THIS is why I didn't want to bother responding to your assertion.



I love how you just handwave away everything that you think doesn't matter. Shadowrunners are not military forces, normally, and have to worry about things like concealability or even, yes, availability. And yes, the assault rifle is objectively better if you just look at numbers. What's your point?



Since Grenades were designed to kill humans, I fail to see what your point is. Are you trying to kill buildings with grenades suddenly? What does this really have to do with the difference between launched and thrown grenades? Have you forgotten that your entire point that I was refuting was that launched grenades make thrown grenades obsolete and unnecessary?



Exactly. Why the hell are you even trying to claim that thrown grenades are rendered obsolete if you get this point that I and others have been trying to render unto you?



Lets look at this seriously. In Shadowrun, an urban game of underworld freelance criminals who are probably outnumbered and out geared by the people they commit their crimes against, carrying around a grenade launcher (a device whose sole purpose is to throw out explosive death at long range) is 'better' to carry than one or two smaller, more portable, and versatile 'emergency' grenades? SHadowrunners regularly engage opponents in open warfare now at extreme ranges? Seriously? Wow. I mean, that's just the tip of the iceberg, really, next you'll be telling me they need a citymaster to go buy beer after the run, seeing as how safe the streets are around here....



Great. You're comparing thrown real grenades against thrown game grenades. Please explain how this has any relevance to your point (again) that launched grenades render thrown grenades obsolete? I already know (and in fact pointed out to you) that game guns and gear tend to be very wonky and/or weak compared to real world equivilents, because game designers are often not at all familiar with the real world devices. Imagine that. It does nothing to establish a defense of your untenable case.

if i'm understanding correctly, the complaint against SR grenades is that janice (or someone?) is assuming there is no distinction between launched grenades and hand grenades also; that is, the game rules are set up such that you can throw a launcher grenade and you can launch a hand grenade.

this is not the case.



further, there is the assumption that minigrenades should not do as much damage as the full sized versions because they are smaller. this supposes that you could not put a higher grade of explosive into the minigrenade to make it just as explosive. if you wish to argue that you think it's silly for them to do so, that's one thing, but to say that they can't do that is just as silly.

of course, the fact that neither grenade is capable of killing someone at more than 10 (or 12) meters is unrealistic, but do you honestly want to be rolling to check for every single person within 100 meters or whatever to see if they get hit by a random bit of shrapnel? sure, it's possible, but i don't imagine it's terribly probable, and it really isn't likely to add much to the game, imo.

This, and this alone is what I disagree with. Just to bring back to the start of the entire debate about grenades and launchers.

I view most, if not all, of Janice's defense of this statement as smoke and mirrors, misdirection, lacking substance or relavence.

But then Janice seems to be excessively fixated on numbers rather to the exclusion of all other considerations. This can suggest an awkward line of argument related to 'role vs roll' playing, but since I'd rather not go there...

This leaves me to point out that it should be faster, by the rules, to pop off with a hand grenade than to switch to your launcher, fire it, then switch back to the conventional firearm to continue a running gunfight.

To which Janice could point out that most, if not all, AR's have GL's built in by 2070 apparently, and underbarrel launchers are not all that hard to get on the street compared to just the rifle... a baffling cricumstance.

Of course, if you've loaded HE minigrenades in your launcher and a frag or, god forbid, thermal smoke is what the situation calls for, you're screwed. Unless, of course, you've got some of those 'pointless' hand grenades on your belt, where you can just grab and toss the one you need.

Yup. Totally pointless, and no way for me to realistically attack such a postion without bringing up the 'role vs roll' debate.

Spike 1.
Well, it doesn't matter. The primary function of an SMG in the real world isn't concealability, where in Shadowrun, that's the only differentiation aside from reduced usability. Special operations and law enforcement frequently make use of SMGs instead of assault rifles for a reason, and it isn't because they need to be able to hide them in the characteristic cyberpunk trenchcoat.

Grenades were designed to kill humans, but there are many creatures other than humans in Shadowrun. Trolls are a good example, they are significantly tougher than humans and the difference between a launched grenade and a hand grenade could play a significant role at only a difference of a few meters.

