Hello Dumpshock!
I have a few SR 5 rules questions:
How does surprise and ambush really work? As I understand it participants all need 3 hits on the surprise test to not be surprised in combat. If one side is ambushing, they get +6 dice on this and cannot be surprised by their target unless they are unseen/unsure when they will appear. So assuming you have an invisible street sam ambushing a group of guards who all fail their resistance test, why would even bother rolling the test for the samurai?
Also, how does Delay outside combat work? If you have the drop on someone with a gun, do you get a surprise test if combat begins? Or do you simply act first?
Healing spells say that: In game terms, this means you take
a dice pool modifier equal to the target’s actual Essence
minus his maximum Essence (which will turn out to be 0
or a negative number), rounded up.
Does this lengthy definition mean mathematically round up a negative number to the nearest more positive number (so 5.9 essence = 0 penalty) or does it mean round "up" to the lower number? Not sure what is intended here, but half my players assume the mathematically rounding while might assume the writer did not know how to round negative numbers.
How does missile launchers work? How are sensor rating on the missile used on attacks? I could not find any rules for sensor, it just seems missiles have the same ridiculous wireless/motion sensor/timer rules as grenades. So assuming something like a modern hand-held missile launcher, how would it work per the rules? In my game no one uses commlinks to wirelessly detonate weapons (maybe a phone for detonating a bomb), so the weapon itself either has impact trigger, timer or built in smart trigger (airburst).
I handled it by doing a normal (3) heavy weapons test, allowing the defender (a helicopter) to use pilot+reaction to dodge, and applied net hits (above the 3+defenders) to apply to damage since a helicopter has weaker parts just like a human. The end result was a damanged choppa since it was just a HE missile, but I wonder how wrong I was. I might have applied sensor rating as a dice pool bonus to the shooter.
If the missile scatters (say a rocket launcher instead), is it still rolling the dice and adjusting for hits as normal? What does "scatter the full amount" even mean? That hits don't apply?
Full Version: Some rules questions
I have interpreted the rules as the following:
Ambushing players get a +6 to the surprise check when they are in wait hut do not know the EXACT movements of the target. If they know the exact movements, delay an action (-1 dice pool), they can automatically avoid surprise and go first (because of the delayed action). So the invisible guy who is looking right at the guards can start combat without rolling to see if he is surprised. The guards might get clues (perception non-visual) to become aware of him but would still roll surprise.
Healing people with less than max Essence is harder. Most max Essence is 6. So if the healing target has a 5.9, that's a -1 dice pool penalty.
Missiles are blast weapons that generally use motion sensor to detonate (they blow when they hit something and stop. In this case you roll a standard ranged attack and apply scatter only if you miss. if you are trying to hit a spot on the ground, then it's a Simple Skill +Agility (3) test. If you don't get 3 hits, you roll scatter. This doesn't work for shooting at copters because there is no ground to shoot.
Sensors can be used passively (they replace Accuracy) or actively (Simple Action, Sensor + Intuition [Sensor] vs (variable)) the the net successes act as a defense test dice pool penalty. For a helicopter with a standard pilot, I believe that uses Pilot aircraft + Reaction(?).
Ambushing players get a +6 to the surprise check when they are in wait hut do not know the EXACT movements of the target. If they know the exact movements, delay an action (-1 dice pool), they can automatically avoid surprise and go first (because of the delayed action). So the invisible guy who is looking right at the guards can start combat without rolling to see if he is surprised. The guards might get clues (perception non-visual) to become aware of him but would still roll surprise.
Healing people with less than max Essence is harder. Most max Essence is 6. So if the healing target has a 5.9, that's a -1 dice pool penalty.
Missiles are blast weapons that generally use motion sensor to detonate (they blow when they hit something and stop. In this case you roll a standard ranged attack and apply scatter only if you miss. if you are trying to hit a spot on the ground, then it's a Simple Skill +Agility (3) test. If you don't get 3 hits, you roll scatter. This doesn't work for shooting at copters because there is no ground to shoot.
Sensors can be used passively (they replace Accuracy) or actively (Simple Action, Sensor + Intuition [Sensor] vs (variable)) the the net successes act as a defense test dice pool penalty. For a helicopter with a standard pilot, I believe that uses Pilot aircraft + Reaction(?).
QUOTE (Gingivitis @ Sep 28 2016, 10:17 AM) 
I have interpreted the rules as the following:
Ambushing players get a +6 to the surprise check when they are in wait hut do not know the EXACT movements of the target. If they know the exact movements, delay an action (-1 dice pool), they can automatically avoid surprise and go first (because of the delayed action). So the invisible guy who is looking right at the guards can start combat without rolling to see if he is surprised. The guards might get clues (perception non-visual) to become aware of him but would still roll surprise.
Healing people with less than max Essence is harder. Most max Essence is 6. So if the healing target has a 5.9, that's a -1 dice pool penalty.
Missiles are blast weapons that generally use motion sensor to detonate (they blow when they hit something and stop. In this case you roll a standard ranged attack and apply scatter only if you miss. if you are trying to hit a spot on the ground, then it's a Simple Skill +Agility (3) test. If you don't get 3 hits, you roll scatter. This doesn't work for shooting at copters because there is no ground to shoot.
Sensors can be used passively (they replace Accuracy) or actively (Simple Action, Sensor + Intuition [Sensor] vs (variable)) the the net successes act as a defense test dice pool penalty. For a helicopter with a standard pilot, I believe that uses Pilot aircraft + Reaction(?).
Ambushing players get a +6 to the surprise check when they are in wait hut do not know the EXACT movements of the target. If they know the exact movements, delay an action (-1 dice pool), they can automatically avoid surprise and go first (because of the delayed action). So the invisible guy who is looking right at the guards can start combat without rolling to see if he is surprised. The guards might get clues (perception non-visual) to become aware of him but would still roll surprise.
