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lorthazar
I have a question. Considering the size and general physical prowess of a Troll would Ares, Magnum esearch, and many other gun companies start markets firearms built around bigger loads. After all a troll can make an assault rifle out of the Stoner Ares GPHMG, so why not .44 Automag SMG's, and .50BMG revolvers?
mfb
i've done that. you use a rifle or shotgun frame, out of CC, knock it down (improved conceal, whatever) to Conc 4-5, make it metahuman-modded, and give it to a troll. trolls don't take the +2 TN mod for using a two-handed weapon in one hand. technically, it's still a rifle or a shotgun, but it looks like a troll-size pistol.
sidartha
QUOTE
why not .44 Automag SMG's, and .50BMG revolvers?

We have those now.
Given that normal humans now can take upwards of seven .40 cal rounds and live to tell about the experience, and how the average human body rating is a mere 3 compared to 9M out of a heavy pistol I would make the judgement that the kind of upgrade you are talking about has allready taken place.
Just My Opinion smile.gif
mfb
hah! a human can take a lot more than 7 .40 cal rounds. humans have 10 fingers, after all, and then there's all those toes...
sidartha
I meant center mass.
Props though on finding the loophole and at the same time making a gruesome comment. wink.gif
mfb
gruesome holes are my specialty.
DrJest
I still remember reading an article in an old sci-fi RPG magazine about how the lethality of guns was over-rated. The writer quoted examples from the San Diego border patrol; one of them was a poor sod who took something in the order of six rounds of 9mm, four of .45 and a couple .44M. He spent six months in hospital and, at the time of writing, was back on the job.

A few months later, I discovered that the bloke who ran my favourite record shop was ex-Drug Squad. Intrigues, I asked him why he left. Apparently he took a blast from shotgun during a raid.

Oh yeah, and his comment always makes me laugh. He says when he came round the corner and found himself staring down the barrels, "the thought that crossed my mind was - this would be a really good time to retire".
Austere Emancipator
If you put the round exactly center mass and your target is symmetrical, he's an extremely lucky SoB to survive a single 9x19mm, .40 S&W or anything else for that matter, with the round hitting the spine by default. If you just meant hitting the torso, well, you can shoot holes along the side of a human torso with a handcannon for quite a while before your target dies.

It's all about the shot placement, after all. Just with the .44 Magnum you can shoot 0.1" further away from the vital target to put him down, and your wound cavity is something like 20% bigger in area so you get more bleeding when you do hit the big arteries in the thoracic cavity.
DrJest
Exactly. And most people just blaze away without any thought for shot placement. What was it that fire combat study by the New York Police came up with some years back? Something like, the average gun fight takes place at a distance of ten yards in poor light between untrained opponents, and nobody get seriously hurt.

The concept of a gun being a deadly weapon in just anybody's hands is one of those urban myths, like the idea that somebody solidly clocked in the head or groin will just get up and keep fighting.
Fortune
QUOTE (mfb)
gruesome holes are my specialty.

Keep your sexual preferences to yourself! wink.gif
Stumps
Actually, DrJest is more correct.

The FBI runs on a training that states a standard of firing at least 3 rounds and assuming for 7 rounds to bring a person down.

3 rounds will be garanteed to be fired, and they are trained to fire no less.
7 ronds is what they expect it to take to make the person actually stop attacking and hopefully drop to the ground.

The guy that was being talked to (I can't remember his place in the FBI) was saying that he's seen people run after getting shot 10 times in the chest and back, and that wasn't something that appeared as too rare for him to see.
But the idea of one shot, one kill, he was saying, is completely fabricated hollywood/tv myth.

He was saying that if anything, after one shot, the person will often times stand in shock if they don't keep going at what they were doing.
Adrenalin is a bitch of an enemy.

All these people will probably die later very easily if not medically treated, but in combat they remain completely functional unless you pack in alot of ammo very quickly so their system can't over-ride the shock with more adrenalin.

And god help you if they're on hiped up drugs. Then you just keep firing until they drop.
There's a good reason that weapons come with more than one round in them.
Austere Emancipator
QUOTE (Stumps)
The FBI runs on a training that states a standard of firing at least 3 rounds and assuming for 7 rounds to bring a person down.

