[X] My Assistant

[ixombie]

I think the rules say that the GM decides who can use a panther cannon. They don't provide weight values or strength requirements. That doesn't mean that neither one exists.

I don't think the panther cannon needs to be nerfed with more requirements. Do people regularly abuse them? No. Why? Horrendous availability, very expensive per shot. There are much better guns for your money. And panther cannons aren't even all that great, especially compared to most autofire weaponry. The only time you really want a panther cannon is when your target has hardened armor. And even then, much of the time a sniper rifle would do the trick, or if it's really heavy a panther cannon won't even work and you'll need a rocket launcher.

[Kyoto Kid]

[djinni]

[bibliophile20]

[Lyonheart]

Lack of a listed weight does not make them weightless, just like your troll can't go around armed with a Ares Citymaster strapped to his back, 6yr olds don't get Panther Cannons. Though the Japanese School girl may get a pass it it's that sort of game.

[JonathanC]

[Eyeless Blond]

[Shrike30]

I just stick with the "don't play Shadowrun with rules lawyers" approach. Works pretty well at filtering out assault-cannon equipped 6 year olds.

SR4 kind of assumes that the players and the GM are on the same page about general "what's reasonable?" kind of questions, or are capable of reaching an agreement should a debate arise. "Can a child use a weapon described as "enormous" and that fires ammunition used in the main gun for tanks?" is one of those questions that, if you're having to ask, would ideally mean that your GM doesn't slap his forehead when he hears it, and goes on to okay it's use after a short, enthusiastic discussion with the rest of the player group about what they want in their game. "Totally!"

[Exodus]

[Critias]

[Starmage21]

[Moon-Hawk]

[Kremlin KOA]

[Kyoto Kid]

...what, the Panther canon or Japanese schoolgirl? :grinbig:

[JonathanC]

Everybody is saying common sense, but common sense is generally based on having an idea of the situation. All I know about a Panther cannon is that it's big. So if STR 1 is unreasonable, what about STR 2? Still too small? What about 3? At what point can someone wield one with only one hand? STR 10? 12?

There are absolutely no guidelines to go by. And nothing to base recoil modifiers off of, even though the fluff text suggests that the gun has huge recoil. At this point the game rules (Panther has no recoil mod) conflict with what the gun's description is telling you. So what's the common sense answer when the rulebook is arguing with itself?

[Dashifen]

[DireRadiant]

There's no mechanical restriction in the rules. So a STR 1 character can carry and fire a Panther Cannon.

If you want to add or modify or change the mechanics to satisfy yourself and your players, go for it.

[Kyoto Kid]

[Eryk the Red]

I think "do whatever you want" is a decidedly unhelpful answer. The issue is that it's hard to come up with a common sense solution when there's no frame of reference for such a solution.

That said, I dunno. I've not had to make a rule on it because the only character in my game who's tried to pick up an assault cannon is the two-ton troll. (It should be noted that in my game, assault cannons are more powerful and the book stats are actually representative of anti-materiel rifles.) If it came down to it, I'd probably pick a Strength rating, like 8 or 10, and say you get -1 or -2 to attack rolls for each Strength point by which you fall short.

But that's just an ass-pull, as any rule of this nature would be, since there's really no rules about weapon size. There's weapons that people can use without problems, and presumably there's weapons that don't work like that (like artillery, not that there are or should be rules for that). But there's nothing in the middle.

[DireRadiant]

No Rules --> Some Rules --> More Rules --> Even More Rules --> Rules for Everything.
No Book --> Small Book --> SR4 Book --> Huge $$$ Book --> No Book.

By explicitly choosing open base mechanics and a relatively consistent resolution engine the game authors have empowered the GM and Players to play the game as they please within a common framework for all the players.

We can add weights and recoil crunchiness to the game, a few pages here and there, and frankly some people, including myself would throw it out and ignore it in their games. So you can make everyone pay for stuff only some would use, or provide a base consistency and allow everyone to enhance it as they please to satisfy their individual and disparate needs.

It's up to the GM, or a full SR4 recall and reprint and redistribution!

And frankly the vast majority of any game session is created by the GM, I constantly find myself lamenting the lack of metahuman psychological, sociological and pathological characterization and behavioral information in the main rule book. It causes me severe problems in figuring out how the NPC s are supposed to act, can we add that to the rule book please? Needs an errata!

I still say you do whatever you want. It doesn't affect me, it might help you.

Now if you want to have a rule published to make me do what you want, well, then we'll need to have a little chat about that.

[Aaron]

If only there were some sort of person to act as a guide or leader for the game, a sort of "game master" if you will, that could be relied upon to make judgment calls of this sort.

[JonathanC]

If only there was a book, a...rulebook, if you will, that gave the Gamemaster some vague idea on which to build his rulings. Hmm....

[Dashifen]

There is. That it doesn't have exactly what you're looking for doesn't mean that it doesn't provide you with a foundation from which to build the game you want to play. One of the great strengths of the SR4 system is its flexibility. Too many more rules and you lose that flexibility.

[JonathanC]

So, what part of the book provides the information I'd need to guesstimate what kind of strength you'd need to fire a Panther Assault cannon? And what about the recoil? If I apply recoil modifiers, I'm technically countermanding the rules. If I don't, I'm going against what's in the flavor text.

[cx2]

Some people seem to have a problem with the idea of "GM approval" being a de facto mechanic.

I have never seen a rocket launcher other than on TV and in computer games, I know very little about them. I know this much - they are a fairly big size and definitely not somehting I would like to lug around. On this basis, and on the basis of what a particular campaign is like I could make an educated guess on what is reasonable for someone to carry a rocket launcher. Similar enough with a Panther, don't overthink things. The moment you overthink you complicate the rules far too much for any rulebook to handle entirely without turning it into something more akin to a tabletop wargame than an RPG.

Or to be more simple - a GM doesn't need to make his mind up about what requirement there is unless someone is an idiot about it.