| From: | losthalo <losthalo@********.COM> |
|---|---|
| Subject: | Re: SRII Lethality |
| Date: | Thu, 18 Dec 1997 17:11:48 -0500 |
>Well, TN for a burst is 6, so for two sucsesses, you need 12 dice, sure,
>with recoil comp, you only need 4. But let's take, as an example, say a bar
>owner fires the gun. He has quickness 3 and with defaulting he's got a +4
>onhis TNs, so they would be 8 or 10. Chances are, he's not going to hit
>anything and if he does, it's just the basic damage.
Perhaps I should rethink my position then. Is SR meant to reflect
unskilled people blasting away at each other with guns? No. Does taking
it into account make it difficult to create challenges for skilled people
in hitting? Yes, if you use the same system for both. The game is meant
to reflect skilled characters using the abilities they are trained in,
whether that be firing guns, matrix combat, whatever. Certainly normal
people can fire guns and kill people, and it should be possible, but...
I've *bnever* seen a system that reflected that. Why? Because if the
difficulty levels are so easy that an untrained person can hit, then it's
going to be very, very easy for someone with skill. Result: very, very
deadly system. SR obviously doesn't want that, or there would never have
been dice pools, and there wouldn't be a Body test for soaking damage
*after* you've already had a chance to reduce damage with a dodge.
>Hmm...IIIRC, a single shot from an AR should kill you (5.56 NATO to the
>chest is a Bad Thing!). 8M are not going to do that. A six round burst from
>an AR would kill someone, unless the shooter is really good (and if he
>wasn't, he wouldn't hit with 6 rounds). Even with a TN of 4, the attacker
>needs a skill rating of 4, which is quite a lot (the average cop has 3!).
But if you up the damage on AR with a single shot, it gets incredibly
deadly with a burst or full auto. Not that that isn't accurate, but people
will drop like flies.
>What I've been toying around for quite a while is to *only* roll armor to
>stage doen the damage. Of course, you'd have to increase the armor
>ratings...
This isn't a bad idea, maybe. Allow a character to dodge, then anything
that doesn't avoid, the armor rolls, and they you apply the damage. Of
course, now the Body Stat is not very important...
But this lethality problem stems in large part (regarding unskilled folks,
that is) from what the system is designed to address. It's there to try to
portray combat between skilled opponents, and throwing in things from RL
that fall outside that make it look silly. That shouldn't surprise us.
But I'm prefectly happy with the lethality for firearms, given killing
karma pool, and replacing combat pool with the 1st ed dice pools, I've been
doing this for a few years now. People in my campaigns fear firearms, and
wouldn't laugh at a light pistol. *shrug*
>Sorry halo, but have you ever tried this? Usually, there is a difference of
>2 or 3 sucsesses and whoever gets them at the first attack wins the fight
>(I've never seen two chars in melee, that did no damage over the first
>three attacks).
Yes, I've seen some pretty inconclusive melees between characters of very
similar abilities, in SR. They tended to end with someone else
intervening, usually with a firearm. If I were to run a few mock battles,
I figure I'd see them as rather inconclusive, given pool dice and Karma
Pool. Now, if you go back to Defense Pool and 1st ed Karma rules, things
go a lot faster.
losthalo@********.comGoFa6)7(Im6TJt)Fe(7P!ShMoB4/19.2Bk!cBkc8MBV6sM3ZG
oPuTeiClbMehC6a23=n4bSSH173g4L??96FmT1Ea4@*********************
4h7sM8zSsYnk6BSMmpFNN0393NRfmSLusOH1Whileyouarelisteningyourwillingat
tentionismakingyoumoreandmoreintothepersonyouwanttobecome