If you shoot completely random locations in the average human torso with something like a .40 S&W JHP, you could probably figure out the statistical expected amount of shots fired before a human is physically incapacitated. It would not surprise me if that number were somewhere around 7. But that does not mean that incapacitating a human with a single shot to the torso is not possible. Make a decent hole in the heart, the aorta, the carotid or brachiocephalic arteries, and your target is going to go down within 20 seconds, 40 tops. Crack his spine and he's out immediately.

These are not very likely results on a randomly placed shot in the torso, but they can happen. After that, you're just hoping you hit some important arteries to cause enough loss of blood pressure to black him out. Indeed with enough adrenaline and drugs that can take quite a while. Shooting big-ass holes in the target would help somewhat.

However, SR is too abstract to make use of a statistic like "It takes 7 randomly placed shots from a .40 S&W pistol firing JHPs in the average human torso to physically incapacitate the target, on average". We haven't got SR equivalents for calibers, ammo types (the few ammo types mentioned in SR generally don't make any fucking sense at all, so they can't be used) or shot placement.

And last I heard, most agencies were still training with the principle Shoot Them Till They Drop, Or Better Yet, Till They Stop Twitching. Giving some sort of pseudostatistic like "it takes seven rounds" might help drive home the point that you should fire at them a lot.

Anyway, since the point here were troll weapons, it makes things a bit different. If you assume they'll be shooting at other trolls, .44 Automag "SMGs" (or more likely troll-modified battle rifles chambered for similar or even more powerful calibers) would make sense. You'd need a powerful round to penetrate deep enough into the bone-plated torso of a troll, and the extra recoil and size won't bother the troll that wields it. A .50 BMG revolver would still be absolutely pointless, the .500 S&W Magnum and similar rounds would be plenty.

mfb's suggestion on how to work this into a canon game of SR works wonderfully. Just use the Firearm Design rules in CC to build these guns from all kinds of base types. The Sport Rifle and Shotgun mfb mentioned are probably the most useful.
mintcar
this would make the lethality of guns in Shadowrun pretty acurate, wouldn´t it? To put a regular guy down it takes: 10+ rounds from a light pistol, 2-3 rounds from a hand cannon or a single shot with a hand cannon backed by 8 skill dice and 6 combat pool dice, and maybe a karmic reroll.

I just know some of you guys are going to throw a lot of examples and reconnings in my face, showing me how wrong I am. Go ahead, make my day biggrin.gif Your all about numbers arn´t you?
Austere Emancipator
QUOTE (mintcar)
this would make the lethality of guns in Shadowrun pretty acurate, wouldn´t it?

For me, I think the biggest issue is the the huge difference between a Light and a Moderate, and thus between Light Pistols and Heavy Pistols, and the fact that I'd rate most common RL pistol calibers somewhere between (doing 2 boxes of damage). Other than that, especially if you tweak the Powers a bit, ignore armor, perhaps even change a Damage Level here and there, and keep in mind how abstract SR is, it works out sort of OK.
Crusher Bob
Yep, works ok if you change everything rotfl.gif The way SR combat is setup (quite abstract) makes it rather hard to add some rules to 'enhance realism' without screwing things up.

The other problem is that SR does not differentiate between 'eventually fatal' and 'instantly fatal' wounds. If you hit someone in the liver or spleen with a JHP round, they will probably bleed to death, but they still have plenty of time to give you an eventually fatal wound too.

Most firearms don't have too much trouble producing eventually fatal wounds (i.e. would be fatal without medical attention). Producing wounds that are 'stopping'/instantly fatal is all about shot placement (or just blowing huge chunks of meat out of the target works pretty well too). Since you can really blow huge chunks of meat out of someone with a pistol, you have to go for shot placement.
FlakJacket
Damn, a thread just like this one came up a while back but I just can't find the bloody thing. Raygun and a couple of the other gun enthusiasts pretty much laid out how much a troll could handle firearms-wise compared to humans.
Stumps
QUOTE
Anyway, since the point here were troll weapons, it makes things a bit different. If you assume they'll be shooting at other trolls, .44 Automag "SMGs" (or more likely troll-modified battle rifles chambered for similar or even more powerful calibers) would make sense. You'd need a powerful round to penetrate deep enough into the bone-plated torso of a troll, and the extra recoil and size won't bother the troll that wields it. A .50 BMG revolver would still be absolutely pointless, the .500 S&W Magnum and similar rounds would be plenty.

