Calling shenanigans on the double hackbut.

[KestlerGunner]

I've been running a gunslinger for three levels now, and have had conversations with other players about the intriguing features of the class. I'm getting concerned about the potential for abuse that the Gunslinger and the Double Hackbut provides.

If you haven't seen the Double Hackbut before:

PRD:

Double hackbut 4,000 gp 2d10(s) 2d12(m) ×4 50 ft. 1–2 (5 ft.) 2 18 lbs. B and P
This double-length rifle uses a pair of trunnions to mount its barrel into a swiveling mechanism fastened to a lightweight, two-wheeled carriage. It takes a full-round action to set up the carriage. The carriage has a hind leg, allowing the wielder to wheel the device about and immediately prop it for stability during combat. Unlike other two-handed firearms, you must fire the double hackbut while it is mounted, or else firing it imparts a –4 penalty on attack rolls and the recoil knocks the wielder prone. A Large or larger creature can fire a double hackbut one size smaller than it is without its mounting as a normal two-handed weapon and without the danger of being knocked prone, but takes the normal penalty for firing an inappropriately sized weapon.

This weapon is clearly a siege weapon and would be assembled in place for defensive positions awaiting enemies. Yet the assembly time is only a full-round action. And where do we mount it? If we pay a few gold to get a wand of Floating Disk (1st level arcane spell), there is the potential for a magical platform with a siege gun to follow the gunslinger at their command. Either that or Enlarge Person (1st level arcane spell) allows the gunslinger to fire away without being knocked prone. And it's classed as a two-handed firearm which allows Musket Master archetypes rapid reloading with the device, meaning more 2d12 50ft touch attacks.

The big glowy arrow pointing the gunslinger to the Double Hackbut, aside from it's jaw-droppingly awesome stats, is the fact that it's equivalent competition, the double-barrelled musket, has a ridiculously poor range increment at 10ft. If I want a gunslinger with a musket with capacity 2, I have to take a ranged weapon that's almost as heavy with 10ft range.

PRD:

Musket, double-barreled 2,500 gp 1d10(s) 1d12(m) ×4 10 ft. 1–3 (5 ft.) 2 11 lbs. B and P
This musket has two parallel barrels; each barrel can be shot independently as a separate action, or both can be fired at once as the same attack. If both barrels are fired at once, they must both target the same creature or object, and the gun becomes wildly inaccurate, taking a –4 penalty on each shot. Each barrel of a double-barreled musket uses either a bullet and a single dose of black powder or an alchemical cartridge as ammunition.

If we want players to respect gunslingers, we can't have Pathfinder Society agents pushing around cannons inside manors, 5ft corridors and dungeons and on the streets and sewers of Absalom. Right now there's real risk of gun shenanigans coming in with no powers to GMs to say no. Players will want to do it. Go look at the damage olympics threads where a rapid-shot, dead-shot, 50ft touch ac 2-capacity paper cartridging dex-bonus damage +1 Greater Reliable Double Hackbut Gunslinger fires one of these things like it's a gatling gun.

Maths is really not my strong suit, but it's clear to me that a 50ft touch attack dealing 2d12 damage is open to exploitation. Any help with damage calculation would be welcome. One poster recently worked out that the Tarrasque can be one-round killed by a solo 16th lvl Gunslinger.

There has also been some discussion about the double hackbut's potential for abuse as an arcane bonded item for a new wizard. At 4300 gold, it's potentially the scariest arcane bond weapon available.

After considering the power of the weapon, I am asking Mike and the Paizo team to consider these proposals:

a. The Double Hackbut is considered a siege weapon and is not available for purchase for Pathfinder Society characters.
b. The double-barreled musket has it's range errata'd to be in line with the original musket at 30ft.

[Varthanna]

This hardly looks like a siege weapon. Just a gun on a tripod. And its only 18 lbs. Definitely not a siege.

Sometimes there's just an obviously superior choice for weapons. See the Longbow.

Another pic of them

[JoelF847]

Considering that you need a full round action to set up (or you take a -4 to attack and are prone after firing), I don't see the big deal. Sure you can get enlarged, but then you're (or a party member) is using up their own action to allow you to skip the full round action on your part.

Also, I don't think any weapon, firearm or not, could kill the Tarrasque, in one hit or not since it's regeneration cannot be bypassed by any means.

[WalterGM]

KestlerGunner wrote:

One poster recently worked out that the Tarrasque can be one-round killed by a solo 16th lvl Gunslinger.

Not that I deny this, but link? You've piqued my interest quite a bit.

[KestlerGunner]

This is where I read it: link.

The pictures make the gun look like a 150% larger, long-barrel musket. So why is it's damage essentially doubled?

There is little description given about moving the dbl hackbut mount (that has at least one wheel). It may be possible to cart it around without using magic, but my preference would be to carry a wand of floating disk that could operate as a 1hr/per CL perma-mount. No full round, no -4, no prone. Just point and shoot.

