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Arethusa
That's pure myth. Teflon Coated Cop Baby Killing Bullets of Pure Evil are bullshit created by an ignorant media that never considered legitimate research a part of journalism. Teflon is used in bullets to retard barrel wear.
JaronK
Ah well, in any case, at least there's already some precedent for Teflon being used in bullets, which is a start.

JaronK
BitBasher
No, it's not a start. Teflon in a bullet does absolutely nothing except to protect the barrel when firing.
Nikoli
Wouldn't sealing the barrel in teflon be easier/simpler/cheaper then coating the bullets?
JaronK
It IS a start. Someone brought up the use of Teflon in bullets to encapsulate HF acid. The fact that Teflon is currently used in bullets means that at least part of that is possible, regardless of its current function.

JaronK
Nikoli
If I recall highschool correctly, the HF acid was stored in a plastic jug, for long periods. You could use normal gel (plastic based) rounds and just put the HF inside those. forget the teflon, the bullets just have a short shelf life is all.
Arethusa
QUOTE (Nikoli)
Wouldn't sealing the barrel in teflon be easier/simpler/cheaper then coating the bullets?

No. The teflon'd wear off pretty quickly, and, besides, you'd have a hell of a time making an accurate barrel with a teflon coating that wouldn't lose it's accuracy very, very fast.

QUOTE (JaronK)
It IS a start. Someone brought up the use of Teflon in bullets to encapsulate HF acid. The fact that Teflon is currently used in bullets means that at least part of that is possible, regardless of its current function.

Well, thing is, the use of teflon in that bullet would be completely different from a teflon coated match round. There's no way you could make the entire solid compnent of the round purely from teflon, which means it would need to be coated internally, presumably with some sort of frangible polymer or metal (or polymer metal blend) jacket. Not that it matters, really; the bullet would be so light as to be useless while still being a major liability if you ever got a jam. Toss in the fact that gains as a combat weapon are minimal (if they even are gains at all) and you've got yourself one useless munition.
JaronK
Fine, new idea. Jar o' Hydrofluoric Acid. Splash on enemy. Run like hell. Good?

JaronK
Nikoli
Splash grenades biggrin.gif
Arethusa
But if you can do that, why not just throw a good ol' hand grenade?
Phaeton
QUOTE (Nikoli)
Splash grenades biggrin.gif

Damn. Beat me to it. grinbig.gif
Nikoli
I suddenly got this image of the poor bastard in the orig. Robocop that was doused inthe toxic waste then splatterd on the car.
Eyeless Blond
How 'bout this? Teflon-coat the inside of whatever they make paintballs out of, and fill the inside with HF. I know you can teflon-coat certain plastics at least, and pretty cheaply at that; we use it for our disposable autopippette tips. Problem solved.
mcb
Teflon coating on a bullet help keep the fibers in a soft body armor from cutting into the bullet and getting a grip on it. It lets the bullet push the fiber out of the way rather than try to break them.
Wraithkin
QUOTE (mcb)
Teflon coating on a bullet help keep the fibers in a soft body armor from cutting into the bullet and getting a grip on it. It lets the bullet push the fiber out of the way rather than try to break them.

I wonder what that does to the rifling on the barrel though.
Eyeless Blond
Someone told you a horrible lie, my friend. Teflon does no more to "push aside" kevlar fibers than it would help me "push aside" the individual particles of a concrete wall. That's an urban legend, pure and simple, just like the whopper that says that people only use 10-30% of their brains, which was made up sometime in the 1910s before anyone even had a clue what a nerve was, let alone how it worked.
Kagetenshi
QUOTE (Arethusa)
But if you can do that, why not just throw a good ol' hand grenade?

Style. And because it's unlikely that they can scream louder than the grenade can blow. Not to mention that the screams will demoralize anyone who hears them better than the explosions.

~J
Arethusa
QUOTE (Eyeless Blond)
Someone told you a horrible lie, my friend. Teflon does no more to "push aside" kevlar fibers than it would help me "push aside" the individual particles of a concrete wall. That's an urban legend, pure and simple

Careful. You're agreeing with me again.

QUOTE (Kagetenshi)
Style. And because it's unlikely that they can scream louder than the grenade can blow. Not to mention that the screams will demoralize anyone who hears them better than the explosions.

Pfah. There is no style in unnecessarily complicated and unprofessional, malicious weapons.
Nikoli
Seeing your buddy's decomposing body as he is screaming for help goes a long way towards taking the fight outta you. But, that's a weapon better suited for "evil" NPC's rather than the "good" pc's.
Kagetenshi
Tell that to the Joker. Or to any Bond villain.

Oh, wait, I'm agreeing with you, aren't I?

