I have been so focused on the diplomacy, I forgot about Trixy. Not sure how the Leeunids would respond to Rix having an animal so similar to them as a pet, she left Trixy on the spaceship.
We should probably do all the discussion over here rather than in OOC tags....
I don't seem to have purchased a vacc suit for Olivia. This may have been because I thought they were supplied as part of ship equipment? Are they?
As for normal-clothes-looking bioplas armor similar to what Dr. Rix has, I didn't buy anything like that for Olivia because I really was building her with the concept of somebody who wasn't expecting combat. (She's probably always wondered why we even need Derek.... This is why she hardly ever talks to him.)
If the GM is willing, I could retcon that Olivia was told by the mission organizers that she really ought to wear *something* with a defensive value, and pick up some bioplas or nanoweave or something TL appropriate. GM, do you want me to do this? Or would you rather Olivia realize that Space Is Dangerous the hard way, and dive for cover, vowing later to pick up some armor?
Wouldn't being raised on mars mean she was practically born into some sort of vacc suit? Not to mention the history of working as a mechanic to and from orbit?
All vacc suits provide some armor value. Don't want stray bounces in zero-g killing people at every turn.
Yeah -- the reason I didn't buy a vacc suit is I that I believed she would have access to one on the ship. I can't remember now if the GM told us we would have that; I could dig and see if I can find it.
However, she wouldn't have worn it to the dinner, any more than she would have worn engineers' coveralls.
Olivia - Earthgov supplied everyone with a Space Biosuit. Whether you would wear that all the time is up to you.
You can retcon having bought some Bioplas or Nanoweave armor because you were advised to. Those armors look enough like clothing (or can be worn under clothing) that you could be wearing that now.
ALL - I'm "showing my work" here because it's been a long time since I ran a GURPS battle.
Aster's Gauss Rifle is Piercing (pi), with a DR divisor of 3.
Boomer's Laser Rifle is Burning (burn), with a DR divisor of 2.
Terra's telekinetic attack is crushing (cr), with a DR divisor of 1.
The Ape-Men are wearing Reflex armor, which has DR 12 (pi/cut) or 4 (other).
I'm assuming that all shots are to the Torso, unless you Call your shot in advance.
So, I'm going to have them roll their Dodge, and if they fail, I'll subtract 12/3 = 4 from Aster’s damage, 4/2 = 2 from Boomer’s damage, and 4 from Terra’s damage.
All three weapon types have a Wounding Modifier of 1, so the damage that gets thru isn't increased.
Subtract the damage that gets thru from the Ape-Men's HP.
If they have less than 1/3 of their original HP left, they halve their Speed and Move, which will affect their Dodge.
If they have 0 or less HP left (up to -HP), they must roll HT each turn to remain conscious.
If they have -HP or less, they must roll HT to avoid dying. They make this roll each time they cross a new multiple of HP (-2*HP, -3*HP, etc.)
When they reach -5*HP or less, they die.
If it's ok with everyone, I'd like to ignore the rules for Shock, Major Wounds, and Stunning for now.
Did I miss anything?
So on the flip side...
The Ape-Men are using Assault Lasers, which do Burning damage, with a DR divisor of 2.
Terra has DR 15(pi/burn) / 5(other)
Boomer has DR 105(all)
Dr. Rix has DR 33(pi) / 21(burn)
Aster has DR 33(pi) / 21(burn)
Olivia : TBD
So, the Ape-Men make their Guns roll against each PC, and if successful, the PC rolls their Dodge.
This could be a major slow-down of combat, waiting for each player to roll their PC's Dodge. How would you feel if I rolled your Dodge for you?
If the PC fails their Dodge, the Ape-Men roll their damage. Then I subtract 15/2 = 7 from Terra’s damage, 105/2 = 52 from Boomer’s damage, 21/2 = 10 from Rix’s damage, 21/2=10 from Aster’s damage, and ??? from Olivia’s damage.
This weapon type has a Wounding Modifier of 1, so the damage that gets thru isn't increased.
Subtract the damage that gets thru from the PC's HP.
Follow the results from the resulting HP as above.
Did I miss anything?
I encourage the GM to roll things for me when the roll is required or can be done with no serious drawbacks. That includes dodge. I generally make rolls for the PCs in the Pathfinder games I GM such as saving throws, perception, knowledge checks, etc. I only slow the game down to let the player decide when the PC might see an advantage in doing something non-standard, such as not taking an AOO when one possible.
