 modifying firearms, what rules to use when altering firearms |
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 Dec 4 2006, 08:30 PM
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#1
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Moving Target  Group: Members Posts: 777 Joined: 22-November 06 Member No.: 9,934  |
obviously the skill is going to be armorer, and the build/repair table is going to be the focus.
but... what basis do you use for increasing rate of fire. Semi Automatic can be easily adjusted to full auto. even in RL, but say taking a slivergun, and increasing the regulator to fire 6 bullets instead of 3. it would still take the same amount of action to fire, but in game balance should it be a Simple action? logically it should. the ruger superwarhawk what about adding a lever to the wheel so it is a double action revolver? |
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Dec 4 2006, 08:40 PM
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#2
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 668 Joined: 4-September 06 Member No.: 9,304 |
You might want to hold off a couple of months
hopefully by then Arsenal will be out, with all the needed rules. As for increasing the rate of fire on weapons, well, sure you can, but can the barrel of the weapon take the increased heat? |
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Dec 4 2006, 09:11 PM
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#3
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 777 Joined: 22-November 06 Member No.: 9,934 |
the slivergun there is no question can handle the increased ROF. a ruger warhawk of course... the lighter pistols would most likely require modifications if you up them to fully automatic. |
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Dec 4 2006, 09:58 PM
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#4
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 261 Joined: 26-February 02 From: Massachusetts Member No.: 2,115 |
You're starting on a dangerous path, djinni. If it's fun for you and your game group, go for it, but ad-hock weapon modifications will lead to a horribly-destabilized game if you don't have a good understanding of the game system and some competence at game design issues.
The guns in Shadowrun have severe realism problems, and and if you break things in your tinkering... you'll get to keep both broken pieces. |
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Dec 4 2006, 10:15 PM
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#5
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ghostrider Group: Retired Admins Posts: 4,196 Joined: 16-May 04 Member No.: 6,333 |
If you have access to it, checking out the Cannon Companion might give you some ideas of how to go about messing with weapons. It won't be 100% applicable, but it'll give you an idea of what they did to balance changes and stuff.
edit: Good to see that the doomsayers have found this thread. ;) Seriously, do you think going "hey, in my games I have a new weapon, it's like a Warhawk, but it fires in SA" will horribly destabilize the game? Again, I think you're looking at what someone wants to do, and taking it to the most ridiculous extreme possible in order to create a problem. If you said "hey, the Predator now does the damage of a Rocket Launcher!!!oneone" it might be a little overboard, but if the NPCs had the uber-Predator too, bam, balanced game. |
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Dec 4 2006, 10:28 PM
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#6
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Great Dragon Group: Members Posts: 5,430 Joined: 10-January 05 From: Fort Worth, Texas Member No.: 6,957 |
Damn, and you had me agreeing with you up until this point. Balance (in most games, SR being no exception) is a trickier thing then just "give everyone the super powered whoozits." |
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Dec 4 2006, 10:28 PM
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#7
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Immoral Elf Group: Members Posts: 15,247 Joined: 29-March 02 From: Grimy Pete's Bar & Laundromat Member No.: 2,486 |
Maybe not, but a Slivergun that fires two 6 round bursts per pass is something that might give me pause. |
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Dec 4 2006, 11:56 PM
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#8
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 147 Joined: 4-December 06 From: Chicago, IL Member No.: 10,193 |
Absolutely. The most obvious change would be to change the legality of the gun from restricted to forbidden. Modified weapons are the bane of law enforcement whether real or fictional. Of course, if you're carrying around an Ares Predator loaded with EX explosive ammo, you're not really going to be worried whether you're going to get into trouble over an increased firing rate. An easy way to do it is to add the chance for malfunction. Say take one die away from the amount needed to glitch when using the weapon for each modification from the original. It's pushing the weapon beyond what it was designed to do. You may be talented but these neoguns were designed by many many people with degrees in metallurgy, ballistics, engineering etc. They made the gun as strong as they thought they safely could. Going beyond that has inherent risks. |
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Dec 5 2006, 12:00 AM
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#9
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 147 Joined: 4-December 06 From: Chicago, IL Member No.: 10,193 |
The possibilities for graphic description of malfunction for that weapon would be endless... "...and that's why they call me porcupine face" |
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Dec 5 2006, 12:20 AM
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#10
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ghostrider Group: Retired Admins Posts: 4,196 Joined: 16-May 04 Member No.: 6,333 |
And...how exactly would the game be unbalanced by everyone having a ridiculous weapon? I point you to the Panther Assault Cannon. Uber-weapon of kill you, and anyone with a decent fixer can get one. The fact that my example weapon was silly doesn't negate my point. |
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Dec 5 2006, 12:23 AM
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#11
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 147 Joined: 4-December 06 From: Chicago, IL Member No.: 10,193 |
Yeah, but the panther is kinda the open war type of weapon. Carrying one of those kinda removes any ounce of subtlety your team may still have left.
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Dec 5 2006, 12:35 AM
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#12
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 261 Joined: 26-February 02 From: Massachusetts Member No.: 2,115 |
Game balance isn't just an issue of "my gun vs your gun". Drones are at a certain power level. Mages and spirits are at a certain power level. The guns the other players in the party have are at a certain power level.