~J
Siege
QUOTE (Eyeless Blond)
Someone told you a horrible lie, my friend. Teflon does no more to "push aside" kevlar fibers than it would help me "push aside" the individual particles of a concrete wall. That's an urban legend, pure and simple, just like the whopper that says that people only use 10-30% of their brains, which was made up sometime in the 1910s before anyone even had a clue what a nerve was, let alone how it worked.

It seems to be a common thread in Hollywood. Hence the teflon-coated "cop killers" depicted in Lethal Weapon 3.

-Siege
CircuitBoyBlue
Hold on, so is a teflon-coated round the same as a "cop-killer" round? Because I heard once, about a year or so ago, that no cop had ever been killed by a shot through the vest with a "cop-killer" round. So was this person just using another way of saying that there's no such thing as a "cop-killer" round, because it totally went over my head.
Arethusa
The teflon coated bullets of mythical cop killing lore are, indeed, the cop killers made famous by a criminally ignorant media. There is no such thing as a true cop killer round, save for the bullets that have killed officers in the line of duty. Dedicated AP ammunition exists, of course, but with none of this teflon coated, evil enchanted silliness. In most places, they're illegal, more because of name than any real functionality.

[edit]

And, on that note, no, to my knowledge, none of these teflon coated match rounds have ever killed police officers. Hell, cops are among the people more likely to use them. Good game, Fox News!
CardboardArmor
And now, back to under-rated weapons in the game known as Shadowrun!

I'm going to have to submit the katana as most under-rated in Shadowrun. Now most people would say, "CardboardArmor, are you a criminally retarded blind social deviant? Katanas are nothing if not the most over-rated weapons in Shadowrun!" To them I would say, "Screw you." But more to the point, I would tell them the contrary. Katanas are dangerously under-rated.

Because they get so much bad press from the large bulk of the SR playing community, nobody has ever considered the 'Stupid' factor involved with katanas. Namely, once a character uses a katana, it not only signals to the GM that the character is likely to go off and do something stupid but also it encourages the player using the katanas to go off and do needlessly stupid things including but not limited to bringing a sword to a gunfight. It is through this reason that the katana is the most under-rated and needlessly hated weapon in Shadowrun. It serves an important and sadly overlooked role in winnowing out the population of runners who go by the name 'Nemesis' or something grossly similar.
Eyeless Blond
It's really unfortunate, though, that katanas--and dikoted katanas in particular--are so much more mechanically better than every other middle-of-the-road melee weapon that it's really difficult to justify taking something else. In the same way, a pair of dikoted retractable blades/razors dominate the Reach 0 crowd because of the peculiarities of their mechanics (getting 1.5 times the Power of the attack for wielding two of them.)
gfen

All this complaining about katanas and how they're used prompted me to look one evening in my book to see just what the fuss was about.

And I read in plain English, "the two-handed samurai sword."

That said, in my revision of the core rules the whininess of the STR+3 versus +2 for a sword ("including longer, more vicious knives" - paraphrased) is done.

What's that, want to say your crusading melee monster uses a two-handed sword instead of a katana? No problem, its STR+3, just like a katana, but now you can pretend its straight and call it a bastard sword.

Moving on to under rated... Anything that does stun damage. Stage up on the attack to physical, but unless you stage it down past D stun, you're still out of the game.
toturi
But Stun is sooo easily soaked by trauma dampener!

If you need something dead/out, use a physical damage weapon.
Crusher Bob
In general, AP ammo will be made of harder material (like steel) that will penetrate armor better. Depending on how you make the acutal bullet, the harder material may come into contact with the groves inside the barrel. This will greatly accelerate barrel wear, so occasionally the bullets would be 'greased' with a light coating of teflon. The teflon did noting to alter the capability of the bullet to penetrate armor, it just reduced barrel wear. Coating a regular bullet with teflon would reduce barrel wear slightly, but regular bullets are pretty soft to begin with.

Also, when cops first started wearing vest, they tended to be class II or II+ vests, which could possibly be penetrated by AP pistol bullets.
mcb
Most high quality bullet lubricants are molybdenum disulfide based materials.

Sorry about the Teflon comment you guy seem to have your mind made up on that one. That was the theory I have heard.

That said it is easier to push the fibers out of the way rather than try to break them when defeating soft armor. Hence the reason most Kevlar body armor that has not been reinforced with something else is so poor at stopping a knife blade or ice pick but they can stop a large caliber handgun bullet. In theory at least if you could create a sharp slender pointed bullet it would defeat soft armor easier than the round nose of a FMJ assuming the same KE. If your wearing body armor the best thing you can get shot with, if your going to be shot, would be soft nose or hollow point bullets. The bullet would expand on the vest allowing the vest to distribute the energy more quickly over a larger area of the vest and thus a larger number of the fiber in the vest reducing the stress in the individual fibers.

