Supposing I have a drone-o-mancer who also has a pistol with Pilot Upgrade (Arsenal p 152).


If I then have a machine sprite (or some sort of agent) occupy the gun...how does this get resolved? Is it even possible? Which skill would be used...gunner or the weapon type?

Obviously the gun has to be pointed in roughly the right direction...but how die get rolled?

Edit: Having reread Arsenal, I am tempted to thing that the grip would be linked by something like a gimbal, so basically the direction the barrel pointed would be under the control of the drone-o-mancer.

It's a drone when it's a drone, and it's a gun when it's a gun. When it's a gun, you'd never use Pilot. It's like the ocular drone cybereyes.

IMHO it was meant to be used with propulsion system. It may also be handy if you want to set up a trap, like leave your gun on the table pointed at the door.

Thanks for the quick replies...

So if I wanted to be able to leave the gun as a welcoming committee for baddies following us, I could just add a gecko tip to the pistol handle (I know it would normally not cover the base but it would about the right cost). It might also be cool to leave it guarding a bike...

The way i see it, while a pilot upgrade gives the gun the ability to acquire targets and fire on its own..... it still needs a way to aim.

I'd give it a retractable bipod, actually. Fluff it as having a small motor to turn around on, and adjust the 'legs' to aim up and down. Like 2/3's of a tripod turret. Unlike a propulsion system, its still stationary.

One interesting note about the pilot upgrade is that its treated like a drone in all respects. While its expressely prevented from taking drone modifications, a pilot upgraded gun still gets a sensor package out of the deal, completely with signal range. And, as a drone, its going to need its Sensor rating to shoot at things.(sensor+gunnery, i believe)

If you don't get the propulsion versions, it's a crappy drone, yes. It can't aim at all. It can watch, and fire (e.g., when taped in front of a door?).

Well, with Sensor 1, it can *barely* watch. Presumably, that is the camera that it already had (Smartgun required).

Don't know what bipod your referring to, but there is a smart weapons platform that is basically a stationary drone on a tripod.

War! also has the Arachne drone gun platform, slightly better than the stock one. It's 26F Availability, though.





-k

The internal bipod modification on Aug 152. Its a snazzy, fancy, motorized Bipod Accessory that can deploy itself, retract itself, or double up to act as a foregrip.

Giving the gundrone the ability to move its two bipod legs around should give it the ability to aim itself, without being able to move around on them, and without using expensive smart firing platforms.(which DO come with autosofts, so you'll have to bring your own.)

I think that all you would need to do is puts a stewarts platform between the pistol grip and barrel (IMO thats what this upgrade is, as a smart fun already has the ability to fire the gun). The advantage of that is that the platform is very very efficient giving 6 degrees of freedom of movement for very little space. It would probably be limited to something like +/- 20 degrees of movement from roughly where the gun is pointing.

Before we get into discussions of body movement causing problems, I should say that systems like this all ready deployed at the top of long flexible 200m poles to compensate for vibration and wind, so the tech is easily up to it

Except the only thing it can do is deploy and retract via wireless command, it is not independently adjustable that way.

And the book is arsenal, not augmentation...

If it's an internal mod, the Pilot should be able to work it. Should be integrated into smartgun functionality, pretty much.
I'd probably think along the same lines if it's external. Coordinating peripheral functions into one system is what smartgun is all about, after all.

The Pilot could deploy or retract it, exactly as via smartlink, assuming it works via smartlink. That wouldn't help it aim at all, though.

Having thought about this a bit now, I am seeing a simple mod (My son has made similar mods when he was 12, although not on guns) that is a the grip of pistol detachable from the gun. Instead of clipping into the gun, you clip it into a 1 inch cube stewarts platform that gives you around +/- 30 degrees maneuverability. This lets you remove the one inch cube pilot modification when you want it to be a normal gun. Given that the gun already has a smart gun link, all we need to do is point it and the smart gun will fire.

So… who is paying what action/dice for this monstrosity? Is is a normal firing action to aim the gun the direction/elevation? Does that take skill? Does firing a gun 30° off-axis increase the recoil or break your wrist? Does the Gunnery roll get fewer dice because it's only controlling a partial horizontal aspect of the normally all-directions firing action? Messy.

This would depend on wether the deploying/rectracting is an on/off type of deal, or can be set to varying degrees of deployment, in which case it could feasibly be used by a Pilot of sufficient quality to aim vertically, or even rotate to some degree if the legs could be adjusted independantly.

Of course RAW says no, RC is not a mode of propulsion.

