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Full Version: Firing Port and/or Smart Turret
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Riley37
RAW: A weapons mount per SR4 RAW costs ¥2500, is limited to LMG or smaller, and any vehicle can have up to BOD/3 mounts.

What about installing firing ports, so that a gun-drone (eg Doberman) inside a large vehicle (eg Bulldog stepvan) could fire its weapon at targets outside the van? I visualize this a bit like a pirate ship's cannons, inside the ship and firing out... but higher tech.
They'd have limited fields of fire. Placing the gun-drones at weapon ports would probably take up extra interior volume capacity (compared to piling them into as small a volume as possible). A Called Shot might become possible, eg targeting the gun-drone and bypassing the van's armor, maybe even firing a grenade into the stepvan via the firing port.
What about a "roof rack" that allows a gun-drone to sit on top of the stepvan, with the fire arc of a turret (360 rotation but limited depression), outside the stepvan's armor? What configuration would allow minimum time to mount and dismount? (presumably this would attract unwanted attention in civilian areas, eg if any standard GridGuide security camera sees a stepvan mounting a gun-drone, local cops/security would respond with immediate APB and HTRT dispatch.)

Would those also be usable as firing ports by metahumans inside the van?
What's a reasonable cost, and other consequences, of installing a metahuman-only firing port?

If you have worked with military vehicles, especially APCs with firing ports, or have done alteration work on van-size vehicles, or otherwise have relevant direct personal experience, please say so.

Alternately, what about a "smart turret", a weapons mount with a built-in Pilot that only runs the gun in that mount? A Bulldog has BOD 16, and thus could have up to five weapons mounts, one run by the vehicle's base Pilot, and the other four firing independently; that's lotsa firepower (especially since Pilots get 3 IPs). Of course, a Bulldog that's been altered into a gun platform probably doesn't have much cargo/passenger volume left.
A Pilot that's specialized to only run the Target autosoft ought to be cheaper than hardware and software that can do the same, plus drive a vehicle, plus run Electronic Warfare and all the other standard Pilot abilities. Any suggestions on reasonable cost?
CrystalBlue
The easy answer to this? Wait for Arsenal. ^.^;;

I'd assume that a gun port would lower the armor rating of the vehicle, because you're compromising the integrity of it's frame for a hole that you can shoot out of. I'd lower the armor rating by 1 for every two gun ports you open up in the van....but that's what I'd do.
apollo124
Along with the "compromising the integrity" idea, you also lose your gas/water environmental seals. With holes in the hull, leaks occur. Obviously the engine block seals, if you have them, would be unaffected, but the crew compartment would have holes in it.
Karaden
Heh, ya, I'm sure Arsenel will have alot of this type of stuff in it.

But lets see what can be done here...

The 'smart turrets' would be easy to do, just use the rules for the Smart Firing Platform. You could get better piloet and autosofts if you wanted, but they'd cost same as always, though you could copy one piloet program into -all- your smart turrets.

As for the roof rack I'd think it would be about the same effort as installing a mountable weapon point as usual... maybe needing twice the spare body since an entier doberman is bigger then a single gun.

But I wouldn't think either of these would take much interior space, your mounting stuff -on- your vechile, and would likely lose a few cubic inches or so of interior space. Now, if you wanted them to be concealable/retractable then they would use up considerably more interior space, I'd say about twice as much as the gun on its own would use.

And ya, ports would slowly degrade your armor I would think, as well as allow for those called shots.
apollo124
A question that occurred while I was reading Karaden's post is..Are you planning on permanently mounting the Doberman inside the van, or just having it pull into it's spot when needed, then roll out with the gang when it's time to infiltrate?
Karaden
I'd imagine he is having it just pull in, mounting it permenetly would be a waste as gun points would have the same effect at less cost.
kzt
You don't significantly compromise the armor with a gun port. You have a 15 foot long 5 foot high vehicle and a 4 inch square gunport. Which is covered with an armored flap when not in use. You don't see vehicles with foot thick armor with gunports because they would compromise the armor. I suspect thats part of why the side firing ports on the Brad got removed in later revs and refits, as I understand the Brad has a lot more armor than it did when first fielded.

If you use a collective overpressure system the gunports open doesn't have an real effect on the ability of the vehicle to keep NBC threats out. Air flows out, bad stuff stays outside.

You might notice how the US Army decided to have the FPW's lock into the firing ports. The effects of having someone shooting a full auto weapon that gets bounced out of the firing port while shooting seems likely to be kind of bad.
KarmaInferno
I always just had the gun drones cling to the outside of the vehicle.

Requires some modification to allow the drone to cling to things.

On the plus side they can also cling to, say, the troll's shoulders and provide him with his own turrets.


-karma
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