In a discussion with my players, I found that there is a rules problem that my players are dissatisfied with, and we were throwing around ideas on how to resolve it.
The issue: There are two ranged weapon skills that are grossly similar: Beam Weapons and Kinetic Weapons. Both skills use similarly shaped weapons and targeting skills, and, as a key point, once you add in a smartlink, both skills are functionally reduced to "line up reticule on target and shoot", with the weapon's computer doing the heavy lifting of ballistics/atmospheric scatter. Add in Gunnery as an additional issue and things got even worse with internal consistency, with my player arguing that, with the computational resources available in the setting and computer aided firing solutions, why wouldn't all ranged weapon skills basically become Gunnery?
It's gotten bad enough with drone combat; the player, in an effort to point out the absurdity of the system with Gunnery and remote piloted drones, had his PC fork and sleeve into a Xu-Fu. The fork relinquished control of his gun arm and used Gunnery to fire a vehicle mounted laser, while the original in the vehicle used Gunnery to fire the Xu-Fu's gun. (My PCs have been challenging the base assumptions of the system mechanics already; the system, I've noticed, is designed around infantry and light cavalry (small and medium vehicles), and they've just been adding more and more weapons and armor to their GEV to the point that it now, IMHO, qualifies as a legitimate military target).
So, to resolve this issue, we shot around and discussed various hypotheticals and what ifs. What we have as a working concept for a house rule at the moment and I wanted to run it by the forum first for side effects and rules consequences that I've not noticed.
Gunnery: Only applies for weapons that are vehicle mounted and of sufficient size to qualify for heavy weapons and crew serviced weapons status that are either vehicle or emplacement mounted; these weapons are so large that the difference in scale becomes a difference in kind, due to the differences in tracking, reloading and other such factors. Examples would be a tank mounted railgun or plasma rifle main gun--I used the examples of vehicle-mounted weapons in games such as Halo and Mass Effect, which have fundamentally different handling and firing characteristics than the infantry weapons used elsewhere in the games.
For times when directly controlling a drone--not jamming it--instead of using Gunnery, the character uses either Beam Weapons or Kinetic Weapons, as appropriate, and a specialty in "Remote Control" in the relevant weapon applies.
Beam Weapons/Kinetic Weapons: Due to the similarities in "line up and shoot" training, when and only when the character has computer aid in the form of a smartlink and data, instead of gaining the +10 bonus, they may instead choose to use the higher of the two skills, regardless of the actual weapon type, as the computational aid allows for the character to put the reticule on target and fire. When the character does not have computational aid to help deal with the indiosyncracies of the weapon's firing characteristics, they must instead use the skill that actually applies to the weapon. (Rough quote: "Why should my skill be lower when I have a smartlinked kinetic weapon with a reticule as compared to a beam weapon? It's the same skill--just line it up and shoot. Yes, you had atmospheric and gravitational effects on the firearm, but you can write up a program that can compensate for that in real time in real life now.")
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"Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch. Liberty is a well-armed lamb contesting the vote." -Benjamin Franklin
- All pre-existing weapon skills (except for Gunnery) are replaced with 3 categories: Pistols, Longarms, and Big Guns.
- Your skill with a weapon category provides a modifier on your skill roll, which is Gunnery. Shooting someone comes with a Smartlinked weapon is as simple as "put reticule over target, think 'fire' at the right time"; compensating for drop, drag, wind, etc. is handled for you. Note that this only applies to Smartlinked weapons, and replaces their blanket +10 modifier.
- Before making the Opposed Gunnery roll, you may first roll your ability with the appropriate weapon category; the result of this will affect the target score for the aforementioned Opposed Gunnery roll. This represents knowing how to handle the recoil, how to properly hold it in the first place, and actual aiming ability; your Smartlink will always do a better job if you're actually aimed at the guy's head!
- Different firing modes cause modifiers to your Gunnery test:
- Semi-auto: second shot is at -10.
- Burst: blanket -20, second burst is at -40.
- Full-auto: blanket -30.
- For the sake of balance, Gunnery cost twice as many CP per point as normal (meaning it costs 4 per point over 60).
- When Jamming a bot, the rules remain unchanged; treat it as though you were using a regular Smartlinked weapon.
For example: Shooter with a COO of 20, a Longarms skill of 50, and a Gunnery skill of 50 wants to fire full-auto at a target. Target with a Fray of 60. Shooter rolls his Longarms first, and scores a 09, a MoS of 41, rounded to 40. He's rolling against a base of 50 for his Opposed roll, plus 40 for his earlier success, minus 30 for it being full-auto, for an end target of 60. Target rolls a 28 for his Fray/2, and Shooter rolls 45, meaning the burst connects. Result! Later, Shooter tangles with Target again, but by now he's down to a sidearm. He's had enough of Target, and wants to end this quickly. He stops to aim (+10), and unloads 2 carefully placed rounds. He elects to allow the computer to do most of the work, and forgoes the usual Pistols test. Shooter rolls his Gunnery + 10, for a target of 60, and gets a 04. Target rolls his Fray/2, and gets a 29, so the shot misses. Shooter fires his second shot, against a target of 50 (+10 for aiming still, but -10 for it being the second round), and gets an 11. Target rolls his Fray/2, and gets an 88, and, for argument's sake, his head explodes. Thoughts? I know it's a bit weird breaking away from the usual Opposed test format, but it's an idea, at least. I'd also consider making the Pistols/ Longarms/ Big Guns test mandatory, or possibly just mandatory for anything more strenuous than semi-auto fire, to represent just how hard it can be to control a weapon."Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch. Liberty is a well-armed lamb contesting the vote." -Benjamin Franklin
"If Atlas can Shrug and Telemachus can Sneeze, why can't Satan Repent?"