So say I've got Joe Assassin, who just botched an attempt at killing me, by the throat. I realize that if he's following the textbook there's someone behind me taking aim with a heavy pistol. I whirl, bringing Joe Assassin between me and the other guy, and the bullets hit the body. How much are they slowed down, or are they stopped?
A similar example, imagine I was running alongside the Troll tank and got hosed down by LMG fire. The troll dies, I'm wounded and drop to the ground. Scrambling, I pull the Troll's body across mine, covering me from the incoming fire. What gets through?
Anecdotes aside, I realize the value would change based on armor on meatshield or meatshield's Body score, but I'm wondering if anyone has guidelines to suggest?
~J
Full Version: The Armor Value of a Metahuman Body
This actually came up the time before last that I GM'ed.
I just ruled that any damage the meat-shield didn't absorb got passed onto the person using said shield. Seemed to work pretty well.
EDIT: Oh, and both the armor value of the meat-shield and the person behind it applied.
I just ruled that any damage the meat-shield didn't absorb got passed onto the person using said shield. Seemed to work pretty well.
EDIT: Oh, and both the armor value of the meat-shield and the person behind it applied.
how about simply adding 1/2 of the meatshield's body to your own soak test?
I'm a nice guy and would rule on the side of the person trying to live (because most of my games are deadly enough as it is). I'd say the power of the attack would need to be greater than the front person's armor rating plus body before it would pass through and hit someone behind (unless it was a called shot to a "thin" body part).
I never was the most realistic person in the world though.
I never was the most realistic person in the world though.
Isn't this one of those things that is "realistically" extremely hard to predict? Like, the issue of the possibility of "overshooting" hasn't been well addressed by anyone because of the fact that it's so unpredictable.
If we're talking about an unarmored body, I would say that maybe if the power of a single shot is above 14, then it punches clean through with minimal loss of power?
Maybe if it's power 9 for a single shot, it gets down to half power.
And maybe if it's power 6 for a single shot, it dosen't pass through.
So, BF and FA damage mods wouldn't affect overshooting.
If we're talking about an unarmored body, I would say that maybe if the power of a single shot is above 14, then it punches clean through with minimal loss of power?
Maybe if it's power 9 for a single shot, it gets down to half power.
And maybe if it's power 6 for a single shot, it dosen't pass through.
So, BF and FA damage mods wouldn't affect overshooting.
I'd go with twice their appropriate Armor Rating (once for the front, once for the back) and treat it as Hardened Armor. If it doesn't penetrate, the body absorbed the full power of the attack... if not, it barely slowed it down compared to the armor. If not wearing armor -- and only if not wearing any armor -- I'd use their Body in the same fashion, albeit only once. You then resist the attack as normal albeit with the Power reduced by the two Armor Ratings or Body score as appropriate.
Treat the meatshield as a barrier providing partial cover. Barrier rating should probably be 1/2 Body+Armor.
Alternatly, treat it is partial cover and he soaks any attack that would have hit you. The bullet overpenetrates completly on a deadly wound and power is reduced by his armor rating.
Unless you're wearing him, then add his armor rating + 1/2 body to your own and take the approperiate combat pool reductions.
Alternatly, treat it is partial cover and he soaks any attack that would have hit you. The bullet overpenetrates completly on a deadly wound and power is reduced by his armor rating.
Unless you're wearing him, then add his armor rating + 1/2 body to your own and take the approperiate combat pool reductions.
How about Occam's Razor? The meat bod is just a form of cover (probably +4). I'm assuming the shootist is trying to hit the hostage taker. Of course, if the shootist intentionally wants to shoot through the person, that's different. I'd use the person's body stat and worn armor to reduce the power of the attack.
A troll could very well be full cover. I'd use the troll's armor and body dice just like Bane said.
Heh...this came up in my last game as well - I had a insect flesh form that was using an elf hostage as a meat-shield. How I ruled was that to hit the flesh form you have to make a called shot. If you make it, the hostage is missed - if you miss...well...poor hostage, I suppose.
