Dumpshock Forums > Missile Parry

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tisoz

Jun 20 2005, 02:37 AM

I always considered the Missile Parry adept power overpriced. After all, how many times do you need to catch a thrown knife or an arrow? It just dawned on me about using it to catch grenades and throw back.

Missile Parry should work against thrown grenades, and maybe grenade launchers if they aren't set to detonate on impact. In my experience, as soon as players (or the GM for that matter) realize you don't really need skill when it comes to grenades (it only reduces scatter) they either don't bother buying the skill at all and default, or put very few points into it. So the adept should be able to get more successes.

Looks like some grenade users are going to be raising a skill.

Wounded Ronin

Jun 20 2005, 02:47 AM

Missile parry *does* work against grenades. Since when are hand grenades not slow moving thrown objects?

EDIT: Also, launch grenades always explode on impact, unless they're within the safety range. That's the way launch grenades work. They don't bounce around like in Quake.

Launch grenades also fly much much faster than thrown grenades. If I hit you in the face with a hand grenade, and the grenade turned out to be a dud, you'd probably be perfectly fine. If I hit you in the face with a 40mm launch grenade within the safety range, you'd probably be incapacitated.

mfb

Jun 20 2005, 02:56 AM

if not dead. you can shoot a 40mm paint round through a half-inch of plywood at 50 yards. even so, if you can catch/block arrows, you should be able to catch/block launched grenades (assuming they're set on a timer).

incidentally, getting smacked in the face with a thrown grenade is not what you'd call good times, either.

Krazy

Jun 20 2005, 04:54 AM

I'd think that you could catch a launched grenade without setting off the impact fuse because iirc most use a stricker type detonator (has to be pushed in) and not an accelorometer (sp?) which would be more complex. or would it detonate as soon as it stops spinning? but I'll let one of the guys here who has actually seen one say for sure.

weblife

Jun 20 2005, 07:19 AM

You need a smartlink to get your grenadelauncher to detonate in mid-air. You need the RangeFinder mod which is part of a smartlink setup.

According to that, an adept who grabs the grenade before its destination, can toss it away, or back, with little risk, beyond the obvious of stepping into the path of a grenade.

Edward

Jun 20 2005, 09:49 PM

Impact grenades may be catch able and throw able if the detonator is push button on the leading edge and not accelerometer based but throwing it to hit the button would be a trick.

Air timed grenades (using a smart link, range finder and grenade link) would be much harder to catch in a useful way, the transit time on those grenades is very low, if it was targeted at you but timed late you can catch it easily enough (if it timed early it blew up before it got to you and thus you have no chance to catch it) but now your holding a grenade with a very small fraction of a second on the clock, even if you hold it for no time before throwing it its going to be moving slower after you throw it and thus explode closer to you.

Also any grenade that scattered more than a meter to ether side will not be within arms reach so you cant hope to catch those either.

Edward

Wounded Ronin

Jun 20 2005, 10:34 PM

Guys....launch grenades are not "slow moving". Trying to catch a launch grenade would be like trying to catch a small medieval cannonball.

Thrown grenades, thrown knives, and shurikens are totally in a different boat than launch grenades.

There's no way I can even imagine an adept who has the ability to catch thrown knives or shuriken remotely having the ability to do anything useful with a launch grenade. That's sort of like saying your adept with Missile Parry should be able to catch antivehicular rockets or something like that.

Fygg Nuuton

Jun 20 2005, 11:09 PM

QUOTE (Wounded Ronin)

That's sort of like saying your adept with Missile Parry should be able to catch antivehicular rockets or something like that.

But we can all agree how awesome that would be

mfb

Jun 21 2005, 12:07 AM

a launched grenade is moving fast compared to a thrown grenade, wounded ronin, but consider that an adept with this power can also catch an arrow. arrows aren't what you'd call slowpokes either, but an adept with this power can catch them. i don't think it's unreasonable to allow an adept to catch a launched grenade, based on that.

FrostyNSO

Jun 21 2005, 12:29 AM

An average Arrow velocity is around 90m/s, whereas an M203 fires a grenade at about 75m/s.

Now a high-velocity grenade launcher will have a much higher speed. Those I would say an adept can't catch, but a low-velocity M203 I'd give.

tisoz

Jun 21 2005, 01:46 AM

I have a character that likes the MGL6. What kind of damage code would the fired grenade generate under the 5 meter minimum range?

mfb

Jun 21 2005, 02:03 AM

argh. i hate that goddamn gun.

offhand, i'd say 6M stun.

SpasticTeapot

Jun 21 2005, 02:35 AM

What would the TN be if someone wanted to try hitting back a grenade with a tennis raquet?

FrostyNSO

Jun 21 2005, 02:36 AM

Or a baseball bat?

FrostyNSO

Jun 21 2005, 02:38 AM

Off-handedly, I'd say pretty hard.

You figure it's pretty damn hard to hit a 90 mph fastball...like, damned damned hard.

So a 240+ mph grenade would be two and a half times as hard?

mfb

Jun 21 2005, 02:38 AM

i figure if a grenade is coming at you with a trajectory that's within your strike zone, you're better off just letting it pass. it's not like you can tell whether or not the damn thing is set to detonate on impact (and most of them are) even when the grenade's sitting still. and if it's in your strike zone, you're probably not going to be inside the radius when it goes off unless there's a wall behind you.

