When a character and a bad guy are duking it out in hand-to-hand and someone wants to shoot at the bad guy what are the rules and modifiers. The book doesn't seem to clarify this example.
I'll post what we have been doing in a while, but I would like to see what others do before biasing the question.
So how have you GM's been dealing with this?
Thanks
DAMBoy
Full Version: Shooting into Combat
Slap on a +6 for cover. If that causes a miss, the shooter hit the wrong person. IIRC, Fields of Fire included someting about firing through cover, which is what I base this resolution on.
I do what DWC does only slightly differently. I give the bad guy cover and only hit the good guy on a glitch or critical glitch. On a glitch, it's just the base power of the gun. On a critical glitch, I stage up the damage using the 1's making up the critical glitch as if they were hits. In other words, on a critical, you may have killed your friend.
Not sure I'd give the blind fire mod to it, but I'd do a similar idea. Probably either give the target partial cover or good cover depending on the situation.
A +4 is adequate for this situation in my games. Maybe a +5 if the bad dude is a troll or big-ass Spirit. A +6 is equivalent to the Blind Fire modifier, as eidolon said, and is a bit too much.
According to RAW the bad guy actually recieve a penalty on his defense test for being shot at while in melee.
Only provide cover if an ally is in between you and your target, and at most -4 for good cover.
Glitches and critical glitches will probably hit the friend though, so it's risky business in the first place. And that's ignoring the chance for overpenetration...
Only provide cover if an ally is in between you and your target, and at most -4 for good cover.
Glitches and critical glitches will probably hit the friend though, so it's risky business in the first place. And that's ignoring the chance for overpenetration...
I start at three and use something similar to size modifiers in DnD. It lowers the cover by 1 if your friend is a dwarf and the bad guy is a human, stays at 3 for human/human, troll/troll, dwarf/dwarf situations. If your friend is a troll and the badguy is a human it is 4, if you friend is a troll and the bad guy is a dwarf then it is 5.and vice versa if your friend is a dwarf and the bad guy is a troll then he only provide a +1 cover bonus.
Chris
Chris
| QUOTE (FriendoftheDork) |
| Only provide cover if an ally is in between you and your target, and at most -4 for good cover. |
I think they intended the cover modifier only to apply to the shooter, therefore increasing the difficulty of the shot but not helping the player dodge.
It would seem like there should be some penalty whether or not my ally provides cover, since the bullets don't "phase out" if they miss the target. Rules-wise, we're not making a distinction between a single, well-aimed pistol shot and a fully-automatic wide burst.
The problem I have with making it a Glitch/Crit Glitch is that the odds are the same on every shot. Its simpler and easy to remember, but it seems like you should have a greater chance of shooting your friend if he's more in the way or the fight is more dynamic. That's why I'm leaning more towards the cover interpretation.
The problem I have with making it a Glitch/Crit Glitch is that the odds are the same on every shot. Its simpler and easy to remember, but it seems like you should have a greater chance of shooting your friend if he's more in the way or the fight is more dynamic. That's why I'm leaning more towards the cover interpretation.
I see no issues w/ the RAW. It gives the GM/player a lot of latitude w/o houseruling anything. And it goes both ways (guards firing at the guy trying to silently knife them after botching his stealth check, or the orc who likes to use his axe).
It provides for cover possibility. (-2/-4 depending on angle and who's in the way)
It provides a potential penalty for running to remove cover (flanking or crossfire, -2 running penalty, no penalty for walking).
It provides a penalty for being stupid enough to bring a knife to a gunfight. (-3 defense pool mod)
And there's an apprropriate penalty for firing while in melee, offset by the same number of dice on the defensive reaction pool. (-3 attack, -3 defense pools assuming you shoot the guy right in front of you)
Gm can be bloody and glitch a result as a friendly fire incident, or be mercifull and call it a jam. GM could invoke option4 of called shot... player takes a free action to take a penalty to shoot into melee and not hit a friendly on a glitch. Also remember, the less dice you roll the more likely you are to glitch.
I disagree completely with Mercer. There shouldn't be an additional penalty... that's one of the problems in other game systems like DnD. There should be a penalty for bringing a knife to a gunfight, not a penalty for bringing a gun to a knifefight!
It provides for cover possibility. (-2/-4 depending on angle and who's in the way)
It provides a potential penalty for running to remove cover (flanking or crossfire, -2 running penalty, no penalty for walking).
