| From: | "S.F. Eley" <gt6877c@*****.GATECH.EDU> |
|---|---|
| Subject: | Re: npc juice the easy monowhip way! |
| Date: | Wed, 28 Jun 1995 14:35:41 -0400 |
> each finger? (At least they're only on one hand) And what do you do for
> role-playing difference? This is obviously not going to be a pretty wound!
Aaaaaarrrrrrggghhh!!!! _Johnny Mnemonic_ hits the screen and now suddenly
everyone wants to have a whip stuck in their finger.. Sorry, folks, it
ain't that simple.
First, let's take somebody's advice and pretend it's a modification of the
burst fire rules. Then, let's add some semblance of logic and decide that
it's only the four primary digits that are whipped and not the thumb,
because you CAN'T give your thumb the same vector of motion as your other
four fingers -- the thumb's whip would fly off in a completely different
direction than the other four. So that's four weapons.. We'll give it the
burst-fire penalty of +1 for each "round" after the first for the whole
group, for a +3 penalty on the attack. For gunfire that penalty is due to
recoil; in this case, it's due to the difficulty of keeping four lines
together and in parallel by a simple hand-wave. (If they got tangled, it
would certainly alter their movement, whether or not the whips are capable
of slicing each other to shreds.) There's a +2 Reach, of course, but that
may or may not help.
Because all four whips are headed to the same place at the same time, treat
them as one attack. A successful defense blocks not just one of them, but
all four. (Makes sense, if they're only a centimeter or two apart from each
other.) Yes, the damage is rolled separately for each whip, but any pool
dice added to the Damage Resistance tests go to EACH test, not just to one
of them. (You're not trying to dodge just one whip, you're trying to dodge
all of them.)
And therein lies the danger.. Because all four of the whips are being
treated as one unit, if even ONE of the whips has a "clean miss" (the
defender's full defense Pool dice successes exceed the attacker's successes)
then all four whips miss, and the attacker needs to make an Armed Combat
Test against a target number 9 (the usual whip 6, +3 as explained above,
Reach bonus is canceled because the attacker is at his own whips' ground
zero) to avoid getting whipped by all four. If this happens, of course,
the fingerman has four 10S damage tests to take... It won't happen often,
but it's bound to happen sometime, and I predict a short lifespan for anyone
who tries this. (Particularly if they don't have a damn good Monowhip
specialization.)
The entire scenario above assumes that all four whips will stay together,
which is a slight digression from reality. In reality, the whips will get
tangled, or "go wild," or other Bad Things will happen that could ruin the
attacker's day. GM's might want to impose skill tests every time the whips
are used, BEFORE the attack is resolved, to see if the fingerman manages to
keep control. Hope he stays lucky.
ONE FINAL NOTE: All this talk about "egg-topping" people, slicing through
floors, etc. with monowhips is grossly inaccurate. Shadowrun monofilament
whips are nasty, but not THAT nasty. A 10S damage code is nowhere close to
slicing someone in half.. Remember that Barrier Ratings double against
them, so they're good at slicing but not really that good at penetrating
hard materials. If monofilament was as unilaterally lethal as some people
seem to think, corps wouldn't need so many guards; they'd just web the
corridors with the stuff every night and pick up the pieces of shadowrunners
in the morning.
Blessings,
_TNX._
--
Stephen F. Eley (-) gt6877c@*****.gatech.edu )-( Student Pagan Community
http://wc62.residence.gatech.edu| "Don't take life too seriously.
My opinions are my opinions. | You will never get out of it
Please don't blame anyone else. | alive." -- (Unknown)
