They're cheap for what they do, but not 5-points-for-unstoppable-no-LOF-Intuitive-Attack cheap. The problem there is not the Chain Rifle and the E/Marat, it's the Jammer. If they had Chain Rifle and E/Marat with smoke and Dogged for 5 points, meh. But with Jammers... that's the broken territory. And the Smoke and Dogged gets that Jammer into range pretty unstoppably. For 10-20 points, sure. For 5? Insane.
Make Jammers cause ISO-1 (no turn limit). EM cause ISO-2. (Same as IMM). Make Jammers Comms Equipment. Fixed. (Oblivion would need separate consideration. My preferred option would be ISO-1 2 Turns, +3 to ATK).
Making them Comms Equipment would be pretty bad for the theme, that's for things like hacking devices. I'd imagine a jammer to be little more than a directional all-frequencies screaming device, something a mostly untrained fanatic can simply point and pull the trigger on.
I thought GUTs made it pretty clear that you can always try to get away from Jammers (emphasis mine below) If the troop is inside a danger zone, such as the Area of Effect of a Special Skill or a weapon that uses a Template or that requires no LoF, it must move up to 2 inches in order to try to exit the danger zone, or declare itself Prone if it can prevent further Attacks that way. In regards to hacking I have always thought you don't get GUTs because the attacks originate from Equipment.
Hacking is explicitly mentioned in the Guts rule: Surviving one or more successful Attacks from weapons, types of Equipment or Hacking Programs with the Non-Lethal Trait, or that do not provoke ARM or BTS Rolls. And in any case would be covered by the first two Requirements. A Jammer is going to have a danger area: If the troop is inside a danger zone, such as the Area of Effect of a Special Skill or a weapon that uses a Template or that requires no LoF, it must move up to 2 inches in order to try to exit the danger zone, or declare itself Prone if it can prevent further Attacks that way. Note that as with all Guts Moves, if you can't get to better cover/out of the danger area, you don't get to move at all
@ijw so you can still make guts move if enemy employed "peek-a-boo" tactic ? (moved out and back into total cover)
So how do you interpret the line "try to exit the danger zone?" If it was intended that you can't move unless you actually can exit the zone, there's no reason to call it "trying".
My take on it is that Comms Equipment is a sophisticated device, such as a hacking device - it can be attacked with a hacking program designed to disable it. The jammer makes an attack of this nature, scrambling communications - however the jammer itself is not a complex device but rather the electronic warfare equivalent of an all-frequency loudspeaker being pointed at the enemy. There's nothing to 'switch off' through hacking attempts, in much the same way as a hacker cannot turn off an enemy flash pulse, combi rifle or medikit. The equivalent of a sophisticated jammer which is capable of being itself hacked and turned off would be a hacking device using something like the Oblivion program.
Sure: because that explains why the effect persists after the Jammer is turned off. You can make the fluff work either way. From a gameplay POV a counterplay to Jammers that enhances the utility of HDs and AHDs seems to me to be a good thing.
By the rationale I used, it would make sense from a fluff perspective for the isolation caused by a jammer to be temporary - i.e. only unable to communicate until the jamming device is no longer pointed at them. So perhaps until out of range or someone takes out the user? Assuming that you want to find a way to nerf them, that is. I don't really think they're broken myself! You could describe them as more sophisticated hackable devices, although their use by the impetuous mutts does suggest otherwise. But if you had them as something vulnerable to hacking, they should probably be able to affect enemy hackers through repeaters as well... How about a piece of supportware like fairy dust but one designed to protect communications? Attempts to jam get a -3, troopers affected get +3 to BTS against Isolation, something like that? Sounds like a thing that could easily exist!
I fundamentally disagree with your conceptualization of the fluff based options for explaining Jammers as Comms Equipment. But that's irrelevant: it would be interesting gameplay.
