You've obviously never been skeet shooting. My friends can do 2 clay pigeons in the couple of seconds it takes them to fall to the ground. My IT consultant, bartender, insurance agent, IT consultant, and IT manager friends; none of whom have any military or law enforcement training and don't hunt. Hell, I've fired a gun three times in my entire life all on the same day and managed with the second time ever picking up a gun firing a .45 Colt 1911 putting 7 rounds in a target at 20 yards all on the target including 2 in the 10-ring in about 10 seconds or so.

And the most legendary small arms shoot-out in American history, the gunfight at the OK Corral, took around 30 seconds with around 30 shots fired between eight men using single-action revolvers and shotguns (meaning they had to be cocked before each shot was fired). Three fatal wounds, one major wound, and two minor wounds/grazes.

The thing you have to remember when it comes to Shadowrun though is the reaction enhancing technology allowing more shots to be fired in a set time period as well as VASTLY superior body armor to current technology (even the best body armor today is nothing compared to the worst armor in Shadowrun). The former speeds up gunfights almost exponentially and the latter slows them down and makes them less likely to be fatal.

Hitting both skeets in the "couple of seconds" still takes 2 IPs. The original example was at 2 targets in 1 IP.

So I totally agree with both TJ and Abstruse that it can be done within 1 Combat Turn -- my bad for being overly dramatic earlier. Could you guys do it in 1 second? The OK Corrall occurred at about 10' and had an accuracy rate of 6/30 or 20%. That was a little less than 4 shots per combatant in 30 seconds or 8 seconds per shot per combatant. And they still had a 20% accuracy. Little scarier when the targets shoot back at you, neh?

The example that was used to show my rules being unrealistic was a second target, moving, at medium range, suffering recoil, while taking cover, with the benefit of smartlink. The only way all of these modifiers apply is if in 1 IP. This gives threshold 7 which is a 2% hit rate for a 5/5 shooter.

Using TJ's and Abstruse's examples we are talking about moving (-2), medium range (-1), aiming (+1, simple action aim and simple action to squeeze off a shot). For a 5/5 shooter this is threshold 3 and has a hit rate of 70%. It's 98% with Smartlink. I'm not sure how regularly you guys can manage that -- is 70% realistic?

I guess the issue I'm learning from all this is that the IPs aren't realistic. I've covered off what advantages the Street Sam has in my last post. But obviously in RL people aren't forced to react only according to IPs. Some of the websites I was reading it sounds like in a combat situation you can reasonably expect to manage 1 shot per second assuming you are taking the time to aim shots. So this would imply that combat trained individuals should have 3 IPs. Perhaps SR should have a house rule where you get +IPs for having a high skill while using that skill?

Combat turn is 3 seconds, firing a pump action shotgun is a Simple Action (still considered a SA gun, see the Remington 990). Two shots per combat phase.



...from individuals firing ball ammunition from single-action revolvers that weren't rifled. 30 shots were fired in 30 seconds between 8 individuals. That's 1 shot per person every 8 seconds on average (though it was actually far different than that due to deaths/disabling wounds on the Clanton side and multiple firearms used on the Earp side).



Like I said before, I don't have the knowledge to quickly do the math comparing averages between the SR3 system modified to use att/skill and the SR4 system using the same circumstances due to the fact that rolls on the defender side are handled far differently between the two editions.


Fire Weapon is a Simple Action whereby the attacker aims his/her weapon and fires. The Take Aim action is specifically spending the time to line up a shot perfectly, as in adjusting a scope or doing something other than just aiming for center mass. There's a difference. An unmodified human can fire 2 shots in 3 seconds in Shadowrun which is close enough to your 1 shot/sec that it's not going to break suspension of disbelief (there's MORE than enough other problems with firearms in Shadowrun to do that).

