Dual Weapon's and Smartgun Links Options

[KarmaInferno]

I want you to try something. Go hunting, and just stare at some deer. Don't bother paying attention to where you want to shoot them, just stare at the deer, pull the trigger, and hope for the best. Let me know how that works out for you.

I have. If I've got my laser sight, I don't really need to be even looking down the barrel to aim.

"Bullet goes where the red dot glows", and all that.




-k

[JonathanC]

Well two things. It is a good thing I am not in fact doing this in real life or a combat situation and this is in fact also a game.

I would also appreciate it if you would lay off the 'idiots' and 'are you stupids'. It makes your tone of voice and posts feel very combative.

Fine; I've edited the posts out of respect for your delicate sensibilities. And yeah, fine, you're right.


Clearly the rulebook is wrong, and Yerameyahu is right. Forget about real-world shooting, game balance, sensible game mechanics, or any factor other than the fact that Yerameyahu says so: dual-wielding with smartlinks should give you +4 dice, and everybody should be doing it.


Happy now?

[JonathanC]

I have. If I've got my laser sight, I don't really need to be even looking down the barrel to hit.




-k

Have you tried it with two laser sights? Apparently anything that works with one works twice as well with two. I can't wait to try driving two cars at once. I'm pretty sure if I hook up two separate GPS machines, I'll be fine.

[Yerameyahu]

Why do you have to lie with every post? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif) I didn't say anything like that ("Clearly the rulebook is wrong, and Yerameyahu is right. Forget about real-world shooting, game balance, sensible game mechanics, or any factor other than the fact that Yerameyahu says so: dual-wielding with smartlinks should give you +4 dice, and everybody should be doing it."). In fact, I have repeatedly said the opposite.

[KarmaInferno]

Clearly the rulebook is wrong, and Yerameyahu is right. Forget about real-world shooting, game balance, sensible game mechanics, or any factor other than the fact that Yerameyahu says so: dual-wielding with smartlinks should give you +4 dice, and everybody should be doing it.

Hyperbole much?

All he was saying is that the Smartlink bonus should not be COMPLETELY negated. That having a Smartlink should be slightly better than NOT having a Smartlink.

Have you tried it with two laser sights? Apparently anything that works with one works twice as well with two. I can't wait to try driving two cars at once. I'm pretty sure if I hook up two separate GPS machines, I'll be fine.

Well, hold on, I'll try it at the range this afternoon.

I suspect that hitting the target with two pistols WITH the laser sights is going to be easier than shooting two pistols WITHOUT the laser sights, though.



-k

[Yerameyahu]

Ooh, record the data, would you? Also, do trials of 1 gun, 2 gun; 1 target, 2 targets; and 0, 1, 2 lasers. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif) Not the most rigorous design ever, but hey. Hope you have plenty of ammo.

[JonathanC]

Why do you have to lie with every post? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif) I didn't say anything like that ("Clearly the rulebook is wrong, and Yerameyahu is right. Forget about real-world shooting, game balance, sensible game mechanics, or any factor other than the fact that Yerameyahu says so: dual-wielding with smartlinks should give you +4 dice, and everybody should be doing it."). In fact, I have repeatedly said the opposite.

No no, I understand now. Bonuses for everyone. I'm pretty sure you should be able to tape another two smartguns to your existing smartgun...twice the bullets! And +8 dice on that firearms test, since more targeting reticles = more targeting!

[Yerameyahu]

Uh oh, he's snapped. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/frown.gif) Just for the sake of completeness, I'll re-repeat that I've never said anything like that.

[JonathanC]

Uh oh, he's snapped. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/frown.gif) Just for the sake of completeness, I'll re-repeat that I've never said anything like that.

So it doesn't matter if I agree with you or not, whatever I say you'll just say the opposite? Awesome.

[Yerameyahu]

You're not agreeing with me. You're quite childishly mocking a straw man of my position. Lying about my statements has been your running theme, but this is a new and interesting turn.

[KarmaInferno]

Hyperbole is not a valid argument.