Wounded Ronin

Jun 21 2005, 02:46 AM

QUOTE (mfb)

argh. i hate that goddamn gun.

offhand, i'd say 6M stun.

Is being pegged by a grenade launcher going to result in stun if falling results in Physical?

Then again, the SR damage codes as written are borked because a mace won't do physical unless it has tiny spikes. If it's studded, then that's apparently not worthy of physical damage.

FrostyNSO

Jun 21 2005, 02:49 AM

QUOTE (mfb)

Well I would have to say it depends on whether you are ahead or behind in the count. Of course the catcher and the umpire could provide reflected blast so that has to be taken into account.

mfb

Jun 21 2005, 02:50 AM

realistically, a launched grenade would probably do physical. but then, as you noted, so would a mace. or a baseball bat.

i'd love to continue the baseball banter, but i don't even know enough about baseball to make a joke about how little i know about it.

Shrapnel

Jun 21 2005, 03:00 AM

I've always used the optional "Delayed Grenade Rules" from Fields of Fire.

QUOTE (Fields of Fire @ pg. 79)

Grenades detonate 5 combat phases after firing. During that time another character with an available action (either a Delayed Action or normal Initiative) may retrieve the grenade and attempt to throw it back. Characters must achieve at least 1 success on a Quickness ( 8 ) Test to pick up a bouncing, jumping, skittering, mini-grenade. To pick up a regular-sized grenade, characters must make a successful Quickness ( 6 ) Test. If the Test is unsuccessful, the character is at an effective Range of 0 when the grenade detonates.
Have Fun!

To me, this has always implied that mini-grenades are timed, not set to explode on impact. I've always pictured it like the grenade launchers in some 1st person shooters, where you can bounce the grenade off the wall or ceiling, and try to land it where you want it. Scatter can be role-played as either a bad shot, or just a bad bounce. Works pretty well this way, in my opinion.

Now, if you want to have your grenade explode on impact, or close to it, that is what the rangefinder grenade link is for. In the Street Samurai Catolog, it had both the Rangefinder Grenade Link, which could be linked to a smartgun, and the special "Ares Air-Timed Mini-Grenades". They never did give any real rules for this item, besides the cost, so my own personal house rule for this is that it reduces scatter from 3D6 to 1D6. I also like the house rule that the attack roll is only for reducing scatter, and the grenade damage is staged up by rolling half the power of the grenade. This way, grenades still have a chance to kill people, no matter how crappy you throw them.

Of course, seeing as how I'm still stuck in 2nd Edition, I have no idea whether these rules were changed in 3rd Edition. Please let me know if I'm way off base here.

As for the adept, I think he could catch even the air-timed grenades, but it would be tricky. If he were between the shooter and the target, he could theoretically catch the grenade in between, and throw it back. I imagine that the grenade wouldn't go off until it traveled an amount equal to the remaining distance to the target, from where the grenade was caught. So, it might make it back to the shooter, or it might only make it halfway. Just an idea. What do you guys think?

nick012000

Jun 21 2005, 10:21 AM

There are rules for picking up grenades and throwing them back in Cannon Companion. You can stop using Fields of Fire.

Nikoli

Jun 21 2005, 12:56 PM

Ditto that for air-timed. all mini-grenades can be air-timed not with the right 'ware or gear. And, it's basically a spiral fuse. weight, free-spinning on an axel starts at a particular point. Each return to that point equals a certain distance. As GL's are rifled, the shell spins at a known rate, air-timed grenades are basically told to detonate after so many revolutions. (this might be changed to an actual timer given how high-tech the detonator tech is in standard grenades). If you can catch the darned thing before it reach it's point, it can still go off in your hand because the weight is still spinning (ain't the laws of thermodynamics a bitch?), which means the timer is still counting.

BitBasher

Jun 21 2005, 04:10 PM

QUOTE (mfb)

argh. i hate that goddamn gun.

offhand, i'd say 6M stun.

I hate that gun too, I dropped it's conceal by 2 or 3.

KarmaInferno

Jun 21 2005, 04:22 PM

I only allow folks to use Missile Parry on actual missiles.

Shoulder-launched, vehicle mounted, if it's got a warhead and rocket propellant, then go to town. Otherwise forget it.

I of course make no guarantees about your ability to actually stop the forward motion of the missile once you've latched onto it, but hey.

-karma

Austere Emancipator

Jun 21 2005, 04:52 PM

[N/M]

Shrapnel

Jun 22 2005, 02:33 AM

QUOTE (nick012000)

There are rules for picking up grenades and throwing them back in Cannon Companion. You can stop using Fields of Fire.

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QUOTE (Shrapnel (That's me!

))

Of course, seeing as how I'm still stuck in 2nd Edition, I have no idea whether these rules were changed in 3rd Edition. Please let me know if I'm way off base here.

Yes, I could stop using Fields of Fire, but since I don't happen to have the Cannon Companion, that wouldn't be too helpful in my particular situation...

I really like the idea of an actual Missile Parry skill...

Just imagine... You can hitch a ride to the job site, and destroy it at the same time! Makes wetwork all that much easier...

Typhon

Jun 22 2005, 07:12 AM

You say that and I can't stop thinking about Slim Pickens yelling "wahoo" from Dr. Strangelove. man he was totally an adept

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