Smokin' Aces sniper scene

OK dudes - is this doable in SR4A? Target designator type thing? Can I have a flying drone on the other end of the sniper rifle? I'm thinking a kind of mild mannered hacker with a bad ass mobile wingman keeping him safe!

Sounds like a perfect application of a tacnet. Anything you see/hear goes up on the tacnet (I picture it as a wireframe built up in AR), you just tell the drone to engage target 1, and he does, even if no LOS.

Tacnets for the win.
A good example of a game that describes a sort of tacnet is Frozen Synapse. It has a "Dark mode" setting where you have the last position of the enemies to tactically decide your moves.

Flyspy spotter drone at ground level and a Stormcloud drone with a Barret is a pretty standard sniper-rigger setup.

Absolutely. You just need unrequited love between the front line face and the shooter. Hit tacnet with the jammers, and layer those visibility modifiers. Spotting at the end just requires a little narrativium on the part of the GM

Thanks all. Which book is the tacnet from?

Unwired, under Tactical AR Software

Also Information Guided Targeting from arsenal. I believe its referenced in the tacnet rules.

And hope the players don't realize there's Beam Link (laser and microwave) technology to make the connection immune to those Jammers.

Otherwise you'll be constantly trying to come up with excuses why there's no line of sight between the drones. Not so hard on indoor 'runs, but outdoor 'runs might be problematic.


-k

Even more fun with short range versions of beam links Gotta do a run in a shielded building? Have your flyspy fit with geko tips, laser beam link, a repeater and somehow smuggle it into the build and have it find a window. Sticks to the window and points that laser beam link out it, a duplicate drone finds that beam and sticks to the window opposite it and the two act as a bridge letting the teams inside and out keep in touch.

It's still pretty finicky. I don't see much evil in having them be much less reliable than normal wireless. It's up to them to 'come up with excuses' why they *do* have clear LOS. This doesn't preclude a solid (and somewhat expensive) plan like Miri mentions… if there's a window.

I imagine most people don't go through the trouble my rigger does of carrying a dozen FlySpys each with beam links, purely to act as a daisy chain maintaining line-of-sight.






-k

Not since SR3, anyway. I kinda miss when you had to make your own network, just for the limitations.

Funny thing, I saw that film a few days past and have been thinking about this exact question since
Yeah, Tacnet is the way to go. Drones can even help other drones with their sensor-guided lock-on. So even if you don't get much out of the standard tacnet bonus because you lack members, this will still go.
I've been thinking about setting this up with an assault cannon on a smart platform...

Smoke is still an issue with lasers, and we certainly saw that in the video!

I don't know about SR4, but in SR3 you actually had to aim the laser at the receiver (sticking your arm around a doorway and hitting a tiny lens in a distant building with a handheld laser is a bit ... goofy). I can't imagine anyone in a firefight running around being able to maintain even near-constant laser communication. MAYBE radio to a stationary laser transmitter, but then you get back to the jamming problem.

Microwave comms shouldn't have that problem, though, as they produce a narrow cone rather than a straight line.

They should probably be slightly easier to intercept, though - you don't have to be exactly in line with the "beam", just be in the cone's range.




-k

Microwave *beam* comms do have a beam, and that's the only kind of microwave available in the game. You can also use direction RF, but that's still subject to jamming.

Yeah, nezumi, it's assuming a certain level of magical tech. But that's what the RAW (implies), because it doesn't warn about laser links being so delicate as that.

Eh. Lasers do beams because they're coherent light.

Microwaves generally don't do "beams". At least with standard microwave emitters, the best you can do is a tight narrow cone.

You CAN create "coherent microwaves", though, but that's a MASER, which is distinctly "something else".


-k

What's this 'reality' you speak of? Besides, for all I know, the microwave version of the beam link is a maser: "Similar to a laser link, except this device emits microwaves for communication."

For that scene I would also go Tacnet but would go a little different. Have some drones outside using the x-ray millimeter of doom and my bio-metrics put in, aprox height, size, exotic shape(s). Then with some nice simple AI treat the entire system like an X-Box Kinect. Make hand and body gestures the commands. The drones stay outside, and would link themselves and the weapon with lasers to increase chance of always having LOS. THen make use of simple command gesture like "Both hands go up, shoot everyone else." Think it would work?

"Put your hands up!" "You wouldn't like that." "Frag you, hands up or we shoot!" "Well, if you're going to threaten me with physical violence..." *Raises both arms up*

Heh, I'd have it keyed to me making my fingers into a gun, pointing at somebody and saying "Bang!"

Need to name yourself Jenson for that.




-k

At least y'all seem to think it is a decent idea..... MWUAHAHAHAHAHAH

Step one, get a box. Wait crap.

In a more serious note I see no reason why you couldn't set up a sniper to back up your team. With a little proper prior planning you could pretty easily get into place, establish surveillance and your concealed (Potentially covered) position. Take a look at some real world sniper videos for some inspiration, and blend it with the scene in question.

If you're a player discuss this with your GM. See what sort of things he or she see's as an issue, obstacle or favorable circumstance for your character.

If you're the GM...well I feel sorry for someone.