I'm positive that Raygun had a crack at this...I won't post his link for fear of Kagetenshi
| QUOTE (Kayne @ Oct 24 2004, 09:14 PM) |
| I'm positive that Raygun had a crack at this...I won't post his link for fear of Kagetenshi |
first, don't be a troll. second he is absolutely right, rayguns rules are not made to be added onto canon rules.
third, i would definitely use barrier ratings, it makes the most sense
trolls provide more cover modifiers
Transforming Armor Ratings and Body scores into Barrier Ratings is every bit as arbitrary as just deciding to use Armor and/or Body in the first place.
As previously mentioned, using twice the Armor Rating of the shield makes the most sense to me (since the attack has to go through *both* sides of the shield, as opposed to just once when shooting someone normally), and at least cinematically, metahuman shields are "supposed" to be very effective. That's why I recommended treating it as Hardened Armor on top of that; if the attack fails to penetrate twice the shield's Armor Rating, the shield absorbed the entire attack. Otherwise, it just slowed it down.
As previously mentioned, using twice the Armor Rating of the shield makes the most sense to me (since the attack has to go through *both* sides of the shield, as opposed to just once when shooting someone normally), and at least cinematically, metahuman shields are "supposed" to be very effective. That's why I recommended treating it as Hardened Armor on top of that; if the attack fails to penetrate twice the shield's Armor Rating, the shield absorbed the entire attack. Otherwise, it just slowed it down.
I'm with the Doc on this.
Me too. What he says sounds very playable and easy to remember.
Makes perfect sense that it's Hardened Armor (or anything similar, like making it work as a Barrier). Double armor rating is also in order. I might even add the Body of the meatshield even if armor is present -- in RL terms, 2 layers of body armor with 4"-12" of meat inbetween is a very effective bullet barrier, I would expect only moderately-very powerful rifles firing armor piercing ammunition to punch through.
The full bonuses from this should only come into play if 80-90% of the body mass of the character is hiding behind the torso of the meat shield. For both cinematic effect and realism, allowing called shots to bypass or significantly reduce the effective armor of the meatshield should probably be allowed.
The full bonuses from this should only come into play if 80-90% of the body mass of the character is hiding behind the torso of the meat shield. For both cinematic effect and realism, allowing called shots to bypass or significantly reduce the effective armor of the meatshield should probably be allowed.
You know, I had considered using Body with my suggestion, too, but I figured a normal person (Body 3) wearing only Armored Clothing (Ballistic 3) would be a pretty good shield against most light arms like Hold-Out, Light, and Machine Pistols. I didn't, however, think they would completely absorb the damage from the heavier penetrators like most Shotguns or Heavy Pistols. So that's why I decided to just recommend doubling Armor instead of doubling Armor and using Body.
If that phenomenon only occured with a beefy shield with substantial armor (Body 6, Armored Jacket), that would be all right. But completely ignoring most weapons in the game using any schmoe off the street was a bit much.
Note also that if you do use any of the recommendations here, it's also a good idea to consider using the Armor Degredation rules from the Cannon Companion. Dunno how you'd adjust it for this since I've never really used those rules, but this seems like a good application for 'em if ever there were any.
If that phenomenon only occured with a beefy shield with substantial armor (Body 6, Armored Jacket), that would be all right. But completely ignoring most weapons in the game using any schmoe off the street was a bit much.
Note also that if you do use any of the recommendations here, it's also a good idea to consider using the Armor Degredation rules from the Cannon Companion. Dunno how you'd adjust it for this since I've never really used those rules, but this seems like a good application for 'em if ever there were any.
Sigh, now I have the image in my head of an HMG toting troll covered with armored drawf bodies...
So thats 6 armor for teh dwarf + my armored jacket, FFBA, and helmet...
So thats 6 armor for teh dwarf + my armored jacket, FFBA, and helmet...
