In regards to the 5th edition, ammunition is based off of type, class and caseless/cased. Is this a metagame concept to allow for less book-keeping (rather than keep separate track of costs for an AK, vs an Ares, vs a Colt, etc) or functional within the game as "Assault rifles have universal ammunition". Does the Superwarhawk use rounds that work in a Predator or a Colt Government?

In that case, (if universal ammunition) is it the quality of the weapon (Colt M23s are described as being kinda cheap mass production models, for example) that produces variable damage? The dmg of a FNHAR is superior to the Colt M23, and both are inferior to the Ares Alpha or the new Raiden. And all have different Accuracy caps too. We don't have Arsenal type mod rules yet, but can we infer that if such stats are based on construction, that a superior build/retune of a 'lower grade' weapon like an M23 could bring it up to near parity with the 'better' guns? I'd imagine cost wise it'd be a bit more expensive to retrofit a lower grade weapon, but with the benefit being that its easier to obtain than a more restricted weapon right off the bat, etc.

I imagine that it's for book keeping purposes more than anything. I still divide up my ammo by specific gun on my sheets and my players do same.

Ammo is standardized between the same weapon group (I simply assume all Heavy pistols fire the same caliber rounds etc.), and therefore interchangable. I imagine accuracy being a matter of weapon design/building quality, with higher accuracy weapons being designed to much tighter specifications.

I don't really know how to explain the different damage, really, and am kinda baffled that the new M23 is now worse than the AK-97.

For what it's worth, we tinkered with the idea of damage being determined in SR5 by ammunition caliber and load rather than by weapon, but it was deemed a) too much of a change and b) way too much paperwork.

Neat, glad you didn't go with it though. I guess people who are into those kind of details could just make a list of firearm damage = specific calibre.

A glitch could be described as an incorrect round being loaded if you wanted to include the flavor without book keeping

It would be more appropriate to simply call the glitch a failure to feed. Otherwise, one has to assume the character is too stupid to load a magazine with the proper ammunition.

A crit glich could even be a "rule of 8 violation" (if you put a 20ga shell in a 12ga shotgun it'll slide down the barrell but not fall out. You then put a 12ga shell in after and fire as normal. The results aren't pretty.

I believe there are a few examples where the weapon descriptions have explicitly said they are using a universal ammo type, but there's also been some canonical uses of actual ammunition calibers. And yeah, it has a long tradition of not making any sense (the AUG-CSL in particular is notorious).

There were a few times things like this happened during the testing. An idea would get put out there, it would be deemed way too complicated/too much paperwork/tedious/etc and get nixed for something simpler. We tried to keep things flowing super smooth. I think it worked in some areas, not as much as we'd like in others.

One thing I liked about CP2020 over Shadowrun was calibers. But really, its a fluff thing that I can imagine just fine on my own.

I just want to know why you guys robbed me of my Colt Manhunter AND THEN had it in an example in the book!

(its OK though, I'll survive)

Yeah, I did that in one game. It wasn't really very much paperwork though. Just had a list of common calibers and assumed that all guns were chamber in one of the common calibers. Of course, it was just using Shadowrun rules in an alternate history world, so we renamed all the guns too and made some other major setting changes that were considerably harder than keeping track of ammo.

I've also made lists of caliber = damage for SR4 guns based on damage codes.

As a rule we assume that light pistols, machine pistols, and submachine guns fire the same rounds. Heavy pistols, sub-machine guns, and light machine guns fire the same rounds. Assault rifles, rifles, medium machine guns and heavy machine guns fire the same rounds. Since you see similar trends in real world guns (with many exceptions).

I'm rather glad about the universal ammo. Also (blush) I just noticed the actual blurb explaining such in the ammo section of the rulebook.

Btw, was the attachment system also intended as easier book-keeping? Ever since the earlier editions I've liked the M23, since it reminded me of the M4. But with the m4 (or any gun with rail-systems) you can end up with multiple mounts off the sides, and under and over. Its kinda fun looking at one that has like a left side laser indicator, a right sight light, underside grip, topside sights with a sight that can fit infront of a 2nd sight, etc.

