Gunnery Question, Redneck with a Truck and a Pig Options

[MADness]

I'm very nearly getting a game going, and one of my players is a rigger. I needed clarification on Smartgun technology and Gunnery. Do the two combine when jumped in? Or do they only help when manually controlled?

[Koekepan]

I think that you may have to decide this one for yourself.

As written, the benefits of smartlinked weaponry is that you can see the ballistics in your vision, you can directly control actions such as chambering a round, firing and ejecting magazines.

If the weapon in question is directly controlled from the vehicle, then the vehicle's rig affords all those options, or as many of them as apply. If the weapon in question is not, then I'd say that the rigger would be unable to do much with it, but in the third case, if the smartlink allows the gunner to swivel it in its mount, control and fire the weapon without manual contact, then I could see a case for the rigger jacking into the vehicle and into the smartlink simultaneously, and being able to multitask up to a point.

[Mantis]

I generally just go with letting the smartlink work with rigged vehicles/weapons. Just remember it goes both ways so the bad guys can also do this. Some would argue that the rigged weapon already has most of the smartlink capabilities but not the dice or limit bonuses but since you can just unmount the weapon with a few minutes work, why doesn't this carry over? So if the weapon is smartlinked then give them all the benefits of doing so. You paid for it so you may as well get something for that money.
It is something that has never been clearly laid out in either 4th ed or 5th ed though so it is really up to you whether you want it available or not.

[binarywraith]

I look at it this way. Getting the benefits of Smartlink systems requires the gun to be wired for it, and the user to have the systems to translate that output into meaningful sensory input. The vehicle rig is essentially a router, just passing through the gun's output to the rigger's smartlink headware, so no reason it shouldn't work.

[MADness]

Thank you for the input. I generally stick to my free runner adepts and bio-razors, triggers of northbound confuse me.

Sensors for example. Chummer gives every drone a Sensor Array of 2. But example characters I see have different sensors attached. What exactly is a Sensor Array, and if it is free, do I need to pay extra for something like an Atmosphere senskr?

Also, do mounted guns have the equivalent of electronic firing, or does that need to be purchased?

Finally, is there a way to armor up a vehicle, or is that Not out there yet?

[Mantis]

Up armouring a vehicle is likely to be in the new Rigger book which is due out soon. In fact, there will likely (hopefully) be a whole slew of rules on modifying vehicles in that book. Until then you'll have to sort of wing it or else import rules from 4th ed. For example, adding more regular armour to a car costs Rating x 200 nuyen with a max rating of 20, though anything over the body of the car imposes a penalty to speed and acceleration of 20%. I'm sure the new book will have more expensive armour and slightly different penalties for exceeding body.

The sensor thing generally means you add better cameras and similar sensors (higher rating) which increases the vehicles sensors. Under 4th ed, a car came with 2 cameras (at stock sensor rating), 2 laser range finders, 2 motion sensors, an atmosphere sensor (at stock sensor rating) and a radar system (at stock sensor rating). Increasing the ratings of the camera, atmosphere sensor and radar would increase the overall sensor rating (average the values to find the new rating). You couldn't do anything with the laser range finder or the motion sensors as they have no rating to increase.

That should give you a starting point if you need it right now and the Rigger book will probably change all that and make my advice useless.

[KnightAries]

The sensor thing generally means you add better cameras and similar sensors (higher rating) which increases the vehicles sensors. Under 4th ed, a car came with 2 cameras (at stock sensor rating), 2 laser range finders, 2 motion sensors, an atmosphere sensor (at stock sensor rating) and a radar system (at stock sensor rating). Increasing the ratings of the camera, atmosphere sensor and radar would increase the overall sensor rating (average the values to find the new rating). You couldn't do anything with the laser range finder or the motion sensors as they have no rating to increase.

That should give you a starting point if you need it right now and the Rigger book will probably change all that and make my advice useless.

And IIRC the sensors were located as such: 2 Cameras (Front and rear), 2 Laser Range Finders (front and rear), 2 Motion Sensors (Left and Right), and radar covered 360 deg radius

[Sengir]

As written, the benefits of smartlinked weaponry is that you can see the ballistics in your vision, you can directly control actions such as chambering a round, firing and ejecting magazines.

It also incorporates the user's posture and movement into its ballistic calculations (which is why the implanted smartlink is more effective). So my rule has always been that the drone and not the rigger needs a smartlink (as a vision mod in its camera), that the smartlink knows about the movement of the drone and can feed the results into the sensors. And if the rigger is jumped in the sensors become his eyes, so he gets all the targeting data and thus the bonus.

[Koekepan]

It also incorporates the user's posture and movement into its ballistic calculations (which is why the implanted smartlink is more effective). So my rule has always been that the drone and not the rigger needs a smartlink (as a vision mod in its camera), that the smartlink knows about the movement of the drone and can feed the results into the sensors. And if the rigger is jumped in the sensors become his eyes, so he gets all the targeting data and thus the bonus.

I hadn't considered that possibility, but it corresponds with what I said about "If the weapon in question is directly controlled from the vehicle, then the vehicle's rig affords all those options, or as many of them as apply."

Still, it makes sense that the weapon's smartlink circuitry would be plugged into the vehicle's mount system, if the plug is there.

[Umidori]

I'm largely with Sengir's interpretation on this one.

[PraetorGradivus]

I'm not sure why this is question.
The gun has a smartgun system.
You have a smartlink.
You are wirelessly connected to the drone and therefore the smartgun system.
The bonuses for being wireless connected to a smartgun system with cybernetics would be +2DP (external can't help you normally while you're in VR though a smartlink in the camera of the drone would but only provide +1DP ). And of course there's a host of other benefits.

For my money, it's smartlink in your eye and in the camera of the drone (in case it fires autonomously) plus vision magnification in the camera of the smartgun system... so Aim and get mitigation of 1 range penalty + Gunnery + Logic + Smartgun + Control Rig and if you don't worry about addiction, Hotsim's +2... umm, but, I'd use a Sniper rifle (heavy Weapon mount) and stay at a range beyond the normal firing range of most character's Automatics. Can't do anything about sniper rifles and LOS magic.

The only question is whether the drone get +1 or +2DP for the Smartlink.

[Sengir]

As of Rigger 5.0 there has been an unexpected (and IMO unnecessary) change, drones can now get a "Smartsoft", which is a smartlink in autosoft form. The question of whether it gets the +1 or +2 bonus is not adressed, but my interpretation would be that an autosoft has access to the drone's proprioception data and therefore qualifies for the +2.