Why do I keep having images of HellBoy run through my head?
Austere Emancipator
FlackJacket: Do you mean this one?
hobgoblin
there are basicly 2 things with sr's damage system that makes it hard to become realistic to the degree some people on this forum wants.

first is the use of levels of damage rather then numbers. this leads to odd jumps like from a light pistol to a heavy and so on.

second is the totaly missing concept of bleeding outside of a deadly wound.
Critias
QUOTE (Austere Emancipator)
QUOTE (Stumps)
The FBI runs on a training that states a standard of firing at least 3 rounds and assuming for 7 rounds to bring a person down.

But that does not mean that incapacitating a human with a single shot to the torso is not possible.

Yeah, but just 'cause it's possible doesn't mean I'd bet my life on it, and stop pulling the trigger. wink.gif
Stumps
Personally (just read through that whole post you linked) I'm all for a full on marketed Troll pistol line.
Why the hell not?
Who gives a shit about possibles of marketing!

Who has a Troll character or is going to have one that's veiwing this thread?
Now, out of you, who wants a Troll gun from Troll-Guns-Am-Us?

I know I do.
DrJest
I don't know what the equivalent in the US is, but over here we have a shop chain called "The Long, the Short and the Tall", and another one called "Long Tall Sally". These are clothing shops catering to gentlemen of unusual height (tall or short) in the first instance, and unusually tall ladies in the second (my best man, who was in fact a gay girl, used to get clothes from Long Tall Sally, but then she was 6' 2").

Sooo....

Set the Wayback Machine for 2064. You just know some bright spark at Ares (is it Ares that own Weapons World? I think so) is going to come up with a new chain of speciality arms stores. I can see it now - "The Long and the Short Of It". Specialists in ultra-chunky and ultra-compact weapons.
Stumps
A .3006 in pistol form, in the hands of a Troll, pressed firmly against the temple of the Rigger's temple and the orders, "Drive!" put a whole new meaning to the phrase "Palm Pilot".
Toptomcat
So cutting down a Rifle or LMG chassis would suffice for one-handed firing.
What about troll-sized rifles, which would be able to fire ammunition bigger than today's biggest AMRs? Will anyone here stat those for us?
And troll-sized assault rifles, what would you do there? Cut down a vehicle cannon?
God Forbid troll-sized Assault Cannons.
mfb
i think machine guns and assault cannon fill that role just fine. note that when you cut down a rifle or shotgun for use as a troll handgun, the troll still used the shotgun or rifle skill. same with MMG "assault rifles" and assault cannon "hunting rifles".
Toptomcat
But super-heavy calibers for Assault Cannons and MGs must exist for trolls...maybe something even a troll would need a gyroscopic compensator for.
mfb
why? trolls are a vast minority. i can see something as relatively common and inexpensive as handguns being marketed for them, albeit on a relatively tiny scale, but expensive toys like rifles and assault cannon? i think not.
Toptomcat
Many reasons.
It would carry muchos prestige for a company/gunsmith to sell the biggest, baddest gun on the market.
It would become an instant collector's item.
People will search for any edge in combat, particularly militaries.
A troll with plenty of cash could have a gunsmith make one for him.
Large-caliber weapons carry massive intimidation value.
It would make a handy complement to heavily-cybered individuals' abilities, and at a fraction of the cost of the actual implants.
I could go on...
Shadow
I think the U.S. Army sniper corps would disagree about the one shot, one kill thing.
Toptomcat
First of all, it's 'corps.'
Second of all, the MARINE sniper creed is 'one shot, one kill.'
Third, many snipers take a shot for windage first.
Stumps
Allright.
Can we all stop with the "Their aren't enough Trolls out there who can buy it" thing?

Who cares! We, the players, want it.
The amount of players who play as a Troll is a hell of a lot higher % than the population of Trolls that can afford it according to SR statistics, so that argument is completely scrap-pointless.