I know maps can be a chore, but they really help if this is going to be a prolonged exchange. I can help if needed, as I have a lot of map generating software and files I've found on line. I can, if needed, superimpose a hex-grid onto a generic map, if that would help.
We can do it in "theater of the the mind," but if so, it will help to give us some information about the landscape, location of enemies, locations of cover, etc.
So if layered armor is -1 to dex, I presume that affects dodge, which is based on Basic Speed which is based in part on DX.
To calculate Basic Speed, add your HT and DX together, and then divide the total by 4. Do not round it off. A 5.25 is better than a 5!
Dodge is Basic Speed +3 dropping all fractions.
So that would actually lower her dodge
Rix' Basic Speed is (10 + 10 )/4 = 5 so dodge is 8.
If DX is instead 9, that makes Basic Speed = 4.75 and Dodge becomes 7.
Still her preferred defense is Increased Dodge, which adds +2, so her standard dodge target is 9.
Ok, so some more info I'm stockpiling...
Rix's Dodge is 9, when taking All-Out Defense/Increased Defense action.
Aster's Dodge is 8.
Olivia's Dodge is 8+3 on the initial attack, Cover/Prone penalties apply to subsequent attacks.
Boomer's Dodge is 9.
Terra's Dodge is 8.
Did I miss anything?
Aster, does lowering your effective DX by one affect your Dodge?
Also, since Aster and Boomer are firing multiple shots : a successful Dodge roll lets you avoid one hit, plus additional hits equal to your margin of success (in the order they were rolled).
I don't think this will be a prolonged exchange, given the differences between your's and their's damage and DR, but I'll keep Dr. Rix's offer for map support in mind for the future.
Olivia needs to pick her armor before I can proceed.
FYI - I tried searching to confirm that lowering DX lowers your Dodge, and I found several people who claimed that it did, and no one contradicted them, so even tho I couldn't find anyone who claimed with certainty that it did, I'm assuming it does.
So, I checked Aster's numbers, and his Dodge doesn't change.
Olivia - you got an armor picked out yet?
That dex penalty for layered armor is ugly.
I was trying to find if there were options on it as some armors are designed to be undergarments.
I'll make some quick reference modifications to my sheet.
Page 421 of Basic (book 2) states that temporary attribute penalties don't affect HP, basic speed, basic move, or FP, this also includes active defenses, resistance rolls, fright checks, etc.
I'm okay with you rolling dodge for me.
I'll likely also roll a dodge just in case at the bottom of my actions.
So is the DX penalty for layered armored considered a "temporary attribute penalty"? If so, it would not affect dodge, just skill rolls based in DX. That would put Rix' dodge back to 8 and 10 for increased dodge.
I would consider it a temporary penalty since it's based on wearing two sets of armor. The section doesn't explicitly state that armor counts as a temporary condition. It also doesn't state that worn armor is a permanent condition.
But then I'm not the GM.
Olivia will be wearing a bioplas bodysuit, tailored to look like "business casual", i.e. something you wouldn't mind hanging out in, but also something that would be reasonable to go to a dinner in (not the equivalent of black-tie, but below that). On the torso, this gives her DR 18 vs. piercing and burning, DR 6 vs. other damage types.
I also picked up a pair of assault boots, because you want things on your feet, although they're awfully heavy, and both bioplas and nanoweave gloves. (The latter are probably good for engineering and picking up pointy things.)
I'll update her profile shortly.
I probably ought to get a suit of nanoweave or bioplas for Boomer as well; he'd probably wear that when he's not in his battlesuit. (And, since they're clothes-like, he can wear them inside the battlesuit, but I'd assume they don't provide their DR there, since it's a whole different ball of wax.)
Aster - page 286 of the first book says that armor can be layered if the under-layer is flexible AND concealable. And Ultratech specifies that Nanoweave is both. So there's nothing in the rules against wearing Bioplas over Nanoweave, except for the DX penalty.
fnord - that's a thought, having everyone roll a Dodge at the end of their-turn post. But that means I'd have to be constantly scrolling back to see if you did it, and what if there's more than one opponent firing at you?
So, I'd rather you did *not* roll a Dodge at the end of your post.
Olivia - Ultratech p. 174 says that a Bioplas bodysuit provides 15/5 DR - how did you get 18/6?
ALL - I'm ruling that wearing armor is not a "temporary penalty" - there's got to be some down-side to wearing two layers of armor! I would assume that a "temporary" penalty would be due to some in-game effect - a magic spell, a weapon, etc. that eventually wears off. But since you're *constantly* wearing armor...
