Can't answer strictly by RAW there.

I handle it that way:

The guy with gun use unarmed or club (whether he dodges and maybe throw a punch if possible in melee or hit with the cross of his gun).

However, to give melee a real advantage (considering that he has to reach melee and that means loads of danger) I go further than giving the shooter a penalty. I houseruled this: the melee guy can parry the shot just the same way he fights into melee.

Exemple: the guy that hit the shooters arm and deviate his shot and so on.

@sk8bcn: dude, that's an elegant solution for this problem... I'm going to submit it for the group's approval. It's not only simple to implement, but looks great in practive. Really reflects that whole "struggling against a guy with a gun" thing I was hoping to go for, and a proper martial artist can actually look awesome doing it.

Many improvised melee weapons (including ranged weapons like rifles or pistols) do indeed use the Club skill (or the Edged Weapons skill). Here it is definitely the Clubs skill. If no Club skill is available the character in question can default to either Edged Weapons or Polearms/Staffs at +2 TN and Combat Pool restricted to 1/2 of the skill used for defaulting. Neither skill available: The character must default to STR at +4 TN with no Combat Pool available.

Defaulting to Unarmed (or any specific Martial Art that might replace Unarmed when using advanced rules from Cannon Companion) is not one of the allowed default skills for the Club skill.

Page 114 of Cannon Companion has a very good table on active skills, their linked attributes and the various skills that allow defaulting with each other (black outline around those that can replace each other) with the exception of those listed under Intelligence because some of the ones in that list represent whole groups of different skills: The entries for Build/Repair skills, Knowledge skills and Languages are in fact a whole series of active and knowledge skills that cannot necessarily default within their category ... Like not having a Photography Knowledge skill and trying to default to that from the Magic Theory (Background) Knowledge skill. For skills in any of these three groups you'll have to make a default ruleset of your own ... and one that might even shift from situation to situation. Medicine (Academic) Knowledge might be a valid default for Biology (Academic) Knowledge in some case but it won't be in other cases.




Well, as stated above: By RAW he'd be forced into a melee test where - in case of no Club skill - he'd either face a +2 for defaulting to available skills or +4 with STR and additionally with either reduced reduced Combat Pool or none at all. That on its own will most likely make him suffer. No need for pushing him into a new "Ready Weapon" action should he opt for trying to shoot at his melee opponent during his next phase. With those penalties on his melee test he'll most likely end up with a degree of stun or physical damage that will punish him more than enough.



The problem there is: With no Club skill he still cannot simply drop the gun because dropping the gun would require a Free Action which - while available during the Combat Phase of another character - is resolved after the melee test (Free actions during Combat Phases of other characters are always resolved after that character's actions)=> He'd still be forced to conduct melee with the gun in hand at increased TN with the high probability of taking damage in the process.

edit:



This could get a bit complicated. Due to the different test and damage resolution mechanisms of ranged combat vs. melee combat you'll get wonky result if the melee opponent really get's a test with his melee skill (with melee modifiers) vs. the shooting character's ranged attack test (with ranged modifiers) and damage resolution will get a PITA should the melee character technically win his melee test there. So no, this is certainly not "simple to implement".

Old Shadowrun 2e vet here, trying my hand at 5th edition for the first time (having ignored 4e completely as I refuse to recognize any edition without cyberdecks and priority chargen as Shadowrun at all ). Am I correct to conclude that I could eyeball most of the rolls on the fly with the following formula:

Success test: Atrib + Skill [limit]
Resistence test: Atrib + Protection (Armor/Firewall/etc) [limit]

?

Also, am I right in assume that the situational modifiers only affect the number of dice rolled, and never the difficulty threshold ?

Thanks in advance!

To really get into it, really big guns like support weapons are easy to parry (TN bonus), longarms are neutral, and pistols and subcompact SMGs have a TN penalty to parrying.

If you think that makes pistols too powerful have the penalty only occur at pistols skill level 4 above to represent training in advanced weapons retention.

Not trying to screw things up here, but I could have sworn there was a "what happens when..." melee vs armed (firearm) scenario in the Core, Cannon Companion or SR3 Companion.

That being said - it was usually only the ninjas that bothered wih melee, the closest to melee with firearms was usually resolved via trolls taking the fight to the shooter, or someone just going full-auto at point-blank, trusting the 20+ initiative roll and an Ares Alpha would take care of rule complications...

-Tir:)

A little late to the party here, but anyway, about the original points:

1)
I thought the point of Bone Lacing on higher Level was to be tough as nails, fits the fluff at least.
The point about the damage is true though, so why not just do damage tests for the wall AND the character? They are hit by the same impact after all.

5) The problem here is that the rules really do not specify whether you need to get your Rifle from the bottom of your bag of holding first, or whether you are carrying it on your back,
with a strap around your shoulder, everything is a Simple Action. I would make the call depending on the effort.

