Aug 05, 09:00 1998
To: Lindharin
From: Froccer
Lindharin,
Thanks for your timely response. I have included my comments
under yours. I have not included the previous comments I had made in the
email that this was in response to. If anything appears
confusing, don't hesitate to inquire further.
>From: "Lindharin"
>Hi Froccer,
At first, your example was somewhat confusing (switching contexts
There are a couple of drawbacks to this (both of which I think are
All, in all, I think that this would be a good rule change. Just
In accordance with the other sections of your letter, I am
>Second, I get the impression that you aren't just concerned about the
This is true.
>That started me thinking, and I think there is some merit to that. I
Four attacks seems a little extreme. I think that three attacks
>I agree that the Juicer is a difficult problem under my rules, but in
Normal Juicers aren't MD though. They just have a lot of SDC. I
I think I am a little off topic here, so I will conclude this
>Although I don't really think they justified that
I think your assessment of the Juicer is pretty accurate. There
>Keep in mind, though, that even normal humans are "tougher" under my
I like the system, because when your armour is penatrated, it does not
I also like it, because (as you have pointed out) a energy rifle will
>As an aside, this type of damage also makes some logical sense to me.
No, I totally agree. In fact, I think there is a table in the
>Well, I do use called shot rules, but haven't planned on using them
We are discussing this currently. So far the armour breakdown is as
Head: 1/3 to 1/4 MDC of the Main body
The discussions are ongoing, so I don't know if it is going to be implemented.
The trick will be that you have to roll a natural 12, it has to
>Keep in mind that under the SDC rules, even
Our rules for called shots were considering the MDC system. With
>If you would prefer to have the explicit called shots, it would be
Sure. What do you think of the natural 12 called shot rule?
>That is my intention for using the damage category scheme, but it
I think that it might be. How about ASN (Advanced Supernatural). It
>If so, we
Melee Weapons: Supernatural PS with melee weapon, and
Projectile Weapons: Rail guns.
Energy Weapons: Particle accelerator weapons, and high powered or
Explosives: Anti-vehicle mines, anything bigger than a
>Would standard body armor protect against them normally, or
I am unsure about this section. I was kind of thinking that it
>What do you think?
I also think that maybe vehicle armor should offer better
The only problem would be that now supernatural creatures would
Of course, this is your base system, so you would know how you
>And thanks again for the feedback!
No problem.
I would have replied sooner, but my netscape has been acting up today.
Froccer
>To: "Froccer"
>Subject: RE: Feedback from the Game Masters Library website
>
>I get it now. I think there are possibly two answers to this.
>
>First, you are concerned about the relative fire power of infantry vs
>heavy weapons. Although the only place I think I have written it is
>in the Rifts Equipment page, under my rules any weapons that have to
>fire bursts list the damage from a short burst, but they can use
>proportionately more ammo to do more damage. So a rail gun that does
>1d6x10 and has enough ammo for 10 of those bursts, could fire longer
>bursts and do more damage. Since a short bursts normally count a x3
>single shots and extended bursts as x30 single shots, an extended
>rail gun burst uses x10 more ammo than the listed short burst. Since
>a short burst normally counts as x2 single shot damage and
>extended bursts are x10 single shot damage, an extended rail gun
>burst would do x5 the listed short burst damage. Of course, under
>the modified rule in the Conversion book (which I wasn't aware of) it
>would actually only be x7 / x2 = x3.5 damage from an extended burst.
>Similarly, heavy energy weapons which do not have the ability to do
>full auto could still fire short bursts, allowing x2 damage for x3
>ammo.
from normal weapons to rail guns), but I believe I understand
now. From what I understand, you surmise that a rail gun should
be allowed to have a more elevated rate of fire. By using x10
more ammo, the weapon's damage code would be elevated to
acceptable). The first is that rail guns can now do a LOT of damage.
A SAMAS railgun for example will now be able to do damage comparable
to a boom gun (1d4 x 10 x 5 (or x3.5) = lots of MDC). Considering that
you are shooting 400 rounds (40 round short burst x 10 ammo) that
are the size of cigars and moving at an extreme velocity, I think
that amount of damage is appropriate. The second drawback is that
railguns use a LOT of ammo. In the SAMAS example, the unit
carries a 2000 round drum. That is only 5 extended bursts.