Not sure... I was probably looking at the new nanoweave table. I'll fix it.
I'd like to discuss the temporary nature of armor. Half our party wasn't wearing their outer layer of armor.
In fact, I think I was the only one wearing it.
The bodysuit is almost like long johns. You can take it off, put it on.
On the other hand, catching a disease that permanently reduces my dex by 2 isn't easily overcome.
That's a lot of math that is going to be changing from one scene to another.
Isn't the -1 to dex skills already a hefty penalty?
The weight of the armor is already making an adjustment to encumbrance, which effects movement.
Now you want to double that penalty by reducing move then reducing it again for the weight?
Aster - from what I've seen, only you and Rix have two layers of armor, and both of you are currently wearing them (altho I had thought to ask you why you're wearing a *spacesuit* when meeting with a new race, I let that slide, since it "resembles a form-fitting jumpsuit").
Furthermore, armors at TL 10 are ridiculously light - both your armors together only weigh 11 lbs, and the "no-load" encumbrance for someone with only a ST of 10 is 20 lbs. And both of Rix's armors together only weigh 9 lbs. So I don't see them as affecting Encumbrance that much - for example, I don't see that your Basic Move has been lowered due to Encumbrance (I'm assuming that you're not carrying your Machinist & Mechanic Tool Kits, Minifac, Doc-Fab, 5000 rounds of ammo, or the 10 D cells and 100 C cells in your inventory). Nor has Rix's.
I don't understand what you mean by "a lot of math that is going to be changing from one scene to another". As a matter of fact, someone on a forum speculated that the "temporary penalty to a Basic Attribute not affecting Derived Attributes" rule was made to *avoid* having to re-calculate your Encumbrance, or Move and Dodge, in the middle of a combat if a temporary penalty was incurred.
...and that's why I'm treating the DX penalty to layers of armors as "permanent" - because you will *always* be wearing them in combat, so no re-calculations needed.
And yes, a -1 to DX-based skills can be pretty hefty, if your skills are average (10-12). But it won't make much difference if they're high (15+). But that's the RAW rule (clearly stated in the book).
And, if it bothers you that much, the answer is simple - just wear one layer of armor! The difference in effective DR between those wearing two layers and one layer is only 3, once weapon DR divisors are applied.
ALL - as I've said more than once, it's been a long time since I ran a GURPS game. My preferred system-of-choice these days is Savage Worlds, where most of the opponents you come up against are so much weaker than you that 1 PC can easily handle 2 or 3 opponents.
However, as I can see by my first two rounds of bad-guy attacks, they're doing way more damage than I expected. I've run into this before in GURPS, when I DM'd a Lensman game. I've also seen it said on forums that a GURPS high-tech combat is usually no damage (Boomer) or insta-kills (Terra).
With weapons that do 4d6 or 6d6 damage (*average* of 14 to 21 HP damage, max 24 to 36), and PC's with HP from 9 to 18 (average 10), and limited DR that's significantly reduced by the type of weapon, I think it's very hard to balance high-tech combat.
So, I'd like to make a major ret-con to the combat so far : have only one Ape-Man shooting at each PC, and the total damage to the PC's is *half* what's been done so far.
If the problem continues, I may implement some house-rules I came up with for the Lensman game, but for now I'd like to introduce one simple solution : Healing patches (TL ≥ 8) locally increase metabolism to halt bleeding and do some tissue repair (but they can't remove bullets or repair deep damage). 1d6 per patch, one action to apply, healing happens at the end of the turn they're applied.
I would assume everyone would have at least 6 patches readily available.
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Thanks for the halfling of HP damage! That means we might survive....
Re: the whole ultra-tech damage being so huge that you are vaporized if anything penetrates DR, I wrote a solution for this once. The problem is that damage is linear in GURPS. If you set things up so that a low-tech weapon does about the amount of damage needed to kill somebody, and armors gets high-tech and better, then the damage becomes seriously overkill if it is to penetrate armor. (I contributed to All of the Above, the GURPS APA, in its last couple of years. We're talking 15 years ago here.) I called the system "pGURPS", because it makes hit points and damage logarithmic (in reference to pH, which is the log of the concentration of H ions in a solution).
What I wrote is here. It was written back in the (waning) days of GURPS 3e, but I think the system works more or less as-is.
It will require us to convert some things -- mostly DR of armor and damage of weapons. But that's a one-time conversion, and after that we can just work with the new numbers.
