last week was the first session of our shadowrun game. our runners were out in the mexican desert trying to take a armored vehicle and its contents for the nameless corp that hired us.

our samurai blew up a bridge it was driving over, crippling it. my own character a chauffeur (not a rigger) was on a ridge nearby laying down automatic fire from a ak-98 to prevent the driver and his passengers from trying to get out of the vehicle. he was not trying to kill anyone, he was not trying to shoot through a window, just strafe the vehicle with a steady stream of lead while another runner moved in to secure the vehicle.

our problem was we could not find any rules for suppression fire. under the sr3 rules someone could just walk through the automatic fire and kill the gunman if his attacks are not aimed at whom he is trying to suppress.

please someone help us out with some suppressive fire rules. are they in another book? are they house rules? have any ideas?

I beleive there are rules for suppressive fire in the advanced combat rules section of Cannon Companion

Page 106

Cannon Companion, pages 106-107 have the rules for Surpressive Fire.

Armed with these rules, you can set up the bad guys with interlacing fields of MMG fire, for a happy good time.

dam good trick to keep peeps staying where they are, use it alot ( especialy if we have lots and lots of ammo) somethimes its the ony option. Epecialy if you have your back to a wall and no where to go!

torz x

Well, there's a reason that machine guns usually come with external magazines containing belts that hold hundreds of rounds. It's precisely so you can use them for lots of suppressive fire.

You'll note that the length on a belt of ammunition isn't specified in SR3; in theory it could be as long or as short as you want it to be.

So, there's really no reason why characters can't run around with a machine gun and a belt of 500 rounds.

Yes there is wounded. Weight.

and how do you hide it!
but hell i would do it!!

Bwhahahah

torz x

Blah. It's only 25kg for 500 rounds with the canon ammo weights, and I don't think there's a single GM out there who uses both the canon ammo weights and the encumbrance rules...

500rnds of what? Regular ammo? MMG Ammo? HMG Ammo? If I remember right, the heavier MGs take more weight for their ammo, as they take more space in an ammobin for mounting them.

You said run around, not sit there with a gun on a tripod. I'll have to dig through CC/R3R for ammo weights, as I'm pretty sure the heavy weapons get some special rulings for them.

Assault Cannons have special ammunition for them, as do some weapons as big or bigger. Anything up to HMGs, however, fires ammunition which weighs the same -- 0.5kg/10 rounds for regular ammo, 0.25kg/10 for APDS, 0.75kg/10 for (EX-)Explosive. You can take my word on this, I've got my SR3 right here.

There are special rulings for the ammo size of some weapons which have still fire ammo of the same weight, though. These can be found in the Ammo Bin entry in Vehicle Customization in R3.

With 1,000 ready rounds, no less.