-k

[Yerameyahu]

Ha, Karma, that made me think of the Argument Clinic (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kQFKtI6gn9Y , if anyone hasn't had the pleasure), which actually explains this whole thread: we wandered into the room for Abuse by mistake!

[Mäx]

You're not agreeing with me. You're quite childishly mocking a straw man of my position. Lying about my statements has been your running theme, but this is a new and interesting turn.

Just ignore the Troll, your life will be easier, as he has very clearly show that he's nothing but that with his latest half a dozen or so post

[JonathanC]

You're not agreeing with me. You're quite childishly mocking a straw man of my position. Lying about my statements has been your running theme, but this is a new and interesting turn.

Just so I have this clear, "lying" is defined as:

- Disagreeing with you.
- Agreeing with you.

So no matter what I said, I'm "lying", as far as you're concerned? Good to know. And to think you guys were accusing me of resorting to ad-hominem attacks. I guess "liar" is the new "idiot", eh?

[Mäx]

Just so I have this clear, "lying" is defined as:

Nope, lying is quite clearly defined as claiming that someone else said something that they didn't say, witch you have done multiple times in this thread.
Yes,yes i know what i said, but i had to reply to this.

[KarmaInferno]

JC, do you honestly believe people do not see what you are doing?

Taking some small piece of what people say, extrapolating and blowing it completely out of proportion so it is a mere silly caricature of what they actually said, and then agreeing with that twisted version?

It's called a "straw man" argument. And it holds no water at all.

Anyway, heading out. I'll let ya'll know what I find regarding the laser sights.



-k

[JonathanC]

Nope, lying is quite clearly defined as claiming that someone else said something that they didn't say, witch you have done multiple times in this thread.
Yes,yes i know what i said, but i had to reply to this.

Examples?

[Brainpiercing7.6...]

What the...

big fuss for a simple topic.

I can provide anecdotal evidence that rail shooters with two light guns (actually the Wii derivative thereof, where actually aiming the gun via the the sights alone does NOT work) are most definitely possible/easier with crosshairs. In fact, you can aim at two close targets - albeit slow-moving targets, or at one.
What's also possible is keeping up shooting at one target and them aquiring another one with a quick shift of one of the crosshairs. Actually aiming at two small or rapidly moving targets does not seem to work too well - but then that's not even a given with just one crosshair.

Obviously you can't actually focus at two points on the screen at the same time. However, in SR you obviously CAN, or else you could never even try shooting at two targets simultaneously.

Now I want to add one more thing: I think the disallowing of smartguns for akimbo guns is largely a historical thing: In the past, and I can only speak for SR3, the smartlink gave a HUGE boost to to-hit probability. -2 to TN was MUCH bigger than +2 dice. So this would clearly have created balance issues if people had been able to fire two guns at a TN of 2, which was the base TN for smartgun at close range. At this point I think that +2 dice isn't that big of a deal, and I for one would not be opposed to house-ruling this.

[3278]

I'm not touching any of these other questions, about rules, about game balance, about the capabilities of the human brain, about multiple targets, none of it. I'm just curious in answers from first principles:

If you had two weapons with rangefinders and gyros, and a ballistic computer with sufficient power to make two sets of computations, could such a system project two - perhaps visually distinct - targeting reticles onto the user's view, each of which is an accurate representation of the destination of a bullet fired from each weapon? If it can, can these reticles always appear to be in focus, if you have direct access to the user's brain?

[Yerameyahu]

The answer is 'totally yes' to the first part. Second part: based on tech like the eyeband, my thought is that the tech doesn't exist to have more than the natural 'brain focus'. But, it shouldn't matter for this question.

[3278]

Second part: based on tech like the eyeband, my thought is that the tech doesn't exist to have more than the natural 'brain focus'.

It seems to me there are three kinds of focus that would be topical here.

1. Concentration: the ability to usefully do something with more than one simultaneous stimulus.
2. Foveal: of or pertaining to increased visual acuity in the center of the visual field
3. Optical: the focusing of light into a distinct image.

The ability to usefully concentrate on more than one visual stimulus isn't something a smartlink does, or is intended to do. You could argue that there are some augmentations that might serve that purpose, but that's beyond the scope of our inquiry for the moment.

