Okay, so call me crazy. I was looking over the heavy weapons recoil and noticed that it only talks about uncompensated recoil. Thing is, with a single shot weapon, you never get any recoil built up, let alone have it uncompensated. That said, the fluff always mentions the super heavy recoil of firing one of these monstrous guns.

Have I missed something in the readings that assigns a default recoil value with these kind of weapons, or no?

Is is vehicular weaponry?

If so, you have your answer (vehicles have recoil compensation of "yes;" or of "Body" if the GM feels that it's needed).

Nope. As you pointed out, they don't give a recoil mod because, as a single-shot only weapon, the recoil is (mechanically) irrelevant. Though it's easily explained away that the weapon kicking like an awakened mule is exactly why it's single-shot only. But, as with all recoil, you're considered to have enough time by your next turn to reacquire your target without suffering any further penalties.

There is at least one assault cannon in arsenal that is semi-auto. And one can always mod the on in SR4 to same using arsenal rules...

You have missed that the fluff, which was only mentioned under the Panther XXL Assault Cannon, part of the recoil is removed from SR4A





All done to keep new players from asking the question about the Panther XXL Assault Cannons recoil

Lars

Is there still a Knockback/knockdown test for those in SR4?
Even if the recoil is only one point, which is doubled for heavy weapons, there allways was the chance of the shot throwing you back in SR3.
Well, at least if you were playing something else than a big and strong Troll. ^^

...oO(Panther XXL or Ares Vigorious modified to Salvo ,or Worse Full Auto )

There is at least one assault cannon in arsenal that is semi-auto
Its the Thunderstruck Gaussrifle thats Semi-Auto.Both Assault Cannons are Single Shot


He who dances with a kicking Mule
Medicineman

There is the "Carrying Heavy Weapons" Rule in Arsenal, p. 162

and there it says:
"Heavy weapons are so large and potentially damaging to the user that they cannot be carried and fired without the help of a gyro stabilization unit. ..."
and
"... whenever a character fires a heavy weapon he is carrying, he [...] may be knocked down (see p. 151, SR4)."

Oh crud, i keep thinking of the barret as a assault cannon, when its listed as a sniper rifle...

Barret is a 12.7mm rifle. IMO, the assault cannons start at 20mm.

As a GM I don't think I would allow a player to modify an assault cannon to fire anything but SS, unless it was a vehicle mounted weapon. Just thinking on how heavy that weapon would be is scary. You would need an exosceleton suit just to carry all that ammo.

Why not?

Panther Assault Cannon with external smartgun: 5900Y, before the recoil compensation that you will *need* thanks to doubled recoil.

Full-Auto/Burst Fire modification: 5,700Y, plus access to a Facility, plus labor (if you don't have the skills yourself,)

The ammo alone is expensive, at 450Y for 10, and hard to find, at 16F. If you really want to chew through it faster, be my guest.

An extra fee for Metahuman Customization. because I know you're playing a troll.

This whole setup is about as subtle as - well, carting a tank cannon around Seattle - it's all very illegal, heavy and has a Concealablity modifier of "NO". How often do you think you'll get to use it?

If a player thinks it's worth it, I say he can certainly try to build one, sure.

Factor in things like Military Armor with built in Gyroscope and Strength enhancement and you will be toting that one around like others would an HMG.
And you are not supposed to take it out to seattle. you are supposed to wait in the Van untill stuff goes boom, then step out and make things go BOOM.

I have the image of a severely leaning van suddenly bouncing as the troll with his FA minigun steps out of the back.

Ahem . . Aren't ALL Miniguns kinda Full Auto Anyway? O.o
But yes, that's what is supposed to happen.
And the Enemy is supposed to SEE that happen too.
Only thing worse than hearing the wwwwhhhiiiiiiIIIIIRRRRRRRR behind you is seing the Guy who can make that noise come straight at you.

Also, first person to argue this being unrealistic does not get to play anything else than a wageslave with no usefull skills/equipment.

A similar argument to this caused be to have a long hiatus from Dumpshock. I'm dropping this tread now before I get really angry and say something I regret.

Well, that's what PN's are there for neh=?

Wait, "small tanks" only fire 20mm rounds?





-karma

This whole oddity (large SS weapons not suffering recoil) is exactly why I'm in favour of rules that give weapons starting recoil (i.e. on the first round) equal to some value based off their DV. Perhaps [Base DV - 5] is a good value. You could go for [BDV - 4] but I like the idea that Light Pistols and Holdouts can fire twice in an Action Phase without needing RC thanks to their low power ammunition.