Seth's idea could work if you modded the gun-drone with a weapon mount. Not quite sure though, AFB atm. But convoluted? Yes sir, it is.

Thats not messy at all. Aiming your weapon is part of the shooting action(a complex action). Taking better aim is an optional free action. Adjusting a bipod is a free action.

Pilots still have one complex + 1 free action per turn. Since they don't need to take aim, and may or may not need to adjust the bipod, they still have the necessary number of actions to aim and fire. Besides, making a gun take a seperate action to aim itself is a stupid ruling: because then you'd have to apply the same ruling rule to other characters, and we already know that metahumans and drones both just take a complex/simple action to aim and pull the trigger.

Smart firing platforms have a 90 degree field of fire. This one has apparently has about a 30. Oh no, big dif.

I'd also like to point out that Pilot Upgrading a gundrone also qualifies it for Body in RC, because its now a vehicle, which ought to help with the turret concept.

Udoshi, you're arguing against points I never made. My point is that the gundrone *can't* aim, not that it must use a Take Aim action. I think you might have gotten confused by my question about whether the *character* spends an action to aim the gun, because (again) the gun can't aim itself. Someone has to aim the gun, and spend the action for it (normally part of the overall firing action, as I said).

And, for the record, 90° is vastly different from 30° (also, 60° inclination), and the smart platform is a purpose-built firing drone (Targeting, better Sensors, etc.), and it's not connected to anyone's hand.

I'm with you on all those questions.

So my thinking goes like this:

• Lets compare this to a hoverdrone firing a similar pistol
• Does the hover drone actually have to be flying, or would it get the same die if it was resting on a table?
• Would the hover drone have the same die if you were holding it it instead of resting on the table?

I think that if you get the pilot upgrade and put the gun in a vice / use duct tape / use a gecko grip, then we are in the scenario of the hoverdrone resting on the table. I think that if you are holding it still, again its that scenario (although I think 3*uncompensated recoil would be fair and a few of the normal recoil compensators would not work). However if you are doing Matrix style one handed cartwheels in the government building (I have to go watch that scene again) then this is not the technology for you.

I think the drone does have to be flying, unless it has a turret/flex mount (and the pistol-drone obviously doesn't—it's a pistol). Honestly, if you're *not* playing up the fixed nature of most vehicle weapons, you're cheating all the people with arms, right?

But you haven't made any points at all, just said the rule are messy, without any clear rules support or arguement, only questions. You don't get to give me grief about the can of works you opened up.



That depends on who is firing the gun. If the gun is deployed and the pilot is firing, then drone rules apply. If someone is firing it by hand, the usual rules apply.



Yes. As i said above, requiring people to take extra actions to aim would be silly, above and beyond the action for firing AND the seperate optional action for taking aim.



Not supported by the rules. However, common sense applies, and the gun does not have to make use of this ability. If it can, it doesn't mean you have to use it constantly.



Nope. Why would it? Thats like arbitrarily suggesting a doberman get a dice penalty to fire just because it happens to be firing forward.
Also, not supported by the rules.


What both me and mardrax are saying is that this mod could give such a gun the ability to adjust its inclination, therefore giving it the ability to aim. Once it has that ability, it can acquire targets(because its a drone with a sensor rating), aim at(because now it has a limited ability to adjust itself), and engage(because it has a pilot, sensor, and presumably gunnery autosoft) targets within a limited field of fire.
Where I think you're getting confused is that just because you can turn a gun into a sort of miniturret, you don't have to - you can still fire it by hand without using the extra options.

Not only do I always get to give you grief, I just did. Ohhhhhh SNAP.

If the gun is 'deployed', it can't move at all. It can't aim. It can't fire (except if the target stands in front).

The doberman can move. This gundrone can't.

Actually, no one said inclination, you said horizontal. Now, the gun *can't* aim or move, at all, but I understand that you're suggesting a house rule. Assuming that house rule, my point is that the gun has to be facing the right way before it can even try to aim and fire; the user's arm has to move and roughly aim the gun. As I said twice.

I usually use the flexible gun mount on my drones (even though it costs an extra slot) to avoid loads of piloting rolls. I also like the fact that I can use the laser sight mounted on the gun mount as a target designator, and FLIR camera.

A doberman doesn't need to move - its gun is a turret mount, so whether the drone itself can move or not is irrelevant.

I'm not suggesting a houserule - i'm suggesting that an adjustable, computer controlled bipod(two legs) satisfies the requirement to aim in a limited capacity, just like you said. I think you're missing the point entirely - we don't want to make it walk, just give it a firing arc- seth's presented a fairly reasonable case on how it could work, and you should re-read it.

limping or crawling propulsion systems may be better options. Especially limping as it allows limited directional control (and 1 meter/min movement).