I agree that there's always going to be a better weapon, but most of the time when this power-jump occurs it's been seen in terms of an extra d2 on the damage dice, or a better crit rate. Longbows at least stick to the game's foundation mechanic of bypassing full AC.

Here's a less serious, and perhaps better question than the whole banstick issue:
Do PFS GMs see a Gunslinger character who chooses to use a double hackbut as a game-breaking power-gamer?

[Don Walker]

I'm not so sure a Floating Disk would work as a replacement to the carriage. It might support the weight of a Hackbut, but how would one mount it to the disk? And how steady would a disk be when shooting it? If one could mount the Hackbut to a Floating Disk how could one keep the disk from the recoil effect. It seems without further clarification, this would be an interpretation left up to the GM.

Personally, I would rule that the Hackbut could not be mounted to the disk and would be thrown off by recoil along with the -4 attack penalty due to the "floating" disk.

Of course there is also the issue of "directing" the disk. It remains 5' from the caster and no more than 3' from the ground and will automatically follow the caster unless otherwise directed. So who determines what "directing" the disk entails? Is it a free action? A move action? Without further clarification a GM could interpret this as they wish. How useful would this be if the GM required a move action to keep the disk closer than the standard 5' each round?

[HepcatMerkin]

Personally, I feel that the best hackbut idea is to mount an immovable rod on a swivel under the barrel, where the hook usually goes. That way, definitely no recoil, portable, and looks like like one of those shotguns with the forward grip on the rail.

[Lamplighter]

After recently running a musket master through Ruby Phoenix at level 11, I'd rather we just did away firearms entirely... but that's just me. If you have touch attacks at range, frankly an extra d12 doesn't mean much compared to the pluses you're getting from other sources. Besides, early firearms were notoriously inaccurate - sure, they'd go through armor *if they hit*, but PF only models one side of that equation. If they were a touch attack with a -8 penalty to hit, that'd be more in line.

My point: it's not the double hackbutt that's a problem - that's just the icing on the cheese.

(On the other hand, seeing said 11th-level musket master trapped in a wall of fire was interesting... so *where* is your powder horn, exactly? ;)

[KestlerGunner]

Scott - can I ask how many players you had in your Ruby Phoenix tourney game? I played through it in a party of 6, then reduced to 5 for the final 5 hours of the module, and we found the entire thing a massive cakewalk. There were far too many combats where a party of adventurers faced a lone combatant. It was a massacre.
I'm not sure if it's the best module to judge difficulty/balance.

[Alfred Dumplepumpkin]

I wonder why pathfinder has put such a low weight on the double hackbut. In the real world it should weigh around 40 LBS without the base, so easy over 50, maybe close to 60 lbs in weight for all

Link http://www.engerisser.de/Bewaffnung/weapons/Doublehackbut.html

[ngc7293]

Probably because this is a fantasy game and not the real world. If we were looking to do that, we would be playing GURPS or the like

[GuitarNinja]

As I read it:

"It takes a full-round action to set up the carriage. The carriage has a hind leg, allowing the wielder to wheel the device about and immediately prop it for stability during combat."

this is the important bit. it says to "wheel about." That phrasing is specific to a certain kind of movement, ie "to turn or cause to turn on or as if on an axis." So it's not saying you can move around with the Hackbut while it's set up. It's saying you can turn/pivot it around. In place.

So it means, once you've set it up as a full round action, you need to break it down (presumably another full round action) before you can move it around again. The wheeling about bit is to imply that you aren't restricted to a certain facing while it's mounted. you can freely rotate it (mechanically meaning you still have 360 facing, like a normal gun). But you cannot move it while it's set up. And if you look up hackbuts, this interpretation seems to fit with how they actually worked, of course with some fantasy flair.

That said, I'd have some suggestions as well.
1. Remove the 2 capacity. It's unnecessary, and really breaks it
2. Clear up the wording on "wheel about" so it's clear that it only pivots
3. Make breaking it down for carry a full round action, at least
4. Arcane bond is just not very nice for GM's not willing to set limits. I feel like there needs to be restrictions to what can be a bonded item (pricewise)

otherwise, I like it. I think MAYBE stepping the dice down a step could be helpful (2d10, capacity 1 seems alright). As a GM, if a player were using one, I'd restrict them at my discretion from having it available in certain locations/situations. Dunno how you'd make that a rule, but like you said, OP, it has no place in a small, enclosed environment. But like i said, the inability to move it while set up might make it less broken.

[Overthinker]

I don't know, I still think the cannon is stronger. A level 3 musket master with enlarge can deal 6d6 in a 30 foot cone every round with blast shot. Of course that pales in comparison to the whip. With the whip feats, enlarge and lunge you get a reach of 30 feet. Add great Cleave and you just killed the entire mob of angry villagers surrounding you with a flick of your wrist!