And that's probably the crux of the issues...lol

Well, the fastest shot I ever heard about (and saw the demonstrations) was a guy, shooting a Single Action Revolver, at two targets seperated by 5 meters of space (IIRC) and at a range of 6-7 Meters (IIRC). He drew his gun from the holster and fired 2 single shots, hitting both targets, all in less than 1/10th of a second (0.06 Seconds if I remember correctly). He is that accurate even at greater ranges, hitting center target, still in less than 1/10th of a second per shot. It was truly amazing indeed. Accelerometers (sp?) clocked his action at slightly greater than 10g's of acceleration.

Just a comparison, Both shots fired accurately so fast that it sounded to the unaided human ear (and appeared to the unaided human eye) as a single shot (The actions took place in less time than the sound/action was even recognized by the brain.

Crazy fast.

Moving on.



The guy takes a long time to aim at coins. Coins are very small. The guy can shoot coins he flips into the air. He could probably shoot 5 man-sized targets in the time it took you to figure out where your holster was.



So you're suggesting that normal people should have multiple IPs? AFAIK, no one's got Wired Reflexes yet. The fact that people can beat your 3 second timer right now in reality seems to suggest that these things aren't as ridiculously difficult as you're suggesting they are.



You can pull off two shots per IP in SR, so that's at least close to your '1 shot per 1 second,' assuming that any simple action shot is aimed (without being Take Aim'd, which takes longer). There's no real fire-from-the-hip option in Shadowrun, where you could take quicker shots at large penalties.

From personal experience, I know that so long as you can handle the recoil, you can fire out an 18 round magazine on a 9mm pistol in about 5 seconds and keep a reasonable grouping (meaning most shots hitting somewhere in the black on your man-sized silhouette). This isn't really very difficult.

It's strange to think it, but even with multiple IPs, SR slows down gunfire.

As for the OK Corral example, while it's one of the most famous gunfights in American history, very few of the people involved were what you could really call experienced.

Right, so each point of INT, QCK, or WIL is worth half a point of Combat Pool. Where does the "actually" come in?


Cerebral Booster.


This is false. You're going by the FAQ, which is not a source of canon information (never mind technicalities of where it's published, it explicitly contradicts printed material repeatedly). It is, I'll grant, pricey.


Right, but you need two dice to expect one success on TN 4.


Is it a surprise that no one plays them?


Half a CP die and a full CP die, respectively. A reasonable starting human's stats would be QCK 11 (Exceptional Attribute+Muscle Toner 4), INT 7 (Bonus Attribute Point), WIL 6, for 12 points of CP.


Only 4, at least unless you accept the serious drawbacks you need to get the temporary point (and point of WIL) from an Adrenal Pump. Plus, the magical thing is that INT and QCK are synergistic—you don't have to choose only one.


Cannon Companion p96, two-weapon melee combat. Ambidexterity 6 or 8 let you use your primary skill as your off-hand skill as well, for a bonus of half the skill rating in dice. Strictly speaking I guess it isn't necessary, but otherwise you're stuck buying the Off-Hand Weapon skill separately and you can't apply Improved Ability without buying it a second time.


And then you get six additional dice from Ambidexterity.


You're mixing in the rules for Complementary Skills. With all due respect, how long has it been since you've played 3rd edition?

~J

Double-post due to dumb-in-the-face limit on quoted blocks.


Skill 5 in SR3 is "professional", not a crack shot. You need to get to at least 6 ("innate") or more likely 7 ("expert") before you can make a serious claim to being a crack shot.

~J

And yet, that is a Skill of 3 (Professional), SKill 4 (Veteran) or Skill 5 (Elite) in SR4...

I usually DO play Trolls. Allmost exclusively. If i get to play at all . .
And then i usually do not do the Quick Troll, but rather the Impressive Troll ^^
Muscle Toner 4+Suprathoid Gland, which gives +1 BOD,QCK,STR,RCT=5BioQCK O.o
And it's been waayy too long for my liking, if i get this much wrong by now . .
Maybe i'm getting some of our houserules mixed up with the official ones too <.<

Well, yes, the cool factor is pretty big. Their penalties to important stats deny them most standard roles, though.