I'm trying to claim that they render them obsolete because THERE IS NO REASON TO USE A HAND GRENADE IF YOU CAN CARRY A GRENADE LAUNCHER ARE YOU BLIND?

Shadowrunners aren't the only people in the world. Sure, for a Shadowrunner carrying around a pair of grenades might be easier than carrying a GL, but for the military forces they may go against, that's not the case if the only advantage is concealability.

My point is that they wouldn't have adopted a grenade that weak as their primary hand grenade like you were trying to claim.

Jaid.
I had missed that, thank you, so they are not interchangable. That doesn't change the fact they function the exact same statistically.

Why would they? If they had better explosives they'd put better explosives in more than just mini-grenades. Mini-grenades would get more powerful and hand grenades would be proportionally more powerful.

Well that's a matter of expediency, I'll give you that.

Spike 2.
Facts are smoke and mirrors huh?

Numbers are supposed to reflect the world around them. If there's no reason to take something, you shouldn't, it's just a fact of life.

You put words in my mouth, but rifle integrated launchers are there, and with them having a 6 shot capacity, surpass dedicated launchers by a rather considerable margin, especially considering encumbrance isn't an issue in the shadowrun ruleset. A rifle integrated launcher can also be fired via smartlink, which makes even the act of shifting grip and sighting a non-concern.

Well, considering dropping a magazine with a smartlink is a free action and then reloading it a simple action vs. readying a hand grenade which is also a simple action, why wouldn't you just switch to a different magazine of grenades?

Interesting,. but I have a point or two.

Most of the grenade loads most of my characters carry are Smokes(various), Pepper Punch, Flash Bangs, and Flash Paks.

With a little technique one can use a "Macro" to arm hand grenades like Flash Paks and have them go off while attached to the battle harness. Also have have smokes be armed via a "Macro" then released from their place on the harness. Ie keep firing weapon, arm and drop smoke grenades at the same time.

So not all grenades are made to kill people.

Also air foil hand grenades are more "concealable" than a grenade launcher.

I have one character with a modded grenade launcher that can fire bursts, but have not yet found the right place to use that added feature yet.

WMS

Speaking of being blind (not to mention rude!), I have seen over a half a dozen uses for normal grenades that cannot be attributed to mini-grenades listed in this thread alone.

disable the 5 meter safety and you can do all those with a mini-grenade

It boggles the mind.

So... back to Arsenal. Gauss rifles, pretty cool gear. Would it be horrifically twinky of me to provide my players with a "sniper" version of the gauss rifle? What kind of changes would make it appropriate for a sniper character?

No, but apparently you are. See Exhibit A.




The military today only equips roughly one rifle per every ten with a grenade launcher. Get your head out of your fourth point of contact and stop pretending that the numbers you are looking at are the only ones available. Cost, for example, is a factor in the military. And while shadowrun has relatively attrocious encumberance rules, that extra pound or so of weight on the rifle is a factor as well, at least in real life.



No, you point has been that no one would use Hand Grenades because launched grenades are so much better. See Exhibit B:





They are when they have no relevance to your point. For example, it is a fact that my car is yellow. However, knowing that proves nothing about grenade launchers in Shadowrun. That's pretty obvious. You were a bit more subtle about it, as you point out real world grenade kill radii, and compared them to shadowrun kill radii. However: proving that the writers of shadowrun didn't make a strong effort to keep grenade kill radii in line with real world kill radii proves nothing about how launchers make handgrenades obsolete.

In fact, nothing you've said has proven that. In fact, you've even contradicted that, with exhibit B above.

I don't know about spike, but without my classes i'm almost blind
But the real question is are you really that stupid or are you just being a troll.

Becouse you can't be seriously thinking that you can use a grenade launcer to perform all the nice tricks you can do with hand grenades(like for example rolling them down the stairs or droping gas/smoke grenades in your feet)

ok, here's something i can't figure out. there's a sidebar in the armor section that talks about armor modifications. there's one on that sidebar called "environmental adaptation." i cant find a decent description of it ANYWHERE. does anyone know where i can find it, or what it does/costs?

