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From:	Richard Bukowski <bukowski@**.BERKELEY.EDU>
Subject:	Autofire/recoil, threat ratings, and rules.
Date:	Fri, 17 Mar 1995 18:14:36 -0800

Message no. 1 I'm beginning to seriously dislike the digest format, which forces me
to reply in batches...
Perhaps I'll go back to message-by-message...

-------------------
Just to put in my $0.02...

Date: Fri, 17 Mar 1995 13:01:40 EST
From: TLOVELL <TLOVELL@*****.FERRIS.EDU>
Subject: Re: Rules in general.
>Roleplaying is about imagination, about the players trying to imagine
>themselves in the situation that the Gamemaster is relaying to them.
>Of course, some dice rolling is going to be necessary. But to go to the
>extremes and make the game a statistical lesson is absurd. Statistics
>takes very little imagination, only a good calculator and the proper
>equations.

Yes, but it really takes a load off my mind if I have a reasonable
model that I can use to _quickly_ tell if something succeeds
"fairly"... i.e. a method that will give people with higher abilities,
in the appropriate situations, a better chance than others. The point
is not the statistics _themselves_... the point is that, if I can
prove to myself _beforehand_ that a particular method of rolling the
dice has the statistical properties I desire (for example, higher
skill=more success, modifying your action in a certain way has a
realistic result, etc) then I don't have to worry during the game
about making "fair" arbitrary rulings about these events; I can roll
the dice and determine how that particular instance of that event came
out.

---------------------

Date: Fri, 17 Mar 1995 13:01:17 -0500
From: Vincent Pellerin <Vincent.Pellerin@***.GMC.ULAVAL.CA>
Subject: dice rules and threat ratings

>Richard Bukowski writes
>>Response 2: An optional rule that I have been considering for a while
>>now, and I'd like your general opinion on this rule as well. A die
>>with a result greater than 6 counts as _multiple dice_, for multiples
>>of 6 below the actual result. So, for example, a roll of 15 on ...
[ my own text chopped... ]
> We have been using this system for years and it work like a charm.
> It add a bit of randomness, but now a guy with firearm-2 and a light
> pistol can kill someone. As a bonus, the players have more respect for the
> less powerfull oposition, a force 3 spirit can get 8 success on a very
> good roll, so better watch out.

Excellent. I was hoping someone had tried it and would say how it
goes... I'll probably start using it next session. Thanks.

> I have a small question about threat ratings. Do the elementals ofa
> player character have any threat rating (same things for watchers) ?
> In "double exposure" one of the player send an elemental against one
> guarding an area. They had the same force, but the player elemental did'nt
> have a threat rating. I took a fast decision and ruled that the elementals
> use their threat dice only against the mage (or somebody who have dice
> pools).
> Any idea on that ?

My opinion of threat ratings is that they are there to allow you to
make something a threat to the players without having to make everyone
in the game a musclebound, brilliant, tower of intellect. For
example, someone with a body or willpower of 2 just isn't going to be
a threat to a samurai/mage respectively. They are too suceptible to
shadowrunner's attacks. However, you may _want_ the bad guy to be a
stringy, pimple-faced geek who happens to run the Great Empire of
Evil. Giving said bad guy a willpower/body/force of 8 just to make
him survive the first 0.5 second of combat goes against the grain of
having a reasonably accurate reflection of the "reality" of the
character in their stats. Unfortunately a reasonable reflection of
said reality means they die instantly. What's the solution? Give
them a single number representing the generalized "buffness" of a bad
guy. The SR design team called this the _threat rating._
This is the reason why PC's and their direct allies (i.e. non-NPC
things like elementals and such) can _never_ have threat ratings; the
PC is used as the _baseline_ from which the NPC's toughness is
increased or decreased with the threat rating.

That in mind, it seems clear that a bad guy's "buffness" should be a
general measure that applies to them under all situations, not just
when fighting PCs. If the NPC elemental in your situation was meant
to be _as_ powerful as the PC's forces, rather than more powerful, it
wouldn't have had a threat rating. If it makes you feel better, call
the NPC elemental's threat rating "spirit energy." It's pretty much
the same thing.