One time in our game, we had some wetwork to do. Wipe out a whole famliy. The mother was holding the baby, so the gm gave the mother a point of impact against our physad punching her through the child.
| QUOTE (Doctor Funkenstein) |
| I didn't, however, think they would completely absorb the damage from the heavier penetrators like most Shotguns or Heavy Pistols. |
Shotgun slugs and heavy pistol non-expanding or mildly expanding rounds wouldn't mind the extra 4" of flesh much, no, but the two layers of armored clothing would stop them quite nicely. IRL, that is. An expanding shotgun slug won't penetrate more than perhaps 18" of flesh in the best case scenario, and even very light armor could drop that to 4-8". Most things classified as Heavy Pistols wouldn't penetrate two layers of even the lightest ballistic armors around.
It's possible that an assault rifle round might punch through the two layers of light armor and about 4-6" (10-15cm) of flesh, but I have serious doubts about it managing anything much beyond that. A human torso is quite thick, I just don't think anything smaller than a powerful rifle (Sniper Rifle) firing non-expanding ammunition or a Sporting Rifle/MMG firing armor piercing rounds going through a torso wearing decent flexible body armor and still manage to do serious harm to someone behind.
Like I said, though, this really depends on most of the character being behind the torso. It's also partly about me trying to work around the fucked-up Power ratings which make the Sporting Rifle penetrate as well as a Heavy Pistol by making sure you need armor piercing ammunition in any case.
| QUOTE (Austere Emancipator) |
| Like I said, though, this really depends on most of the character being behind the torso. It's also partly about me trying to work around the fucked-up Power ratings which make the Sporting Rifle penetrate as well as a Heavy Pistol by making sure you need armor piercing ammunition in any case. |
Well, you have to remember that's part of what using the Armor Rating represents, too. Few things in the game are clear black-and-white hit-or-miss scenarios.
But surprising as you may find it, I agree about the odd way they handled Power in the game. Or more correctly, the Power they gave assorted weapons. It's tricky, though... there's a hard line to stay on when you have to balance between gameplay, simplicity, and "realism." The designers -- at least in this case -- placed the priority on gameplay > simplicity > realism... and in the long run I think it was the right decision. Doesn't mean that it didn't create quite a few oddities and "what the hell?" results, but overall it does what it's supposed to do.
EDIT: Another method (this one a bit more complex and time consuming to resolve) that I was pondering was this: Have the meat shield resist the attack normally as if he were a prone target. If, the shield fails to fully resist the damage of the attack, whatever Damage Level he didn't resist is used with the original Power reduced by twice his appropriate Armor Rating (to the normal minimum of 2) against the person using him as a shield. No Hardened Armor effect is used with this variant, the shield's meat body still has a chance to reduce the attack either in full or in part, and the beefier the shield the more protection he'll provide. The logic behind using twice the Armor Rating is preserved as well. But like I said, it's quite a bit more complex and it will definitely add time to combat resolution...
My main beef is that there's so many things that could have been done to maintain gameplay and simplicity while still allowing rifles to be much more powerful than handguns like they really are. For example, had the current edition been designed to work with DamCodes such as LP: 6M, SMG: 7M, HP: 8M, AR: 9M, SportR: 9M-12S, etc, with rifles getting an extra 0.75x armor modifier or a straigh -2 to all armor values, I'd be a lot happier. I don't see how that would negatively affect gameplay or simplicity, although it's still a long way from realism.
| QUOTE (Doctor Funkenstein) |
| Well, you have to remember that's part of what using the Armor Rating represents, too. Few things in the game are clear black-and-white hit-or-miss scenarios. |
Then you could modify the actual armor rating by how much is covered by the body. In any case, an armor+torso+armor sandwhich would provide extremely effective armor against most small arms fire, significantly better than just the 2 layers of armor.
i don't think that converting body into armor works. every other thing in SR that puts more flesh between you and damage simply gives you extra body dice--troll's armor, body plating, dermal sheathing. it makes more sense, given that, to simply have the meatshield soak the damage first, and then have the person behind the meatshield soak the reduced damage.
mfb: that also seems like a very sensible approach, with the minor problem that it creates extra dicerolling. I propose a blend of that approach and Doc Funk's
Use Armor*2 as hardened armor as suggested. If the bullet would still penetrate (due to high power or low armor), add the body of the meatshield to the number of dice rolled to resist damage. That way you aren't creating an extra diceroll and calculating damage twice, you're just incorporating the protection into a single resistance roll.
