Basically i can juggle 1kg to 4kg lumps of commercial explosive because if they ever were detonated i'm looking at the equivalent of a punch to the gut from Richard Simmons...only with less "Oldies" music and a lot less sweat.

Even a 1kg lump that was applied quite well (say rolled 4 hits) to my abs is going to do less boxes of damage than a one net hit Stick-n-Shock shot? As in 1kg+4 hits = 5, square root of which is 2DV. Even with halving the armour that isn't much. Well maybe Stick-n-Shock isn't the best example since it's got its' own problems. But still i'm likely better off with 2-4lbs. of very well place explosive than a heavy pistol shot?

Not at all.

The base damage is rating * sqrt(kilograms). So if we assume rating 3 commercial explosives then that 4kg will have a base damage of 3 * sqrt(4), or 6DV. Four hits is then applied directly to the base damage, like it is for everything else, resulting in a lethal 10DV.

The damage is still rather low, four kilos of even very dodgy homemade explosives should be able to kill without any real skill.

Interestingly, when applied to destroy barriers, explosives do their base DV * 2. If you want explosives to be lethal against people, double the base DV against them, too. 2 * rating * sqrt(kilograms). Makes 6DV for one kilo, 8DV for two, 12DV for four, 18DV for nine. Sounds alright.

However, this causes a problem at the other end of the scale, once out of character generation, players can get explosives up to rating FIFTEEN without any change in the availability. Resulting in 15DV for one kilo, 30DV for four. Which is rightfully powerful. However, double that as above and you wind up with an insane 60DV for four kilos. This is already how much damage it's going to do to a barrier, it's certainly not a good idea to double it for people. In fact, it might be worthwhile lowering the max rating and/or making the availability incremental.

So it's got a few problems, rating 3 is like a sack full of sparklers, while rating 15, which is just as easy to get, is like a nuke-in-a-box. Lower the cap, increase the avail, make commercial explosives variable rating (say 3-6), if you feel it's a problem, fix it.

*addingdemolitionsskilltochar*

*laughinginamunchkinnyway*

Ok, considering what even one kilo of C-4 can do irl, I'd say triple it against soft targets.

But that's just me.

-Siege

max rating of 6 in chargen

Guess I'll be adding a Demolitions skillsoft to my wish list

Only if you are a masochist:

Skillsofts can't be boosted with Edge, so if you get a (critical) glitch while planting bombs...

I'm personally envisioning manequins full of rating 15 foam and ball bearings....

Lets grab 9 kilo's (cause the math is easier) of the rating 15 stuff and have a realy good demo expert set it giving us say 4 extra hits. So we get a dv of 19 * 3 for a whopping total of 57 DV now thats what i'm talking about. Just watch out for the mage with the lightningbolt spell when you're carrying it around

LOL, important safety note, always get electrical protection for your demo case.

Ouch indeed - especially when using shaped charges.

hmm, looks like i can remove my original statement. this stuff is lethal

And to replace 1kg commercial, you only need 40g of rating 15 foam/plastic.

PS: Detcord isn't really 'directional'.

one interesting way i observed ones for directing blasts where to put a bag of water on the side pointing away from the surface you wanted destroyed.

the water helped increase the amount of force directed towards the surface. and it allso have the positiv of no extra shrapnel generated

Either way...with a direction charge with little or nothing in its way of the size and rating I talked about earlier you can still generaly kill someone, or at the very least cripple someone standing 47 meters away which one will note is on the edge of everything but a heavy pistol and even then the heavy pistol only outranges it by 13 meters and doesn't do nearly as much damage (granted 5 more meteres out and they're about even save the HP ushualy has AP on its side.)

blakkie: A "shaped charge" refers to explosive charges where the explosives themselves are shaped such as to direct the energy of the explosion to a particular direction or point. There is a huge variety of these: Simple cutting charges, linear and platter charges, and some others you can rig in the field just fine. The most common type of shaped charge, the concave copper-lined one used in e.g. HEAT warheads, is impossible to make without the specific tools and materials, which you aren't going to have on the field -- and the same goes for several other types of shaped charges.

Or, to put it more simply, you are definitely able to make an explosive charge direct most of its energy in some general direction, and this can be used e.g. to cut or break through supports and beams and such or to make field-expedient directed mines, but the direction will indeed be general (and thus no armor-piercing or linear cutting charges), and the only real way you can stop the explosion from having a signficant effect in all other directions is to place something heavy (and, if you want to stop shrapnel, solid) in between.

Dont know if you guys noticed this or not, but the hits on the demo test dont add to the DV, they add to the RATING

so with 4kg of rating 3 commercial, and 4 hits on the demo test, thats DV 14, not 10

silly question, but how common is C4 or similar in commersial demolition jobs? to me it sounds like something that more often then not overkill for what they are supposed to do with it.

ie, i wound rather have several weaker detonations then one big one as it allows me to contol what and where things happen, and in what sequence.

still, it sounds as if SR rules got quite a bit more practical when it comes to demolitions as one can get stuff in flexible ratings compared to the commersial, C6 and C12 of old.

if one dont have demolitions, grab a higher rating. if one have demolitions, grab a lower rating and apply it correctly. bigger bang or more control, either way the result is (more or less) the same...

What I find interesting is somemining operations have to register with an international body before some detonations because the impulse wave closely resembles that of an underground nuclear test to a seimographic sensor and they don't want to panic anyone unduly.

SR4 has commercial grade (Rating 3) and Foam and Plastic explosives (Rating 4 - 15). Commercial costs 100 nuyen per kilo, and covers pretty much any liquid and solid compound that blows up and is available for general use. Foam and Plastic both costs 100 nuyen times the rating. Foam is 12F availability, plastic is 16F availability.

Um, what's so pecial about malleable expllosives, that make them so hard to get?

Assuming we give TNT a rating of 4, most 'homemade' explosives would be rating 2 or 3, with most 'good' explosives being rating 5 or 6.

Well, for PC manufacture, I would have rating*2 for threshhold with an interval of 8 hours to 1 day (rating =<5 8 hours, 6 and up 1 day)

and i would guess its very rarely that you need explosive clay if all your going to do is blow apart rock or concrete supports.

instead you drill holes where sticks of the stuff can fit...

as for the strength. maybe the commersial stuff is rather downmixed then the other stuff is upmixed. ie, the commersia stuff is limited by adding extra chemicals somehow.

as people need more stuff to make a bigger explosion its harder to smuggle into an area. so trying to take out a a big part of a consert will reqire you to smuggle in several kilos of the stuff, more then enough to set of any electronic or biological nose in the area

but if your going to blow stuff up legaly then you just roll the stuff in by the truckload and drill more holes

And pay for shipping, and pay for trucks, and pay for truck drivers, and pay for drilling machines, and pay for drilling machine operators, and pay for more demo guys to pack the explosives, and wait for all the extra time to get dome.