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Can they fire single shots are a number of rounds from 1 up to there listed RoF for Auto/full auto and also aim those at individual targets as part of a single action? Example would be the Liberataor Minigun and a PMG-1 Pulse Machine Gun both interface Zero weapons, both only have Auto fire. Does Auto Fire require you to shoot the full Rate of Fire RoF? And is it possible to aim these shots with one action at multiple targets are do you have to use the Suppressive Fire Rule for that?
Per SWADE (this is the last entry under Range Attacks on page 93): "Unless a weapon says otherwise, a shooter can fire less shots than his weapon’s maximum Rate of Fire."Quote:
Originally Posted by Blackwolf
So RoF is the number of rolls you make for that Action (keeping in mind you have have up to 3 actions). ROF 3 gives you the following on one Action
1. You can just shoot 1 time, or 2, or all 3 (2 and 3 trigger the recoil penalty)
2. If you do 2 or 3, you select targets and roll. You can then assign results after the rolls (so if you shoot at A, B, and C and only hit once, you can choose who to assign it to. If you hit twice, you have to assign the dice to 2 of the targets)
3. Suppresive fire is lay down the template and do one shooting roll (range, recoil unless Rock and Rock, factor in). If you hit", everyone under the template is Distracted. If you get a raise, up to the RoF people under the template are hit. So I think you could so a "Suppressive Fire RoF 2" if you have a RoF 3 weapon to save ammo (SF is very ammo intensive). Note that cover and such may impact who it hit after you get the main roll done.
I get that this seems to make weapons with high rates of fire are the auto fire ability way to Over Powered then? No penalty to Target additional targets in a Action beyond the first and able to fire up to 6 shots in an single action with only the recoil penalty of 2 which can be compensated for fairly soon in game. Of course other Modifiers can and may apply but would also to any other shot.
Is that really how it was intended? and there or some weapons that have auto fire with no recoil penalty like the PMG-1 Pulse Machine Gun a Laser weapon RoF 5.
So I can use that PMG-1 Pulse Machine Gun fire at 5 separate targets in a single action(no recoil for the laser) short range(50) and no other modifiers and other than the high ammo use have 4s to hit? and not have to use the Suppressive Fire Rule? wow stick a laser site on it and add a smart gun Link for a +2.
Bigger weapon, more weight. And more dice to trigger a Crit/Fail/Innocent Bystander. For multiple targets, keep in mind range and cover for each of them (and they should be using cover!).
Crit/Fail: If the Wild Die is a 1 and overall more than half are 1s bad things happen (so if you are rolling 5 dice including the Wild Die, if you get 3 ones (including the Wild Die) its a critical failure).
Also Innocent Bystander Rule. If you use ROF2+, then any 1 or 2 on the shooting die (dice) that misses (basically if you do not use the Wild Die to change the miss to a hit) can, if GM feels its a appropriate, hit a non-enemy. So if the squad closes ahead and the gattling laser opens up its going to hit a lot of people, both good guys and bad guys.
Full auto with a Improved Rapid shot gets EVERYONE into the fun.
Finally, be sure to enforce ammo and encumbrance if you feel the heavy gun guy has it too easy.
Interface Zero 2.0 was made for SW Deluxe. Automatic Fire was a rule in Deluxe that was removed in Adventure Edition. In Deluxe a weapon could be fired either in single shot, TRB if available, or Automatic Fire if available. When using Automatic Fire, you'd have to use the full RoF, and all at the same time (i.e. no movement between shots). In Deluxe you could only make one shooting attack per weapon per turn.
In Adventure, weapons can fire up to the max RoF edit: each shooting action unless the weapon states otherwise (bottom of p93 of SWADE). For an example of minimum RoF weapons, see p75 of SWADE, the machine guns blurb notes the minimum RoF. The laser weapons blurb on p76 of SWADE notes that laser weapons don't typically have recoil, except the gattling laser because it's so big it needs a tripod to avoid recoil. The modern machineguns blurb in SWADE also notes that most are either Snap Fire or cannot be fired until the shooter has deployed the bipod/tripod.
