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Sesix
Ok Im about to be running a Shadowrun group and I know my group will deff be in situations where vehicle combat will come in to play, more by their own devices then mine hehe. So I need some help understanding some of the Vehicle combat rules. For instance the opposed vehicle test at the beginning of the chase turn. The whole every vehicle still in play on the driver’s side add a +2 modifier to the test, and the –2 modifier for each vehicle on the other side. I also dont get the speed value par. When does acceleration come into effect, or does it always go off just the top speed? It just seems a little confusing to me.
ggodo
I honestly have no idea, but I would like to know too, as one of my upcoming adventures involvesthe party stealing a car to get out of Portland.
Critias
I'm not often an advocate of heavy house ruling, but the current tangle of regular combat, vehicle tests, tactical (vehicle) combat, and chase combat, is one that can get a little overwhelming to folks...and there ARE a few strange little loopholes or modifiers to it that, I think, might not work strictly as intended. If you try to use them as written and run into something that's wrecking your fun, don't be scared to tweak things a little. No one from CGL is gonna come to your house and shoot you if you think a rule isn't working right.

The two things I suggest you keep in mind at (1) it's supposed to be fun and awesome, and if your team wheelman isn't having fun and feeling awesome, don't be scared to change things, and (2) it's an abstraction, a simplification, etc, etc, which means that the chase rules kind of clash with other core rules a little, and "the ball is in your court" to come up with the cool explanations and stuff.

First off, the +2/-2 modifiers for extra vehicles. This is there to keep your super wheelman from just casually racing away from a bunch of Knight Errant traffic cops; just like in Grand Theft Auto or something, it's often not one cop car that's the issue, it's that there's a lot of them who are ALL chasing you at once. So if you've got one car full of Shadowrunners and five cop cars actively chasing them right now, suddenly your awesome Rigger is going to have a little trouble, and suddenly those schmuck traffic cops (with a normal skill pool of maybe 5-6 dice) are able to stay a problem.

Remember that these modifiers only apply for that initial Opposed Vehicle Test at the start of the turn, where the winner gets to describe the engagement range (short, medium, long, extreme). The +2/-2 modifiers are there to show that multiple guys in a chase make getting away harder; maybe you shake one and think you're getting away, when another car full of bad guys comes roaring at you from a side street (just think of classic action movie chases where this sort of thing happens). The modifiers don't apply to the actual Chase Stunts and that sort of thing -- so while the Knight Errant cops might be "setting the pace" of the chase scene initially, constantly keeping things at Short Range, crowding the getaway car full of Shadowrunners, etc, etc...after a few Cut off rolls that thin the herd, the PC wheelman should be able to start moving things to longer ranges, as the +2/-2 eases up.

Acceleration is, during the abstract Chase Combat rules, a non-issue. Vehicles compare Speed and Speed only, because it's assumed that by the time the Chase Combat rules "kick in" (where a turn is considered a full MINUTE, 20 standard combat turns!) everyone is flooring it by now. You're likely to use the regular Tactical Combat rules for the first few seconds of a chase scene (as folks are first piling into cars, getting up to speed, etc)...the Chase Combat abstractions are there for the actual high-octane, "everyone is already speeding like a madman," sort of full-on car chase. Speed matters, not acceleration.

Suggestions: I think things work a little better if you cut some of the modifiers in half. The +2/-2 for the opposed vehicle test adds up REALLY quickly, otherwise, especially given how many baddies can be involved in a chase scene. It all comes down to the flavor of game you want to run, of course, and what sort of core die pools your characters have...but the core "Smuggler" (the closest to a dedicated driver from the template/archetype characters) is going to have some real problems with more than 3-4 cop cars, for instance, if you keep it at +2/-2. I think making it +/- 1 instead can make things a little more manageable depending on the average die pool in your game.