If for whatever reason you're interested, here are most of the other submissions I made to All of the Above between 1997 and 2002..
rknop - that is an *amazing* system, and goes in a completely different direction than I was thinking of! I will start thinking about it in earnest soon.
Question : how much was it play-tested?
Part of the issue was that you effectively limited us to very light armor (like the spacesuit), but allowed full military weapons.
And if you don't like the damage to armor value, why are you house ruling penalties to armor? (your argument of how little our armor weighs is also an argument for not adding additional penalties... I'd state it was an argument for not imposing the DX penalty!) ;-)
There's still the dozens to hundreds of natives and six Terran aliens, with the aliens getting most of the attention of the ape-men.
You could allow us to have a higher TL armor, and/or give the bad guys lower TL weapons. (You did kinda restrict our ability to get armor to some low end basics.
For instance, I turned on a chameleon surface before firing, in the heat of wildly firing at potentially hundreds of targets running and screaming, I should have been a very low target. Unless they are wearing battle armor with near miss indicators. These coatings should be added to everyone else with armor that will support them.
Page 148 lists typical weapons by TL and need. Page 186 for the armor list.
Another option would be to identify if kinetic weapons are predominant, or energy, and allow armoring to follow suit.
While the table top version can really drag out a battle, pbp already has time built in for looking up and putting together quick reference tables.
Are the ape-men pausing and targeting or firing wildly? They have plenty of targets to shoot at. Many of their hits would probably be misses or randomized.
Where's the security for the king? They are a warrior race that prides show of arms, allowed us to be armed in front of their king, and didn't have any of their own warriors/weapons around?
The fact they managed to get from orbit to the surface without warning is pretty surprising. The natives didn't have any problem detecting our ship.
Many of these questions Aster doesn't know, but if he survives, he'll be asking.
Aster -
The damage-to-armor ratio has nothing directly to do with the DX penalties to multiple armors. And the RAW clearly states that wearing multiple armors incurs a DX penalty, regardless of weight. If you're going to claim that you could get a higher DR by layering, but the DX penalties (*indirectly*) offset that - as I've already pointed out, the difference between 1 and 2 layers of armor DR is only *three*, once weapon divisors are applied. And 3 points vs. the swinginess of 4d6 weapon damage is nothing.
As I've said before, there are more ape-men that are shooting at the lion-people, including the King's Guard, which I am totally ignoring in terms of melee.
I addressed your chameleon surface in Gameplay. Regarding being targeted by the ape-men, I said earlier in Gameplay that "...the Ape-Men may just be kill-happy, targeting anything humanoid they can see."
I can't even remember (and am not going to slog thru pages of posts) if I even offered you the chance to re-pick your armor, but please remember that we started this game with Bringer-of-Stories. As far as I'm concerned/can remember, we had the full pick of TL 10 weapons and armor. So please don't say that *I* limited you to very light, low-end armor. For that matter, Nanoweave and Bioplas ARE the *highest-end* "wearable" armors at TL 10!
(...ok, so I lied, I went thru the first few pages of Recruitment posts. The only things Bringer said was "TL 10" and "As for legality class...so long as you can say (and if necessarily explain) that said character acquired it before game, then it's fine." So no one limited your armor choices, not even by cost - at ordinary starting wealth, you could easily have afforded sealed combat armor!)
As far as page 148 goes, it only mentions *one* laser weapon (para-military/special ops) at TL 9 (the ape-men's TL), while the laser weapons tables lists at least a dozen TL 9 options. And page 186 would limit *all* your armor options to only Nanoweave, while Bringer (and I, for Olivia) allowed Bioplas armor as well.
And, the natives didn't detect your ship, you radioed them a message.
As you yourself noticed, they don't seem to have much hi-tech, so it could be very easy for ships to arrive undetected.
I hope this addresses all of your concerns/issues.
Thank you, I appreciate your time to refresh my poor memory.
I usually tend to try for the best defense i can get and then worry about offense later.
Hollywood requires everyone to push buttons. I'm not sure why I couldn't voice command "Computer, activate MCS!" If I'm being detected and aimed at, my next command would be "computer, activate reflec surface!"
My biosuit has the following options built into its surface:
interphase - allows two suits with this option to merge into one suit. Allows sharing life support and first aid treatment. I highly recommend this for everyone that can get it.
rainbow - change color on request, can become reflec (adding 20 Dr vs lasers and microwaves)
morphware - reconfigure to normal clothing, with rainbow can duplicate most clothing types
multispectral chameleon surface - gives +8 to stealth for ordinary/infrared vision, +4 vs hyperspectral and ultraviolet, +2 vs high and low band hyperspectral, half if moving.
radar stealth - -6 to detection from radar, imaging radar or terahertz radar
scent masking - +4 vs tracking to cover my trail
suit doc - provides ongoing medical care as if physician 10.