SR4, page 316. it's a mod available for full body armor, adapts the armor to protect you from hot or cold environments.

Where exactly does it specify that shadowrun mini-grenades work exactly like real world 40mm grenades? They list them with the same stats and description as hand grenades, which would imply that I could get them set to a variety of detonators, which means I could do those things. How does rolling a grenade down a flight of stairs work better than launching it down a flight of stairs and detonating it via wireless command? Also, that 5 meter safety could be disabled by a monkey, so a smoke grenade at my feet is perfectly feasible.


Cost is a factor, but unless the rules say so, weight isn't.

So, just because you choose to read shit into the rules that isn't there, and then opt to disregard common sense in totality when considering 'in-game' effects, the rules are fucked. I understand now.

Which rules would those be? The rules for detonators are stated right at the start of the grenade section. As to weight, common sense shouldn't apply unless the rules say it applies. Houserules can be used to fix that, but that doesn't change the fact that the base ruleset is flawed. Saying otherwise would be the same as saying "I can beat the Dallas Cowboys at football, if you remove all the players except for one and then blindfold and handcuff him." it's just inaccurate.

One note to potential Darwin Award Nominees.

Removing the 5 meter safety feature on any mini grenade of explosive, Flash Bang, High Explosive, and the like means that it goes boom when dropped. And I mean boom on the first bounce, not the second or third. There is no spoon and ring arming system on mini grenades, that are used in grenade launchers.

For your non explosive types of mini grenades with the safety feature removed/disarmed, any shock/drop can set them off attached to ones battle harness.

So by all means remove the 5 meter safety feature on you explosive types of mini grenades. See if you can get your character the SR4 Darwin Award.

WMS

Except as explained at the beginning of the description for grenades, they don't have to detonate with impact. Remove the five meter safety on a mini-grenade designed to detonate on wireless command and that's not an issue.

RAW page 313

So Sorry No Hoto Gari.

Grenades made to be hand thrown have the possible wireless link.

Airburst link
RAW page 310

No wireless connection to the mini grenade.

WMS

Guess I was wrong. For the record, I did read it, I must have just missed that. Thank you, I concede on all points except for the fact that Shadowrun grenades are underpowered and that rifle grenades should be different from hand grenades. I'm going to go elsewhere for the time being, I've spent way too much time arguing a wrong point.

Edit: for the record, I freely admit I've made an ass of myself.

Hands Janice his personal foot in mouth tooth brush, that has a well used look to it.

Then welcomes him into the private and exclusive club of arses. I am a charter member.

WMS

Don't start, that's all I'm asking. If you really have a beef with that statement, take it up with messages.

Lighten up a bit. It'll help.

The sentence just made me laugh. Common sense shouldn't apply? Seriously, common sense should always apply, even if it's not written in the rules. Or I'm getting your statement completly wrong.

Lets assume that the power/damage/radius of launcher/thrown grenades are the same.

Now we take a look at the main difference.

Grenade Launcher Use
Shoot Grenade  Impact Explosion
Shoot Grenade Airburst Explosion

Standard Grenade Use
Throw Grenade in enemy face  Hurts targets head  Bounce  Explosion
Throw Grenade  Bounce  Explosion
Place Grenade  Enemy approaches  Detonate by Wi-Fi
Place Grenade  Attach RFID Tag Motion Sensor  Activate after moving out of range  Enemy activates motion detector BOOM
Roll Grenade Down Stairs  Boom Below
Boobytrap Body  Medic moves body  Boom
Wear Flash-Pack on jacket  Detonate flash by Wi-Fi
Wear Smoke Grenades on jacket  Detonate by Wi-Fi to hide in smoke
Drop Grenade  Set Timer  Move away from grenade area

So, regardless of possibly damage factors a pair of standard thrown grenades have a gazillion uses.

My favourite is the following:

MK1 Starburst Smoker
Doberman
4 stun grenades
4 flash packs
4 smoke grenades

Tape everything to the hull facing in all four directions and have it run right into a group of enemies activating everything at once with one linked wireless command.

The resulting lightshow and detonations should take care of almost everything.

And the drone ignores stun damage so it will be ok.

