thebluespectre wrote:

I know a guy whose PC uses a longbow, so this is a great PDF to have. I think he's going to like the Smartbow…

Tell me what he thinks of it. I'm a little worried about where it falls on power; I plan to buff it up by putting in special arrows (essentially, it will be able to use any custom ammunition more or less wholesale, plus include features that a bullet is too small to take advantage of). EDIT: I'm adding in some bioware/cyberware. One is a "whiplash tendril" bioware, which is useful because it allows for ranged touch attacks (I have an NPC non-exsurgent async who needs to be utterly terrifying with his Psychic Stab power), and it plays into some of the new melee combat overhaul that I still haven't actually started on. The other is a "Mjölnir System", which is essentially a one-shot very fast jetpack (not inspired by something Adam Jensen does in the new Deus Ex game's trailer, nope not at all, move along). I also wrote up some weapon manufacturer designs, though I think I'll scrap those in favor of focusing on allowing more flexibility in weapons.

I will probably be buffing the shotguns and bows (though we'll see; I'm gonna mess around with bows a little more in my games). I'm adding in cone attacks to allow for dragon's breath shotgun rounds (aka nanite-b-gone), and some energy weapons. I've also added EMP weapons, and I have write-ups on my phone for a "power sledge" (actually more inspired by Red Faction: Guerilla than the Fallout-esque name implies), and a maghook. EDIT: Semi-new version is up. All the tables have been pushed to the end (formatting was getting crazy), and there are new things. I kept in a short thing about weapons manufacturers that I messed around with, though I think I'm going to remove it because I couldn't get it to work like I wanted it to. Cone attacks are not yet fleshed out, but I'll have a "hotpatch" up in the next hour and a half to get some more stuff in. EDIT 2: Patched version up. Also, Eclipse Phase doesn't seem to have any explicit rules for taking cover, at least as far as I can find.

Ah, I didn't necessarily mean that there were no cover rules, rather that there are no rules for moving into/out of cover. I try to use extant cover rules as much as possible. Hopefully people won't be rolling 10d10 reliable; the purpose of reliable is to mimic the tearing quality in Dark Heresy, which I've seen used a lot. It's not a strict drop lowest system; it's linked between the two—at the table, I roll two dice at a time to simulate the effects, then pick the better one. It takes a while, but not so much so to be crippling. Unreliable is something I'm actually thinking about dropping, mostly because I can't think of any time when it'd realistically be applied. Frag rounds in shotguns are designed with the idea that they're 12-gauge shells (I sort of pretend that the shotguns are 20-gauge/12-gauge, but that's not exactly accurate), which gives them ~18mm diameter, while I treat microgrenades/missiles as 25mm and grenades/missiles as 40mm diameter rounds respectively. This isn't necessarily true to canon, but it's why the frag rounds in my shotgun do a little less damage than the respective microgrenade. The blast and cone weapon qualities are intended to simulate different things than the original rules do. I probably should rename them; it'd be easy to switch blast over to "area" or some-such, but it's hard to think of another word for cone. Cone weapons in AUGC tend to be focused on saturation (flamethrowers, EMP blasts), rather than making specific numbers of attacks. They, once again, are Dark Heresy inspired. Whiplash tendril and bows now have more appropriate prices; no bow costs more than Moderate, and I added some fluff text about dipping arrows in toxins (frog bite, anyone?). The party async got downed with some BTX-squared last session, and I intend to let him relive that trauma soon (hopefully vicariously, but you never know). Remember that combat drills require not just the rating, but a number of invested skill points equal to that amount. I've increased them all by 5, because for the most part they were still too low, but I'm also contemplating making them require CP/Rez, though that's added bookkeeping. EMP weapons are intended for nanoswarms more than anything; they start doing 2d10+2 with the pistol, 2d10+6 Reliable for the rifle, and go on up to 3d10+8 Cone 40/10 with the saturator. I'll also be including rules for hardening antennae against EMP, which will be useful for people who still want to have long range radio after close encounters with EMP weapons. A more descriptive writeup is dependent on me getting around to it, but I added some more details after consulting one of my players, a physicist who was very willing to provide advice in exchange for his neo-avian not being referred to as "skeet". I've put a new version up with better prices, slightly revised bow stats (they might be getting a little too much AP), and more, including terrifying rules for radiation poisoning. EDIT: Oh yeah, another reason why reliable is in there is because it prevents the weapon from doing absurd over-damage; shotguns firing flechettes won't ever out-damage a bullet-firing weapon that gets good rolls, but they probably will do more damage than it on average. EDIT 2: I also need to rewrite most of this stuff; the (mostly still waiting to be added) intra-diegetic parts are going to be written by an Ultimate (capitalization?) mercenary (and commentators who have their hands on it, a la Shadowrun), and the extra-digetic parts are going to be written to a higher standard than my sleep-deprived 18-credit hour mind allows, which means that we'll have to wait for my school to let out for significant editing. Akin to other Eclipse Phase books, I'll have a lengthy discussion section, and then separate the crunch into its own section at the end.