You can take those rules and add them to your game, or tweak weapons/items in other ways. SW is very open like that. Also don't be afraid to throw in extra difficulty modifiers if the situation warrants it, or disallow actions/items because of common sense/balance. If a character wants to put five separate shots at individual targets in opposite directions, I'd penalise it or outright disallow it.
When characters split fire, they run the risk of not killing targets, because shots are assigned to targets before rolling damage. They can fire six separate shots at six separate targets, but that means only one successful shot can go into each target. The enemies that aren't killed/shaken are free to act at full effectiveness.
Suppression fire is not meant to kill targets (if it does, it's a nice bonus). It's meant to inflict Distracted, giving a -2 penalty to all trait rolls, which seriously hampers return fire and makes it easier to use Tests on them to make them Vulnerable (+2 to hit them) and possibly Shaken, or prevent enemies from recovering from Shaken and lock them down.
Ok that's what I was missing the new rule restriction on weapon RoF to the old sets Rate of Fires. thanks I didn't even think to look at the SWADE Weapons Tables to see what RoFs they had. Now to explain that to the players, I was allowing them to use a medium template to target any in that are a line of targets as long as each new one would be partially covered by the small template and add a +1 to the shooting roll for every target above the first.
#2
Today, 06:06 PM
Here is what the official forums think.
Originally posted by 8lackw0lf View Post
For weapons with rates of fire with 2 or higher you may assign that many shooting die to each separate target (nothing about penalties for multiple targets) wild cards roll their wild die too and then assign the dice. So someone with a High rate of fire weapon like the Minigun(7.62mm) RoF 5 could fire at 5 separate targets all spread out over say a large template using a laser sight+1 Ranges for this gun or 30/60/120 damage 2d8+1 AP2 so possible to get the drop at short range but lets say a multi action penalty of -2 as he wants to shoot again for any still standing. doesn't this allow people to side step the suppressive fire rule?
Let me break this down.•Firing more than 1 shot triggers Recoil, which is –2 to your Shooting roll, unless you're on a bipod, tripod, etc. or have Rock and Roll! Also, if you're carrying this beast, even if you have Rock and Roll!, you're Encumbered, since even Strength d12 is Encumbered by a rig weighing 170 lbs. (85 for the gun, 85 for the harness). So you could be at up to –4 before you even pull the trigger once. If you're emplaced, then good on you, I guess! Still, firing twice in the aforementioned worse case scenario puts you at –6.
•Good luck ambushing someone for the Drop, given the size and weight of the rig. You'd be loud moving around in such a rig. Even at the tail end of short range, I might apply a penalty to any Stealth rolls if this is on the fly. A good plan and a bipod or tripod would get around this though.
•On Suppressive Fire, I wouldn't say it sidesteps it, as your just shooting folks doesn't cause the Distracted condition.
Honestly, your minigun scenario, if set up as an ambush with a tripod, bipod, etc., puts you in a situation where you'd have superior equipment, planning, and positioning, so it's all about the intent here. Just wanna murder folks? Fire away. Wanna keep people thinking about staying out of an area to cover your fellow heroes and allies? Then use Suppressive Fire.
I hope that helps!
Keep in mind he didn't take into account that I would have had this weapon on a tripod Negating recoil and the Strength penalty as the ammo would have been on the ground using it as a crew served weapon. So at most a multi action and medium range penalty of 4 with a laser site+1 and trademark weapon+1(customizing Raises cost to weapon x3-5).
I can never see a reson to use the suppressive fire rule now.
Suppressive fire is a method to support the rest of the squad. It allows others to attempt actions while the other side is keeping their head down (ie, Distracted). What you just said you could say for Tests and Support - why would I ever do it if I could just kill them? Well, maybe you are not trying to kill them. Suppressive fire creates tactical options. You might not use it all the time, but someone that is built for it can do things other than just do the same thing every round.Quote:
Originally Posted by Blackwolf
Suppressive Fire isn't about killing people in SWADE. It's to inflict Distracted, a -2 penalty to all trait rolls (that's all abilities and all skills), which is a massive debuff if you land it. Enemies can't resist this Distracted with an opposed roll, or by high toughness. It's most useful when you have tough enemies you'll struggle to kill but aren't that hard to hit, or there a lot of enemies in a tight space and you want to severely reduce their effectiveness.