I would say WMS is absolutely correct if we were talking about today's grenade ammo, with it's mechanical fuses. The only way to make a shell detonate inside it's safety zone today is to bypass all the safety devices, make the shell think it has already fired and spun the right number of times. If you do that, you will definitely get what WMS describes. And you will deserve your entry on the Darwin Awards.

In 2070, though, it is harder to say. You may well see all-electronic fuses the size of a dime that are still as smart as today's cell phones. It is entirely possible that the Armorer+Log test actually involves logging into the maintenance port of the grenade, and changing the internal logic from "After acceleration, wait 10 revolutions before listening to the impact sensor" to "After acceleration, wait .25 revolutions before listening to the impact sensor"

But is it smart enough to accept the command, "Don't blow me up."

When dealing/working with explosive devices ie grenades I am old school ie K.I.S.S. (Keep It Simple Stupid).

In an era of electronic warfare in the battlefield, having widespread electronic(wireless) devices in warheads, could lead to major warhead malfunctions.

But with non electronic(wireless) devices in warheads the effects of electronic warfare or hackers is greatly reduced.

But to each their own, to suite the game that they are gaming or GMing in.

WMS

I agree with you 100% here about wireless explosives. I don't need to be able to websurf and check my email on my hand grenade.

Hm... after a runner with lots of hand grenades had an encounter with a mage that cast "magic fingers" and started to pull some pins, a number of the members of the team at the time started to add fingerprint checks or codes to the grenades to avoid a repetition.. That was before wireless, of course..

The idea is the wireless if off, until activated via manual (via Skinlink most likely). So grab it from your belt, toss it, send wireless signal to detonate. Can be quite smooth

Adding skinlink would cost 50 per grenade though... seems a bit steep. I'd stick with a simple on/off switch for the wireless connectivity.

Issue with a wirelessly enable command detonation grenades is what is the signal strength, if a jammer is online and has a stronger jamming signal than your grenades wireless signal then grenade does not go boom.

Remember for wireless to work the signal is bidirectional, meaning the grenades signal has to be able to reach the comm link etc generating the command to go boom.

For command detonators from Arsenal again signal strength can be a key issue, in environment with jamming ongoing.

As for magic fingers effects, try some small carabiners attaching/holding the grenades/rings to the combat harness, fingerprint scanners on hand grenades?? no too much for Murphy and his relatives. Also if the grenades are not in LOS of the mage attempting to pull rings etc, he can not, so having each under inverse pouch type of affair would work also.

Timing the detonation of a thrown grenade via a wireless link is critical too, again sounds neat but in actual effect no go. Again KISS.

Now if you are into complicated ways of doing, have a hacker cracked the software/hardware on a airburst link, then use software/hardware and a smartgun link's laser rangefinder to set the time to travel the distance to the target. Now the software would have to have the average throwing speed of the thrower factored into the arming solution etc. You could also factor into it a biomonitor so the software can take into account any adrenalin or drug enhancements. So then just before the grenade is thrown it is set via the wireless link to detonate at the target's location.

Good luck on the above, my GM heard me out, took into account things he had let me try, and Told Me "No F*ing Way!!!".

@Fuchs
Your players characters stood still in one place long enough for a mage to do this? Moving/motion is life, standing still is a body bag waiting to be zipped closed.

WMS

Tossing my hat in a little late here, but I just recieved the book a few days ago.

After reading through it, I have to say I am very satisfied with the book. Vehicles are good, weapons are good, the martial arts is good...I have never been a fan of all the chemical stuff but for those that are it covers that fairly well. I also really liked how there is some of the world info stuff with a breakdown of various aspects of how the EQ listings relate to the world itself. All in all, a well written book that is well worth the buy.
One complaint I read was that there wasn't enough military vehicles, specifically the lack of a tank. To me if you need tank stats your doing something wrong, it is Shadowrun after all right
It's pretty easy to make a tank with the things provided in the book anyway, they even provide weapons designed for tanks, throw that on to the APC and put some more armor and body on it and you have your tank.