Trappedinwikipedia wrote:

The only time that 10d10 would happen (I think) is with an assault shotgun firing full auto, but a suitably tweaked PC could do that 3 times per action turn, which would slow. I like the rewrite of it, the flexibility to switch over to a simpler system in comparatively rare cases is good. I think my concerns have generally been pretty well answered. Maybe something like "torrent" or "saturation" could be a good name for the rule currently named cone? I'm kind of conflicted about the drills, because they make sense, and the entry prices feel about right, but they're a pretty big change to the combat system. I'd probably have to actually get a combat-heavy session or two in with them to really decide. They may not be a problem at all, and they might be a good addition. I really like the radiation rules, the only thing I might do would be adding rules for medichines allowing faster recovery (or making those rules explicit), as they're kind of involved already in the description. All it probably needs is a quick blurb about the halved healing times granted by medichines apply to radiation poisoning (unless you want them not to work on it) The EMP weapons seem pretty good, and sound pretty similar to the microwave agonizer, it might be interesting (but maybe a bit over the top) to give them similar pain-causing rules.

Oh, right. I forgot to do the doubling math (I thought you were talking about actually rolling 20 dice, after the reliable effect is added to ten dice to begin with, because night-time me is not into math). The simpler system should allow for more speed, though it undoes some of what reliability is meant to do (smaller range of possibility, but greater chance of getting good results). Saturation has been adopted instead of cone. Technically, there's nothing to say that it isn't just a rectangle emitting from a character, but in practicality I don't think there's a huge chance for it to make huge differences. Drills are still untested; none of my players had access to the book last session, and I didn't put in any NPC's who were sufficiently skilled with kinetic weapons and had a reason to whip them out. They will likely be tested soon. Expressly forbade medichines from aiding recovery; radiation exposure has a negative impact on nanites. Radiation poisoning is scary, and the levels of radiation that we're talking about are pretty severe (for reference, I doubled the actual doses required for ARS, and excluded the lowest level of ARS from the chart entirely). EMP weapons can now moonlight as microwave agonizers (they actually function similarly, except for at much higher power for significantly shorter pulses). The difference is that unlike microwave agonizers they do not have a roast setting. EDIT: Oh yeah, I've added new stuff. Fire, rules for threshold attacks (for future additions to EMP and firefighting), dragon's breath shotgun rounds, added in rules for variable weapon qualities, stuff like that. Also added the power sledge and the Unwieldy quality (for use with some more dakka that I've got planned). EDIT 2: Firefighting, more threshold attack rules (still not done with the EMP overhaul), the first "fluff" bits with a military strategy guide, new kinetic weapons, hypervelocity/subsonic ammunition, alternate caliber, and more all appear in the fancy fifth release. I need to add in range tables. There are now 21/24 (railguns, amirite?) new weapons in AUGC, and I still haven't put in the maghook (which is a tool, not a weapon). EDIT 3: Still trying to work on radiation for synthmorphs, if anyone has ideas. EDIT TO THE EDIT: Actually, it sounds like modern electronics handle 5-100 gray by default. Hardened electronics start at 1k gray or more, which is the point at which biomorphs will basically be toasted and done, even with radiation resistance. The fluff clearly states that synthmorphs are affected by radiation, so it'll likely be something to do with cyberbrain dysfunction. Unfortunately, most of the things I write will not really be realistic for optical electronics, which don't have the same issues as silicon-based systems, but they'll be based around mechanical balance. EDIT 4: No radiation for synthmorphs, but I fixed the TOC up a little, rebalanced some of the new guns, polished grammar and content throughout, added more content to the introductory military primer, and added the Rabbit, a hardy biomorph made for recon and scouting in almost any terrestrial environment. I also added in range tables for the weapons, and an appendix containing "why I put things in", plus a couple of minor additions throughout.

Fixed that. What parts are you using in particular, if you don't mind saying, so that I can know what to focus on? EDIT: I've actually posted a new version with full-sized missile launchers and grenade launchers, as well as flare ammunition and self-launching mini/micromissiles. Talk about smart ammunition.