One problem with both this and a similar post I placed earlier about hacking cyberarms is that if we are not careful the players don't need to be there...they can just send in the drones. I think its really up to the GM how much of this he wants in his game. If this is a game about drone on drone action with nano-drones fighting nano-drones, micro-drones fighting micro-drones...etc then thats the game he wants to play. I think that could work very well in a smuggler based rigger heavy game.

I personally prefer to play in a world were the drones are weaker than the street samurai (the street samurai has the disadvantage that they are actually there and can get seriously hurt), otherwise there is no point in having players physically enter buildings. So to make that happen I guess in those worlds drones have to be restricted in effectiveness, and we have to leave what is actually probable behind so as to be able to tell the stories that we want create.

there is some stuff about dogbrains in either Arsenal or Unwired...

No, Udoshi, that's my point. Giving it the ability to move enough to aim is exactly what I'm calling a house rule. It's effectively a drone with a fixed mount. You're giving it a flexible mount, outside of the existing rules. That's all.

I'm not fighting you on this Yerameyahu, but I am wondering why you think it hasn't got the ability to adjust its point of aim. I thought that as its a drone, and treated as a drone, pretty much by definition it has the ability to adjust its point of aim. Otherwise I assume its a smart gun: you are paying 1000 nu-yen for something, and I cannot see what the 1000 has been spent for if it cannot move... Is there something that makes you feel it doesn't?

The thing is, Pilot is software.

How is changing the software magically supposed to give a gun the ability to move around by itself to aim?

I understand that there's a hardware alteration to the Smartlink to make the software upgrade possible, but the mod makes zero mention of adding in servos or whatever to allow the gun to move.


-k

The smartlink doesn't need a hardware alteration to make the software upgrade possible:

• its already a computer
• its already running software
• it already can be hacked by a hacker or agent
• it can be made to fire when the gun is pointing in the correct direction by the hacker or agent

So back to the question "what do you get for your 1000 nu-yen that turns a gun into a drone?". I cannot see it being anything other than a set of motors, otherwise it wouldn't be a drone it would be a smart gun.

More memory and processing power, along with some extra sensors, allowing it to proces a wider range of inputs and to fire itself or operate it's systems and options without external order, allowing you to use it as a (expensive) remote sensor platform or autonomous booby trap.

It is also mandatory for the Mobility modification, which is the one that add a motive system

It has all of these...otherwise you couldn't get a hacker to fire it remotely.

I am not interested enough to push it further...my closing comment is that drone has movement capability: otherwise we call it a computer.

I may have not been celar enough : with the pilot upgrade, the gun is able to operate alone, without any external input beyond it's sensors. When operated through smartlink or spoofed, it process an external order and perform it.

The description of the option explicitely says that the gun operate like a drone in all regards except mobility and that the gun is unable to point itself. The 1K you pay is mostly for the ability to further modify the gun by adding some kind of motive system - that's the various Mobility modifications.

Right: at level 1, you're paying for Pilot software. The higher levels can move.

You realize there ARE other drones that have no ability to move on their own?

Movement is not the defining ability of a drone. The defining ability of a drone is the ability to make decisions on it's own.

Thus the Pilot program.




-k

What's wrong with just taking the limping/crawling mod for the weapon, and saying it does so by means of the bipod you've also got bolted on there being pretty cool? I don't see why we need to create new systems to do something in-game when an existing system already does the exact same thing.

or just nail the gun to a smart firing platform from SR4(a) and call it a day.

Because they want something for nothing, Shrike30.

I'm not actually aware of other drones that cannot move...I am interested in examples. All the ones I have seen in SR4a and Arsenal seem to be able to move, but I could easily have missed something.

Correct me if I am wrong but IC and agents can make decisions on their own. They are needed to make decisions in computers that don't move.

The drone needs a program called "pilot". A pilot program moves things. Like the skill "Pilot ground vehicles". You need to pilot it because the ground vehicle moves. The defining characteristic of a program called pilot is its ability to pilot things.

Edit:
I am only hammering on this point because its technically easy, seems to be the obvious interpretation of being made into a drone, and in fact I cannot work out what the upgrade does if it doesn't provide the ability to target the gun: I can already stick an agent with the command program in the gun with or without the drone upgrade. So what does the upgrade do if it doesn't allow the barrel to be moved?