I have to say, Catalyst has done a really good job with 4th edition. It's comprehensive and easy to use (well, a hell of a lot easier than previous additions but not really as simple as say D&D, though modern gaming systems never are), the books are well written and balanced and the supplements are coming out at a very nice pace.

What i really would like to see is a "monstrous manuel" of some kind, with more paracritters, more stats for security, special ops, military troops, monsters and specific stats for various important sec forces like on Zurich orbital or in the executive offices of a mega corp along with some nasty baddass big guns that the mega's have squirelled away for when the shit really really hits the fan (I always imagined that somehwere in the bowels of some facility there is a 10-15 million dollar killing machine with pure deltaware and bioware and Jason Bourne style skill\combat conditioning).
You could even throw in a whole bunch of unique creepy crawlies and badass from the various metaplanes, even a few adventure\campaign write-ups involving magical threats or sites. I have always thought that Shadowrun lacked those supplements, like the ones D&D has for undermountain or the temple of elemental evil. They came close with the renraku arcology book, but I would like to see some thing with more different kinds of them in one book.

thanks for the reply, but that doesnt help. all the SR4 has is the fire resistance, the insulation, and the chem seal. which arsenal already has as seperate entries. the environmental adaptation still remains a mystery, though... unless there's something im missing

Just gotta say, if you are firing smoke grenades that are attached to your armor to generate smoke, you are a hardcore mother-effer.

Those things get HOT. I've seen 'em start small grassfires in dry enough conditions. I honestly don't see any economical benefit to designing cold smoke grenades, and given the value of thermal smokers (where the smoke stays hot...) The trend seems to be the opposite direction, ne?

No opinion on the thread, but this is the funniest thing I have read in a week.

Come on, you can't tell me you don't want a grenade capable of playing an mp3 clip from "Don't Stop Me Now" when thrown.

The last thing I would want to hear before being blown up would be This

After hearing that, the explosion would be relief.

WMS

I remember that piece of crap from when I was kid, I think it got to No. 1 in the UK.

Oh something on topic?

Do all gauss guns half Armour before applying AP? Or is it just the vehicle mounted one?

Also love the new steampunk range in the armoured clothing. In our first post arsenal session everyone bought formfitting, and the two girlie bought up the fashion armour. Plenty of new toys all around.

I think I'm gonna stick with this, I really don't want to be forced to hate my grenades.

the page i listed has a table. on that table, as sub-headings under full body armor, you have chem seal and environmental adaptation. in the description for full body armor, it mentions that environmental adaptation makes the armor suitable for hot or cold environments, and chemical seal protects you from toxins and toxic environments.

Hmnn. All this talk of music has me thinking that I really need to put loudspeakers on a large size aerial drone just so it can blast Wagner's Ride of the Valkyries as it does a strafing run. (Yeah, it's cliche. So what? )

Well, if you are gonna do Cliches, its always good to go with the good ones. I mean, that particular cliche is so good, God created Wagner just to make it possible, right?

And helicopters

well i'll be fragged hard by a flaming monkey. i found it, and i cant belive that i missed it before. i mean... how many times have i been over that page? how could i have missed it that many fraggin times?? ugh... anyway, thanks, chummer.

I've always been about flavor in my weapon of choice, and this book delivered. I loved the guns section, and the survival section was unbelievably badass as I do enjoy playing the occasional crazy survivalist man.

There are a few things:

1) 100 nuyen for a telescoping staff that has a decent damage code, excellent reach, and is incredibly easy to conceal? Ok.....

2) How can you release this book with the cover looking so crappy and the second page arms dealer looking so awesome?

3) Spelling/grammar errors on every page. EVERY PAGE!

4) I really hope that whoever decided to put inline skates in this book has read Diamond Age. Because if they did, I love them. Also, if you're going to start ripping off of Stephenson, you need to include the magnetic harpoon (magnapoon).

5) The Hotspur on page 110 looks like the front suspension is off by about a foot.

2. The front cover is awesome.
4. Are you suggesting that Stephenson invented inline skates in a 1995 book?

2. Simply submitting a Philistine's opinion (i.e. mine, not yours)
4. Certainly not, but the only thing they don't have in common are rocket propulsion.