Requiring a Simple action in Melee is a little much though, that goes into full-on house-rule territory.
It is not a bad idea though.

Didn't realize about how dropping the gun in order to use unarmed would screw you over because free actions occur later than the other guy melee-ing you.

Question, then, if dropping the gun doesn't help: would fighting with a rifle-length weapon give you Reach 1? That could offset penalties to some degree.

SR doesn't generally handle bayonets. But if you had a rifle with a bayonet, would that use the Clubs skill or the Edged Weapons skill? Would you require the person to Ready Weapon for bayonet combat, or just roll with no penalty if attacked in melee while holding a rifle with a bayonet?

Would it be Clubs if you wanted to deal stun damage but Edged Weapons if you wanted to deal physical?

I would treat a bayonet as doing M damage, although I could see some argument or controversy there. After all there are different types of bayonets, too. I could see it going down to L for a crappy camping knife-style bayonet like an AK47 bayonet, or possibly going up to S for a giant spike bayonet like you might see on a musket.

Here's another point on the astral perception/spirit thing.

Imagine you are in a room with a bunch of other people. You look around. Can you tell which people are looking at you and which people arent?

Now, imagine you are a spirit in astral space with a bunch of auras. None of them are looking at you. Then, suddenly, one of the bodies turns and stares directly at the spirit. At a minimum the spirit should get a perception test to determine whether it notices it is being watched.

Bayonettas Deal STR-1M and use the Polearm Skill in SR3 as far as i remember.

Polearms skill - oooooh, THAT's why the troll has the bayonet on the HMG!

Makes sense really - it's not like it's going to be like using a knife, sword or Katana.
I suppose that if it's on a rifle or similar longarm (SMG's need not apply), you'd also have the +1 reach advantage as well?

...Hmm, number-crunching, it really does make sense for a Troll to have a Dikoted Bayonet and a decent polearm skill, it makes Strength (M) damage quite respectable and the reach advantage means that those pesky TN's drop fast.
Obviously, it's not as broken as a Troll-sized Neo-Dashi with dikote, but considering the strength advantages in recoil reduction, it's a worthwhile build for serious offensive capabilities.

Heh, the nice thing is, the Bayonet would also take the place of an under or even a barrel-mount slot for the firearm, so not too broken.

-Tir

Even better:
The Dikote would change it from STR-1M to STR S Damage.
And also on an attack versus a barrier make it versus just barrier rating, instead of barrier rating x2.

Loved my Troll with the Dokoted No-Daichi... He was totally brutal.

STR+4D, half armor versus barriers, Combined Reach of 3. YES PLEASE!

It was a good time to be a troll.

From Dikoted destruction to having small arms fire flatten against you like a gentle rain.


good times

Indeed...

In my version of cannon companion, bayonets are (Str+2)M. A good solution if you find sad that your troll should only get to reach +2 when using his shotgun as a club. I actually didn't see anything preventing to mount it on an Assault Cannon.

i might have been wrong on the numbers, i never really bothered with these for some reason . .
But if it's STR+2M, then it's with Dikote STR+3M with more Reach again. Still pretty damn good..
Also DO REMEMBER: Bayonettas count, I THINK, as under barrel weights and give +1 Recoil Compensation!

Seriously, why the hell was nobody, inluding me, using these things? O.o They are awesome! o.O

Stahlseele - Mainly because some weapons don't like underbarrel mounts - but the FN HAR and the Colt M23 (I think?) are great battlerifles for this.
But if you're a troll, you've got an assault cannon (not rifle) or a HMG

Oh, looking at the Panther Assault cannon, you'd have to lose the bipod. But the Vigorous can equip it out of the box...

-Tir

Similar suggestion to the first edition rules, I knew Ronin was a SR1 man.

Hi there! I just read this post from the first page of this thread and I cannot fully follow. Why do you multiply the rating twice? I checked the book and it is written a little odd in the german version, because there seem to be different handlings of the barrier rating depending on what the character is trying to do...

The "break through barrier" section explains that the barrier should receive a x2 multiplier against melee attacks.
In the "fire through barrier" section it is stated that the rating is x2 against edged weapons, but only x1 against punches, clubs and similar.

So why make the difference at all?

Assuming we stick to RAW a unarmed melee attack (12M) would have to stand against obj. rating of the door (4) x2 (=8).
Damage is handled in the same way according to the table 12M would cause a 1 Meter hole in the door and the barrier rating is reduced by 1.

Please correct me if Iam wrong :)


tldr: Question about the barrier rules example from pg. 1 of this thread. Why was the barrier rating multiplied two times with two. I thought it should be multiplied just once with *2. Does the nature of the player action change the rules how barriers are handled?

Somehow I picture bayonets best suited for my trusty AK97!

Probably, if the rest are understood to be increasingly made of polymers and not really designed to hold up to repeated full power buttstrokes.