If you tweak any of the power-level variables in your game, it will change in proportion to all the others. This means that game balance in your game will have changed overall. Now, I'm not going to claim that a Ares Viper Slivergun that can shoot long bursts will completely destroy playability. I'm not even going to claim that Shadowrun 4th edition is especially well balanced by default. What I will claim is that game balance matters, and that increasing the power level of what's probably the best pistol in the game (the Slivergun) probably isn't going to make game balance better. |
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Dec 5 2006, 12:40 AM
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#13
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 147 Joined: 4-December 06 From: Chicago, IL Member No.: 10,193 |
You really think it's the best pistol? I mean... the AR alone makes it questionable to me. Are you just doing called shots all the time? |
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Dec 5 2006, 12:46 AM
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#14
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 399 Joined: 27-May 04 Member No.: 6,361 |
Agreed. However his point, while an exaggeration, still stands. Just be sensible about the mods. A damage variation should likely only be by one (or two for rifles). AP should be by the same amount. And add drawbacks for each modification... like even more maintenance (done with an upkeep cost of say... 25% of the weapons base cost and perhaps constant RP opportunities and an armorer or mechanic (not sure which is gun smithing) test) . Also... for each modification increase the cost of the by at least 50%. Maybe double it for each change. Increased clip size would mean less conceal likely. Other neat options like biometric safeties and so on shouldn't be a big deal though. I'd like to hear from someone who actually modifies weapons though. Should be interesting. |
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Dec 5 2006, 12:49 AM
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#15
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Midnight Toker Group: Members Posts: 7,686 Joined: 4-July 04 From: Zombie Drop Bear Santa's Workshop Member No.: 6,456 |
Due to the way the armor system works flechette ammo's +2AP is even more worthless to defenders than its late double impact armor was. Flechette bullets are always +2DV +2AP. Since damage downcoversion is determined by comparing the armor rating to the DV the +2 armor does not make it any more likely. Since each armor die is only a chance to stage down the damage with a 1/3 probability of success and the +2 DV is a guaranteed +2 damage if hit, the flechette always has an advantage over standard ammo. |
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Dec 5 2006, 01:03 AM
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#16
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 261 Joined: 26-February 02 From: Massachusetts Member No.: 2,115 |
If we don't consider ammo cost, then absolutely. It's base damage value is one higher than normal for free and it has a 30 round clip. Flechette ammo is strictly better than normal ammo, as has been argued more than once in the past. The real question is this - how does flechette ammo compare with ExEx ammo? The standard answer is that it's 4/3rds of a damage box worse because of the 4 AP difference. I'd tend to argue that since it's more likely to do stun damage it's actually better - but that doesn't matter. The Slivergun does an entire box of damage extra, so the "advantage" is only 1/3rd of a damage box. So... at this point, if you accept the claim that ExEx is better than Flechette (I don't) the Slivergun is 1/3rd of a damage box behind the Predator. At this point, you can consider the fact that the Slivergun has double the clip size. Advantage Slivergun maybe? Hard to call? Here's the clincher: The Slivergun can fire bursts. That beats even the Ruger Super Warhawk with ExEx by 2/3rds of a damage box. It's true that there's recoil and you can't get a Gas Vent system, but on the other hand you can fire two bursts instead of the Warhawk's one shot... (Taking into account a recoil penalty of -2, the expected damage from the warhawk with ExEx and a burst from the Slivergun is the same... and the slivergun can do it 4 more times, and has the option of higher-penalty second bursts.) Oh, and just as an added benifit, the Slivergun has an integral sound supressor. |
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Dec 5 2006, 01:19 AM
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#17
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Bushido Cowgirl Group: Members Posts: 5,782 Joined: 8-July 05 From: On the Double K Ranch a half day's ride out of Phlogiston Flats Member No.: 7,490 |
...which is why the Viper is my hacker Violet's favourite weapon...she's been pretty damned effective with it and she isn't even a real gunbunny. |
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Dec 5 2006, 01:48 AM
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#18
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Bushido Cowgirl Group: Members Posts: 5,782 Joined: 8-July 05 From: On the Double K Ranch a half day's ride out of Phlogiston Flats Member No.: 7,490 |
...the only downside of that is you will be spending more time reloading than shooting. Take a gunbunny (like KK 4.3) with 3 IPs and she's out of ammo in just one combat turn. Next you suffer recoil penalties with no way to compensate since the Warhawk cannot accept a barrel mounted accessory (gas vent). Having fired a Blackhawk in RL, I can say it does have a bit of a kick. Considering the firepower of the Warhawk, especially when loaded with EXEX or Gel Rounds, I have found one shot is pretty sufficient to take most targets down or at least make them think about diving for cover (save for Trolls, for them you need a PJSS with loaded EXEX & fire both barrels at once) There was some discussion a while back in a thread about "Fanning" where firing two Warhawks in alternating fashion (as opposed to simultaneously) with the Ambidexterity quality allowed two shots per IP. Then again this could just be someone's houserule. |
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Dec 5 2006, 02:09 AM
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#19
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 178 Joined: 4-September 05 Member No.: 7,682 |
I am and always will be a fan of the Roomsweeper. Pull out Cannon Companion, tweak it up a little...
Of course it's a bit less practical now that concealability rules got the axe. :( |
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Dec 5 2006, 03:11 AM
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#20
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Immoral Elf Group: Members Posts: 15,247 Joined: 29-March 02 From: Grimy Pete's Bar & Laundromat Member No.: 2,486 |
No house rule involved ... it's perfectly legit. I believe that the second Warhawk would have a recoil penalty though. |
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