Healing people with less than max Essence is harder. Most max Essence is 6. So if the healing target has a 5.9, that's a -1 dice pool penalty.
Missiles are blast weapons that generally use motion sensor to detonate (they blow when they hit something and stop. In this case you roll a standard ranged attack and apply scatter only if you miss. if you are trying to hit a spot on the ground, then it's a Simple Skill +Agility (3) test. If you don't get 3 hits, you roll scatter. This doesn't work for shooting at copters because there is no ground to shoot.
Sensors can be used passively (they replace Accuracy) or actively (Simple Action, Sensor + Intuition [Sensor] vs (variable)) the the net successes act as a defense test dice pool penalty. For a helicopter with a standard pilot, I believe that uses Pilot aircraft + Reaction(?).
Missiles use Impact or Proximity Detonation generally, not Motion Sensor. Since they are in Motion, as soon as the sensor activates it blows up. Could be bad if the Sensor is activated prior to firing.
QUOTE (Gingivitis @ Sep 28 2016, 06:17 PM)
I have interpreted the rules as the following:
Ambushing players get a +6 to the surprise check when they are in wait hut do not know the EXACT movements of the target. If they know the exact movements, delay an action (-1 dice pool), they can automatically avoid surprise and go first (because of the delayed action). So the invisible guy who is looking right at the guards can start combat without rolling to see if he is surprised. The guards might get clues (perception non-visual) to become aware of him but would still roll surprise.
Healing people with less than max Essence is harder. Most max Essence is 6. So if the healing target has a 5.9, that's a -1 dice pool penalty.
Missiles are blast weapons that generally use motion sensor to detonate (they blow when they hit something and stop. In this case you roll a standard ranged attack and apply scatter only if you miss. if you are trying to hit a spot on the ground, then it's a Simple Skill +Agility (3) test. If you don't get 3 hits, you roll scatter. This doesn't work for shooting at copters because there is no ground to shoot.
Sensors can be used passively (they replace Accuracy) or actively (Simple Action, Sensor + Intuition [Sensor] vs (variable)) the the net successes act as a defense test dice pool penalty. For a helicopter with a standard pilot, I believe that uses Pilot aircraft + Reaction(?).
Ambushing players get a +6 to the surprise check when they are in wait hut do not know the EXACT movements of the target. If they know the exact movements, delay an action (-1 dice pool), they can automatically avoid surprise and go first (because of the delayed action). So the invisible guy who is looking right at the guards can start combat without rolling to see if he is surprised. The guards might get clues (perception non-visual) to become aware of him but would still roll surprise.
Healing people with less than max Essence is harder. Most max Essence is 6. So if the healing target has a 5.9, that's a -1 dice pool penalty.
Missiles are blast weapons that generally use motion sensor to detonate (they blow when they hit something and stop. In this case you roll a standard ranged attack and apply scatter only if you miss. if you are trying to hit a spot on the ground, then it's a Simple Skill +Agility (3) test. If you don't get 3 hits, you roll scatter. This doesn't work for shooting at copters because there is no ground to shoot.
Sensors can be used passively (they replace Accuracy) or actively (Simple Action, Sensor + Intuition [Sensor] vs (variable)) the the net successes act as a defense test dice pool penalty. For a helicopter with a standard pilot, I believe that uses Pilot aircraft + Reaction(?).
For the ambush, that's sort of how I read it too. The only issue is, if one side can ambush with impunity, but the opposing side is not surprised due to a good Surprise test, the one being ambushed could easily gain the initiative and somehow go before the invisible guy who wants to shoot, which makes little sense. I get that the Surprise rules is supposed to simulate peoples' reaction times being tested at sudden unexpected combat, but for many situations I don't see why it can't just be based on perception vs stealth instead to check who is surprised or not.
For healing, it's targets essence - max essence, round up. So 5.9 - 6 = - 0.1. - 0.1 rounded up equals 1, not - 1. I need some more input on why it should be the other way around.
Missiles as blast weapon seems to follow the same rules as grenades, using Heavy Weapons skills instead (listed as threshold 3). It does not say you only need 1 hit more than the enemy to hit, but point it out if I'm wrong.
That said, it does make more sense to not use the (3) threshold and only use normal ranged attack rules (attack vs defense) for missiles against vehicles, as scatter is generally so high a miss is likely to end up far from the vehicle targeted. As for Sensor rating on missiles, using it as Accuracy seems really weak as rating is 1-6 and costs extra. If they add to accuracy, that would make more sense. The active one (which I interpret as locking on) probably works alright.
Hitting larger vehicles might also give a dice pool bonus in some cases, although missile vs helicopter seems like appropriate size, while missile vs human target is maybe too small to easily hit. Smart weapon systems are supposed to be very accurate, but compared to a bullet fired by a sniper it's really not.
We'll see if it comes up again. I think not appying net hit to damage kind of makes sense for throwing handgrenades or grenade launchers against people, but not for cannon rounds or missiles against vehicles. As of now there is no way a missile can take out a helicopter with a single hit, which does not make sense when a skilled shooter with a pistol can take out a street samurai with a single lucky hit (happened last session, 13 hits).
Motion Sensor (in the CRB, pg 181) is the detonation device that "explodes after any sudden stop or change in direction, meaning hitting the wall, floor, or target. This method uses the standard Ranged Attack rules..."
On pg 182, they refer to motion sensor and impact trigger as the same thing. Most launchers have a minimum range in which they will not detonate before that range.
On pg 182, they refer to motion sensor and impact trigger as the same thing. Most launchers have a minimum range in which they will not detonate before that range.
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