It's the only way to play them, as it is. They're too specialized for a small group, but I have to admit that you can make a devastating archer (also called "mobile artillery") or melee specialist. The questionable choice to tie armor penalties to Quickness hurts their tanking ability, though I guess Muscle Toner might make up for that.


Supra… of course, that one slipped by me. Though considering that Trolls are already Signature 5, kicking that down to 4 strikes me as very risky—tantamount to hanging out an "obliterate me" sign for the Riggers.


Happens. I have a friend who calls Shadowrun the Perl of RPGs, based on how quickly his knowledge of the system evaporates when he isn't playing regularly.

~J

Wait, you mean someone actually learned the pre-4th ed Rigger rules and actually played one?! I don't think I ever saw that once, and I've been playing since 1992...

Yes, I play Riggers every chance I get. They're really not that complicated, though I admit that that's partly because of the way broadcast encryption defense outpaces offense so badly that the MIJI rules turn into just the J rules.

Still, I think the rigging rules are easier than the decking rules (decking rules have less inherent complexity, but they're also filled with undefined corner cases), and those aren't even vaguely unmanageable.

~J

*nods*
yeah, it happens . . we had one in our group one time who actually knew the rules . .
that one was scary, i'll admit . .
and because of nobody, not even my current GM's, really bothering to actually READ those rules and comprehend, or at least TRY to comprehend them, i get to play a signature 4 troll with no big problems in that regard. if i DO get problems, i'll only have myself to blame. The Suprathoid Gland is just too good not to take on anything physical . .

QUOTE (BishopMcQ @ Apr 12 2011, 06:01 PM) *
SR3, p. 113. Every 3 bullets fired in burst or FA mode increases the TN by 1 to dodge. I had to dust of my old book s for this thread. And remembered that my SR3 book is held together by duct tape...

Aaah, ok good to know . . .


Dammit - I so did NOT notice that little gem. Still, I suppose that since I didn't apply it to the opposition, my player's won't scream so much when I tell them

-Tir

as long as a rule is applied to both sides, it is fair for everybody and thus, usually, no reason for anyone to scream, really . . well, hopefully at least ^^

Well, that explains something

The real joy is Riggers. A vehicle with a Rigger jumped in dodges against Handling modified as per a driving test, which with a VCR-3 and a decent vehicle selection is often 2 or under. Aside from some issues like the MIJI rules reducing to the J rules, the real problem with Riggers is that they're a military-level archetype in a street-level game—it takes some GM skill to not have them just run roughshod over everything.


In principle, that's not true. The change disadvantaged the side that did less burst-or-greater shooting (since they didn't get all the effects of their bursts), and advantaged the side that did more dodging overall (since the opposition might have used more bursts if it affected their dodging).

~J

The SR3 Rigger rules were not bad, I thought. (Ok, NOT going into "let's make a wheeled sound-breaking vehicle" custom build rules)

And the whole "Darth Racer" ("he's more machine now, then man...") concept made sense, especially if using high-end vehicles with high (5+) handling TN's. Dronework took a little getting used to, but after that, it was like, "Oh man, these things are like watcher spirits with HMGs if used right!" and people realized how useful they could be.

The high essence loss has stopped the majority of my players from going that route (50-50, a lot of them) but as I start taking them out of the boonies and into the information-networked cities the deckers and riggers are going to be very popular.

Wow, total threadjack.

Back on topic -

Ok, if "Att + Skill" works for SR4, how on earth would you apply that to riggers in the "Modded 3 version" you're playing with?
The control pool made it simpler for organising your little clockwork army and enabled the savvy rigger to let the cheap and disposable drones take the brunt of distraction/assualt duties for a looooooooong time while the expensive ones (like the armoured chopper) were used to the best advantage.

Without control pool, it'll just become RC cars with missile launchers.

-Tir

Ok, you guys convinced me to keep the Pools.