So I decided to add the Designated Marksman Rifle to the arsenal; a hybrid of the sniper rifle and automatic rifle, it has better portability than the sniper and has burst fire, but lacks the same kick. I also added weapon mods to add semiautomatic fire to weapons that lack it, as well as the converse (automatic or burst fire to weapons that lack it). This reflects everything we know about modern firearms manufacture and trends in weapon stabilization—the main thing that keeps snipers balanced is their need for two hands and miniscule ammunition amount. These are also somewhat pricey as far as firearm mods go, simply because they're pretty hefty rebuilds of the fire control groups on weapons, and for balancing purposes. I also figured I'd make some fancy new ammunition. Defab rounds consist of fast-acting nanites and chemical compounds (they burn out after only seconds) that attack most armoring materials by weakening them. They do little damage (projectiles fired from a traditional firearm do some damage, but seekers do no damage other than reducing armor), but can weaken any targets for *at least* the duration of the battle. Good against armored vehicles. They also affect bioweave or robotic armor implants, which means I should add ways to repair those.

I assume that the PDF issues that were in your original post were resolved? I did actually bump the PDF export settings panel, but I don't think I did things; that doesn't mean I didn't. New version is up. Includes fixes and some content that I was really hoping to wait to push until the next thing (aka tomorrow), but you're worth it.

You're both right. I derped big time and conflated the two rules. Short barrel should do a +5 to the bonus for close-quarters, while long barrel removes the bonus entirely. The penalties for fighting back against attackers are adjusted appropriately as well (+5 to offset the penalty or -10 to exacerbate it).

TheGrue wrote:

Hardly "capable of doing more damage than the pulser" though. The difference between a concentrated pulser shot and a full-auto rifle burst is a mere 4 DV. Is that 4 DV really worth losing the stun setting, halving the ammo capacity, and going from one- to two-handed at five times the average credit cost? EDIT: Just noticed, the Mozambique drill makes reference to the Unreliable weapon quality, but Unreliable isn't defined or referenced anywhere else in the document.

The laser rifle should be possible of doing 5d10+4 or 2d10+4(x2), whereas the laser pulser does 2d10 or 2d10(x2). This is a pretty significant damage hike compared to the original (8 in the concentrated fire mode, 13 in Full Auto versus the concentrated fire mode) and makes the weapon much more effective against light armor). The range goes from 40 to 54 maximum damage, and the EV goes from 11 to 15 for a single shot, 22 to 31 for a concentrated shot, and adds an EV 29 full auto shot. (Full auto is actually less effective than a concentrated shot, but you could get more accuracy than is possible with sweeping fire or do multiple attacks per the full auto rules). EDIT (because I post too early and don't remember to include everything): The Unreliable quality was removed a while back because there weren't any weapons that logically could use it. There shouldn't be any more references to it in the next release.

TheGrue wrote:

SquireNed wrote:

The laser rifle should be possible of doing 5d10+4 or 2d10+4(x2), whereas the laser pulser does 2d10 or 2d10(x2). This is a pretty significant damage hike compared to the original (8 in the concentrated fire mode, 13 in Full Auto versus the concentrated fire mode) and makes the weapon much more effective against light armor). The range goes from 40 to 54 maximum damage, and the EV goes from 11 to 15 for a single shot, 22 to 31 for a concentrated shot, and adds an EV 29 full auto shot. (Full auto is actually less effective than a concentrated shot, but you could get more accuracy than is possible with sweeping fire or do multiple attacks per the full auto rules).

You have it written that laser rifles on FA add +2d10 rather than +3d10. ;) Anyway if that's the intended behavior, I guess I can buy that multi-target capability and flexibility helps offset the rifles significant drawbacks as compared to the pulser.

Oh gosh, I left that in? It's out now. I'd intended to give it a bigger damage buff, but decided against it because I wanted to keep the laser rifle in the context of other beam weapons.

TheGrue wrote:

Crowd-sourced proofreading, yay! :D Love that you've codified mechanics for radiation sickness, a rather glaring omission from the core rules for quite some time. How do Bananas Furiosas interact with your radiation mechanics, numerically? The Radiation Tolerance biomod works well enough out of the box; its benefit as written allows a morph to "survive radiation exposure thirty times as effectively"; take your numbers and multiply them by thirty then? The Radiation Shielding robotic upgrade and Coronal Adaptation trait both describe granting radiation tolerance at a more narrative level, ie "immune for most practical purposes". Should those last two grant blanket immunity to radiation weapons, or apply some kind of numerical "radiation armor"?

I should codify the rules for Banana Furiosas; it drops you down one level exactly, but only once per exposure. Radiation toleration is exactly the 30x, and the radiation shielding robotic upgrade and coronal adaptation both make one essentially immune to radiation weapons (the doses are getting so astronomically huge that you'd be likely to see things just drop dead from the physical damage of being burnt away before the ARS rules begin to apply).