Point-in-case: The Katana. Riiiiight. There's a REAL high demand for BATTLE READY (not trophy hanging) katana's in the world.
But you know what? There sure as hell is amongst the players!
Further in that respect, panzer cannons on comercial sale? um...uh huh...cause they're all out there outside of military use in bulk.
No, but we sure as hell are happy that they are!

Anyways.

Troll pistols are the only things that need to be added.
Rifles and all others are simply just like they are right now.
The big guns.

"But what if I want a Troll sniper rifle?"

Get a .50cal, spec it for the Troll, slap a scope on it, and modify it for single shot.
Vuala! a Troll sniper rifle!

"Shotgun?"

Grab a grenade launcher, spec it for a Troll. That was easy.

"But what if I want a Troll .3006 hunting rifle?"

Look, to a Troll that's like saying that I want a .22 hunting rifle in a gun fight.
That .3006 is a handgun caliber basically to a Troll. Don't insult them with that request for rifling. They're worth much more in power than that.
Shadow
QUOTE (Toptomcat)
First of all, it's 'corps.'
Second of all, the MARINE sniper creed is 'one shot, one kill.'
Third, many snipers take a shot for windage first.

Excuse me Mr. Fancy pants. I wasn't in the marines, but I was in the army. And they most certainly said 'One shot, One kill' regardless of who came up with it.

And none of the snipers I ever heard of alerted their targets by firing there weapons just to see where the wind was blowing. They had other techniques to do that.
Toptomcat
Didn't mean to come off as arrogant, sorry if I did.
Stumps
I am IN the army.
One shot, One kill IS one of our mottos
Make no mistake though, that is not a creed. Creeds are not catchy phrases like that to help you shoot better.

The other standing motto in rifling is:
40 rounds, 40 kills.

Saying the marines are THE ones who say One shot One kill is like saying that the army says Hurah!

no probs there Toptomcat.
-edit-btw, I think I fixed your martial art in the other thread there Toptomcat.
Austere Emancipator
QUOTE (Critias)
Yeah, but just 'cause it's possible doesn't mean I'd bet my life on it, and stop pulling the trigger. wink.gif

...and that's basically what I was saying. It happens, but you can't count on it.
QUOTE (Stumps)
Get a .50cal, spec it for the Troll, slap a scope on it, and modify it for single shot.
Vuala! a Troll sniper rifle!

By "a .50cal", I assume you mean the M2HB? Why bother when there are guns like this, which are more accurate, lighter, cheaper and easier to get at, modify and conceal?

QUOTE (Stumps)
"But what if I want a Troll .3006 hunting rifle?"

Look, to a Troll that's like saying that I want a .22 hunting rifle in a gun fight.
That .3006 is a handgun caliber basically to a Troll. Don't insult them with that request for rifling. They're worth much more in power than that.

What if they want to, you know, actually hunt animals? Other than juggies, that is. You're going to be wasting an awful lot of meat by hunting deer with a .50 BMG firing expanding ammunition.

Yeah, keeping the size difference in mind, a 7.62x51mm or a .30-06 is basically like a 5.7x28mm is for a human. But, much like most would opt for a .40S&W over the 5.7x28mm in a RL "self-defense" handgun, I'd much rather take a .500S&W revolver than one in .30-06 if I were a troll. And if the troll-me could pick between a massive (by human standards) battle rifle firing .338 Winchester Magnum that felt like an M16 does to humans, or a HMG that feels more like an M60 does to humans, I'd absolutely pick the .338.

If BFTGs in general are a bit iffy, then heavy weaponry specially designed for trolls are just stupid. If you personally don't care, and I'm not saying you should, go right ahead. Allow them to shoot a Victory AC with a gyromount if you wish.