Remembering to bring my asbestos underwear extinguish.gif smile.gif
mcb
Zeel De Mort
Well if you want something that's similar (in terms of game mechanics) to a katana, but would like to be a bit different - just go for a monosword. Same damage and reach as a katana. Obviously there's the debate about the effects of dikoting and all that, but it's a pretty good option regardless. Plus there's nothing in the flavour text to suggest it has to be used two-handed. It's described as a modern day broadsword, which I'm sure any strong character could wield one-handed no problem.
Glyph
A dikoted spear can be effective. Str + 5 M (and for characters such as adept, who can regularly stage up to Deadly damage, the higher Power, making it harder to stage down, is worth more than the damage code). It also has +2 reach and, as a thrusting weapon, is much better suited to close quarters than other polearms.
Phaeton
QUOTE (Glyph)
A dikoted spear can be effective. Str + 5 M (and for characters such as adept, who can regularly stage up to Deadly damage, the higher Power, making it harder to stage down, is worth more than the damage code). It also has +2 reach and, as a thrusting weapon, is much better suited to close quarters than other polearms.

On a random note, I was considering making a troll pole-arms/throwing spears physad once. Canadian ex-pirate who with the Flashbacks flaw, and during the Flashbacks, he thinks he's whale-hunting, and ends up harpooning anything the size of a Citymaster out of delusion.

His name was captain Eh-hab. grinbig.gif
CardboardArmor
I'd argue concealability issues with the spear, but we're probably marketting the weapon to the same people that use katanas and end up buying longcoats just to go with the image/try to hide them, so the point is moot I guess. biggrin.gif
Glyph
You could always get a telescoping staff and have an armorer make you a variety of detatchable heads - spear, polearm, etc.
Siege
QUOTE (Glyph)
You could always get a telescoping staff and have an armorer make you a variety of detatchable heads - spear, polearm, etc.

Interesting idea -- would a telescoping baton work as a functional poking/thrusting weapon?

Anyone try to thrust with an asp baton?

-Siege
Shockwave_IIc
That wouldn't be so much of a problem assuming you've "opened" it properly, Prob wouldn't get a power bonus but it would work, The end is smaller and at least as hard as a normal polearm you just don't have the power of bith arms thrusting.


Side Note: considering How heavy they are, i would let some gain a +1 Power when holding one in thier fist when it's clolapsed. (Quarters in the fist kinda thing)
Wounded Ronin
Cybernetic finger squirt gun is almost unavoidable.

Narcojet pistol is really broken too. Note that they never explain how armor affects getting hit by a narcojet.
BitBasher
just like all other chemicals, the armore prevents the dart from fully penetrating and delivering it's full dosage.
Kesh
That's what DMSO is for. biggrin.gif
Arethusa
DMSO does not aid in penetrating armor. It only gives non-contact vector agents the ability to pass through skin, power lessened by armor (rational being that armor is still a solid barrier that keeps stuff away from you). Unfortunately, DMSO doesn't really do all this crazy shit in real life, but that's another debate entirely.
Cursedsoul
I remember one of those....whee...good, hate filled times....

As for the spear I'm trying to get myself a bostaff with a dikoted spear tip hidden in one end. The very end of the bostaff would look sorta like this:
(o)

if viewed from above, with the o in the middle being the spear tip. I'd have a rubber knob covering this up and it'd be pointed down, so it'd look like I was simply using it to walk with. I'd have a rubber grip with a hidden button, pressed via applying enough pressure and it'd cause the end concealing to fall into the staff, exposing the dikoted spear tip and causing the rubber notch to fall away.

Thus, I'd end up with a Str+3M stun bostaff with a Str+5M phys spear, specialiation in polestaffs to use it, and the ability to put a whole lotta hurt on the enemies.

This is overly complicated sounding and the screw in spear tip would probably be the smarter idea, but inconvienent as all hell.

"'scuse me for a second guys, I've gotta assemble my weapon. Do ya mind holding on for a minute?" sleepy.gif

But yeah, back on topic. What about a sling? Str+2L stun is fun stuff and you could load it up with a bouncy ball and distract someone, or wing it at their head and leave a nice bruise.

8 conceal and the ability to pick up anything and use it kind of reminds me of the Streetsweeper.

You can even use a capsule round loaded with pepper punch or neuro-stun X for a quick disposal method. Of course with the lack of penetration of armor that I was just reminded of you'd have to aim for the face/hands/etc. But hey, with NSX you can aim center mass and let the gas do the damage for you.

Oh and the sling is damnable cheap. 5 nuyen x str minimum. 6 strength and 30 nuyen nets you an 8L stun weapon with range that's almost on par with a heavy pistol.