Also, what would recommendations be on mechanics of something like a combat optic sight (red dot, whatever). Like a laser sight without the visible laser?

That's exactly what a smartlink does. Already.

That's not entirely true. If that were the case, the smartlink would have the same 'stats' as a laser, which it does not. So i'm asking, "would a red dot sight, as in conventional 21st century 'current' technology, provide the same effective bonus as a laser does in this case?" Why a red dot sight? 1)no visible laser lancing out to target 2)no need for wireless 3)immune to hacking.

A Red Dot Sight will probably be the same as a Laser Sight, less the Wireless bonus (so just +1 Accuracy & no DP bonus). In the SR4 rules, from Gun Heaven, a Red Dot Sight gave the same +1 DP as a Laser Sight.

That exists already in Shadowrun, and is in Gun Heaven.
It is called a Red Dot sight. It gives a +1 dp (much like a Laser sight does) in SR4A.

EDIT: Ooops, did not see Spellbinder's reply, apologies.

No worries, TJ.

I remember the red dot sight as a much maligned piece of rules lawyery used by many a dualwielder. Some people would go to great lengths for a measly +1 DP.

I could see it working if the dual wield involves staggered shooting, but at the same time, or different targets? Nah.

It's mostly a case of purple monkey fallacy, since the Red Dot sight was introduced after the dualwielding rules were written, and the rules specifically exluded lasersight and smartlink.

That said, smartlink IMO should apply if it works similar to a FPS HUD (which it does, according to fluff). It's just that the Devs somehow hate dualwielding.

Heh, real life hates dual wielding.

Yknow, I do kinda wish gauss weaponry had advanced a bit more and was now available in 'assault rifle' size

Real life also hates Trolls and pretty much everything magical, and at least half of the tech in the game. Rule of Cool, friend.

Rule of Cool.

~Umi

Give it time, am sure someone will tweak the Ares Thunderstruck Gauss Rifle eventually.

Trying to up the rate of fire is going to be fun considering the power consumption it has just for its regular firing mode.

A better question will be for the Guass in SR5 will it still be Halve the armor (from SR4 errata) before applying the AP or are they retweaking that bit.

Actually the concept of different weapons having different characteristics even while using the same ammo is a Real Life™ phenomenon.

Part of this is different weapons have different barrel-lengths. The rule of thumb is, the longer your barrel, the faster your bullet will be when leaving it, as the pressurized gas will accelerate if for a longer time. This translates to greater range and penetrating power.

Another thing is the twist-rate of the barrel, and now we're dealing with some, 'almost' esoteric issues. The initial 5.56x45mm NATO round for instance had a pronounced tendency to wobble, meaning it was "just" stable enough while in flight, but once striking a target the bullet would tumble and cause grievous wounds. The same tendency though rendered the round not that accurate at long range, so later they increased the barrel's twist rate (so the round spins faster, becoming more stable) which adversely affected its tumbling tendency. (American refurbished AKs also have a bad rep., because a lot of manufacturers used the wrong twist rate for the 5.45x39mm round).

The receiver, and operation of the gun can also affect it ballistic properties. A bolt-action gun will better utilize the propellant's energy as non of the gases are diverted to operate a short/long stroke piston (or direct impingement system). (I'm not familiar enough with recoil operated guns to make any quick and fast ruling).

So there you have it, even when using the same round, various guns can have widely varying characteristics.

This.

Also, back in SR3, I setup a spreadsheet where I "caliberized" all the firearms from the rulebook, SSC, and FoF, using mostly conventional calibers (5.7mm, 4.6mm Caseless, .223, .308, 9mm, .45 ACP, 6.8 SPC, .338 Lapua, .408 CheyTac, etc.). The downside to doing that is that I needed to revise the damages a little to bring them all in line with each other, and that led to having to revise armor penetration for anything with an MV of 2000+fps, and it was hours upon hours of work (with some help from good old Raygun).

Then SR4 came around and I said "fuck it...I'm not doing this all over again!".

Now here we are at SR5, and I'm again contemplating the masochism of caliberizing again.