I've ranted about trolls' inability to actually withstand hits from even human-standard firearms often enough before, I guess I don't need to get into that again.
hobgoblin
about avarages, they just say that the total of bullets in x amount of people, divided by that amount of people came out as seven. it could be 100 in one person and 2 in another (to put it on a edge).

as for 1 shot, 1 kill. it can be done. towards a stationary target. with wind and distance compensated for. and aiming for either head, heart or the higher part of the spinal colom (to cut of the nerves that control the heart and lungs).

most other wounds you can survive. you may be out of the fight but you will survive. with the right medical care that is...

and most handgun use is in a state of semi panic. unless your a longtime war veteran or similary used to be attacked (this is something you cant realy train for). most other people will point in the general direction and only stop fireing when the target drops or one runs out of bullets.
mfb
stumps, i'd have to disagree. "we" don't want any such thing, as evidenced by the fact that whenever the idea comes up, it gets shot down.
Austere Emancipator
QUOTE (hobgoblin)
and aiming for either head, heart or the higher part of the spinal colom (to cut of the nerves that control the heart and lungs).

You don't need to hit the higher part of the spinal column, most parts of the spine will work fine. Blowing a big hole in the spine will instantly drop a human or any other mammal. If you can produce a decent-sized cavity, the head, the neck, and anything extending down from there to at least around your navel in a strip about as wide as your neck, are all spots that are very likely to produce a death within a rather short time period.

Damage to the lower spine might be survivable, even if it takes you out instantly, but if the wound cavity extends in a straight line from the front to the spine, it will also take out the aorta (or the heart, or one of the arteries between the aorta and the brains), killing the target pretty darn fast.

Still, that doesn't increase the target area that allows for quick, reliable kills by a whole lot. You're basically right.
Austere Emancipator
QUOTE (mfb)
stumps, i'd have to disagree. "we" don't want any such thing, as evidenced by the fact that whenever the idea comes up, it gets shot down.

Also, I think the players' enthusiasm would quickly wane once all the troll gangers start carrying automatic shotguns that do 20D, -1/meter.
hobgoblin
the term "fine red mist" comes to mind...
lorthazar
To tell the absolute truth you can one shot kill hitting nothing more that the palm of a hand, the fleshy part of the shoulder, the foot, or any other noessential area. Shock can happen with very minor wounds and can incapacitate then kill a person in short order.
Kagetenshi
And by the same token you can perform a one-hit kill with a piece of relatively stiff paper. Admittedly it involves waiting for gangrene to set in and reliance on them not having access to sanitary conditions or medical treatment…

~J
Arethusa
Clearly, paper is not realistically lethal in SR. I demand the rules be fixed.
Ol' Scratch
You would. nyahnyah.gif
hobgoblin
QUOTE (lorthazar)
To tell the absolute truth you can one shot kill hitting nothing more that the palm of a hand, the fleshy part of the shoulder, the foot, or any other noessential area. Shock can happen with very minor wounds and can incapacitate then kill a person in short order.

i know its known to happen, but if you want to do it reliably (and if your doing sniper duty then thats what your after) you will aim for a known vital area of the person.

basicly when shit like that happens its equal to stageing to D and the other guy failing to stage it back down.
Ol' Scratch
QUOTE (hobgoblin @ Nov 14 2004, 12:15 AM)
basicly when shit like that happens its equal to stageing to D and the other guy failing to stage it back down.

Isn't that usually how it goes for a one-shot kill? smile.gif

If you staged it up to Deadly purely on your skill test alone, you did hit a vital area.. no question about that. Now if it came from various situational things, like the target having a Low Tolerance to Pain (does anyone ever take that?) and a Body so low that he Rule-of-Oned his Damage Resistance Test, and you only scored one success on your skill test... that would probably mean you hit a worthless spot on your target and he just died from the shock of how incredibly lame he was.

Same could probably be said if you only scored one net success after the target's Dodge Test but utterly failed his Damage Resistance Tests against your FA burst or something, too. I dunno. In any case, it's going to be pretty rare.
Kagetenshi
Interesting thing about Low Pain Tolerance: by a strict reading, an unwounded person should be taking +1 to all TNs.

~J
Crusher Bob
OC, the low pain tolerance excuse shoudl like a great IC reason to get a pain editor.
Drain Brain
It's a moot point guys! Because somewhere on the internet there is, floating about in some horrendous gunboy page, the TROLLSTOPPER!

Yes ladies and gentlemen, it's a 3-shot revolver. Yes ladies and gentlemen, it's chambered for ASSAULT CANNON ROUNDS.


What more do you want?

*snigger*
Herald of Verjigorm
QUOTE (Drain Brain)
What more do you want?

Dwarf portable gattling heavy railguns.
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