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Dumpshock Forums _ Shadowrun _ Full Auto

Posted by: Zephania Jun 14 2004, 10:15 AM

I don't know if this has been covered in a different forum but the full auto rules in SR3 either make everything hit or everything miss.

Does anyone have a better way of doing this? It just seems a bit strange that even the first couple of rounds would miss thats all.

Posted by: Cray74 Jun 14 2004, 12:15 PM

QUOTE (Zephania)

How do you know all the rounds hit or miss?

Shadowrun damage is abstracted so that you do more damage by firing more rounds, but you don't necessarily know many rounds hit because of that abstraction.

Posted by: toturi Jun 14 2004, 12:22 PM

You'd know only if you are using the Suppression Rules.

Posted by: Jason Farlander Jun 14 2004, 12:47 PM

I think you're missing the point. What Zephania is trying to say (I think) is that the chance of hitting someone with the first bullet in a stream of full-auto fire should not really be different than hitting someone with a single bullet fired in SA mode.

And yes, this has been covered before. One solution is to simply count every bullet as a separate instance, using a single dice roll and comparing those successes with an incrementalling increasing TN ending with the last bullet fired. Bullets start missing once you fail to generate successes for a given TN. Dodge test results would then be compared to each individual bullet's number of successes. This will make combat take longer and will increase the lethality of the game dramatically... but hey, if thats fine with you then go for it.

Example: you are standing on an open plain with goon A at short range. You dont like goon A. You have initiative and fire 10 rounds from your AK-97 at Goon A. Since you have a smartlink-2, your base TN to hit goon A is 2. So you roll your assault rifle 5 skill with 2 combat pool and score 9,7,5,5,3,1,1. The TN for the first bullet is 2, and you got 4 successes. That one hits. The second bullet has its TN increased by 1 to a total of 3. That bullet hits. The third bullet hits with 4 successes at TN 4, the fourth bullet hits with 4 successes, the fifth bullet hits with 2 successes, as does the 6th, and the 7th and 8th bullets each hit with a single success. The 9th and 10th bullets miss.

Goon A is in trouble. He rolls 4 combat pool at TN 4 for his dodge test (the TN does o increase because supressive fire is not used) and generates 2 successes. He manages to avoid bullets 5-8, which is good. What isn't good is that he's still hit with 4 bullets.

Heres where you have an option: either keep with the theme of treating each bullet as a separate instance and resist damage for each one individually - in this case that would be 8S damage 4 times. Alternatvely, you can apply the normal rules for burst fire DL modification and using the lowest number of successes that still resulted in a hit for staging - in this case you Goon A must resist 12D damage.

Posted by: BitBasher Jun 14 2004, 03:48 PM

QUOTE

How do you know all the rounds hit or miss?

because it always, always stages up by 10 bullets. They all hit.

I house rule it so the first success on a test is 1d3 bullets hit (rule of six applies) and one more bullet hits for each success beyond the first. You can still get lucky and hit all 10 on a bad roll, and you can still miss the last 2 bullets of a 3 round burst. Staging is based on how many bullets hit. TN increase for dodging is based on how many bullets were fired.

Posted by: TinkerGnome Jun 14 2004, 04:45 PM

The only problem with that, BitBasher, is that it still doesn't make it easier to hit with the first shot. Personally, I favor just making it a mixed open-success test. You roll your dice against the TN without recoil, note successes as normal, but also note your high die. The difference between the high die and the TN is the number of bullets that hit. Add one bullet hit for each point of recoil comp the weapon has. If you get any successes at all, 1 bullet automatically hits. You can't hit with more shots than you have ROF.

So if you were shooting at TN 4 on full auto, you'd roll your dice (let's say you've got 8 of them) and get something like 09 05 04 04 04 03 02 01. Your opponent doesn't get to dodge, let's say (he's surprised, doesn't that suck?). You count your successes (5) and note your high die (9). Subtract the TN from the high die and that's how many bullets that hit (9-4=5). Add your recoil comp (3) to determine the final number of bullets that hit (5+3=8). Now modify the damage code per the normal rules and the defender tries to resist damage (say 3 successes). Decide what you're going to do with the resulting hamburger meat.

I like this system because 1) skill has a large effect on the number of bullets that hit, 2) recoil compensation has a much larger effect on the number of bullets that it, 3) it doesn't add much to the die rolls that currently exist, and 4) a good shot can put all 10 on target while a bad shot might just get one.