If you happen to hit someone while suppressing, nice. Suppressive fire can Distract as many enemies that can fit under a medium blast template, and you can do it on the move with a ROF 3 submachine gun, you don't need that ROF 5 minigun, a reinforced spine and an ammo trolley. Suppressive Fire can only hit as many targets as your ROF, and only on raises.
Suppressive Fire isn't a direct replacement for shooting a high ROF gun, it's a different action with a different intention and result. It's an option that has its own niche, like Aim, like Support actions and Test actions.
Shooting
I figured I would break down how I would handle Shooting step by step. I'm using SWADE rules. Holy hell this is long, strap in.
I'm assuming the character is a wild card with shooting D8, has no relevant edges, is using a SAW (5.56mm), DMG:2d8 AP:2 ROF:4 Ammo: 200, with a bipod and red dot sight (+1 short range). I'm assuming the character is not encumbered and meets the min strength for the SAW.
I'm assuming the combat starts with the character out of position, and they'll have to move to fire.
From now on, when I say "I", I'm referring to the character.
I start my turn by declaring ALL of my intended actions, to work out the multi-action penalty (MAP). A character can perform up to 3 actions a turn. Performing two actions incurs a -2 MAP to BOTH actions. Performing three actions incurs a -4 MAP to ALL actions. Note that the MAP applies even if those actions are subsequently not performed, i.e. if it relied on an earlier action or is no longer appropriate, not performing a declared action doesn't retroactively decrease/remove the MAP. Free actions do not incur or suffer a MAP. Free actions don't generally use one of a character's potential three actions, but it's up to the GM to decide if a character is doing too much to fit into a single turn.
If you don't declare an action at the start of turn, too bad. If you're a nice GM you can let them get away with it once or twice, but start enforcing it soon so they get used to it.
Turn 1
Declare my actions. I'll move up to my pace to get into a shooting position (free action to move up to pace), drop prone (free action), deploy the bipod (1 action), shoot (1 action) and shoot again (1 action). That's three actions and two free actions, so the MAP is -4.
Turn 1 Shooting Action 1
I'll assume there's 6 enemies in total, all within short range, two are in the open, two are in light cover (-2) and the final two are in medium cover (-4).
The SAW has ROF 4, with a minimum ROF 2. For each point of ROF I use, I get one Shooting die. Normally, shooting with a ROF 2 or more incurs a Recoil penalty (-2), but I've deployed the bipod, choosing to suffer the bigger MAP this turn to make Recoil easier to manage in subsequent turns. Seeing as I'm starting full on ammo and don't need to conserve it, I use the full ROF 4 so I will have 4 Shooting dice for this action.
Before rolling, I declare how many of the ROF 4 shots I'm putting into each possible target. I chose to split it up, one each for the two enemies in the open and one each for the two enemies in light cover. This means that even if I have an amazing stroke of luck and somehow all the dice roll high enough to hit the enemies in medium cover, I can't reassign the shots after seeing the results. Likewise, if I targeted the two enemies in medium cover with two shots each, but then rolled poorly, I can't reassign shots to the easier targets. If I assign all four shots into the one target because I REALLY want him dead, even if I hit with all four, I can't reassign them to others after rolling.
I then roll all 4 Shooting dice, d8s because my character's Shooting is d8, plus a d6 as I'm a wild card.
The d8s roll 14 (an 8 that aced then 6 = 14), 6, 2 and 5 .
The wild die is 6 (aces), then 3 = 9. The wild die can substitute for one of the Shooting dice, so I'll swap it for the 2.
Final results are 14, 6, 9, 5.
I then assign those rolls in whatever order I like to the targets, but I have to respect what I declared earlier, one each into the enemies in the open and one each to the light cover enemies.
The base Target Number (TN) to succeed is 4, then modifiers apply. You could work out the TN + modifiers at any point in this process.
This is my quirk, but I use modifiers to shift the TN, rather than to shift the dice rolls. I find it's easier and more exciting to give a player what they would need to roll to succeed before they roll, rather than calculating modifiers to each die.
For the enemies in the open, the base TN would be 4, a -4 MAP, no recoil (thanks bipod), +1 for red dot at short range. Like I said, I shift the TN, so I would take the TN 4, +4 MAP -1 Red dot = TN 7. I know the enemies in light cover would be a further -2 modifier, so I add +2 to the TN I just worked outTN 9 to hit the guys in light cover.