However, that is the price for the amount of damage you are
doing.
think! Now a battle between two SAMAS units won't have to take
over four combat rounds to complete (SAMAS has 250 MDC, the
railguns only do 40 MDC max. damage). Also, a SAMAS unit can
strafe ground troops, and actually kill somebody! Amazing!
thinking that this action should take up more attacks as well.
>ratio of damages, but think the infantry might have just too much
>damage capability.
>think the damage ratings on weapons is okay, and the
damage
>multipliers from bursts are at least in the ball park (I need to pull
>out my Conversion Book and maybe I'll reduce it to x7 too). However,
>what I noticed while going over things was how "inexpensive" it is to
>do a burst. For something that uses up 30 times the ammo, it only
>takes 2 actions to fire an extended burst? I don't think so. I just
>modified my burst rules so that, while a short burst still only takes
>1 action, a long burst now takes 2 actions and an extended burst
>takes 4. I think it may help make bursts a little more balanced.
>What do you think?
is a better compromise. If you consider that the conventional
character has three attacks at first level (hand-to-hand +
boxing), then it seems more reasonable to make the burst only
take up the 3 attacks. This means that conventional first level
characters will be able to do a full clip burst, and those that
have four+ attacks will at least be able to do a full clip burst
and some other actions (like dodging).
>my opinion they were also problems under the original Rifts rules.
>While MD weapons could blow through a Juicer anyway, just because of
>being MD, anytime a Juicer got into a bar room brawl or a non-MD
>melee weapon fight, he was vastly superior to a score of well-trained
>normal humans.
agree that Juicers will be able to defeat a score of well-trained
normal humans in a "brawl" in pretty much any system that is
developed just because of the way the Juicer is set up. The fact
that the Juicer is super quick, strong, and tough means that he
is going to be one tough guy in a fight. If he is not wearing
armor, though, he can still be hurt by non-MD weapons (unless he
is a mega or dragon juicer); they just won't be as affective as
they would be against a normal human.
section by saying that the Juicer is significantly tougher with
your system. Whether this is unbalancing or not remains to be seen.
>type of physical toughness in their description of the process that
>makes a Juicer, the authors apparently think that a Juicer has super
>human resilience. When considered on those terms, when I made my MDC
>conversion it made sense to me to treat the Juicer as having super
>human resilience, which is why I used the SDC bonus from the Heroes
>Unlimited minor power of Extraordinary Endurance. It requires you to
>shift your mental perception of a Juicer to someone who really is
>super tough, almost a minor comic book super hero, but he still is no
>where near as tough as true supernatural critters like dragons.
>Alternatively, if you don't like that flavor it is easy enough to
>further reduce the SDC bonus. I don't have any Juicer characters at
>the moment, so I haven't play tested it at all.
is at least one Juicer in the party whenever I
play, so maybe I will be able to better asses this in the future.
>SDC rules than in MD Rifts. A human with decent PE, maybe a few
>physical skills that add to SDC, etc, could easily have 20 plus hit
>points and at least 20 or 30 plus SDC. A single shot laser rifle
>will on average do 21 damage, or 42 from a short burst, so it will
>severly hurt, or maybe even mortally wound, a normal human, but it
>will not automatically blow him away. I personally think this is a
>much better system because you could NOT survive in Rifts outside
>your armor, and I never liked that flavor. Obviously, you still want
>armor whenever you go into battle since an unarmored person will
>be quickly wiped out, but you no longer have to worry about needing
>armor just to survive being bumped into by a supernatural PS being
>like an Undead Slayer while walking down the street in town. :)
automatically mean that you die. You may get severly injured
though, and I think that is way more realistic.
probably kill you; but it is not guaranteed. Also note that you can
now go into negative hit points, which means that you can be
revived if healed quick enough (also more realistic).