Resist the Urge. Though I would applaud the effort (and often have that very complaint that Calibers would have been the way to go), it is really not worth it in the end.

Heh...it really comes down to how much free time I have between now and when Splinter Cell: Blacklist comes out.

I would also have to do some testing too, as calibers will result in probably adjusted DVs and APs.

Would anyone be interested in doing some field testing once I get the rules together?

I don't suppose that 5th ed fixed the ridiculous weights for ammunition (0.5kg for ten rounds)? IRL a full 30-round magazine of 5.56 weighs 0.45kg.

I don't recall weight for ammunition in either 4E or 5E. Was it in 3E?

Besides, the rules pretty much say "Don't bother enforcing weight unless your runners are being dillholes about carrying stuff", so I've never really had to.

~Umi

Do it! I'm really enjoying SR5 and while It's not as good as SR3 a little OneRonin awesomeness would do the trick. Shoot me a email if you want help.

It was in 3E and I'm pretty sure it was the same in 2nd. It's not too bad for characters, but it gets insane when you start loading up drones when 0.2 CF holds 2000 rounds of assault rifle/ LMG ammo.

Heh in a sense they've done away with weight entirely. Basically told the GMs, hey, as long as its reasonable, let them carry what they want, keeping their STR limits and stuff in mind.

Btw, anyone try to stat up a Lawgiver type gun (ala 2012 Dredd movie)?

I was thinking an electronic firing hvy pistol, ala colt 2066, but with burst fire capability. The general pistol takes standard grip-load mags. The 'fun' part is functionally an undermounted revolver with variable loads, which (since the whole thing is smartset) can rotate the chamber to whatever specialized round you need, while suspending 'regular' fire. So you get a 15 or so round 'regular' fire, and a 5 or 6 round variable load fire. Maybe some sort of smart material for the barrel which provides either recoil compensation or suppression based on mode for the upper barrel, and no mods for the lower one. You could still load whatever you wanted in the grip-magazine feed, but generally keep it homogenous.

It'd understandably be heavy, like even if made of polymers its Ares Predator/Warhawk type heavyweight.

Its not close to replicating the gun, more an inspiration. To actually do the gun is beyond SR level of tech, same mag sizes as modern guns but waaaay more ammo. And the effects of special ammo is more like minigrenades than buffed pistol rounds.

Btw,in regards to the Colt 2066, the arsenal picture makes it look like a regular pistol that seems to load like a...regular semiauto, instead of a breakaction type tube thingie like....this:


[img]http://i.i.com.com/cnwk.1d/i/ne/p/2004/172005gun.jpg[/img]

Regular firearm on left, electronic firing one on right. Would the electronic firing guns follow today's designs, or ..what?

You're removing the hammer and the need to cock it, as the bullets propellant will be ignited by an electric current instead the strike of a hammer. The only reason the gun might still have a slide is to feed new bullets and seal the chamber (...and extract and eject shells if it's not caseless). Technically you could get rid of ever more moving components by making these functions performed by electro motors/electro magnets instead recoil/gas operated.

Since no one has produced such a gun outside research labs, how they would look is anyone's guess... at the onset, I'd say externally not that different from a striker fired Glock.

I always thought it was the Thunderbolt with Smartgun and a few mods (like Additional Clip - Pistol, and Ammo Skip System)

barrel length can make some appreciable differences in terms of accuracy and damage, even with the same round (most common example being M4 vs M16, say). i assume the M-23 is more akin to an M4 now, while the AK-97 remains full-size. you could give weapons with a lower damage in the same class better concealability modifiers to reflect this sort of thing. that said, the spread in many of these cases is pretty ridiculous for weapons all firing the same type of ammo. especially the enfield AS-7. either the T-250 should do 12P or the enfield should do 11P, that's way too big of a gap as is. and of course machine guns are totally fucked unless you say that LMGs and MMGs use assault rifle rounds and HMGs use sniper rifle rounds. which is reasonable if you stick to the canon damage numbers.

Yknow, looking through gun heaven 2 again, with the Browning Max Power, it occurs to me that it kinda reminds me of the Stallone Dredd Lawgiver, complete with secret tracking of rounds fired.