I did not say there is not a time and place for killin, Kove also runs APDS through the Elaphant gun
Killing is not the place of a Hold-Out unless it is an Assisnation [Then it goes into the bay], its place is personal self defence.
I was going for the point that a Streetline Speical has a use and I am happy with how the discussion is going I hope that those reading this that thought they were useless now think othewize now.

the ability to inflict physical damage is also important when you need to destroy a vehicle (or security drone) or other object (such as the security door that just dropped between you and your escape route after the system underwent a wireless shutdown making life a lot harder for your hacker).

Hell, who needs $400? A couple $20 bottles of tequila should do the trick. And provide blackmail material!

1.) If the not-yet-dead men could tell a tale, you screwed up in the first place. Ever heard about masks?
2.) Blowing holes in corpsec employees lands you on the shit list. Rack up too high a score on the shit list and you become a problem. You do not want to be a problem.
3.) In the Shadows, firing guns and killing guards does not land you a cred as "bad ass" it simply lands you a cred as "amateur". Amateurs get paid less.

That all said: if you wanna use physical damage, don't let the pros and cons tell you otherwise. After all, regular ammo IS cheaper. But in this thread the main argument was that said regular ammo would do stun damage and I merely pointed out why that is not a drawback.

1) Right, right, the whole "Shadowrunners are never, ever, seen" nonsense that springs up every so often. Like a ski mask is gonna defeat what passes for Shadowrun's actual capacity for forensic science, much less a quick aura read.
2) Pointing guns at corpsec lands you on their shit list. Being on their property lands you on their shit list. Stealing from them lands you on their shit list. I don't know where people got the idea that corporate security teams, or their management, making the decisions higher up, are such humanitarians that folks who don't use lethal violence against them won't be hunted down just as resourcefully.
3) Yeah, sure. That's why so many of the canon stories involve every single character toting nothing but gel rounds, no one ever dies, and so many characters don't start with edged weapons built right into their arms and stuff, right? And why every sourcebook is full of nonlethal gear, so as to discourage that sort of amateurish behavior?

The simple answer is that sometimes nonlethal means are just fine, but sometimes you've got to make some noise and kill some fools. Expecting corporate security to pull their punches just because you are is how you wind up dead, in a business like Shadowrunning.

My opinion?

People who like completely non-violent runs are the kind of people who like to play tighly controlled games. For them, the planning is always more fun than the execution. They go over every possibility in their discussions, sit arguing the various merits of various stages of various plans for 3+ hours, and then they go and do the run and it's in, done, and out in ten minutes.

People who like overly violent runs are the kind of people who like to play loose and fast. For them, planning is all well and good to a point, but past that point you might as well just be sitting around arguing over who would win in a fight, Han Solo or Captain Picard - it gets old, and doesn't really provide anything new to the experience. So in they go with a plan that's "good enough", and if shit hits the fan (either because they didn't plan enough OR because there was no way they possibly could have planned for something) they toss the plan out the window and just make it up as they go along.

~Umidori

If you quote me, don't put words into my mouth. Read what I wrote. I wrote "screwed up". That means did not prepare properly. Does that happen? Yeah, it does. That's just Murphy's law in action. But to consider failure as your primary outcome does not exactly portay a lot of confidence in yourself.



And this is where you are wrong. Runners are considered "part of the business" since both sides employ them. And as long as you "play by the rules", you won't land on their shit list. Your employer will.
Now the moment you start to become a problem, that changes...



Is that your attempt at an argument? If you noticed, all those runs went bad.
As for the gear listed: Even a gun with stun damage is lethal. And keep in mind, that the gear is not just for you to toy around with. It is also for the opposition. Or do you really believe that a Strike Cruiser is meant for Runner teams? Or a naval Gauss Cannon?



No one expects Corps to pull punches. Somethimes, you may need to ise nonlethal means. Just because you sometimes need to employ nonlethal means does not mean that physical damage is by default superior.
I showed WHY stun damage is most of the time superior. If you don't agree with the fluff, you still have to refute the rules argument. Fact remains: In most cases it is easier to incapacitate your target with stun damage than with physical damage.



I completely agree. In the end, you need to play the game the way you like it. If it is no fun, you might as well not play at all.
That said, from a pure ingame perspective, the former would most likely be considered more professional by a potential employer.
Then again, sometimes all a Jhonson needs is someone to cause a distratction...

That said, I'm gonna stop here, since now I am drifting off to purely personal opinion, which does not add anything further to this thread.

True, but the difrence is do they come at you with a stike team armed with normal weapons and try to capture you or a Runner Team with all the APDS they can carry

On the question of photography, it is worth noting that in the here and now, a serious hit team on a difficult target apparently simply assumes that they will be photographed. All 11 of them. (See the analysis of the recent assassination in Dubai.)

