The thing that stinks about going tech is that it seems that most of the weapons and armor can just be found. So why put points in those disciplines? Or am I misunderstanding you?
I would be mad if I spent a point to learn a certain schematic, and then found that schematic as part of a quest or sitting in some chest in a cave. Are the schematics you find unique?
Found schematics are unique. Basically you get a rating for each tech discipline based upon the learned schematic (from 10 for the first schematic to 100 for the "doctorate") and the found schematics usually require ratings in one or two tech disciplines. You can temporarily raise your rating (by your intelligence score) in a discipline by having a manual (bought at the university in Tarant) in your inventory.
To some extent you are right. A tech-user can find a lot of things, but some of the very best pieces of equipment have to be constructed from schematics. Some of the good finished tech stuff that can be found is quite hard to find though (the first suit of mechanized plate, the repeater rifle, and the hand cannon comes to mind), and some of it is only found very late (my second suit of mechanized plate). The superb ones that I made (the finished items MIGHT be available, I havent explored half of the games) are:
Learned:
lvl1 explosives Molotov cocktail. Incredibly useful. Cannot be bought.
lvl2 electrical: Charged ring. Gives 2 dex which helps your melee/dodge skill and increases the speed of attack, also saves points. The only tech ring?
lvl7 electrical: Tesla rod. Does a ton of damage.
Found/bought:
Mechanised gun (requires roughly level 6 gunsmithy). Does the same damage as the hand cannon but is about 3 times as fast (and eats ten times the ammo). Good mid-game weapon.
Tesla gun: Requires a tesla rod as ingredient and high level gunsmithing, so in practice high level in both gunsmithing and electrical..
Ancient gun (not sure about the name of this one) requires high level gunsmithy. Is essentially a better version of the hand cannon. Faster and more damaging than the elephant gun.
Electro-armour: High level electrical + low level mechanical (or was it smithing, the skill level you get from having a manual in your inventory is enough at any rate). This armour is lighter than mechanised plate, has worse AC but MUCH better damage reduction, which in my experience is superior to AC. Strong enemies will hit you anyway... Combine this with the electrical top-hat (or whatever it is called) and you will soak up much of what the enemy throws at you.
Poisoned/pyrotechnical axes, swords, and bows (didnt have enough smithing skill to make those, but they have good stats)...
Then there is some recipe for a drug that increases all your primary stats permanently, but it requires so many points in the otherwise weak therapeutics and herbology techs that I didnt find it worthwhile (and I didnt have enough points left to spend when I found the schematic anyway).
And I think technological aptitutde gives you magic resistance. This is however a mixed blessing, it means your mages wont heal you either