Posted by: BitBasher Jun 14 2004, 05:05 PM

Yeah, I wasnt trying to address the "first bullet hits", I was addressing the "all bullets hit".

I dont think your system is bad except that Open Tests are the worst thing since Greedo shooting first. I eliminated all open tests because tyhey freaking suck mechanically, so I wont be using them for this.

Posted by: Jason Farlander Jun 14 2004, 05:05 PM

Noone has any direct comments about the system I proposed?

Posted by: BitBasher Jun 14 2004, 05:10 PM

I'll comment. Far, far too much math. The KISS principle rules. Adding a single extra die roll is cool. Adding up to 15 extra comparisons for using a minigun or 12 for a HVAR is way too much.

Also does each bullet stage up individually, will he need 40 sucesses from the first 10 bullets to stage it down if they hit?

Posted by: The White Dwarf Jun 14 2004, 05:10 PM

It depends on how you use the FA action, as to how likley things will/wont hit.

Like say theres 5 guys in the room, at short range, and you wanna shoot; and FA gets you 10 rounds to use. For sake of ease, Im gonna say youve got yourself 6 points of recoil comp, and a basic smartlink, and that the gun is 8M using normal rounds. You could:

Fire all 10 at the first guy. TN would be (4+4rc-2sl=) 6. Damage would be (8M+10rounds=) 18D-over. Guys TN to dodge would be (4+10rounds=) 7.

Fire 3 bursts of 3 at the first guy. TNs would be (4+0rc-2sl=) 2 for the first, (4+0rc-2sl=) 2 for the second, and (4+3rc-2sl=) 5 for the third. All dodge TNs would be (4+3rounds=) 5, and all damage codes would be (8m+3rounds=) 11S.

Fire a burst at the first 3. TNs would be (4+0rc-2sl=) 2 for the first, (4+0rc-2sl+2secondguy=) 4 for the second, and (4+3rc-2sl+4thirdguy=) 9 for the third. Damage would be (8M+3rounds) 11S to each. All dodge TNs would be (4+3rounds=) 5.

Fire 2 bullets at each guy. TNs would be (4+0rc-2sl=) 2 for the first, (4+0rc-2sl+2secondguy=) 4 for the second, and (4+0rc-2sl+4thirdguy=) 6 for the third, (4+2rc-2sl+6fourthguy=) 10 for the fourth, and (4+4rc-2sl+8fifthguy=) 14 for the fifth. All dodge TNs would be 4, takes 3 rounds to increase it. The Damage would be 10M to all.

As you can see, the ability of everthing to hit/miss depends on what youre doing. How you allocated each round, and the order, is what makes the differeing TNs. Only in the first case is it all or nothing, all other scenarios involve multiple rolls for different segments of the fullauto fire.

Posted by: The White Dwarf Jun 14 2004, 05:12 PM

My reply is to original poster, I dont have any comments on all the house rule stuff. And it is, afaik, the way the rules say to do it. If Im wrong lemme know.

Posted by: TinkerGnome Jun 14 2004, 05:22 PM

QUOTE (BitBasher)

I dont think your system is bad except that Open Tests are the worst thing since Greedo shooting first. I eliminated all open tests because tyhey freaking suck mechanically, so I wont be using them for this.

Then don't call it an open test (it's not really, since open tests are generally only used to set the TN for an opposed roll). It's very similar to the mechanic already in place for wound effects.

The strengths of doing it that way are:

No extra rolling
If you hit at all, you're going to hit with as many bullets as you can get off before your barrel starts to climb (ie, the recoil comp runs out)
It allows a random factor (what high die comes up) along with a skill factor (more dice = better chance at a high number)

It's worth noting that I don't actually use the system when I'm running. It's just something I've been thinking about for a while now.

Posted by: Zephania Jun 14 2004, 05:55 PM

Yeah, I like most of what you were saying Jason the increasing target no. etc. I'll probably do that and then work out one damage resistance test based on how many hit.

Thanks everyones comments were appreciated.

Posted by: BitBasher Jun 14 2004, 05:56 PM

QUOTE

Then don't call it an open test (it's not really, since open tests are generally only used to set the TN for an opposed roll). It's very similar to the mechanic already in place for wound effects.

