdeck programs?

[Senko]

From missing the rule in a different section of the book, my mistake there you can either use the modification to run 1/2 programs or the extra attribute not both.

[Xenon]

Just remember that Agents really rally suck at checking their own overwatch score, control devices (such as elevators, maglocks, lights etc. etc.), hide once spotted (even if they can successfully erasing hostile marks), jam signals and snoop (they can't view or re-transmit hostile camera feeds and they can't snoop a persona as it travels the matrix).

[Rooks]

But they can matrix perceive and defend against attacks

[Xenon]

Sure, they do after all have their own matrix persona with their rating acting as mental attributes - but they don't have a matrix condition monitor or physical location of their own, instead they share the matrix condition monitor and physical location of the device where you probably run your matrix persona....

[I_AM_ZHOUL!!!]

Just remember that Agents really rally suck at checking their own overwatch score, control devices (such as elevators, maglocks, lights etc. etc.), hide once spotted (even if they can successfully erasing hostile marks), jam signals and snoop (they can't view or re-transmit hostile camera feeds and they can't snoop a persona as it travels the matrix).

I guess it comes down to how one perceives the term "Secondary Decker." Like does that mean you want something that can fill in for a Deckers Secondary roles to allow the Real Decker to focus on his primary tasks or do you mean a someone who has inferior decker capabilities. I think the Agent route gives the most versatility to a non-deckers to contribute to Matrix activities while having the best cost to effectiveness route. But if have a large chunk of skill points you don't need to use towards your primary Role & reasonably decent Mental Attributes then the second option is a way to achieve it. But that takes a substantial investment to become an essentially "Multi Class" character & not that viable option for a wide range of Characters without making them unusable from MAD. High Logic Street Sams or Shamans coupled with the skill level investment from characters that have Attributes & Resources/Magic as their normal A & B choices.

[Top Dog]

So, back to my post a while back - I asked my GM about a counterargument to the whole Virtual Machine/Agent/Cyberprograms bit. His main arguments was "I don't think that's balanced" (which, to be fair, is true - if you can run VM in a program carrier and get 2 free slots, there's no reason ever to get any other one). But that hardly a convincing rule argument, even if it's binding for my own game.

He did have a secondary argument, though, which I find harder to counter. Cyberprograms can only run on their intended system. That is, you can't run Cyberdeck programs on RCC's and vice versa - you must have one made for the platform in question (see sidebar, p269 SR5). So you'd need to find Commlink cyberprograms to run on a commlink - but there are no Commlink cyberprograms.

Program Carriers bypass that since it comes with a hardcoded program that it runs by itself. But using a Virtual Machine would mean you increase the program limit of the Commlink in question - and programs running thusly would be running on the commlink, and thus need commlink programs.

[Jack_Spade]

Counter-counter argument:
A virtual machine is by its very nature the thing you need to run system foreign software.

[Herr Brackhaus]

Except you're not running a commlink cyberprogram on a commlink with a program carrier module; you're running a cyberdeck cyberprogram on the program carrier module, which has the dedicated hardware necessary for it. You still wouldn't be running the cyberdeck cyberprograms on your commlink if you got Virtual Machine in a program carrier, because the program carrier is the hardware that would be running the virtual machine (and thus the two extra programs).

As for your GMs argument; if the writers intended for Virtual Machine to be an exception to the rule about Program Carriers, don't you think they would have stated as much explicitly?

Besides, there's already another commlink out there with an Agent program; the Nixdorf.