-----------------------------
And now, the meat of the post...

Date: Fri, 17 Mar 1995 14:27:04 -0500
From: Insomnia <insomnia@*******.CORE.BINGHAMTON.EDU>
Subject: Re: Recoil in SR
>On Fri, 17 Mar 1995, Damion Milliken wrote:
>
>> No, you're not really missing anything. Fiddling with the recoil modifiers,
>> and determining a way to decide how many rounds hit is what we've all been
>> doing the last few days. Your idea is just another slant, with slightly
>> different repercussions. Did you see Rick's suggestion? I think it's pretty
>> good.
>>
> OK, I'm new to this list, so as far as I know someone has already
>posted something like this, but these are the rules I use for
>recoil/rapid-fire:

Okay... Good, another opinion...

> Make a standard attack roll as if firing one shot, then a
>standard defense roll, each defensive success cancels the highest attack
>success (If the combat pool alone cancels all of the sucesses then the
>shot misses otherwise removing all successes just does base damage, but
>extra successes stage the damage down as normal.). If the first shot
>does not hit and do damage then no shots hit.

Sounds good so far... no more dice rolling than before...

> Each shot is figured separately, with appropriate target numbers
>(Thus those shots covered by recoil comp will all hit as the first did
>while others have a number of successes equal to those in the original
>roll with the appropriately modified target number).

Hmmm... It seems to me like this would result in excessive amounts of
damage... Not that that's all bad :)

> EXAMPLE: Troll with a minigun (my favorite): A troll firing say,
>a 10S minigun (15 rounds/turn) with two points of gas venting (-2 recoil)
>shock pads (-1 recoil) and a 9 strength and 7 body (-2 recoil in my game)
>fires all 15 shots at one target. The recoil penalties for each bullet
>are as follows;
> 1-6 none
> 7 +1
> 8 +2
> 9 +3
> .....
> The troll rolls 16 dice to attack, getting : 35, 13, 7, 5, 5, 5,
>5, 4, 4, 4, 4, 3, 3, 2, 2, 2. The troll has a level one smartlink, and
>the target is at normal range, thus the target number is 3. The defender
>has 5 balistic armor... since the minigun is 10S, his target number is 5.
>He rolls and gets 10 successes (good ol' combat pool). This eliminates
>the trolls 35, 13, 7, and all 4 5s, and 3 4s. Leaving him with 4, 3, 3.
>(Twos don't work). the first six shots hit with all three successes,
>that's two _extra_ successes, staging the damage to D. So _EACH_ bullet
>does 10 boxes of damage, PLUS bullet number 7 hits with one success (as
>the target number for that one is four. The next bullet will also hit
>(as there were 5s in the original roll, but there were 3 extra defensive
>successes (those that cancelled the fours.) So the damage is stages to
>M. Bullets 9+ will not do damage.
> Thus our heroic target just took 6 deadly wounds, A Serious
>wound, and a Moderate... 69 boxes of damage!! `Even DocWagon Can't help
>you there, chummer.'

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! <choke gasp>
"That's *GOTTA* hurt"

> This example is of course extreme. The system is actually well
>balanced, and has been play-tested. It also seems to make more sense in
>the game mechanics then the standard system.

I like it... I like it a lot, actually. I'll have to think about it
some more. It seems like you've lost the ability to stage up the
_power_ of the attack (there's no +1 power/bullet thing), and in early
shots at a system that we used, this tended to mean that armor became
_extremely_ effective at stopping shots. Is this actually the case?

69 boxes of damage... Yeesh... That'll really ruin your day... Not
that I think that's inappropriate for a troll with a Vindicator.
Speaking of which, I thought a Vindicator did 7S or so, not 10S.
Or is this another, as-yet-unnamed minigun?

