[Anela]

Okay boys and girls here is my issue. 

 I loved sr3.  After a long search we have built a nice group that is up for some good sr4 fun.  I, however, am well known for not making characters who are the easiest to play.  In true fashion, I am building a Technomancer/sniper.  What I am hoping  for is some input on how to properly balance out the skills so my techno isnt useless but can still get in some decent sniping when the matrix option isn't viable.  I have a general understanding of how the technomancer works and I am still reading and learning more. I would love input from others who have played one or who just have more knowledge than I do on how to properly build this character to make it work.  I can, if needed, show the build I have started to work with for more input. 

We are using 450 BP.

I am interested in the key skills I would need. ( I know that technically I should not be sniping but Id like to try it out. Currently with my body I really cant take much of a hit, I dont think I can change that haha.)

We will be playing long campaings so there is room for build up as we go along

Thank you in advance for the discussion. I also appoligize in advance as I am still pretty new to this type of gaming concept.

Anela

[Onion Man]

Electronics group.  Hacking.

Compiling.  Registering.  Whatever meat world social or technical function you may wish to have.

Weapons.  Meat world physical skills.



Look, I put them in tiers.  All just my humble opinion (okay, so I'm not humble at all).

[Anela]

Currently I have 3 points into cracking and 3 points into tasking and 3 in electronics.  Should I take out the tasking group and drop decompiling?

I guess I also want to know if it is going to be to far out of the realm of reason to snipe with this character as I have been told by some of my group that it will be impossible.

I am very sorry for my lack of knowledge in the game.  I will get there though hehe

[Onion Man]

Currently I have 3 points into cracking and 3 points into tasking and 3 in electronics.  Should I take out the tasking group and drop decompiling?

I guess I also want to know if it is going to be to far out of the realm of reason to snipe with this character as I have been told by some of my group that it will be impossible.

I would.  Unless you're in a very Matrix heavy game, decompiling won't come up often enough to be worth it.  Maybe take it at 1 just so you can attempt it, but it's more useful as a skill for NPCs to challenge players with than as one for players to overcome obstacles with.

[Anela]

Thank you very much Onion Man, if I show you my buidl would you mind helping me critic it and set it up better, once again sorry for the trouble.

[Onion Man]

I'd be happy to, but the real expert on these boards is squee_nabob.  Ill credit him as the source of most of my TM knowledge at this point.

[Anela]

Hopefully he will get a wif of tthis post and give me some input as well.  I am really excited to play this character as I have been more of an adept kind of player so this is looking pretty fun to me.   I am going to make a few tweeks and post up the new build here shortly .  Haha with your gys help ill get to show these boys what a Techno is made of. Im so looking forward to it.


Anela

[UmaroVI]

As a technomancer, you are going to suck at physical combat. If you want to snipe, you have two options:

1) Play a hacker rather than a technomancer. I won't go into too much depth here because it sounds like you want to play a technomancer, but a hacker can hack and also fight.

2) Use drones to snipe - for various reasons, you will be able to "snipe" people much more effectively by carrying around a drone with a sniper rifle mounted on it (or by just sending the drone to the sniper point while you hang out in a van, or by being in a rigger cocoon in a drone with a sniper rifle mounted on it, etc), than you could ever hope to be as a technomancer using a sniper rifle in your hands.

The basics of building an effective technomancer:

You want a stream from Unwired that uses Charisma or Intuition as your fade resistance stat. Charisma -> talky-talky as a secondary thing, more registered sprites, easiest to raise (by being an Elf). Intuition -> better at rigging (because it determines initiative). If you want to rig, have Machine as one of your sprite types because they are awesome.

You want Resonance 6. No exceptions. Normally hard-maxing stats is inefficient but because of the loopy way complex forms work, you really, really want to hardcap your resonance or you'll pay through the nose for it.

Don't try to be equally good at everything. Buy a few complex forms at 6 and just thread the others when you need them. Threading is an action that takes no time, so you can thread them when you are about to use them; you can also retry threading as often as you like unless you glitch (which might cause some unspecified problem) or get no hits (-2 to your retry). I suggest Analyze, Stealth, Exploit, Spoof, and Command.

Fade resist is super important. Don't have less than a 5 in your fade stat. Fade can be Healed and First Aided; it's good to know a mage and a medic.

You need in a "must have to do your role" way the skills Compiling 4, Registering 4, and Hacking 4. You do not need or want Decompiling, it is a trap. You need Gunnery 4 to rig effectively. You should have Electronic Warfare 1 at minimum; it might be nice to have more on occasion. You will be very sad if you don't have Computer 1, Data Search 1, and Software 4; you may very well want to just buy Electronics Group 4 but it's not, strictly speaking, mandatory.  You do get one 6, it should probably be either Hacking or Gunnery depending on whether you are more about the rigging or the hacking.