I have no idea what cybereyes would do to foveal focus; we talk a lot about sensory overload and such, but the fact is that the brain is very plastic, and it'll adjust to a broad spectrum of alterations.* That said, I don't think foveal focus matters much in this case, unless you're trying to target two individual targets not within the center of your vision, and as you've pointed out, that's hard irrespective of the smartlink.

Optically, I don't see where it would be a problem for people with cybereyes, because the signal from the image link is going to be dropped into the data stream long after the optical data, anyway. So you should be able to have a set of razor-sharp dots, or crosshairs, or fuzzy slippers, in whatever colors, blinking whatever pattern, dancing whatever polka you'd like, as far as that goes. As far as shades and goggles go, well, that's an optical focus issue, but that's the same optical focus issue you'd have with one smartlink, and the same optical focus issue you have with scopes today.

But, it shouldn't matter for this question.

I'll confess I'm not certain how any of this could matter at all. The smartlink, in my understanding, is nothing but a ballistic computer and a rangefinder [and other senses if you'd like; there's no reason not to allow such a thing], which figures out where, if you pulled the trigger right now, a bullet would end up, like a laser pointer with a rangefinder and a servo on it, constantly adjusting trigonometry. And only you can see it. Does everyone agree that's what the experience is like? I read some stuff upthread about cameras and two video feeds, so I'm not sure my understanding of the hardware is the same as everyone else's.

*Build yourself a set of goggles with cameras on them, but with the image inverted, so that when you look through the goggles, everything you see is upside-down. Blacken the windows in your bedroom, and see nothing without the goggles for, say, a week or two. You'll find very quickly - like, crazy quickly - that you'll stop noticing the goggles, and your view won't be inverted, because [as I'm sure you know] the goggles are just undoing the brain's inversion of our visual input. Take the goggles off after a couple of weeks, and you'll be again stuck with inverted vision, until the brain re-orients itself. My point being, I don't have any difficulty with the concept that, with cybereyes not having a foveal acuity increase, the human mind could deal with having no "periphery," and would do just fine. I, for one, wouldn't mind being able to read without looking right the hell at things. Anyway.

[Yerameyahu]

Sure, but we do know that in SR, it doesn't work. Eyeband, etc. For some reason, blah. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

I agree it'd be awesome, and sounds at least plausible. At minimum, people would run around with a net of cameras and trodes.

[KarmaInferno]

So, I tried out paired pistols with laser sights at the range today. Fortunately the range owner is a friend so he humored me.

Firing a 9mm Glock 17 and a Taurus PT840 .40, each with lasers and properly sighted in, at a 10 yard range at human-shaped paper targets spaced 20 feet apart:

2 targets, 2 pistols, no lasers: Damn that's difficult. I ended up really focusing on one and then the other much of the time, really. Missed most shots.
2 targets, 2 pistols, with lasers: Easier but still a pain. I could get some body shots on both targets but any more precision (like specific body areas) was about impossible.

1 target, 2 pistols, no lasers: Moderately difficult as sighting down the barrels of two pistols required more things to keep track of than usual. Missed a number of shots.
1 target, 2 pistols, with lasers: Again, easier. I could consistently group within a one foot circle. Which is much worse that my usual single-pistol groupings, but hey.

Each test was performed with 6-8 shots per pistol.

Really, my biggest observation is that when firing with iron sights, you have to keep track of at least three objects, the rear sight, the front sight, and the target. To hit you need to line up all three. With the laser sight you only have to keep track of two, the laser dot and the target. Aiming using laser sight is almost instinctive, rather than the conscious thought that goes into lining up iron sights.

In all cases, shooting with the laser sight was easier than shooting without the laser.

That was a fun twenty bucks worth of ammo to spend. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)



-k

[CanRay]

Damn I wish I could go shooting...

[KarmaInferno]

I wish I owned those pistols! I borrowed them from the range owner.

I used to live in Texas, Land of the Gun, and had about a half dozen firearms while there. I eventually moved to New York, where They Hate Guns. So I had to sell most of them before I moved. Kept just the shotgun because that is much easier to get a license for in NY.





-k