Rick

From:	Robert Watkins <bob@**.NTU.EDU.AU>
Subject:	Re: Autofire/recoil, threat ratings, and rules.
Date:	Sat, 18 Mar 1995 14:03:17 +0930

Message no. 2 Richard Bukowski wrote:
>
> I'm beginning to seriously dislike the digest format, which forces me
> to reply in batches...

What kind of system do you use? Under UNIX, at least, it's easy to break up
the digest... I use a Perl script called (oddly enough) 'undigest', for
some other mailing lists (but not this one, so if hearn.bitnet uses
something different, it might not work).

--
Robert Watkins bob@**.ntu.edu.au
Real Programmers never work 9 to 5. If any real programmers
are around at 9 am, it's because they were up all night.
Finger me for my geek code

From:	Damion Milliken <adm82@***.EDU.AU>
Subject:	Re: Autofire/recoil, threat ratings, and rules.
Date:	Sat, 18 Mar 1995 22:31:24 +1000

Message no. 3 Richard Bukowski writes:

> My opinion of threat ratings is that they are there to allow you to
> make something a threat to the players without having to make everyone
> in the game a musclebound, brilliant, tower of intellect.

I always thought that Threat Ratings were essentially to replace NPC dice
pools, to save GMs the bother of keeping track of dice expended during
combat. The Threat Ratings had the secondary purpose of determining just how
nasty the NPC should be, and the GM could adjust the rating to
decrease/increase the nastiness of any particular NPC. For critters, since
they never had dice pools to begin with, the Threat Ratings only purpose was
to determine just how nasty the critter was.

> them a single number representing the generalized "buffness" of a bad
> guy. The SR design team called this the _threat rating._
> This is the reason why PC's and their direct allies (i.e. non-NPC
> things like elementals and such) can _never_ have threat ratings; the
> PC is used as the _baseline_ from which the NPC's toughness is
> increased or decreased with the threat rating.

Well, actually, since Prime Runners came out, the Threat Ratings of NPCs are
now based on what their appropriate dice pools would have been.
Consequently, there are 4 Threat Ratings, one for combat, magic, decking, and
control. And critters have Threat Ratings based on their atributes (I can't
remember exactly how it works, but powers and so on get the critter
bonuses). Spirits have Threat Ratings equal to half their Force. So from
this I'd have to say that both the PCs and NPCs spirits would have Threat
Ratings.

> If it makes you feel better, call the NPC elemental's threat rating
> "spirit energy." It's pretty much the same thing.

Not really. Threat Ratings give extra dice for combat related tests. Spirit
Energy gives bonuses for the spirits attributes in manifest form, as well as
other additions. The two are quite different.

----------
> Hmmm... It seems to me like this would result in excessive amounts of
> damage... Not that that's all bad :)
>
> > [Example Snipped]
>
> !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! <choke gasp>
> "That's *GOTTA* hurt"
>
> > This example is of course extreme. The system is actually well
> >balanced, and has been play-tested. It also seems to make more sense in
> >the game mechanics then the standard system.

Just how extreme is it though? Lets take an example of a sammie firing a 7M
SMG with a smartlink and enough recoil comp to make a 3 round burst all
target number 2's. Say he rolls 10 dice (Firearms + Combat Pool). He's
likely to get 8 successes. By your calculations he'd be doing Deadly + 4
successes for each round! Even if the target got 6 success on defence, he'd
still be taking 3 Serious wounds! You certainly like your games deadly, with
a capital D. The situation I described is not all that uncommon (in fact
it's downright common), so your game would end up very nasty as far as I can
tell.

> It seems like you've lost the ability to stage up the _power_ of the
> attack (there's no +1 power/bullet thing)

This is because each bullet is doing its base damage, which is then staged
by the successes rolled. Kinda like SRI autofire, but a heck of a lot more
dangerous. Since each round is doing damage separately from the rest of the
burst, then no Power level staging is neccessary.

> and in early shots at a system that we used, this tended to mean that
> armor became _extremely_ effective at stopping shots. Is this actually the
> case?

I'd have thought that armour would play rather a big part in defence. In the
example I had with the 7M SMG, it would only require an armour jacket to
make the resistance test target number 2. Then it's just a matter of who has
the most dice.