Use Armor*2 as hardened armor as suggested. If the bullet would still penetrate (due to high power or low armor), add the body of the meatshield to the number of dice rolled to resist damage. That way you aren't creating an extra diceroll and calculating damage twice, you're just incorporating the protection into a single resistance roll.
works for me.
Ditto.
I like it.
The idea of useing the meat shield to soak up damage makes sense to me - but what about during melee? How would that work?
The house rules i have been using are:
Living Metahuman shield- The unsoaked damage goes through and add any armor the shield had to your armor.
Dead Metahuman Shield- Treat as barrier = to body+armor. Partial cover rules might apply if you are using something smaller (A troll hiding behind a dwarf corps). But just treat as barrier is = to or larger than player.
This is what I was doing.
Living Metahuman shield- The unsoaked damage goes through and add any armor the shield had to your armor.
Dead Metahuman Shield- Treat as barrier = to body+armor. Partial cover rules might apply if you are using something smaller (A troll hiding behind a dwarf corps). But just treat as barrier is = to or larger than player.
This is what I was doing.
Also makes sense - lets turn it around. What disadvantages would you get in melee with a body shield? (I.E. It's clumsy, if it's alive it's struggling, it's occupying one or mor hands...)
Frankly, using a body as a meat shield should be a huge loss of mobility, since you figure that most healthy adult Humans weigh between 50-100 kgs (nevermind fatties like us stereotypical gamers 
) depending on build, gender, height, etc. Even assuming someone very strong (ie, str 7+), the inertia alone would prevent rapid movement, especially if the "shield" is alive. Don't even talk about the sheer strength to use a Troll "shield".
Hiding and/or shooting behind someone is one thing; you don't need to jockey for position. Melee is a whole different animal; for that matter, the attacker could just as easily seize the "shield" himself and hold it out of the way while punching/kicking with the other hand. But all that's just my opinion.
) depending on build, gender, height, etc. Even assuming someone very strong (ie, str 7+), the inertia alone would prevent rapid movement, especially if the "shield" is alive. Don't even talk about the sheer strength to use a Troll "shield".Hiding and/or shooting behind someone is one thing; you don't need to jockey for position. Melee is a whole different animal; for that matter, the attacker could just as easily seize the "shield" himself and hold it out of the way while punching/kicking with the other hand. But all that's just my opinion.
i... hm. i guess in melee, i'd allow someone to use their meatshield to impose a +2 modifier to their opponent's attacks, but only when the person is using Full Defense. when making an attack, the person would take a +4 to their own TN.
I would let a troll or something of = size, use a Dwarf...maybe an thin elf as a shild in meele if they were dead. Other than that...could not see it doing more good than harm. In a real fight the best you can do is dodge behind some one for a single attack or push some inosent person at the attacker in hopes of delaying an attack.
So with that, It would be a resited improvised weapons roll...I think. LOL
So with that, It would be a resited improvised weapons roll...I think. LOL
Disagree Gaias. For one, Dwarves are often quite heavy. But even discounting that, the weight will cripple even a Troll trying to melee.
Try this: Take a 20 lb weight, hold it away from your body (arm extended) and just try and hold that position. That's not much weight; far less comparatively speaking in fact than a Dwarf, or Elf, especially one that's not stripped naked, being hoisted by a Troll. Even if you're in pretty good shape, you're going to get tired pretty quickly; the muscles in that part of the body (mostly shoulders, some upper back) are some of the least-used (and consequently weakest) in the upper body.