Stat-wise, you do not actually need any stats other than Resonance 6, your drain stat soft or hard capped, Logic 3, and at least a decent Edge score. You probably do want a decent Body so you can wear enough armor to not die if you get caught outside a drone, and you may want other stats for fluff reasons.

Quality-wise, you should have an extremely good reason if you don't have Analytic Mind, a paragon, and Codeslinger. For codeslinger, if you plan on rigging, Control Device is super awesome. If you really, really don't care about rigging, you could take Hacking on the Fly, but it's less bang for your buck because Hacking on the Fly is only a lot of hacking whereas Control Device is 100% of rigging. On which note, you want to rig via VR remote control, not jumping in.

How to hack, in very (very) brief: thread your Stealth up. Thread your Exploit up. Get a registered sprite to Assist Operation your Stealth (possibly get another one to Assist Operation your Exploit). Hacking on the Fly them, and go for security or admin. You can get a stealth rating of 12 fairly easily, so you have a really good chance of getting in unnoticed, but you may have to edge the hacking on the fly roll to do it quickly. Alternatively, instead of threading your exploit up, thread the Mute program option onto your exploit, screw Stealth, and just kick the door down and grab what you want before the alarm sounds. Alternatively alternatively, send a Crack sprite in; they are unsubtle as hell and whoever you do this to will know they've been hacked, but they can't do anything to you directly.

[Anela]

Ok let the ribbing and criticing begin.  Remember I am truely a newb at this.

Elf

B 2
A 3
Reaction 3
S 2
C 4
Int 4
L 4
w 4
e 3
R 5

Skills
Electronics 3
Longarms 4
Negotiation 3
Etiquette 3
Cracking 4
Compiling 3
Registering 3

Qualities zero out

Technomacer

Common:
Analyze 3
Browse 3
Edit 4
Scan 4

Registered:
Crack 4
Data 3
Machine 4
Fault 3

Hacking:
Decrypt 4
Biofeed 3
Blackout 4
Sniffer 4
Track 4
Armor 3

  okay teach me please

Much thanks again for the patience and help.

[Onion Man]

What's your resonance stream?  And what are your qualities?  Those are sort of important to evaluating a build.

Longarms 4 is way too high, that'ss a points sink.  If you have your heart set on sniping in the meat world, take longarms 1 or 2 and specialize (either right away or with the first set of karma you get), then add contacts with smartlink and image link and a top or bottom mounted smartgun system to your gear list.

I'm not a big fan of matrix combat as a TM.  It'll likely get you killed or at least hurt bad, so IMO you could drop Armor, Blackout, and Biofeedback from your complex forms pretty easily.  Have a paladin or tank sprite do that for you, it's much safer.

I've recenltly fallen in love with having Databomb as a complex form, it's way more vindictive than editing away your trails (trideo footage of us on a run, fine... let me drop a rating 10 databomb inside that file before we leave...)

With body 2, I assume you're planning on being in a rigger coccoon most of the time (a good way to go).  If not, try to get body up to 3 when you can or if you can squeak out the points.  You won't spend much time in meat world combat, but having your armor encumbrance cap at 4 makes you pretty vulnerable to normal bullets.

[Anela]

First impression
Toughness

Distictive style
dayjob medium - already figured out how to work this around the stroy
Flashbacks uncommon

as for streams im conflicted with cyberadept or drono.

[Onion Man]

AIPS related flashbacks?  That's be a ton of fun to play.  My current TM (Tommy "Knuckles" MacMurgatroy) is something of a tough guy too, so I can understand the play motivation for having toughness.  It's sub-optimal, but the game isn't all about being optimal.

For streams, consider Technoshaman as an option.  You'd lose the fault sprite but keep access to the ever-useful machine sprite and gain access to Paladin and Sleuth sprites (okay, sleuth is mediocre but Paladin is a life-saver).

I'm going to be offline for the next ghost-knows how long tonight, but you'll want to start putting together a gear list.  Keep in mind what time period the game is set in, TMs are sort of in the closet before 2072 and it never hurts to be disguised as a Hacker (trodes, medium commlink, sattelite link).

Best of luck to you.  Hopefully squee can come on and point out some fine tuning for you too.

[Anela]

Thank you veryone, I am going to make some tweeks over the nxt foew hours and see how it looks I think I am starting to get a pretty good idea on how to put it together.

The more info the better as I said, now to go read some more on the play style of my new little toy.

[UmaroVI]

Do not pay BP for registered sprites. You can register them for free after the game starts in a moderate amount of time - buying them is a trap.