Even classic WWII wood rifles would get dinged from buttstrokes. I have a Mosin Nagant and one time at a friend's house I attacked his wooden pell with bayonet thrusts and buttstrokes. The roundhouse buttstroke actually dinged the wood on my Mosin on the first stroke.

Since I love bayonets, my ideal future rifle would use the properties of polymers and modern alloys to make an extremely indestructible rifle that you could bash against solid objects full power and know that it's unlikely to be damaged. Something that is heavy but balanced because distribution of weight can be well controlled, so it is fast and good for bashing and which is designed with a bayonet combat grip in mind as well as a shooting grip. Rather than something that is extremely light and as short as possible which is the direction we are going in today.

I used to joke that if I run out of ammo for my GPMG (FN MAG variant), I could field strip my weapon and throw the pieces at my targets with a reasonable chance of really hurting them. But for melee, buttstroke with MG could work, since the butt has a metal plate at the end.

I'm surprised the bayonet takes anunderbarrel mount over a barrel mount though... (easily house-ruled though)

On some rifles, the bayonets even end up over the barrel.

Hoi Ronin,

Somewhat off-topic, but one of the reasons why you can't make a rifle like a polearm is the fact that the damn thing will weigh a ton - I'm not an expert, but worked with them and after they'd put a few magazines full-auto, old barrels can bend to a surprising degree. (Austeyr)

Also, never trip carrying a MG after you've laid on full-auto suppression without changing the barrel.
The armory minions have no sense of humour...

-I worked with funny funny people....


-Tir.

Good to know. I didn't realize that full auto can soften the barrel. At fifty cents per round suppression is too expensive for most private citizens.

I guess that the real example of the melee-ized gun is really the classic musket with bayonet.

An M-16 with fixed Bayonet is a thing... quite lethal, in fact.

That's why I have an A2 style AR 15 instead of the more popular M4 style. I feel like the A2 still could be used in this way but that the M4 was getting a little too small. No doubt the stab is good, and I've heard that the latest bayonets are well made. How does it hold up to buttstroking, though? Have you tried it? That fixed stock doesn't really seem like something you want to slam against something solid. It feels like it would be fragile compared to a classic hardwood stock.

Maybe it's time some sorry individual remind that, even during first world ware, bayoneting was responsible for less than 1% casualty (probably much less). Sorry .

M-16 Butt-stroke is solid... I would not do it with an M4 though.

Get back on topic, boys.

a bit old, but I never saw this addressed...

The Franchi Spas-22 uses a SR3 defined magazine, reloading is a Complex Action and the character can load Quickness # shells per action. It holds 10 rounds and if she's firing bursts, then that is 3 BF and a single shot until empty.

Another thing I would consider is warning, perhaps OoC or through a 'common sense' roll, that using a weapon as a club in melee could lead to it being damaged or the smartlink becoming less accurate, it is a type of sighting device and I would think users would try to minimize habits that could decrease their effectiveness. I think one of the sniper rifles used to have a warning about sustaining damage during melee. A folding stock seems to beg for some flipping around during melee and possible damage to the weapon or pinching to those grasping it.

You were applying more 'ready weapon' actions than I would think applied, but I could see applying some action to move the weapon out of harms way during melee and again to ready it for ranged combat. Likewise if they decide to fold the stock for melee. Given their superhuman strength (basically 2 x), they are putting more stress on the weapon than it was likely designed to withstand. For example, would a damage check be made if they used it for leverage to move a huge weight? Her using it as a club at Strength 12 is similar. If she 'babies' it and decides not to use full power, like only doing Strength 6 damage since it should have been designed with this as a perhaps likely event, then I'd implement a TN modifier similar to the ones for subduing.

I've often felt that for simulating small unit combat, SR needed more satisfying suppression fire rules and more realistic volumes of fire instead of capping full auto fire actions at ten rounds.

Now we're talking about barrel overheating and things like that. I understand also that stuff like that is an even bigger problem in caseless weapon systems which the SR world is said to have espoused.

Should weapon systems overheating be part of the rules? Is this important to model, especially for small teams that might be doing a lot of breaking contact?

Considering modern firearms aren't really designed as clubs I think there should be all kinds of problems that happen with prolonged use in melee. Even a vintage weapon will start to break (i.e. stock will start getting dinged up) if you bash it repeatedly into a solid object.

SR weapons with optics, attachments, etc. should surely have issues. I've seen some internet commentators state that steel World War II firearms hold up better to prolonged abuse than do modern polymer firearms. I have no idea if that's true or not but if we're talking bashing I can see something that is made of contiguous solid steel being better.

I can see it coming up in some kind of CQB horror survival ghoul tunnel.

You're making me imagine a troll with a custom retro-styled .70 cal musket that is mostly designed as a melee weapon, but which is also designed to withstand the pressures of firing a giant smokeless powder cartridge with a tungsten carbide cored musket ball.