Circling back, I can assign the dice rolled 14, a 6, a 9 and 5 to the targets and their respective TNs, in whatever order I like, as long as I stick to the earlier declaration of how many shots into which targets. I personally want the guys in cover dead first, so I send the high rolls their way.
So, I assign the rolls as follows.
Shot #1 14 to Light Cover Guy #1, TN 9, so that's a hit with a raise.
Shot #2 6 to No Cover Guy #1, TN 7, miss.
Shot #3 9 to Light Cover Guy #2, TN 9, hit.
Shot #4 5 to No Cover Guy #2, TN 7, miss.
For the sake of brevity, I'll skip rolling damage. I can't swap shots to other targets, or take damage meant for one shot and apply it to another. If I don't even shake Light Cover Guy #1, I can't reassign the shot at Light Cover Guy #2 to #1.
Resolve damage.
Shooting at ROF 4 expends 20 of the SAWs 200 ammo, so I note that I'm 180/200 ammo. You don't have to track ammo, it's optional.
Turn 1 Shooting Action 1 Ends
If I had movement to spend, I could keep moving, but I don't and wouldn't want to undeploy the bipod now.
Turn 1 Shooting Action 2
Same as before. ROF 4, so 4 Shooting dice. I decide that the guys in cover are too hard to hit, so I declare two shots to each of the No Cover Guys.
Roll my 4 D8 shooting dice, plus the wild die. 4, 7, 6, 13 (aced), and wild die 4. I discard the wild die as it's the same as the lowest roll.
So 4, 7, 6, 13.
Get the TNs, assign the shots against them as I like. The No Cover Guys are still TN 7. (Base 4, +4 MAP, -1 Red dot = TN 7). At this point I know I've got one hit with a raise, one regular hit and two misses. Because one hit is a raise, I'll take a chance that it'll kill the target and assign one hit and one miss to each target.
Shot #1 4 to No Cover Guy #1, TN 7, miss.
Shot #2 7 to No Cover Guy #1, TN 7, hit.
Shot #3 6 to No Cover Guy #2, TN 7, miss.
Shot #4 13 to No Cover Guy #2, TN 7, hit with raise.
Resolve damage for each shot.
ROF 4 used up another 20 rounds of ammo, so down to 160/200.
Turn 1 Shooting Action 2 Ends
If I had movement leftover, I could move, but I don't so with all actions resolved my turn ends.
Turn 1 Ends
This was using very generous rolls, I could easily have missed every shot with a TN 7 on d8s. If medium range added a further penalty it'd be hopeless.
I hope you can see how much the MAP impacts and how it needs to be applied to all actions equally. It's not a progressive penalty, it applies to ALL actions except free actions.
Having to declare actions at the start of the turn and assigning shots makes splitting fire risky and encourages hard choices. Say you really need to kill that enemy with a rocket launcher before he acts. Can you risk going full auto with recoil? Are you likely to kill them in one shooting action, or do you risk a bigger MAP with a second shooting action? Is it worth deploying your bipod now if you're going to have to move soon? Can you risk splitting your shots into multiple targets?
Negating recoil is a huge buff and the red dot or Trademark Weapon edge are both fantastic precisely because they consistently offset negative modifiers.
It's also worth noting the enemies had very poor cover in this example, which is where machine guns really cause damage. If those enemies had a chance to act and went prone or got into better cover, the MG would be almost useless, especially being so ambitious with three actions. If I was playing enemy force, I would have them sticking to harder cover, going prone, using smoke grenades, moving to a corner to shoot then moving back out of sight (to force the machine gunner to try using Hold and interrupt, or reduce the number of possible targets he has), using tests on player characters or supporting each other to make the machine gunner as useless as possible while he's stationary.
Remember that Light Cover is only a quarter of the target is obscured which is really easy to get there, that's like knee high cover. If you're a GM, don't be afraid to stack up negative modifiers such as cover and illumination, or have your guys go prone (prone does not stack with cover though). It makes Test, Support and Aim actions much more valuable to players, along with utility items like smoke grenades or utility edges/powers to safely flank their cover.