Which I dont use. It's a big fat pain in the ass. I dont want one roll with 2 mechanics that I have to keep track of that work off of different target numbers. The surgery rules are a nightmare like that.

It will work fine, I just wont use mechanics that work that way. I'm for making all the mechanics homogeneous, not making them more complicated.

Posted by: Cray74 Jun 14 2004, 06:17 PM

QUOTE (BitBasher @ Jun 14 2004, 03:48 PM)

QUOTE

How do you know all the rounds hit or miss?

because it always, always stages up by 10 bullets. They all hit.

I disagree. Firing a burst of ten rounds from the same model of gun will put the same base amount of firepower into the air, understandably providing the same base amount of damage that can be inflicted with the weapon.

However, what is then done with that base damage is determined by skill and dice pools (of the attacker and defender). A target in street armor that dodged and soaked a 10 round burst down to a light wound was probably not hit by all ten rounds. An attacker that only got one success to hit probably only got one of the ten rounds near the target.

Posted by: TinkerGnome Jun 14 2004, 06:20 PM

The power of the hit is part of what goes up, though. The only use for power is as part of the Damage Resistance test... it has nothing to do with skill or dodging.

Posted by: Cray74 Jun 14 2004, 06:32 PM

QUOTE (TinkerGnome)

The power of the hit is part of what goes up, though. The only use for power is as part of the Damage Resistance test... it has nothing to do with skill or dodging.

Skill is quite involved. There's a definite difference in the damage you need to resist from a 10-round SMG burst that hits with 6 successes vs a 10-round SMG burst that hits with 1 success.

The base damage goes up due to the burst, yes, but there's still room for improvement due to skill.

Posted by: TinkerGnome Jun 14 2004, 06:41 PM

There's skill involved, yes, but not with the power level. It's static. The only things that change damage level are ammo type, number of bullets fired, and armor. There's no skill in that part. Some luck (combat pool) can come into it, but besides that it's pure body which is rolled against the power of the attack.

Also, while you can stage damage with dodging, you will never stage it below the damage level as it is increased by the number of bullets because if you do, the attack misses (ie, you've rolled more successes than your attacker on the dodge roll). You still get hit by all of the bullets. At that point, body is the only thing that can stage down the increased damage level. The way those 10 bullets hit you is about all you can affect.

Posted by: Cray74 Jun 14 2004, 06:47 PM

QUOTE (TinkerGnome)

There's skill involved, yes, but not with the power level. It's static.

Yes. Same number of bullets in the air, same base, abstracted damage. Maybe most of the bullets miss but a few hit vitals, maybe most hit but only graze, but the base damage is still just an abstraction of the effect you get out of firing X bullets.

Posted by: CoalHeart Jun 14 2004, 06:48 PM

Full Auto is wonky on the rules side and mechanics side.

1 success on any test means it's a success. You hit the target, you jumped the chasm, you mended the wound. Anything more than that just means you did it spectacularly.

So 1 success on a full auto attack means every bullet hits.

The problem with this is that each bullet adds power and the damage level. Just because a bullet travels with 5 of it's buddies at you quickly doesn't mean that your Armor plated jacket's protection should'nt matter.

I always opt to make the person use the base damage of the gun, but I do use the extra damage levels inflicted.

Normally and very deadly
8M full auto weapon 10 round burst does 18 D with 1 success.
You need 8 successes at a huge target number. 18ish to take no damage

in my game it's still very deadly
8M full auto weapon 10 round burst with 1 success does 8M+10DLs (+1 from each bullet)

Now you need 14 successes at a much much lower target number.

It ensures that even the mighiest of tanks can still be hurt and torn down. It also means that the piddly weak will still be torn up.

So take your Average Sammy with 6 body, and 6 armor. (for ease)

Normal rules he would have to resist
12D with body+CP with about 12 dice. There's very little chance he'll survive. Some nights I can't even roll one six.

My game he would face 2M+10 DLs. So with all of his Body and CP he can at the most hope to stage it down to an L. Provided all successes.

Chances are he's taking an S or a D as he should.

The only problem with my rule is that Troll tanks tend to shrug it off rather well, but thats why the ShadowRun gods created APDS and ExEx.

Posted by: CoalHeart Jun 14 2004, 06:52 PM

PS Oh and addition to my rule. each 2 Extra successes add more DLs to resist. So getting shot is definately a bad thing.