I doubt it, maybe if they're using APDS rounds? Anyway, here is something that uses 20mm rounds. 20mm vulcan

..personally i found this this rule somewhat stupid..Grenade Launchers are considered as Heavy Weapons, as RAW
so no shooting Armtech MGL-6 (pistol-version Grenade Launcher),no shooting under-barrel Grenade launcher from
your Ares Alpha without gyro stab. unit..as for LMG:s in RL even M60 and M249 could be fired without it..
SR3 were even more vicious toward heavy weapons ( Body 8 AND STR 8 needed), it seems in SR4 it is OPTIONAL rule..

Good to see I wasn't missing something. Still, something like an assault cannon *should* have recoil, in my opinion.

As for modifying the weapon's firing mode, it's RAW. Arsenal gives all the info you need to make an assault cannon Semi-auto at the least. Even doing that much is potentially problematic. An assault cannon is exceedingly deadly to start with. Give it 2 points of Recoil Comp, and you'll never have "Uncompensated" recoil to double, and then a SA Assault Cannon becomes a devastating weapon.

Yah, For something that's described as firing tank cannon rounds 20mm is awfully small.

Perhaps the high impulse weapon I posted in the other recoil thread?



-karma

20mm for a tank shell is very small, considering the NTW-20 Sniper rifle fires them, and the Barret M109 fires 25MM rounds (including 25mm grenade shells)
As soon as I find a Vigorous, I intend for my current sniper to try and wire it into a sniper rifle (SS, high damage, anti-tank...yep, the design is even based off the barret, and subsequently the Robocop assault cannon which was a barret with a speed camera on top.)
Let's just face facts that Assault cannons are slightly more mobile, hip fired versions of high callibre sniper rifles, with an apprpiate modification to range.
Indeed, the gauss rifle is oft synonymous with an upgraded sniper rifle in many game systems.

And to those who think my ideas are sick and twisted (which they are), the 950 JDJ exists, essentially a .95 callibre rifle cartridge.

Since everyone is talking about assault cannons maybe you can answer a question that has been bugging this newbie since he picked up arsenal. The thunderstruck and the 121 both do the same damage so why choose the assault cannon over the rifle? You can get the rifle at chargen with the restricted quality, its easier to handle, and with a couple of mods you get no recoil. The only thing the thunderstruck seems to have going for it is just sheer cool factor which while in some circles that can get you far I'm sure the 121 with custom look 2 could do just as well.

Amen Brother...

Errata has updated the Thunderstruck to halve armour before applying the AP value.

Well thats nice to know. Couldn't someone with a high enough armourer skill just make a lighter version of the thunderstruck? Or just use similiar technology to modify a sniper rifle? It seems possible with the technology, it would just probably have a rather high threshold.

For one thing, this isn't a simple modification that we're working on. Coil guns (aka Gaus guns) and Rail guns (different thing, but closer to the description given for how they work) both operate based on very different technologies from normal firearms. You'd be building a completely new weapon - possibly using parts from your sniper rifle, but to call it a modification is terribly disingenuous (then again, Arsenal has turning a car into a walker drone and replacing every single part of a gun with ceramic or plasteel as modifications, so that would hardly make it unique in this respect).

What's more, given my (admittedly limited) understanding of the technology, the weapon in question would, in fact, end up needing to be bulked up a fair bit to both make room for the hardware that goes into one of these - and to ensure that it's not going to be damaged by the forces it uses to fire. To the point where one might expect it to end up closer to the size of an assault canon, perhaps?

Now, if your players want something smaller, and you're okay with it, go for it. That said, per the core book, inventing something new (and I think making a gaus gun that much smaller qualifies) is beyond the scope of technical skills such as Armorer, so if you want to avoid it, there's reason number one. Further, with this being the smallest gaus gun in the book - and the only man-portable one, it's not unreasonable to assume that this is as small as they've been made at this point.

More precedent:

Some crazy bastard actually modified a Russian anti-tank weapon to fire 20mm Vulcan.

seems the page is awol...

I would read that in one of two ways:

1) The Panther assault cannon is itself not used on small tanks (nor are autocannons of similar calibre), but it fires an ammunition type that is commonly used by the larger weapons of small tanks. HEAT or HESH rounds perhaps. Ammunition that would not be used by the smaller firearms common to Shadowrun.

2) Panther assault cannons or faster-firing autocannons of an equal calibre are commonly used on light armored fighting vehicles which are often referred to colloquially as 'small tanks'. Autocannons in the 20-30 mm range are quite common on modern IFVs so that's not a stretch.

An old friend of mine actually made a coil gun sufficient to fire paperclips at wounding velocities (that is, break the skin and stick into the flesh). He only ever fired it at walls though.

Also, if you click on your coil gun wiki link you'll find a nice picture of "a handheld single stage coilgun with a pistol grip."