You are talking about binoculars not telescopic sights.

I haven't played SR4 as yet, but I actually had the opposite view... that shooters had it too good, because in melee, the defender always gets dodge (or unarmed, or parry, or whatever). Although I haven't played a game, it seems to me someone shooting with 10 dice is going to fare better than the dodger, with say 5 - 7 dice (on a good day)... So I would expect most shooters hit. Of course I haven't played a game, so, er, guess this don't count for much!!

You're quite right. Shooters hit way more often than not (until you start trying to factor Edge). Even against targets with a reaction of 9+. Sure, the first two guys missed, but they were firing on that quarter sized bit of air. The third guy, putting more lead in the air catches the artful dodger because there just wasn't anywhere else to zig-zag too (remember, very compressed time spans of about a third of a second, if you're zig-zagging there's about three places to aim: as far right as you go, as far left as you go, and right down the center--one of them's going to hit).

No, I mean telescopic sights (Really!). You see, with a telescopic sight you have both an excellent intel-gathering visual aid and a weapon in one handy-dandy package for instant use if the tactical situation requires someone to have a hole blown into them. With binoculars you get the joys of setting down your binoculars and then grabbing your weapon which has a high propensity to mean that you missed your chance to do anything about the aforementioned tactical situation except pick up the pieces.

Needing a dicepool of 12 instead of 15 to hit and possibly damage every second target at extreme range, is not enough a bonus for me. Don't forget per RAW you cannot use the take aim action if either the target or the shooter moves.

All this does not eliminate the problem that with the threshold approach the attacker has no benefit for laying an ambush.

Only at Extreme ranges, actually. Judging by the fact that the vast majority of Police sniping is done at 50m or less and happens in an urban setting, it gives you an idea of how often your typical SR marksman is going to be shooting at the 600+ meter long greens. Yeah, the rifle and your marksman can probably do it, but you're probably never going to get a LOS that long in a place like Seattle. Even then, you'll probably not get some super nugget-busting hit unless your boy (or girl) really knows that they're doing (which is reflected in a large dice pool).

First off, not many ambushes are sprung at distances of over 100m and most are far shorter than that. Threshold range penalties doesn't hurt you at all in terms of an ambush except for the fact that instead of getting a free pass to shoot some chump at the farthest reaches of your weapon's capability for big money like 100 (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nuyen.gif) , you actually have to make a good shooting roll to, well...make a good shot (and at those ranges, it's a "good shot" just to hit your target). Kind of makes sense now you see it typed out, huh?

How often this occurs in a typical shadowrun is irrelevant. If such shots regularly are made IRL by trained professionals, they should be made in the game as well, and I'm not talking about headshots, just hitting any part of the target. Called shots are even more difficult.

The threshold is indeed mostly irrelevant for ambushes unless handguns are used, but if you don't use an opposed roll but instead the threshold for the ranges, there is no difference between sneaking up on an unaware target and shooting it and stepping in front of the target yelling "Now you die!" and pulling the trigger. I find that weird.

Kind of makes sense now you see it typed out, huh?




"shrug" had to do it...

It's FAR easier to hit in SR than in real life. With any reasonable die pool you'll hit with more than 75% of your shots, often over 90%

In actual warfare a 5% hit rate is considered pretty good. In police shootings about 20% is average, over 50% is outstanding. And police shootings are typically at under 30 feet.

Umm...who said that we don't make opposed rolls? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/indifferent.gif) I had simply stated that we use threshold increases for range modifiers rather than removing a few piddly dice that (pre-SR4A, and the new ones still aren't enough, IMO) were not even close to reflecting how hard it is to hit targets at long ranges, especially in combat.

I assumed you were using the following alternate rule:
So in your games the shooter has to beat a threshold of range penalty + defender's hits? This probably makes combat quite long.

Pretty much the rule we use. Of course, we used it before it was published.

Not at all, really. The main reason for this is because I rarely give the PCs a chance to set up a sniper position where range modifiers come into play (and most of us realize that Snipers are really whack for PCs anyway). Since most fighting in an urban area, especially the type engaged in by 'runners, is at distances of 10m or less, it's largely a moot point. Keep it up close and personal and all types of characters can enjoy themselves, not just the gun bunnies.

Just so that I understand then... it is a penalty to those who would prefer a little space between themselves and the opponents throwing out tons of lead... Yes?

if so, Okay...

There is a common structure of teams in which the sammi just kills most everything from 800 meters. After all, a HMG bullet does extra special damage in a "sniper rifle" and with no range mods in the normal rules they just kill everything they see as they get like 6 successes even if they really are not very skilled in long arms.

Some people find this kind of annoying.

Close, but not quite. The annoying aspect for me is how the character is always trying to be 600+ meters away so they're: 1) useful for a very limited scope of actions well over 90+% of the time, 2) they seem to almost always also involve the skills of a medic for some $&#@ing retarded reason, and 3) really super easy to counter if your opponents aren't complete idiots by simply selecting locations without a long LOS easily found by a quick online comparison reference between a topographical map and Google maps.

Long range marksmen (especially criminals) aren't very common and you can only do the same trick so many times before it gets you dead...

May be true in some games, but we have yet to even be at that distance and have observable line of sight to the target... on the rare occassion that that is the case, what is wrong with it?