My other big beef is that the ramming rules are pretty ridiculously dangerous -- which is awesome for realism, but not so much for cinematic action movie fun. I strongly suggest the PCs mod up their getaway vehicle with Arsenal some, but even so the ramming/crashing stuff is still plenty dangerous. If you're wanting a classic James Bond type car chase, it might be a little too lethal for your liking and you might want to tone it down.
CanRay
Also, getting an Off-Road Range Rover SUV for a race that ends up happening on the freeways of LA, while the pursuit cars are Jaguar Sports Cars, that doesn't work so well.
Mardrax
QUOTE (Critias @ Feb 23 2011, 09:15 PM) *
My other big beef is that the ramming rules are pretty ridiculously dangerous -- which is awesome for realism, but not so much for cinematic action movie fun. I strongly suggest the PCs mod up their getaway vehicle with Arsenal some, but even so the ramming/crashing stuff is still plenty dangerous. If you're wanting a classic James Bond type car chase, it might be a little too lethal for your liking and you might want to tone it down.

Agreed. Ramming your car into something at 61 meters per turn hits like taking an AR burst to the face.
Then again, wear seatbelts! Takes a simple action, negates all ramming damage to passengers. Problem solved.
Or better yet, everyone have Rigger Capsules or whatever they're called love.gif

But yeah, generally, chase combat is kindof a mess. Even the timescale feels wonky for that swift driving action feel.
Brazilian_Shinobi
The acceleration value of the vehicles and drones is not acceleration per se. It is just the speed of said vehicle and drone when used in normal combat situation (where the first value corresponds to walking speed and the latter to running speed).

Now, the rules for damage when ramming and crashing doesn't make any sense. AT ALL. By a strict reading of the rules, Arsenal updates vehicles to tell us that using seatbelt prevents any damage to passengers and pilots when crashing, but it doesn't protect you against ramming... grinbig.gif

This means, that if you crash into a concrete wall in a car over 100 mph, you are safe.
Now, if a 16-wheel truck rams your car moving at 20mph, chances are you are not gonna make it...
ShadowPavement
Bah! I've given up on the vehicle combat rules. I pretty much just let the PC's drive and only have them make drive tests against a static Threshold if they try something dangerous / cool or to avoid obstacles. The driver can also take actions on their own turn like normal so they can shoot out the window at others or ram vehicles (which I treat as a melee attack with the body of the car as the damage) Anyone in the car can shoot and do stuff but with the standard -2 or -3 for being in a moving vehicles. That pretty much covers most of it for me.
Udoshi
Another thing to watch out for is that, sometimes, a vehicles Speed(the reasonable high-end velocity of a vehicle, p168) makes more sense to use in tactical combat.

Cyborgs, for example, explicitly use Speed instead of Accel for running around.As a rule of thumb, you might consider letting various Walker types use their speed, since walking around is what they're made for.

it helps keep things a bit more sane when you get vehicles all mixed up with regular combat if, say, someone's rigging.


But yeah, i'm going to have to chip in my vote for 'houserule the heck out of it'. Like the new matrix, vehicle combat is supposed to be pretty narrative and cinematic, which can mean its kind of a pain for a GM to control the flow of it. It just takes more effort, really.
Keep in mind your modifiers, call for driving/crash/stunt tests when appropriate, and don't forget to stick your players with handling penalties if they're driving a clumsy ride.
Sesix
Hmm I see. Yeah I think I may have to incorporate d20 modern driving then. They actually have a pretty reliable system to use. Just need to do a little converting.
Mardrax
One of the simpler houserules I apply to vehicles says Acceleration does exactly that.
They accelerate to (current speed+"running" Acceleration) with a simple action, 5 per hit on a vehicle test is added with a complex action, with a free action, "walking" Acceleration is used.
Braking takes "running" Acceleration*Handling(minimum 1) off of the current speed with a free action, with 5 per Vehicle test hit added to the "running" Accelleration for a simple action. If hits on the test cause "running" Acceleration to double, another Vehicle test is needed to avoid crashing. Hits may be forgone voluntarily.
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