Hell, with a troll sized sling you might be able to wing molotovs or something.
John Campbell
QUOTE (Cursedsoul)
As for the spear I'm trying to get myself a bostaff with a dikoted spear tip hidden in one end. The very end of the bostaff would look sorta like this:
(o)

if viewed from above, with the o in the middle being the spear tip. I'd have a rubber knob covering this up and it'd be pointed down, so it'd look like I was simply using it to walk with. I'd have a rubber grip with a hidden button, pressed via applying enough pressure and it'd cause the end concealing to fall into the staff, exposing the dikoted spear tip and causing the rubber notch to fall away.

Just go with a spring-loaded locking spearpoint, like a giant switchblade.

Of course, the whole idea has the problem that, thanks to the wonders of the UCAS legal code, staves are totally illegal, and you can't even get a permit to carry one, so concealing your spear as one might not help all that much.
Cursedsoul
*blink* *blink* I am blind. Didn't notice that. Anyways I'm sure I could weild the sword of logic and get myself a permit to carry a big stick.

Same thing for bows. Crossbows and normal bows are illegal, but a Ranger-X Bow and a Pistol Crossbow aren't.

Just another reason why you don't smoke crack and write rules for a game. Hooray for house rules.
Neon Tiger
What about something like this? (short MPG movie)

So you can use it either as a club (Str+1 M stun, +1 reach), a sword (Str+2 M, +1 reach) or a spear (Str+3 L, +2 reach).
BitBasher
I'd be on the fence as to whether that would get a +1 reach as a sword, and I would say it would not get a plus 2 reach as a spear, it's not long enough.
xizor
what about tool lasers?
4L damage sucks, but being able to cut their car in half given 15 minutes is price less. also is useful for removing handcuffs, ie cutting the chain part in half, as well as cutting locks off of doors.
ShadowGhost
My personal favorite is the Gyrojet Pistol. 10 round clip, 12M damage, and shotgun ranges on land, pistol ranges underwater and 12S damage.

Availability of 4, 1,000¥.

And the Gyrojet Plus rounds have an availability of 14, and count as AV and APDS ammo.

Not a weapon for stealth or quiet infiltration, but a good one when the crap hits the fan.
Cursedsoul
Its not very essence friendly doing that. 0.65 for the high power laser and the tool laser mod. Sure that's only 0.15 extra essence if you use a cybereye, but chances are that eye has vision mag, image link, flare comp, low light, etc, etc, so you're probably paying close to the full price.

battery life is only 25 minutes too. 150 for a battery ain't terribly cheap, but then again how often are you using it?

Biotech(6) test and a base time of 10 minutes means you better know the battery's life limit (maybe DNI connection to an image link or retinal clock?).

Keep in mind that the tool laser cuts through barrier 10 or less. Metal restraints have a barrier of 12, plasteel is 15. Presuming they're dumb enough to cuff you with your hands in front of you you'll take a couple extra combat turns to cut through it. Not a big deal for metal, but chances are if you're in that position time is of the essence.

That all said its still a really nice thing to have. 11000 nuyen is pretty cheap, too bad the essence is really high.

Using just the eye laser is rather nasty in and of itself. You can use it to blind people.

Say you take the medium laser. Range of 50m, +2 dice to blind. Battery life of 50 minutes, which is twice that of the high power. Sure you lose 450m of range but is that really ever going to matter for this?

Complex action, opposed quickness tests. Not terribly bad if you've got like, 5 or 6 quickness because they've maybe got 4 or 5. Still in your favor, and although the effect is reduced by 2 per combat turn they still suffer +1TN for every net success you achieve.

Could this be really useful in melee perhaps? What about moving INTO melee? Stare at them, blind them, and run. I'm fairly sure you could get your GM to let you run and stare them dead in the eyes.

[edit: to Shadow]

Yeah but don't forget it is EXPLOSIVE AMMO. You can fire it at say, the sprinkler system to start it up or use it to start a small fire in a trash can filled with paper.

Get a can of oil or something and have some fun. A normal pistol could do it too, but a GJ would do it better. Too bad it uses its own skill, but that's still not too shabby.
FlakJacket
QUOTE (ShadowGhost)
My personal favorite is the Gyrojet Pistol. 10 round clip, 12M damage, and shotgun ranges on land, pistol ranges underwater and 12S damage.

I can't remember who it was, but someone on the boards came up with the evil idea of mounting one of these on an assualt rifle like an under-barrel grenade launcher, adding a top mounted laser designator and loading it with anti-vehicular shells with seeker heads. smile.gif
Raife
The most underated weapons in shadowrun are OSP items. OSP = On Sight Procurement.

You need a weapon? Pick up the chair, splinter it, find a good sized hung... bam you have a club. Need something more fun? Rip out a wall socket, pull out the wireing, throw a puddle on the floor...

People who can't kill with creativity, kill with guns.
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