You really can't use an agent to fire the gun. That's a Pilot. Yes, it's a little messy (writers' fault), but that's the basic distinction. Agents (programs which *have* a Pilot rating) are hackers, Pilots (System 'programs', which have a Pilot rating) are actors. The upgrade makes it a drone (a device with a Pilot System).

Like we discussed, a hoverdrone with a fixed mount can't aim unless it's flying, either. There's nothing inherent in being a drone that means 'can aim the gun'.

Understand, if you want to add in the ability to aim itself, microservos & similar, as part of the Pilot Upgrade package, it's not a terribly unbalancing house rule.

But it is a house rule, because the text of the books make no explicit mention of any such ability.

Generally, if something gives such a signifigant new ability, the rule should specifically state so, and not rely on some oblique phrase to merely imply it.



-k

The way I've always seen it, the Pilot/Agent distinction is pretty much a moot point either way.
Can't remember off the top of my head if there's anything to prevent an Agent from running Autosofts, but if there isn't you're making drone right there.

Grab your smartgun, run an agent in it with the proper Gunnery Autosoft and you've upgraded the gun to a drone.
The Rating 1 Agent/Pilot is what you pay the :nuyen:1000 for. You're getting the Autosofts for free, and I'd go with Yerameyahu's interpretation of the Smartgun cam being named a Rating 1 Sensor from then on.

You want it to move or aim? Grab a propulsion or weapon mount mod, or hope your GM is lenient enough to interpret some other mod as giving it the capability of either.

You're right: Agents can't run a 'Gunnery' (Targeting) autosoft. In fact, under the core rules, autosofts are (drone) Pilot-only. The agent autosofts in Unwired clearly reinforce the 'agents are hackers' distinction; basically any autosoft emulating a 'physical' skill is (drone) Pilot-only.

You definitely need a Pilot for the gundrone. You almost-certainly *can* run agents in your smartgun (it's a node, though a peripheral one), but they'd be for hacker defense, etc.

Gecko Grip makes easy to hide a gun or leave it to cover a door.
Perfect thing to slow down some one chasing you.


You know you can take a simple solid small motorized disk with a gecko grip base and a skinlink and attach it to the side of a pistol or SMG.
It just needs to be big enough to let the weapon balance on it and it can get a good grip on a hard surface. Put it on the left side of the weapon it will be out of the way for most people.
Put it on a table and you can cover the entire room at belly level.

Would a small sticky motorized disc (after you house rule it into existence) let the gun fire accurately, or just wildly spin backwards?

Well if a single Gecko grip glove will support a 200 pound man hanging from the wall, I think a disk 2 inches in diameter disk could hold a pistol to a solid wall or table.

Admittedly it would be hard but impossible to find a solid surface to anchor the gun to.



I guess you would need some sort of locking mechanism to prevent the recoil from damaging the motor.

With all the drones and the like running around it would be fairly simple to find a servo that could do it off a junk drone.

The motor doesn't have to be fast and considering you are using a smart weapon, it doesn't need that much fine control.



After all the idea here is a cheap weapon that can be abandoned. Some thing you use to cover a door or hallway and slow them down while you make a fast exit or just to provide some security while you are in the bathroom.

Stuck on the edge of a corner, it might be mistaken for some one pointing a gun around the corner and aiming using the smart link.

12 rounds or so would provide 20 or 30 seconds delay depending on how badly they wanted to come through. If they did, well drones get 3 actions per combat turn. Even at max fire that would be 12 seconds


Put a speaker on the gun so you can threaten to blow up the place if they keep coming (while you beating feet).

They HAVE existing game options for this already, either a movement mod, or one of the two gun platforms.




-k

cndblank, I'm talking about rigidity, not clinging strength. It seems to me that the gun would rotate away from the recoil, even as it remained stuck to the spot. Even if, as you mention, the motor/mechanism itself could take the strain.

True, but we were talking about some thing jury rigged so it was cheap enough to be left behind.

And some thing that would allow a gun to spin around in a single dimension while firmly gecko gripped to a hard surface is obviously going to be cheaper than a 3K limping propulsion upgrade.

I guess that falls under a used or jury rigged weapon modifications that only has a fraction of features of the regular weapon modification so it is a fraction of the cost (and a GM's call of course).


Gecko grip is 100 and a used drone server mod that do 360 movement on a single plane while firing the weapon would be maybe 800 or 1000. Add a slight upgrade to the pilot to handle control of the servo for a 100 and you have a disposable gun turret for around 1K plus the cost of the weapon. Then add an explosive self destruct for 400 a final goodbye that leaves little to be analyzed.