Posted by: Jason Farlander Jun 14 2004, 09:29 PM

You know, its actually rather easy to avoid any on-the-fly math at all with the system I proposed by simply preparing a table with the numbers 4 through 16 in the first row, with additional lines for levels of recoil compensation on it. Apply non-recoil TN mods to the dice roll itself, then just check your results against the line corresponding to the appropriate level of recoil compensation you have and only check for successes up to the number of bullets fired. Easy.... unless you dont like tables.

Posted by: Eyeless Blond Jun 15 2004, 12:17 AM

Tinker: what I want to know is, how does your system handle multiple successes and staging? Say the base TN is 4. A guy fires a 3-round (uncompressed, just to simplify things) burst, and rolls 7, 7, 4, 4, 2 on his Assault Rifles test. Now, is that 2 net successes with three bullets, 4 net successes with 3 bullets, or 4 net successes with 1 bullet and 2 net successes with the other 2?

Oh, and another thing: someone mentioned the surgery rules having multiple different TNs in a single test, and I don't see that anywhere. From what I read in M&M the surgery rules are a good old Success Test, with a threshold of 3 successes in order to aboid any negative options. Did I miss something there?

(Edit: mixed up systems. I like this one the best of all; the others just require too damn much dice rolling. Tinker's system works because it's immediately comprehensible, although it has the complication that I mentioned above, plus it's far too powerful.)

Posted by: BitBasher Jun 15 2004, 12:48 AM

QUOTE

Oh, and another thing: someone mentioned the surgery rules having multiple different TNs in a single test, and I don't see that anywhere. From what I read in M&M the surgery rules are a good old Success Test, with a threshold of 3 successes in order to aboid any negative options. Did I miss something there?

Yes, you did miss somehting there. I'll post when I'm at home with my books. There a TN, a second TN on the same roll, and an open test to boot. all on one roll.

Posted by: TinkerGnome Jun 15 2004, 01:25 AM

QUOTE (Eyeless Blond)

Simple enough for both. Surgury has a "threshold" which is involved with options and the like. I remember it being complicated to the point that I decided not to bother memorizing it. There are also wound effects which work in a similar way. When you take damage, you treat your body roll as a success test (obviously) to resist the damage, but also as an open test which determines whether or not you take wound effects. It's complicated.

Anyway, the system I propose is very simple. The maximum number of successes applies to the number of bullets that hit. So if you fired a 3 round burst with the dice you showed, he'd hit with three rounds (+3 power +1 DL) and four net successes for the entire burst. This is actually a net greater effect than that shooter would achieve using the current rules, but that's part of the intent.

The supposition is that the first shot from a gun should not be any more difficult to hit with than the first shot from a SA weapon. It is not completely realistic, but it does allow for a much wider range of results than the current system while being more useful. If there was an effect to multiple rounds greater than what is currently present, I'd be wary of allowing it. It is just about as complicated as I'd want to get, too.

Posted by: Eyeless Blond Jun 15 2004, 04:47 AM

Well I do remember that full-auto is harder to dodge...

Anyway, I like your system, but I'm concerned that it makes full-auto weapons far more powerful than they are currently. Certainly it won't make recoil compensation as absolutely necessary as it is currently. If I were to go with this, I'd at the very least only give a +1 to Power for every two bullets, and +1 DL for every three.That *does* end up giving you a "sweet spot" of getting a big boost to power and damage at multiples of 6, but this doesn't concern me so much, as SR seems to have that problem with sixes in general.

Posted by: TinkerGnome Jun 15 2004, 12:18 PM

It does make full auto more powerful, but... as it stands right now, full auto is rarely useful for straight out shooting. Recoil comp is still king, though, since each point means a bullet automaticly hits.

The balancing factor is that the dice only rarely break 12. Shooting TNs are generally in the 6-10 range. You're not likely to hit with many bullets unless you're in one of the more rare TN 2-4 cases. At which point, being lit into with full auto fire should be a death sentance.

To balance it, I might go so far as to reduce the dodge TN penalty to only account for rounds which would miss you. Because there are less rounds off target, it means that there is less errant lead for you to dodge into.

Posted by: Jason Farlander Jun 15 2004, 12:52 PM

For those who would be interested in such a thing, I went ahead and generated a table for use with the system I proposed (note, however, that said system has not been "field tested" yet) .