> 69 boxes of damage... Yeesh... That'll really ruin your day... Not
> that I think that's inappropriate for a troll with a Vindicator.

Any autofire weapon could do some really signifiacnt damage using this
system. It doesn't really matter who or what it is, if it can spit out lots
of rounds, it's going to cream things.

> Speaking of which, I thought a Vindicator did 7S or so, not 10S.
> Or is this another, as-yet-unnamed minigun?

Unless it's one of the RBB MMG or HMG miniguns (which are not man portable -
although you could rule they're troll portable :-)), then it isn't out of
the books.

--
Damion Milliken University of Wollongong E-mail: adm82@***.edu.au

(GEEK CODE 2.1) GE -d+@ H s++:-- !g p0 !au a18 w+ v(?) C++ US++>+++ P+ L !3
E? N K- W M@ !V po@ Y+ t+ 5 !j R+(++) G(+)('''') !tv(--@)
b++ D B? e+$ u@ h* f+ !r n----(--)@ !y+

From:	Insomnia <insomnia@*******.CORE.BINGHAMTON.EDU>
Subject:	Re: Autofire/recoil, threat ratings, and rules.
Date:	Sun, 19 Mar 1995 17:18:56 -0500

Message no. 4 On Sat, 18 Mar 1995, Damion Milliken wrote:

> Richard Bukowski writes:
>
> > Hmmm... It seems to me like this would result in excessive amounts of
> > damage... Not that that's all bad :)

`Not excessive chummer... Adequate.'

> Just how extreme is it though? Lets take an example of a sammie firing a 7M
> SMG with a smartlink and enough recoil comp to make a 3 round burst all
> target number 2's. Say he rolls 10 dice (Firearms + Combat Pool). He's
> likely to get 8 successes. By your calculations he'd be doing Deadly + 4
> successes for each round! Even if the target got 6 success on defence, he'd
> still be taking 3 Serious wounds! You certainly like your games deadly, with
> a capital D. The situation I described is not all that uncommon (in fact
> it's downright common), so your game would end up very nasty as far as I can
> tell.

Actually, It would be Deadly +3 (at least the way I play) you need one
success to hit, and only got 7 _extra_ successes. Anyway, If you are dumb
enough to not be wearing at least 5 armor where there's a trained guard
with an automatic weapon... Hey you deserve 3 D3 wounds. As I said I
_have_ playtested this system, and it is balanced.

> > It seems like you've lost the ability to stage up the _power_ of the
> > attack (there's no +1 power/bullet thing)
>
> This is because each bullet is doing its base damage, which is then staged
> by the successes rolled. Kinda like SRI autofire, but a heck of a lot more
> dangerous. Since each round is doing damage separately from the rest of the
> burst, then no Power level staging is neccessary.

Exactly.

> > and in early shots at a system that we used, this tended to mean that
> > armor became _extremely_ effective at stopping shots. Is this actually the
> > case?
>
> I'd have thought that armour would play rather a big part in defence. In the
> example I had with the 7M SMG, it would only require an armour jacket to
> make the resistance test target number 2. Then it's just a matter of who has
> the most dice.

Or just wear heavy security armor w/ helmet and Ignore the guy except
knockback.

> > 69 boxes of damage... Yeesh... That'll really ruin your day... Not
> > that I think that's inappropriate for a troll with a Vindicator.
>
> Any autofire weapon could do some really signifiacnt damage using this
> system. It doesn't really matter who or what it is, if it can spit out lots
> of rounds, it's going to cream things.

Why do you think everyone loves & hates them.

> > Speaking of which, I thought a Vindicator did 7S or so, not 10S.
> > Or is this another, as-yet-unnamed minigun?
>
> Unless it's one of the RBB MMG or HMG miniguns (which are not man portable -
> although you could rule they're troll portable :-)), then it isn't out of
> the books.

The actual minigun in question was a hommade heavy-calliber gun. Real
effective.

--Insomnia

--Sleep is for the weak!

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