Ok, I forgot that at TL 10 voice-understanding computers would definitely be a "thing". But still, there's got to be a limit to what you can say in one second - perhaps two short commands?
rknop -
So, I've done some statistical modeling of your system vs. GURPS RAW.
Using Terra/Olivia (Bioplas armor, Dodge 8, 10 HP) as a target against the Ape-Men's laser rifles (4d6 damage) :
Using RAW, the mean damage per round (including all the 0's when the PC dodged, or damage <= DR) is 5.2 HP. This results in about 1.9 rounds until "death" (HP <= 0), and each shot has a 12.2% chance of "killing" the PC.
Using your system, the mean damage per round is 4.1 HP, resulting in about 2.5 rounds until death, and a 3.2% chance of a one-shot kill.
Altho the percent chance of one shot killing the target is much lower, I'm not seeing that much improvement in damage per round, or rounds-till-death.
On the other hand, using Rix/Aster (layered armor, Dodge 8, 10 HP) and RAW, the mean damage per round is 3.1 HP, resulting in about 3.2 rounds until death, and a 1.9% chance of a one-shot kill.
This tells me that the system is extremely sensitive to DR, since only a 3-point difference in DR made such a huge change in damage/round.
And upping the DR by just another 3 resulted in 1.4 HP damage per round, resulting in 7.1 rounds until death, and a 0.03% chance of a one-shot kill!
ALL - I'm not sure what to do about this. I'm welcome to any suggestions...
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(Question about armor divisors: if you have an armordivisor of 2, and the target has DR 15, does that give the target effective DR 7, or 8? It looks like, from your numbers, you assumed 7.)
Hmm, OK. Looking at your numbers, it actually looks like things are working as designed. That is, if you get hit every round and take 3-4 HP of damage a round, that's pretty reasonable. (That's the kind of damage you can expect to take from a sword, say.) But, the probability of one-shot-one-kill goes down by a lot.
I'm not sure why you conclude my system is extremely sensitive to DR. I'm also having trouble reproducing your numbers. (For instance, where does the DR 3 difference come in?) Here's what I get:
By GURPS RAW:
- Olivia: Dodge 8, DR 15, Dam 4d(2): 5.2hp/round
- Rix: Dodge 8, DR 30, Dam 4d(2): 0.7hp/round
In my system:
- Olivia: Dodge 8, pDR 11, pDam 3d+2(-4): 4.1hp/round, max 13hp
- Rix: Dodge 8, pDR 16, pDam 3d+2(-4): 1.1hp/round, max 8hp
The layered armor makes for more survivability; the difference is bigger in RAW than it is in my system (where the layered armor doesn't help as much). (NOTE: In my system, you can't add the pDR if you layer armor. One way to do it is to add the regular GURPS DR, and then convert; that's what I did here.) Where the difference really comes in is with Boomer. He has DR 50, and since 24<50/2, he can never take damage in the RAW system. In my system, his pDR is 19, and he takes an average of 0.24hp/round, max 5hp. His super battlesuit is still really helping him out, but it doesn't make him completely invunlnerable.
To put things in higher focus, consider somebody coming at us with a 6d(2) laser rifle, which converts to pDam=3d+6(-4) in my system. The damage/round taken by various people with Dodge 8 are:
GURPS RAW:
- Olivia, DR 15: 10.4
- Rix, DR 30: 4.5
- Boomer, DR 50: 0.28
Boomer can now take damage, but is still in OK shape. In fact, he still has a 86% chance of taking no damage. The other two are in trouble, and Olivia is especially screwed.
My system:
- Olivia, pDR 11: 7.0
- Rix, pDR 16: 3.4
- Boomer, pDR 19: 1.5
Olivia is still screwed, which suggests to me that I might want to bump all pDRs by 1 or 2 in order to allow people to survive; on the other hand, you could say that if you're going on to a battlefield with TL 10 laser rifles, then you need more than just bioplas or nanoweave.
Let's go the other way. Consider a 3d laser pistol.
GURPS RAW
- Olivia, DR 15: 2.7
- Rix: DR 30: 0.05
- Boomer: 0 (can't be damaged)
My system: (Weapon is 3d(-4) now.)
