Contact Vector at close-combat Options

[Machiavelli]

Yesterday i GMed a run that caused some serious discussion among my fellow runners.

They were about to save a little child out of an danger-zone and jumped over a wall in a backyard. Unfortunately they messed up their perception tests before, so they had no chance to prevent thie following. 10 ghouls charged at them, but they were all about 25 m away and so it would take them until the end of the round to reach the chars. for an infight (ghouls were unarmed and un-armored/chars all had rating 2 wired reflexes and came worlds before the ghouls). Instead of fleeing right back over the wall, the players decided to shoot it out. At the end, every char. had 3 ghouls in close-combat-range but they managed not getting hit by them and so they took them out with the help of the good old ares predator, some real serious neck-breaking kicks and an MP. I told them before that the contact with body fluids would be adequade of becoming infected and after the started to shoot bursts while in close-combat, i said that on a throw of a 1 out of 6, they get drops of blood from the ghouls on their bodies. But unfortunately i didn´t had the runners companion at hand and acc. to the core-book, ghouls don´t even have the infection power. So they started a quite loud discussion about the really big chance of the 1 out of 6 to be hit that would be ways to exaggerated, and that you cannot become infected this way.

So plase tell me, if i really exaggerated this situation. Is 1 out of 6 really too much? I, for myself, thought to be quite fair, because i can hardly believe that you could prevent not beeing hit by blood, if you shoot somebody in this range. In CIS they always find blood at the targetter.^^

Below the characteristics of the ghoul-metastrain:

HMHVV III (Ghilani Wichtiviridae)
Vector: Contact
Speed: 1 day (10)
Penetration: –6
Power: 8
Nature: Retroviral
Effect: Pain, nausea, Essence loss, transformation
HMHVV III is responsible for the creation of ghouls, and
is typically spread by unprotected contact with those creatures or
their bodily fluids. Unlike the cases of other retroviruses in this
genus, the subject is usually awake and aware during the metamorphosis.
Every time the character fails the Disease Resistance Test,
he loses 0.1 points of Essence. If his Essence falls to 0 or below,
he dies.

I really need your advice, because basically i want the players to enjoy my runs, but i am not used to GM a SR4 game so i might overact sometimes.

Thank you in advance

[McAllister]

Fluff: I think we're talking contact between bodily fluids and other bodily fluids, not simply between bodily fluids and skin. Think HIV. You can't get HIV from any amount of making out with an infected person, saliva just doesn't have the virus. Also, even if you dipped your hands in a vat of HIV-blood, there's a good chance you'd be ok; infection would only result if you had some sort of open cut or abrasion. I think, since people tend not to have unprotected sex with ghouls, the major risk is getting bitten/clawed, at which point you're pretty hosed, or sprayed by so much blood that it gets in your mouth/eyes/cuts.

Crunch: Roll Reaction + Edge (sometimes you just need to be lucky) vs. 1/3 (rounded down) of damage inflicted on the ghoul, -1 for every meter between the ghoul and the character. An uninjured (all physical boxes healed) character gets +3 to resist, in addition to all characters adding their chemical protection ratings, but wound penalties count double (harder dodging plus more places for the blood to get in).

For example, if you're in close combat with a ghoul and your buddy shoots him with a Panther Assault Cannon, let's say the ghoul takes 12 damage. You've got chemical protection 3, but, having taken 5 boxes of damage, you're also working with -2 in would penalties. You'd roll Reaction + Edge - 1 vs. 4. If your Reaction and Edge are normal, you've got a good chance of making it, but it could go either way, because that cannibal got -splattered.-

To reduce cruelty (and/or if your players are lacking chemical protection) change the opposing roll to 1/4 of the damage in inflicted on the ghoul, or take the square root.

[Machiavelli]

They had no chemical protection and the description says "contact" not "injection". It was only about, if my solution of the "1 out of 6" was fair or not. The book says to contact:

Contact toxins (in liquid or gas form) must be applied to
the target’s skin. If coated on a weapon, they may be applied
with a successful melee attack (whether or not they cause damage).
A chemical seal (see p. 317) off ers complete protection
unless breached (by an attack causing damage), while chemical
protection (p. 317) gives a bonus equal to its rating to the Toxic
Resistance Test.

[Rotbart van Dain...]

Whoever wrote the SR4 rules for the ghoul-metastrain completely disregarded kanon till then. Back then, the disease took three months, could be medically treated within the first and there was a fair chance to never get infected in the first place.

Basically, with SR4 rules, ghulism will infect the entire world within weeks.

[Machiavelli]

Except the bounty-hunters that are mentioned sometimes do their work properly. For me this is a cool change because it makes a great "resident evil" feeling to fight ghouls like this. Acc. to their statistics, at least wild ghouls are quite lame. No dodge-skill, low agility, mainly no armor and a lame attack of 4P accompanied with an even lamer close-combat skill. I think i could have send 20 of them without much danger for my 2 runners. Dissappointed me somehow yesterday.

[Rotbart van Dain...]

Except the bounty-hunters that are mentioned sometimes do their work properly.

Those are the first to fall, actually. Everyone infected is a carrier, infecting everyone they come in contact with - and it takes days to become a ghoul.

Not becoming infected is pretty much impossible, even if reading the Augmentation rules the way that making the first test keeps you from getting sick. (disease takes no effect)
Why? Because it has a -6 Penetration, meaning even the best chem suits don't offer any protection - and making 8 hits is pretty much impossible.

For me this is a cool change because it makes a great "resident evil" feeling to fight ghouls like this.

Sure, having the world populated by flesheating monstrosities is very resident evil, but not the way the 6th world is described in supplements.

[Machiavelli]

Somehow they are about to solve this problem. Maybe ghouls prefer canibalism?^^

[Red-ROM]

Except the bounty-hunters that are mentioned sometimes do their work properly. For me this is a cool change because it makes a great "resident evil" feeling to fight ghouls like this. Acc. to their statistics, at least wild ghouls are quite lame. No dodge-skill, low agility, mainly no armor and a lame attack of 4P accompanied with an even lamer close-combat skill. I think i could have send 20 of them without much danger for my 2 runners. Dissappointed me somehow yesterday.

their stealth makes them pretty deadly in the right circumstances

[Ravor]

Personally I think you made the right call, if anything I'd have ruled that blood spatter was pretty much a given, but given a bonus on the disease test.

[Machiavelli]

Thanks for your comment. I will confront them next time, with the result of this discussion. Lets have their hair fall out.^^