The problem of course is that unlike a professional organization taht can sometimes afford to use its best in a way that leaves them alive, healthy, but not usable again, Shadowrunners really can't do that. Which means that if you want an enjoyable game the GM has to set things up so that there are ways for the runners to to be burned. Even though the technology ought to burn them badly and quickly. (About the third time the same gait shows up in a job, it gets added to the alerts list, and you can't travel any more... Or other similar problems. Many ways to make a game no fun. And fun is the actual point.)

Yours,
Joel

The Rule of Fun: whenever it makes your gaming experience more enjoyable for all parties involved, disregard all other rules as you see fit.

Perfect case in point. I had my sniper character sitting in our team van while the rest of the team went into a bar to chat with a particular story-related contact. I've got my goggles and earbuds on, I'm picking up the feed from our face's eye and ear recorder units (as well as the van's cameras), and I'm just keeping our asses covered.

Suddenly the contact we're trying to get info from goes paranoid and runs out a back door and down the alley toward the street. I stand up in the van and get ready to intercept him as he runs toward the street, but I hear a loud and powerful engine roaring down the road and the van's rear camera shows a four-door sedan barreling toward the bar. It stops on a dime blocking off the alleyway and four armed grunts get out and spot the contact in the alley, with my team right on his tail.

I pop open the van's rear door and make a suprise attack on the closest target with my sawed off .50 anti-material sniper rifle loaded with APDS. We'd parked the van about a block or so away, with the rear pointed toward the bar, so the line up was perfect. I roll beautifully, no possible miss due to surprise, awesome damage with a really nasty custom rifle with and the aforementioned APDS. My GM decides that in this particular instance, given the absolute perfect lineup and the rifle's sheer power, the rules can go fuck themselves: I manage to headshot the guy I'm aiming at AND the guy standing directly behind him, vaporizing both their skulls into a fine crimson mist.

It was glorious.

~Umidori

I can do that with two good bottles of irish whiskey-total cost about $50.

More seriosusly I agree with the 'fun' rule being best. I know from real life one reason there's little love for the hold out is it just is not intimidating. Seriously. I might be very good with my .25 Berretta but it's so dinky even in my hand that it really look more like a joke. By comparrison my .38 airwieght is more impressive looking for bult, even though I'd trust the .25 far more to hit what I aim at.

Obviously. The point was that the cost of laes/narc/capsule round is very expensive for the job it does.

and not as much fun.

True, but a .22LR can do a lot of damage and not bounce off a leather jacket.
My only problen is there is a lot of .38 Special, .357 Mag, .45 LC and even .44 Mag rounds IRL, that don't exist in SR.
Remeber for the early bond movies JB used a .25 ACP and then he went to the PPK [IMOHO is also a Hold Out] and i belive that was a .32 ACP

As small as the hold out is... Forehead+Gun=Scary...

APDS shoots through cover. UWB radar sees through walls.

"If you ever find yourself in a fair fight, you have fucked up."

What rules in SR4 would cover this kind of situation? I'd treat it as a called shot, no reaction dice, no armor to soak... but even then, they might not die. (Which is not inherently unrealistic, but it seems like it would happen more often than it should.)

What if you let them do the thing where you buy hits at 4-for-1? Agil 5 + Firearms 5 - 4 for called shot = 6 dice, buy 1 free hit. Base DV 4 + 4 for called shot + 1 for the hit = resist 9P with just Body.

Still, that might not kill you.

You forgot +2 for point blank

You forgot the +2 from aiming, unless the shooter just raises the gun to the temple and pulls the trigger. You can either call a shot to ignore armor(and yes all armor applies) or you can increase the damage, not both at the same time. You may want to look at the optional modifier for point-blank range in Arsenal (p. 161) for an additional +2.
For a more accurate calculation use the statistical 1 hit in 3:
AGI 5 + Pistols 5 + 2 Aiming (+2 Point-Blank) -4 Damage Increase= 8 (10) Dice => 2(3) Hits => DV 4 + 4 Damage increase +2(3) Net Hits=DV10(11) vs. BOD+Armor

or

AGI 5 + Pistols 5 + 2 Aiming (+2 Point-Blank) -Armor=12(14) -Armor Dice =>4-Armor/3 Hits => DV4 + 4 -Armor/3 =DV8 -Armor/3 vs. BOD. This won't kill anyone, but doubletapping is your friend. This however cannot be made to look like a suicide.

Of course, if you follow the RAW rules then...suicide isn't a one-shot deal either.
(Think about it, shooting yourself in the head isn't easier than shooting someone else in the head and follows the same math you just outlined)

Can you voluntarily fail a soak check?