- Olivia, pDR 11: 2.7
- Rix, pDR 16: 0.4
- Boomer, pDR 19: 0.05
The design of the system is to keep everything playable when people show up with laser pistols, TL9 laser rifles, and TL10 laser rifles, and also show up with bioplas, layered armor, and battlesuits. Even in my system, the bioplas people are still kinda in trouble. But, the laser pistol stands a chance of hitting the layered armor (whereas practically it doesn't in RAW), and even somebody just in bioplas will survive one hit by a TL10 laser rifle on average (whereas they won't in RAW). Things are compressed together.
(Notice that 3d damage and DR 15 is in the range where my system and GURPS RAW give basically the same results. For 3d or lower damage, and DR 7 or lower (i.e. most medieval things where the GURPS system was originally designed....), the two systems are identical.)
Re: extreme sensitivity to DR, that is more true in GURPS RAW than my system, although when typical amounts of damage are close to the effective DR, it's going to be pretty true in both systems. If you have a weapon that does 3d (average 10.5), then your damage/round (ignoring Dodge) is:
- DR 6: 4.6
- DR 7: 3.7
- DR 8: 2.8
- DR 9: 2.1
- DR 10: 1.5
- DR 11: 1.0
- DR 12: 0.6
These numbers will be true in either system. The reason my system has less effective sensitivity to DR is that the numbers don't vary as much; they're compressed together. Right now, we have people on the field with DR 50, 30, and 15. After an armor divisor, that means that the same shot will do 10 or 18 hp more to the latter two than the first one. In my system, those DRs become 19, 16, and 11, so the additional damage for the more lightly armored people is 3hp or 8hp.
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By the way, here's the code I slammed together to calculate this stuff: gurpsprob.py.
Edit the variables at the bottom of the code to change the parameters. (I'm too lazy to write a command line parser....)
rknop – The RAW says to round DR divisors *down*.
I wasn’t clear, when I said “the system”, I was referring to GURPS RAW.
Also, Rix/Aster’s DR is 21 with respect to burn damage, not 30, so that’s why your numbers don’t match mine. And my example with her was using RAW, not your system. The “DR difference of 3” comes from Terra/Olivia’s effective DR of 7, vs. Rix/Aster’s effective DR of 10 (after weapon divisors are applied).
What is the “max HP” about? Did I miss something in your system that limits the max amount of damage one attack can do?
In my system, those DRs become 19, 16, and 11, so the additional damage for the more lightly armored people is 3hp or 8hp.
Since a pDR of 19 results in 0 damage (vs. 3d6), why isn't the additional damage for the pDR 11 person just 1.0 HP (ignoring Dodge, and with no DR subtraction)? I verified this via simulation...
Also, we both erred in converting the Ape-Men's weapons (4d(2)) to your system, they should be 3d6+3(-5). That changes Olivia/Terra's results to an average damage per round of 5.6, which is *higher* than the RAW result! Adding 3 to their pDR results in an average of 3.4 HP/round.
So, yeah, I would suggest bumping all the pDR's up by 3 points.
But still, most of these PC's have only 10 HP, so they're down in an average of 3 rounds.
So, I would suggest giving all PC's 20 HP.
P.S. - regarding Boomer’s DR, his equipment entry says “Heavy Combat Battlesuit”, and the Ultratech table for TL 10 battlesuits lists a “Heavy Battlesuit”, which has DR 150 – so why do you say his DR is 50?
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rknop – The RAW says to round DR divisors *down*.
What is the “max HP” about? Did I miss something in your system that limits the max amount of damage one attack can do?[/quotes]It's just the dice. If something does 3d+1, then it can at most do 19 points of damage, minus DR.
In my system, those DRs become 19, 16, and 11, so the additional damage for the more lightly armored people is 3hp or 8hp.Since a pDR of 19 results in 0 damage (vs. 3d6), why isn't the additional damage for the pDR 11 person just 1.0 HP (ignoring Dodge, and with no DR subtraction)? I verified this via simulation...
I wasn't talking abou averages. If weapon does (say) 24 points of damage in a given hit, the pDR 19 person takes 5, the pDR 11 person takes 13. That's all I was saying.
Also, we both erred in converting the Ape-Men's weapons (4d(2)) to your system, they should be 3d6+3(-5). That changes Olivia/Terra's results to an average damage per round of 5.6, which is *higher* than the RAW result! Adding 3 to their pDR results in an average of 3.4 HP/round.So, yeah, I would suggest bumping all the pDR's up by 3 points.
Let me poke at it a bit. Rather than just flat bumping, I'd like to grade it a bit. I wouldn't want to bump pDR 1 to 4, for instance.