>A high tech laser will burn through armor pretty well (hence it
>counts as a supernatural damage category for penetration purposes)
>but it is still a narrow beam. It shouldn't completely disintegrate
>a human sized target just because it does 10 MD = 1000 SDC. It
>should punch a hole right through the human, but if there were no
>vital organs along that line (ie, a low damage roll of 10 or 15) the
>human would survive and could maybe even keep fighting. A better
>shot (an average to high damage roll of 20 to 30) is much more likely
>to put a normal human down for the count, though heroic and/or higher
>level characters with more SDC and HP would still be on their feet,
>presumably because they were able to jerk aside or angle their body
>to keep it from hitting anything vital. Even so, the heroic
>character will be slowed by the wound (since he now has fewer, if
>any, SDC or HP) and will be an "easier" target for the next shot.
>That is how I envision the combat proceeding under my SDC rules.
>Your mileage may vary... :)
RIFTS Conversion book that tells you what minuses you get for
being hit in a certain location (arm, leg, vital organ, etc ...).
When damage gets through the armor, maybe it should be determined
at that point what part of you is hit (I am working on a hit
location scheme with my group right now, but it will likely take
more time).
>against normal body armor. For example, if you were not wearing any
>helmet I say that you can do a called shot to the head (-3 strike,
>total of more than 12) and it would bypass the armor to do full
>damage to the person, even if the strike total wasn't over the AR.
>
>But if someone is wearing a full suit of armor, then for speed of
>play I don't think it is needed to list the SDC of each part of
>standard body armor.
follows:
Arms: 1/4 to 1/5 MDC of the Main body
Legs: 1/3 to 1/4 MDC of the Main body
Hands/Feet: 1/10 MDC of the Main body
be a called shot, you get a penalty of -3 to -6 on the roll, and
a miss is a total miss (doesn't hit the main body, as per regular
called shot rules).
>full environmental suits still have an AR and if you beat it than
>some of the damage will get through to the wearer even if the armor
>still has SDC left. So, that kind of makes up for it. Instead of
>explicitly requiring your characters to specify what they are
>shooting at and keeping separate SDC totals for each body part, you
>just assume that they are always aiming for the vulnerable places
>between the armor plates, the joints, the eyes, etc, and if the
>strike roll is good enough to beat the AR then they managed to hit
>the vulnerable area and do some damage to the guy inside.
your system in mind, a change might be in order.
>easy enough to add it, though. I'd be happy to work it out with you
>and bounce ideas off each other, if you'd like.
>doesn't quite fit as-is. Take a look at my definition of what
>weapons count as each of the damage categories. One of the key
>"balance points" was that bullets pretty much needed to be in the 3rd
>category, superhuman, so that they are sufficently better than melee
>weapons and bows in a medieval setting. That meant that any ex-MD
>weapons needed to be in the fourth category, because they are better
>able to penetrate than bullets. As it stands, though, since there is
>no 5th category, the ex-MD hand weapons are just as effective against
>tanks as against any high tech (ie MD) body armor, but the tank just
>has more SDC. Is it worth adding a 5th damage category?
would be damage from heavy weapons or, in the case of
supernatural beings, damage that would not normally be accessible
to those beings (such as supernatural creature with a weapon).
>need to think through some of the implications. What weapons would
>do damage in the 5th category?
Supernatural Power Punch.
heavy energy weapons (such as those found on tanks).
mini-missle
>would those weapons always do damage to someone in ex-MD body
armor?
would be like a modern type of armor against a SN source of
damage. LTE AR would mean that it would take the standard damage
and x1/2 to the wearer. GTE AR, well, adios amigo. It would be
like the analogy of going into a modern battle, and getting hit
by a tank shell. Not pretty.
protection than body armour (the flip side of ASN). It would be
normal for this type of armour to take an ASN source of damage,
but against SN, it would only take x1/2 damage.
have a harder time to defeat the high-tech monstrosities. Ha! I
can just see a gargoylite trying to knaw off the leg a UAR-1
Enforcer. I don't know if this would be accurate, but I think it
would chip a tooth before it would be able to penatrate the
armour.
wanted it to work. Just throwing some stuff in the air, and
seeing where it lands.
>Lindharin