It provides a penalty for being stupid enough to bring a knife to a gunfight. (-3 defense pool mod)
And there's an apprropriate penalty for firing while in melee, offset by the same number of dice on the defensive reaction pool. (-3 attack, -3 defense pools assuming you shoot the guy right in front of you)
Gm can be bloody and glitch a result as a friendly fire incident, or be mercifull and call it a jam. GM could invoke option4 of called shot... player takes a free action to take a penalty to shoot into melee and not hit a friendly on a glitch. Also remember, the less dice you roll the more likely you are to glitch.
I disagree completely with Mercer. There shouldn't be an additional penalty... that's one of the problems in other game systems like DnD. There should be a penalty for bringing a knife to a gunfight, not a penalty for bringing a gun to a knifefight!
How are you disagreeing with me?
| QUOTE (Mercer) |
| it seems like you should have a greater chance of shooting your friend if he's more in the way or the fight is more dynamic. That's why I'm leaning more towards the cover interpretation. |
| QUOTE (Falconer) |
| It provides for cover possibility. (-2/-4 depending on angle and who's in the way) It provides a potential penalty for running to remove cover (flanking or crossfire, -2 running penalty, no penalty for walking). |
| QUOTE (Mercer) | ||||
How are you disagreeing with me?
|
He doesen't like the idea of using cover rules when there is actually not something between yourself and your target (but rather close to it or behind it)
I don't want to houserules it either, but I understand you want it more likely to hit a friend if he's close to a target you're firing a wide burst on, even if he's not actually in the way.
Just curious, if the character shooting into the melee fight spends a simple action to take aim, does that negate shooting his friend at all? What about a smartlinked weapon told not to fire on the people carrying x, y, and z commlink ids.
| QUOTE (Tarantula) |
| Just curious, if the character shooting into the melee fight spends a simple action to take aim, does that negate shooting his friend at all? What about a smartlinked weapon told not to fire on the people carrying x, y, and z commlink ids. |
Taking aim give you more dice, which makes it less likely to glitch. Other than that, no.
A smartlinked weapon could be instructed not to target a friend (as long as both commlinks were subscribed to eachother and conforming commcode I guess), but since people in a fight move by the time a bullet is fired, it could still hit a friend I suppose.
How could it hit if it won't fire when it'll directly hit the friend? Movement between fireing and hitting is negligible.
Another side question, if the shooter misses, does his friend get a dodge test to dodge the badly aimed bullet?
Another side question, if the shooter misses, does his friend get a dodge test to dodge the badly aimed bullet?
| QUOTE (FriendoftheDork) |
| He doesen't like the idea of using cover rules when there is actually not something between yourself and your target (but rather close to it or behind it) |
I see what you're saying. It seems to me that if your friend wasn't in the way-- that you're firing at a target and your friend in on the other side, if not directly on the other side then at least close enough for gov't work-- then it wouldn't matter unless you missed your target, either because you made a bad shot or because your opponent dodged.
But we're still sort of looking at it from the perspective of a well-aimed shot. But what about the 10-round Wide Burst. It seems like in that situation there's the possibility of hitting your target and your friend, although that's dodgy because its like covering fire against people you don't want to hit (as opposed to spraying a bunch of tightly grouped enemies).
I'm going to reverse my earlier position. Even though I'm nto wild about the mechanical implications (the why's), using the Glitch/Crit Glitch Dashifen suggested is much more playable. Its simple and easy to remember, and in poor conditions (bad lighting, wound penalties, movement and cover), even high dice pools can have a decent chance of glitching. So I'm down with that.
| QUOTE (Mercer) | ||
I see what you're saying. It seems to me that if your friend wasn't in the way-- that you're firing at a target and your friend in on the other side, if not directly on the other side then at least close enough for gov't work-- then it wouldn't matter unless you missed your target, either because you made a bad shot or because your opponent dodged. But we're still sort of looking at it from the perspective of a well-aimed shot. But what about the 10-round Wide Burst. It seems like in that situation there's the possibility of hitting your target and your friend, although that's dodgy because its like covering fire against people you don't want to hit (as opposed to spraying a bunch of tightly grouped enemies). I'm going to reverse my earlier position. Even though I'm nto wild about the mechanical implications (the why's), using the Glitch/Crit Glitch Dashifen suggested is much more playable. Its simple and easy to remember, and in poor conditions (bad lighting, wound penalties, movement and cover), even high dice pools can have a decent chance of glitching. So I'm down with that. |
Using 1s as hits against your friend is nice... I could even go for those even if it's not a glitch! That way, 5's and 6s hits your enemy, 1s hit your friend. You're still more likely to hit your friend but firing even in good conditions would be risky at best.