I am pretty sure you can convince your GM to allow you to burn edge for an automatic citical botch

Not quite. In the early books he used a .25 Berretta. At the end of From Russia With Love he had a silencer on it and it got stuck when he tried to draw it. Meaning the bad guy almost got him. So in the next book- Dr. No he was told to retire it by M. He was given the Walther PPK for in close work and a S&W airweight .38sp for heavier work.

By this point the book series was half way done but they started the films at the same time, also with dr No and in that you have the scene where Bond is forced to give up his beloved .25 with a skelaton grip to the armorer, Major Boothroyd.(the only Bond film in the first 20 without Q)

Personally I started to wonder if fleming really knew about guns. The .25 Berretta is a good gun but I can't see it doing what Bond did with it-in the book Diamonds are Forever he shoots into a car chasing him causing it to crash-I seriously doubt even allowing for distance, the .25 would pierce the wind screen, never mind kill the driver. The airweight is great for concealed carry but its accuracy is sacrificed for concealment. The things are a stone bitch to shoot.

That's an interesting question. It's unclear to me whether Fleming's work with the 30AU in WWII would have provided him with that sort of gritty detail about specific firearms. Then again, it's just as likely that he did know his stuff, but took a degree of artistic license. I know a science fiction author with a physics degree, and he tells me that knowing what you're talking about actually makes your job a lot harder, since you can't treat that kind of thing as a "magic black box" that can do whatever is necessary for the story.

By RAW? Not that I'm aware.

Don't forget the blind fire modifiers, unless you do it in front of a mirror. Strictly by RAW, of course.

or a smartgun. Besides adding +2 it removes the Blind Fire modifier because of the installed camera.

I remember that in Cryptonomicon, the members of Detachment 2702 were trained in how to shoot themselves in the head, since "it's amazing how many people manage to botch this apparently simple procedure" or something like that. Does anyone know if there's any truth to this?

I don't have any numbers on attempted suicides, but in general, gunshot wounds to the head are a lot less lethal than most people think. From 1982 to 1993, 66 percent of the patients treated at Cook County Hospital in Chicago for gunshot wounds to the head survived. (check here for details)

I figure that while attempted suicides with guns might fare better than that percentage, but there is most likely still a large number of "botched" suicide attempts this way. After all, most people don't even know which part of the brain to destroy in the first place. A majority will probably try to set the gun to their temple. While that may leave then a drooling idiot for the rest of their lives, it will most probably not kill them. Same holds true for the "gun-in-mouth" approach (unless they use shotguns).

In places which still practice common law, it's illegal to attempt suicide. So, you fail it and you go to jail. How messed up is that?

The more disturbing question is: How can they justify outlawing suicide in the first place? Or is it just "attempted suicide" that is illegal? Kind of like a "if you wanna do it, make sure you do it right" type of legislation?

I think it is for two primary reasons.

The first is that a botched suicide attempt is very expensive. If someone is taken to the emergency room following a botched suicide, it will likely cost a whole lot of money that they will be unwilling to pay. Also, people who act like they are going to jump tend to shut down roadways and cause thousands of dollars of damage in lost productivity.

The second would be that you would have legal grounds to commit them to a mental hospital if they or their family would be unwilling to do so. It seems reasonable to me to assume that people who are committing suicide have some sort of mental problems that ought to be discussed before terminating their lives.

I've heard of a .22 round hitting someone's skull near the temple, deflecting, passing under the skin, and exiting on the other side of the head, only doing superficial damage.

Crap that bullets do is living, breathing proof that quantum mechanics probabilities are real.

I forgot who it was, but I believe a female news anchor back in the 70's asked what the most effective way to shoot herself to ensure she was going to die, and was told by medics that a gunshot to the back of the head, near the base of the skull, would obliterate the parts of the brain required to keep you ticking.

Then she shot herself on live television using that specific technique. It worked flawlessly

Ick... other topic...

That's because the brainstem contains your medulla, pons, and midbrain. The medulla contains the cardiac, respiratory, vomiting and vasomotor centers and deals with autonomic functions, such as breathing, heart rate and blood pressure.

All of that is pretty much irrelevant the moment the formatio reticularis and the medulla oblongata are severed. Once the brain ceases to communicate with the rest of the body, death follows.
In other words: Sever the Myelencephalon.

Added advantage: You don't hear the shot.

How do they know?

(Goes along with decapitation gives you about 20 seconds of consciousness, due to lingering blood sugar)

The bullet travels faster than the sound. By the time the sound reaches your ears, the nescessary nerves to transmit their signals will be severed and as a result, the percept is never established (no transmission of the outside stilumli to the auditory storage, let alone working memory).

After the first bottle, you can probably go with a cheap 2nd bottle and save a few bucks.