Now try taking that weight, keep it held away from your body (facing a single facing if you'd like), and do something strenuous and requiring coordination like boxing a moving, heavy bag or running through a tire obstacle course. For one, the weight's going to eat your endurance like candy; for two, holding it like that's going to throw off your coordination like hell (something vital to an aggressive melee fighter).
Even if you want to discount all of this, try doing this when you're facing multiple opponents (who are going to come at you on opposite sides).
Try this: Take a 20 lb weight, hold it away from your body (arm extended) and just try and hold that position. That's not much weight; far less comparatively speaking in fact than a Dwarf, or Elf, especially one that's not stripped naked, being hoisted by a Troll. Even if you're in pretty good shape, you're going to get tired pretty quickly; the muscles in that part of the body (mostly shoulders, some upper back) are some of the least-used (and consequently weakest) in the upper body.
Now try taking that weight, keep it held away from your body (facing a single facing if you'd like), and do something strenuous and requiring coordination like boxing a moving, heavy bag or running through a tire obstacle course. For one, the weight's going to eat your endurance like candy; for two, holding it like that's going to throw off your coordination like hell (something vital to an aggressive melee fighter).
Even if you want to discount all of this, try doing this when you're facing multiple opponents (who are going to come at you on opposite sides).
OK, so maybe I am a little off with the troll thing. Just when I think of a Troll I think Stronger than we could ever attempt to become even with help of many drugs. Also, who holds there shield streight out away from there body. It would be very hard and would make a better improvised weapon than a sheild.
If you really "need!?" to use some one as a sheild I feel convinced that a troll with a good strenght could rip into a a human or smaller body "using the spin as handle" and hold the body up as a sheild. Might work ok because you just keep your arm curled and insted of moving your shield to block a weapon "like buckler" move your body around the shield "like a tower shiled".
Cant say I have used this in real life or anything. To be honest the only thing I do with other peope's bodies in a fight would be to push them towards some one when facing multipul opoinets..but then I'm not a troll.
If you really "need!?" to use some one as a sheild I feel convinced that a troll with a good strenght could rip into a a human or smaller body "using the spin as handle" and hold the body up as a sheild. Might work ok because you just keep your arm curled and insted of moving your shield to block a weapon "like buckler" move your body around the shield "like a tower shiled".
Cant say I have used this in real life or anything. To be honest the only thing I do with other peope's bodies in a fight would be to push them towards some one when facing multipul opoinets..but then I'm not a troll.
Oh yes, and one other thing on bodies and gun fire. For some odd reason, in real life, bullets seem to be stopped more so by dead bodies than live ones. This is proven by such things as drive bys here is southern CA when bullets go through one target and hit some kids behind him. And then meny true storries of people from wars hiding under the corpses of other bodies and m-16 or AK47 fire being stopped by the dead body. It must have somthing to do with the dead weight provided by a corps.
Just some more food for thought
Just some more food for thought
I could see the blood starting to clot causing that. "dead weight", on the other hand, simply refers to the rather unwieldy way dead people or similar tend to slump or loll about.
~J
~J
The rules for carrying a load more than cover that aspect. Unless you're exceptionally strong, an average 70kg-ish person is going to be a pain -- literally -- to move about.
Once again, really not the sheild of choice.
I have grown fond of car doors when I am in a pinch. But then again, why use a shield?
I have grown fond of car doors when I am in a pinch. But then again, why use a shield?
Because standing around going "hit me hit me hit me!" in the open is a stupid idea?
Depends on whether or not you have a Trid Phantasm going 
~J
~J
heh - what is the psychological armor value of a trid phantasm meat shield? Now THERE's a question. Well, not really, but still.
| QUOTE (DocMortand) |
| heh - what is the psychological armor value of a trid phantasm meat shield? Now THERE's a question. Well, not really, but still. |
Whatever you THINK it is, duh!
| QUOTE (Shanshu Freeman) |
| One time in our game, we had some wetwork to do. Wipe out a whole famliy. The mother was holding the baby, so the gm gave the mother a point of impact against our physad punching her through the child. |
That's a dark game your playing chummer.
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