CODE

*. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10 11 12 13 14 15
0. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18
1. 4. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17
2. 4. 4. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10 11 12 13 14 15 16
3. 4. 4. 4. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10 11 12 13 14 15
4. 4. 4. 4. 4. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10 11 12 13 14
5. 4. 4. 4. 4. 4. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10 11 12 13
6. 4. 4. 4. 4. 4. 4. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10 11 12
7. 4. 4. 4. 4. 4. 4. 4. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10 11
8. 4. 4. 4. 4. 4. 4. 4. 4. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10
9. 4. 4. 4. 4. 4. 4. 4. 4. 4. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9.
10 4. 4. 4. 4. 4. 4. 4. 4. 4. 4. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8.

Note that columns represent the bullets fired, rows represent levels of recoil compensation.

*As an aside, is there a way to stick .xls or .sxc files in here directly? formatting this thing such that the columns lined up was rather annoying... As a second aside, does anyone who uses open office know how to generate space-delineated (as opposed to tab-delineated) output files?*

Posted by: Siege Jun 15 2004, 03:37 PM

Upload an .xls file to a website and link to that -- if geocities, two hyperlinks away.

Otherwise, I don't think you can do it directly.

However, Excel allows a user to save a spreadsheet as an .htm file - you could open the .htm file in notepad and copy-past the requisite code for your table.

-Siege

Posted by: TinkerGnome Jun 15 2004, 04:11 PM

Hmm... okay. I've given it some revised thought and come up with another possibility that seems to work as well as the first.

To fire full auto, you roll a success test as normal. You don't count your recoil on the TN for doing this. One success indicates that your target has been targeted accurately. These successes are used in the exact same manner as any attack test and can be dodged normally (with TN modifiers on the dodge test based on the number of shots fired, per normal).

Okay, here's the tricky part. For each success past the first remaining on the attack test, one bullet hits. For each point of recoil compnesation available, one bullet hits. Maximum of the number of bullets you fired.

Stage damage according to the ruels for bursts and short bursts per normal. Proceed with damage resistance per normal (successes on the damage resistance test apply only to reducing the normal effect of extra successes on the attack test and do not lower the number of bullets that hit).

So let's take a goon with a SMG (SA/BF/FA, 6M, RC2, skill 5, smartlink). He's firing on a runner with no cover in good lighting. He is at 5 meters and goes full auto. His target is walking. His TN is 3 and he rolls his 5 dice. They come up 08 04 03 02 01, or 3 successes.

Okay, the runner tries to dodge, using 5 cp against a TN of 7 (4 + 3 for 9+ rounds of autofire). His dice come up 07 05 03 02 01, so 1 success.

The runner has been hit with 2 net successes. The goon figures out how many rounds actually struck his target and stages damage accordingly. He starts off with a base of 0 rounds and adds 1 for extra successes and 3 for recoil compensation. He has struck his foe with 4 rounds, which boosts his base damage to 10S.

The runner rolls to resist the damage (10S with 2 successes) with his body as normal.

Characters who are serious about autofire can get recoil comp as high as 9, making this a workable system for all involved.

Posted by: Eyeless Blond Jun 15 2004, 04:40 PM

Oh, I *like* this one. It even addresses BitBasher's objection to combining an Open Test and a Success Test at the same time. Only one issue:

QUOTE (TinkerGnome)

The runner has been hit with 2 net successes. The goon figures out how many rounds actually struck his target and stages damage accordingly. He starts off with a base of 0 rounds and adds 1 for extra successes and 3 for recoil compensation. He has struck his foe with 4 rounds, which boosts his base damage to 10S.

Shouldn't you start with a single bullet, rather than base 0? Otherwise 1 net success with no recoil comp means that you hit with 0 bullets.

Oh, and with a hip pad, max-gyro, personalized grip and high Str can't you get RC to 12 or higher fairly easily?

Posted by: TinkerGnome Jun 15 2004, 04:46 PM

QUOTE (Eyeless Blond)

Otherwise 1 net success with no recoil comp means that you hit with 0 bullets

This is left in to mimic the behavior of the current rules where the first shot has a +1 recoil number. It's no big deal to just count all of the successes (and is even cleaner that way).

I wasn't considering strength over 11, but it'd boost RC on up past 9. Nine is strength 6 (1), an Ares Alpha (2), shock pads (1), personalized grip (1), and gas vent IV. It'd not be a big deal to pull off the GL and replace it with a foregrip, giving you a straight 10 RC.