[squee_nabob]

Hey, I'm here. You cannot believe how awesome it is to have my name mentioned as someone to learn from, and summoned me on a Sunday.

First let me post up some links to other posts I've made:

http://forums.shadowrun4.com/index.php?topic=4241.msg59568#msg59568

http://forums.shadowrun4.com/index.php?topic=3839.msg50965#msg50965

http://forums.shadowrun4.com/index.php?topic=3982.msg53690#msg53690

Now onto some specific comments (these are all ment to be constructive, also I play missions so I work via RAW rules rather than by any given house rules so you may need to alter my advice based on how your GM runs the matrix).

I play a technomancer and am very happy with it, and a TM sniper works, but not with holding a gun. You want to snipe by mounting a gun on a drone, then using remote control on the drone. You can thread to a 12 in Command, which means Command + Gunnery (12 + Funnery + Smartgun + tacnet).

Good news: This isn't the worst TM I've seen
Better news: You can also improve your character from here


Attributes:
Body 1 or 3, it rounds for an extra box of physical. I suggest 3 so you can wear Milspec Armor eventually (that will let you wear 13/13 armor in meat one day). GMs want you to be in the meat occasionally, and being able to show up in armor is good. You can also get 9/8 armor after softweave and form fitting body armor.

Agility you can shave a point there, reaction can shave 2 points, strength 1 point. Don't do this if it draws GM aggro.

If you are an elf, you want to be a Charisma TM, I suggest Technoshamman, because they get machine sprites (which are great). You can register them and give out diagnostics to your friends. If you are being a Charisma TM, you should have more Charisma (especially as an elf).

You can skimp on intuition as a charisma TM. This tanks your initiative, which means you start combat with a sniper shot, then let everyone else clean it up. If you go for an intuition TM, you will have a better initiative, but you don't want to be an elf (be an orc).

High Edge is important, that is very good for hackers. Resonance 6 is a must. It is very expensive to buy up complex forms,and resonance is the biggest cap on your win.

Skills:

Are you trying to be a hacker or a rigger? Beyond a very cheesy face build (threading emotional software) those are the only two roles for TMs. You can build a logic based meat-spaced TM, but it is not as good.

Don't get cracking, cybercombat is for fail, and you only need 1 Electronic Warfare (not that more doesn’t help, but one is required). Hacking is very important so i'd go for 6 as a hacker.

Longarms is bad, get Gunnery. You use Gunnery for guns while rigging.

Getting Negotiations and Etiquettem is good if you want to also be a face. You could get Con and buy the Influence skill group, but I respect just those two.

Very smart not getting decompiling. Most people get it, and it sucks. I'd go to 4 in Compiling at least though. You want 4s and 6s in your skills based around the way buying up skills with karma works.

Qualities:
Get Technomancer and Paragon. Get 35 points of negative qualities.

Don't get registered sprites with BPs, you can just register them in play.

Complex Forms:

Buy them up to your resonance, buying them up in play is super expensive. You only need 11 dice of decrypt (including the +2 for hot simming) to crack rating 6 encrypt. Anything higher than that you spend edge for. Otherwise a hacker can crack it with their encrypt. Because you can thread your Decrypt, I'd not pay BPs.

Biofeedback is based on Charisma and not bought with BPs.

Cybercombat is for fail, so drop blackout and armor. Shield is good however, because you arn't sure when you will need it. Sniffer and Track are less good than Scan (and I don't recommend all 3, you can thread them when needed).

Command is critical
Exploit is primarily your reason to live
Stealth is critical
Analyze is critical
Disarm is not critical but I think it is very important (and is very good if your GM has nodes/IC/spider use analyze to scan for you once you log on).

Good job not wasting points on Browse, but buying Data Search, now you can thread it when needed.

Figure out what is situational, and then buy the ones that come up more often.



This advice is also biased because another player in my crew plays a hacker with all programs at rating 6. This means tracking, sniffing, etc are not needed on the TM. TMs can get program ratings up to 12, so try to focus on things that are really good to have at 12. Hacking, stealth, and command are good examples of this.

And now I will post  (for the first time) the character I started play with. Notice he is does not have disarm (which I am sad about).

Finally, you should buy a Wuxing Hussar from WAR! Attach a Rigger Cocoon and Walker legs to have a go anywhere Mecha. It can mount a vehicle weapon, which gives you a great deal of range in your sniping experience. I like a Lonestar Flash Flood Water Cannon, the Ares Thunderstruck Gauss Rifle makes a nice sniper rifle. The GM Vanquisher Heavy Autocannon is capable of shredding people with 11P -6AP Fully Automatic Minigun.

Let me know if you want more information. Eventually I'll release “Squee's guide to technomancy”