But still, most of these PC's have only 10 HP, so they're down in an average of 3 rounds.So, I would suggest giving all PC's 20 HP.
That would certainly improve survivability. You could also do things like allow for more generous cover; e.g., if Olivia dives behind cover, she can have complete cover vs. attacks. If she pops her head out to shoot, then it's less so.
P.S. - regarding Boomer’s DR, his equipment entry says “Heavy Combat Battlesuit”, and the Ultratech table for TL 10 battlesuits lists a “Heavy Battlesuit”, which has DR 150 – so why do you say his DR is 50?
Uh.... I will look at this. I may have just failed to type the 1. Or I may have just read it wrong.
Let's also keep in mind that we have light, civilian armor against military grade weapons.
For most of us, we're wearing civilian armor.
Pg 148 for weapons, 186 for armor.
For a TL 10 laser rifle, we'd need at least 6*3.5*2=42 DR against burn to take no damage from half the shots.
That requires military grade armor.
We can simply accept that civilian armor vs military weapons is a bad combination, upgrade the armor we're wearing, or downgrade the weapons we're seeing.
Counting armor as a temporary adjustment that doesn't double penalize active defenses and encouraging a layer of reflec would also go a long ways towards survivability without allowing everyone to wear battlesuits.
Though allowing TL 11 cybersuits would be just fine by me!
Yeah, the problem with adding Reflec is that then the PC's become virtually untouchable against the Ape-Men's weapons, at least by RAW.
Huh - using Rknop's (unmodified) system, it's 1.5 HP/round, 6-7 rounds until you're down, and a 0% chance of a single shot killing you. And the difference in effective DR between Terra/Olivia and Rix/Aster is only 1, so there'd be virtually no difference in wearing one layer or two.
That might work! And no need to artificially increase the PC's HP (altho I might still want to - 6-7 rounds is still pretty small).
(And Aster - since no one's over their basic Encumbrance, the DX penalty isn't being doubled.)
Any other thoughts on this?
Yeah, but I gave these guys a high enough Guns skill that they don't need to Aim every other round. Altho they're only firing once per round, and Aster and Boomer could in theory hit multiple targets every round...
Aster and Boomer - could you please look at "Spraying Fire" on page 409 of the 4th ed. second book ("Campaigns")? It will make both of you much more effective in mowing down enemies...
Aster - in reviewing the material for my next post, I came across this line in Ultratech : "No clothing or armor can be worn under a space biosuit."
So, you *can't* wear Nanoweave and a Biosuit at the same time, regardless of any DX penalty!
But, take heart, the changes I'm thinking of making in my next post will make that point moot...
So, here's what I'm thinking of doing :
Using rknop's system for high-damage, high DR situations. This won't affect you at all, except for the damage roll to your weapon, which I will tell you. I can tell you your new DR's if you're interested, but I'm the one who'll be using them.
Allowing everyone (except Boomer) to have had Reflec sprayed on to their armor. This would not count as a "layer" of armor. This doesn't cost you anything.
Changing base HP to HT + ST/2 (I know it's ST in 4th ed., I just think HT makes more sense). Whichever one is used as the base does not affect Rix or Aster, and this formula benefits Olivia and Terra (I'm ignoring Boomer because of his armor). This basically increases everyone's HP by 50% (I will not be using rknop's HP conversion), for longer combat survivability.
The "two-layers of armor is a permanent DX hindrance" rule is still in effect, but by using rknop's rules, the difference in DR between Bioplas+Reflec and Bioplas+Nanoweave+Reflec vs. lasers is *only 1*. So if you can't stand the penalty, switch to just Bioplas (or your Biosuit, see next paragraph). If you give up your Nanoweave, you get what it cost back into your bank account.
Actually, the difference between Bioplas and the Space Biosuit is that the Biosuit has the same DR, but keeps the same DR vs. almost every type of damage (in particular, cutting damage, which Bioplas sucks at)! So it might make more sense to make the Biosuit+Reflec your "primary" armor (and if you give up your Bioplas, you get back what it cost into your bank account). However, if you want additional ballistic protection (you never know, you might just run into some aliens with a significantly lower TL), use Nanoweave+Bioplas+Reflec (which in rknop's system adds 5 DR to piercing (bullets) compared to Bioplas alone, resulting in a DR that's only 2 less than that vs. lasers, otherwise your piercing DR is 7 less than that vs. lasers) and take the hit to DX.
Thoughts? Comments?