I think I'll use this for automatic fire into melee at least
For your proposed cover house rules, how much penalty did you have in mind? -2? Same as partal cover.
And what if the enemy is actually in between? That SHOULD make it harder, thus the number should stack.
The only problem I have with it is that a ordinary botch still hits the target. I'd say the bullet goes *through* both of them, maybe grazing your friend white hurting the enemy.
| QUOTE (Cain) |
| The only problem I have with it is that a ordinary botch still hits the target. I'd say the bullet goes *through* both of them, maybe grazing your friend white hurting the enemy. |
Yeah, if you use hits are against the enemy and 1s are against your friend it could represent the bullet(S) actually penetrating one and hitting the other.
I apologize if I read your statements wrong, but I was reading your statements to the effect of firing into melee should always have a penalty. That's something I outright disagree with.
Even my statements about 'moving' to remove the cover bonus. Stop and think if I have a gun adept at 7m away from target, and the guy in melee 'adjusts' 1-2m to keep the melee troll between him and the gunman. In order to change his shooting angle by 90degrees the shooter needs to go 10m in a single initiative pass. That probably requires a run/sprint action which just replaces one -2 mod w/ another. But note it's not automatic!
The advantage to that is that the troll is no longer in the line of fire! Adept probably had to use a sprint action, reducing him to a single attack as a simple action. On the flipside, adept could just fire twice risking the trolls cover, but as a GM it's fair then to risk hitting the troll. (the price you pay for risking 2 risky shots over one 'safe' one... where I'd only consider hitting the troll on a critical glitch).
The other thing is that the fewer dice rolled all around results in a higher chance to glitch. So inherently by reducing the dicepool as above already you're increasing the chance of a glitch. By the fact, that you glitch while there's other potential targets in the line of fire, you make the glitch a lot more lethal just by the nature of firing into melee already. That's the core of the rationale for not adding extra penalties already. (as well as my statement, you shouldn't be penalized for bringing a gun to a knifefight).
I like that suggestion for wide bursts and shotgun blasts. If someone is firing a wide burst they're not really aiming they're spraying a wide area. There's no reason 1 or two bullets might not go wide and hit someone behind or in front of the real target. But to be honost I'd only houserule that against someone really abusing their ability to spray lead into inappropriate circumstances. But normally I'd only consider adding up the 1's like that if the attack succeeded but glitched.
Even my statements about 'moving' to remove the cover bonus. Stop and think if I have a gun adept at 7m away from target, and the guy in melee 'adjusts' 1-2m to keep the melee troll between him and the gunman. In order to change his shooting angle by 90degrees the shooter needs to go 10m in a single initiative pass. That probably requires a run/sprint action which just replaces one -2 mod w/ another. But note it's not automatic!
The advantage to that is that the troll is no longer in the line of fire! Adept probably had to use a sprint action, reducing him to a single attack as a simple action. On the flipside, adept could just fire twice risking the trolls cover, but as a GM it's fair then to risk hitting the troll. (the price you pay for risking 2 risky shots over one 'safe' one... where I'd only consider hitting the troll on a critical glitch).
The other thing is that the fewer dice rolled all around results in a higher chance to glitch. So inherently by reducing the dicepool as above already you're increasing the chance of a glitch. By the fact, that you glitch while there's other potential targets in the line of fire, you make the glitch a lot more lethal just by the nature of firing into melee already. That's the core of the rationale for not adding extra penalties already. (as well as my statement, you shouldn't be penalized for bringing a gun to a knifefight).
I like that suggestion for wide bursts and shotgun blasts. If someone is firing a wide burst they're not really aiming they're spraying a wide area. There's no reason 1 or two bullets might not go wide and hit someone behind or in front of the real target. But to be honost I'd only houserule that against someone really abusing their ability to spray lead into inappropriate circumstances. But normally I'd only consider adding up the 1's like that if the attack succeeded but glitched.
This is a "lo-fi" version of our main content. To view the full version with more information, formatting and images, please click here.