Shooting at passengers, How much a vehcle protect them? Options

[Luca]

I'm a bit confused by SR3 page 149.
It seems that Armor or Body (whicever is higher) acts like an added armor...but what about hardened armor of the vehicle?

here the piece:
"...subtract either the vehicle's Armor or Body Rating, whichever is higher, from the Power of the attack, but do not reduce the weapon's damage level..."
Does it refer to the fact that power must not be halved and damage level not staged down by one level like for normal weapon vs vehicles rules?

furthermore:
"...because vehicle armor is considered hardened armor, passengers cannot be harmed by a weapon if the vehicle's Body or Armor rating is greater than he weapon's unmodified Power..."
first of all in normal vehicle rules a weapon does not hit if hits halved power is smaller than teh armor, NOT the body and the armor.
Secondly must I halve the Power of the weapon or not?

A further question by my players:
once they hit the driver, the glass is already broken, so further hits should be easier or not?

[nezumi]

1) Correct. You do NOT halve the damage and you don't stage the damage down. You only apply the armor or body of the vehicle as though it's a wall you're shooting through.

2) This is a bit more curious. I hadn't notice the 'or body' part. I'd say if the power of the attack is not greater than twice the armor or twice the body, it doesn't go through. But the power of the attack is never actually divided by two.

Effectively, it's a two step deal.
1) Does the round penetrate? Determine this normally, EXCEPT you count body if it's higher than armor.

2) Treat like shooting through barriers, with the barrier rating equal to the armor or the body, whichever is higher.

As for the last question, I'd say it'd depend on the type of weapon. A standard bullet will likely leave a neat hole, but won't shatter. If it's a shotgun with spread, or something with way too much power, it'll break the windshield, and it no longer counts as armor.

[Wounded Ronin]

I believe SR3 says that the windows are considered broken once the vehicle has M damage. However, I think that that would only make spellcasting or gas attacks against passengers available when they might not have been before, since windows don't have separate statistics.

Also, to shoot at the passengers requires a +4 called shot anyway, which makes life a lot harder.

Bottom line is shoot the vehicle, not the passengers.

[Arethusa]

[Trax]

And if you are shooting at a vehicle, use AV or APDS ammunition.

[Austere Emancipa...]

APDS will be of no use whatsoever. In SR, saboted tungsten carbide projectiles do not penetrate any armor on a vehicle any better than basic FMJ ammunition -- instead, you need bullets with solid bronze cores, which cause any vehicles hit to implode.

[Wounded Ronin]

Yes, APDS dosen't count vs. vehicles. AV ammo, the bane of my existence, magically does work against them.

Sigh, it's so silly...

[Trax]

Whoops, my mistake. For some reason I thought it did.

[Wounded Ronin]

It's still really silly, though, that you can load any old handgun with the right cartridge and it will destroy a vehicle.

It reminds me of a bad action movie with exploding cars.

It's, like, something Tom Clancy would write into a novel if one day he went on crack. Normally, he keeps it a little bit toned down, with heartbeat sensors that tell you where everyone in the next room is, or with magical strobe lights that make you fall unconscious. But if he got just a little bit more fantastical and crazy, I can see him deciding that there's this ammo that makes vehicles die as well. I see it as being two or three steps above magical strobe lights that make you fall unconscious.

[weblife]

If the exact wording is something like "treat vehicle armor as a barrier when firing though", then remember that a barriers effective rating is doubled vs. bullets.

I guess that explains why they do not mention the vehicle armor being doubled, because the barrier rules will do that too.

EDIT: And the TN modifier to shoot a passenger in a car is +8, because of course the target is completely hidden behind opague windows.

Anything less and they are just asking for a magical attack.

[Wounded Ronin]

[nezumi]

I don't see too many problems with this as it stands. If you're shooting at someone behind opaqued windows it SHOULD be almost impossible to hit 'em, all told. That's why in most movies, when people are shooting at a car, they use full auto. Suppressive fire, as long as the bullets are tough enough to penetrate, you happily ignore that +8.

[Arethusa]

In real life, when you want to stop a car, you shoot the driver. Driver's in the same damn place, opaque windows or not. Only in bad movies do people shoot the car (or, oh oh oh, the gas tank!).

[Luca]

anyone knos what are tehrules for ahhhotingat the gas tank and then doing a decent damage?
(in any case I know that in great part of the models the gas tank is not visible because is too armoured or too concealed).

[Critias]

Most SR vehicle are electric.

[noname_hero]

Regarding APDS vs. vehicles: I thought it *is* better than normal ammo. We've always played it that APDS ammo suffers the same penalties as normal ammo but *does* halve the vehicle's armor, so firing 7S LMG loaded with APDS works against vehicles with armor 5 (or lower). The LMG does 3M damage, reduced by (halved) armor to 1M. A burst from said LMG would cause 5S damage, reduced by floor(5/2)=2 points of armor to 3S.

Are we misunderstanding the rules?

[Critias]

[Austere Emancipa...]

[Luca]

[Austere Emancipa...]

I'd assume car fuel tanks in the 2060s would be self-sealing, non-conductive (both electricity and heat) and made of materials that minimize friction, pressure and sharp impact heat-up and the possibility of sparks. Thus fuel fires would only occur with massive incendiary attacks (when the whole car is on fire anyway) or rupturing the fuel tank together with some kind of incendiary attack (i.e. large caliber incendiary round).

I wouldn't bother making up rules for it unless you like making up rules for everything and also assume that cars have not become any safer in 60 years.

[toturi]

[Austere Emancipa...]

Depends on just how fucked up you want the Fireball-spell to be in your game. Also, you might say a Fireball powerful enough to cause the non-heat conductive fuel tank to rupture because of heat-up pressure through the vehicle hull counts as a "massive incendiary attack".

[Edward]

Driving behind most cares from 10 meters behind you have a nice view of the fuel tank under the bumper. A shot there would be tactically efficient if you don’t mind a chance of fire and the probability that you won’t get one (and no explosion). Ether way I would expect them to run out of fuel in les than a kilometre.

In SR this is not likely to change. How many people in commuters cars are worried about somebody trying a stunt like that. And those that are worried (shadow runners) will buy the cares that don’t have that issue.

For attacking the driver directly I would tend to use suppressive fire in the drivers seat position utilising the firing threw a barrier rules this feels like the appropriate way to attack the driver given what Arethusa said. So what is the barrier rating of a windshield as a function of body and armour?

Edward

[Austere Emancipa...]

There are plenty of other safety issues with fuel tanks in cars aside from people shooting at them. Self-sealing, non-conductive fuel tanks would make cars much safer in all kinds of accidents. The tech to do this (with smart plastics -- kevlar/polyurethane covering has been around for quite some time, but it's a bit more expensive and is more bulky and heavy) is just about ready today, it should be really cheap in 60 years.

[Edward]

How do you do self sealing, I can see how it would be possible for a small bullet hole but a crash will crack the tank wide open as likely as anything else, you cant reseal that.

Also remember this formula and the fact that it is supposed to be cyberpunk.

Cost of implementing safety feature >< probability of incident * probability of legal loosing lawsuit * cost of payout.

Other factors can be added in including increased ales du to safety awards but most of those only apply for very expensive cars. I think teat in SR most corps will not bother with safety features they don’t have to on consumer vehicles.

Edward