Would everyone (except Boomer) please post what armor they're going to be using?
I'll be interested to see what you want to change.
If you gave them skills greater than 14, you effectively made them an elite special forces unit.
If they are firing every round, they don't get the accuracy bonus of their weapon, they do have a range penalty between them and us.
If we assume they have a 14, don't aim, and we're 10 yards away, then they're firing at an effective skill of 10, they should be missing half their shots.
Aster has a 12 in pistol. He's proficient with it. But he gets a -2 for using a rifle. He has another -4 for that 10 yard range.
He needs to aim for at least one second to get the weapon accuracy to boost his effective skill from 6 up to 14.
Let's say these guys are each two yards apart, standing in a nice neat line (and they stay that way after the first round of return fire).
My gun has RoF 12. I decide on 3 shots per guy to be sure of knocking them down and out, and I'll only spread fire at two guys.
I aim at the first guy to have that 14 skill. Let's use my last roll (without doubled armor), it was pretty good with an 11. My skill target is 10-4 range+9 accuracy+1brace for a total of 16. You've been ignoring range penalties, but we're going to put them back in.
My first target has recoil 2, so all three slugs hit (16, 14, 12)
I lose two shots that may go hit something else walking the fire to the second target. Since this is a second attack, I do NOT get an aim bonus and lose accuracy. My skill target drops from 16 to 6. My recoil is now 3. Let's say I roll really good and get a 4-6. One of the last 3 slugs hits.
Now I could choose to use 5 slugs against each as long as they were no more than 2 yards apart. This would add a +1 to both to hit rolls. This would have given me one more hit against the first target but would have only given me a second hit on the second target if I rolled a 3 or 4.
This is why I'm not spraying fire.
Instead of adding homebrew rules. Maybe reconsider the skill levels you gave the bad guys, especially if your players don't have similar skill levels.
Kinda like expecting level 1 dnd characters to have a chance against 6th level adventurers.
It would seem to make sense that the ape-men should have been using spraying fire as they have many targets in front of them, that only one or two shots might have hit any particular PC.
Most of the players are not military background. The ape-men are military background. That's going to impact the results of fire in either direction.
Take a look at the sample characters starting on page 309.
1665 CP character has ranged attack skill of 15.
250 CP characters has ranged attack skill of 15, and 14.
200 CP character has ranged attack skill of 12.
325 CP character has ranged attack skill of 13.
335 CP character has ranged attack skill of 15.
535 CP character has ranged attack skill of 12.
225 CP character has ranged attack skill of 14.
We're 150 CP characters that were designed to come from varied backgrounds that would not necessarily include combat skills. We're also built on 150 CP.
Rather than adding homebrew rules, maybe just take this as an opportunity to look at the rules we do have and make adjustments to the NPC and PC point values.
Aster is an engineer. Originally he only had pistol and brawling, very basic for a space themed game.
If I had a choice, I'd prefer to be using a scout heavy battlesuit! (pg 184)
Monocrys is TL 11, if you're opening up that TL, I'd be really happy with a military cybersuit.
Page 179 shows a really big difference between the space biosuit and the monocrys vacc suit's armor values.
Sorry! I meant Bioplas instead of Monocrys! I have edited the OP.
Aster - I did give the Ape-Men too high a Guns skill (it will be modified), but their weapon is only TL 9 and ROF 1, which is why they're not Spraying Fire.
I would say, let's change the rules so that the Accuracy bonus applies to *ALL* shots in Spraying Fire. Then it becomes useful!
And, the rule changes I've suggested above have *nothing* to do with the skill levels or points that the characters have. It's strictly a damage-vs.-DR issue, which rknop's rules and my changes handle nicely.
Since Rix is a medic whose top priority is not causing damage but healing it, I don't have an interest in this discussion except to hope that the chance of instant death or TPK is reduced to a rare event. Her first priority is avoiding combat and then getting to people who need help. She has some weapons but mostly for situations where she might need them against a wild animal or an unexpected firefight like this. But she's not expecting to be especially deadly, just dangerous enough to have a chance of scaring an animal off or defending herself when she has not one else to help.
Take your time getting it worked out. I know that GURPS is tricky when dealing with combat and it may take some time.
So, Rix, are you going to keep your Nanoweave+Bioplas armor, with the new Reflec coating and take the DX hit, or change to Bioplas+Reflec or Biosuit+Reflec (I would not recommend Nanoweave+Reflec, that's the worst of both worlds)?
Terra's going with Biosuit+Reflec (and gets back $1800, woo-hoo!).