ATR/ETS Question

[vitruvian]

Originally Posted by the_matrix_walker

As for ETS effecting physical speed... it does not! Reaction time is mental, the time it takes your brain to go from "this is happening... what should I do...ok I'll do this" is vastly reduced, so your brain tells your body what to do with less of a pause. You don't get a defensive bonus from greater body speed once you use your active defense, you get it for staring the defense slightly earlier. Your mind acts faster, as a result, your body moves sooner (but while you are moving, you're no faster than the guy without ETS)

You still physically acted sooner, no matter how you cut it. If it was truly only perceptual, you'd just be able to look at the fist coming toward your face in slo-mo, but be unable to dodge the fist any better, let alone hit the other guy first.

[Fred Brackin]

Originally Posted by the_matrix_walker

Rather than a given speed, I think this would be closer to the mark if your target's speed was reduced fractionally according to your level +1, so one level would half effective speed for targeting purposes, 2 levels would result in dividing by 3 etc.

)

Halving speed will give you up to a +1 or +2 depending on where the breakpoints fall. Dividing by 3 would give you +2 or+3.

Except of course whre the distance component overwhelms the speed component and you get nothing.

This will happen fairly often with weapons like rifles where taking aimed shots at objects 50 yards away is much more reasonable in the real world than shooting at things going 100 mph.

The Speed/Range table just doesn't work the way a lot of people expect and it sometimes doesn't work the way I think it should.

[Fred Brackin]

Originally Posted by vitruvian

You still physically acted sooner, no matter how you cut it. If it was truly only perceptual, you'd just be able to look at the fist coming toward your face in slo-mo, but be unable to dodge the fist any better, let alone hit the other guy first.

Nope, the reaction component is compounded from 2 sources. The first is the time required to process the info and the second is the time to move the muscles.

Shorten the first step and you begin the second sooner. The perception/decsion-making process proabably takes more time than you expect too.

[Mark Skarr]

The answer to why ATR doesn’t come with ETS is a simple, GURPS answer: TANSTAAFL.

Just because you can cover yourself with flames in GURPS doesn’t mean that you get an equivalent amount of free DR versus fire. You have to buy it. Just because you can fly to the edge of space doesn’t mean that you don’t have to breathe anymore, you still have to buy that advantage. Just because you have Hardened 6, DR 75 and doesn’t breathe, doesn’t mean that you get pressure support for free.

With ATR you DO perceive faster, but only because you can make two maneuvers in one second, so, if the GM makes people take actions to determine what is going on (like I do in non-cinematic games), you can spend one of your actions to absorb combat then on your second maneuver, get stuck back in. You don’t perceive any faster than someone else who goes on the same “actions” as you, you just get to perceive again later in the turn, so you have the potential of perceiving more, and, fundamentally, it seems faster.

Most games where ATR is available, the players will buy ETS because the two things work together, well. But, trying to force-bundle them is removing the Generic from GURPS. ATR can also reflect parallel-processing, where you don’t actually move any faster, but you can do several things simultaneously.

When you break high-levels of ATR down, you have to start looking at how far something actually moves to the character in question. A bullet with a speed of 1,500 fps suddenly has a speed of 150 fps to someone who has ATR/10. So, for the purposes of Parry Missile Weapon, it makes sense because bullet travel is abstract in GURPS. So, it's a simplification, not an implication.

ETA:And, let’s be totally honest: you are going and perceiving faster. If you have ATR/1, you’re going twice a second, and everyone else is going once. Sure, on the first action, you’re going at the same time as everyone else, but, by your second action, everyone else is stuck with what they’ve chosen. So, now, you get to go faster than everyone else before the next turn.

[Refplace]

Originally Posted by Fred Brackin

This will happen fairly often with weapons like rifles where taking aimed shots at objects 50 yards away is much more reasonable in the real world than shooting at things going 100 mph.

The Speed/Range table just doesn't work the way a lot of people expect and it sometimes doesn't work the way I think it should.

OK so lets try an example, maybe were using the table differently.
I want to shoot a bird moving 10y/s at 100y that is 1 foot.
That is -11 for speed/range and -5 for size, and I ignore 1 point for range.
I want to shoot the same bird at 10y that is -6 for speed/range and I ignore up to -2.
OK the math seems easy to me still. You get a greater differential when speed exceeds distance but that is ok since your targeting arc is shorter on something farther away. It moves across less of your visual reference.
I do see that the bonus is not as good as I thought it would be however.
You would have to be moving really fast at any distance to take full advantage of anything beyond a level or two.

I was thinking of this in reference to computer assisted targeting or an AI in aerial/space combat. But its not a huge bonus worth much of the 10 points.

[vitruvian]

Originally Posted by Fred Brackin

Nope, the reaction component is compounded from 2 sources. The first is the time required to process the info and the second is the time to move the muscles.

Shorten the first step and you begin the second sooner. The perception/decsion-making process proabably takes more time than you expect too.

Sure, processing time is a major component of reaction time. The end result is still that your muscles and limbs started moving sooner, which is a physical as well as perceptual effect. My point was that if ETS was purely perceptual, you wouldn't be able to get your body to react more quickly, and it would be close to useless.

[the_matrix_walker]

Originally Posted by vitruvian

Sure, processing time is a major component of reaction time. The end result is still that your muscles and limbs started moving sooner, which is a physical as well as perceptual effect. My point was that if ETS was purely perceptual, you wouldn't be able to get your body to react more quickly, and it would be close to useless.

But this is the point exactly, I guess it's just how you're interpreting "Physical effect"
Once the message to your body is composed, a person with ETS moves no faster than one without, they just move earlier.

[vitruvian]

Originally Posted by the_matrix_walker

But this is the point exactly, I guess it's just how you're interpreting "Physical effect"
Once the message to your body is composed, a person with ETS moves no faster than one without, they just move earlier.

Composing a message to your body and having it carried to the nerves and muscles by your motor neurons is not a strictly perceptual thing, and has the physical effect of your body actually moving sooner. While it's true that none of this implies that your muscles will be able to pull harder and therefore send your body or extremities moving at any greater velocity once you get going, the net effect to an observer is still going to be that you reacted much more quickly.

Also, really this reduced reaction time (perception + processing + sending messages to muscles) should logically allow you to control your movements with the same degree of precision when moving at the top speed/velocity allowed by your muscles as when moving slowly and deliberately, not the case for normal people. That effect should then logically encompass things like not taking any penalty for a Rapid Strike; after all, somebody without ETS or ATR can Rapid Strike for a -6 penalty, so it's clearly within the physical limits of a normal person to execute both strikes in one second's time. The only question is whether they have the ability to coordinate and control the two strikes.

[Bruno]

Originally Posted by vitruvian

Composing a message to your body and having it carried to the nerves and muscles by your motor neurons is not a strictly perceptual thing, and has the physical effect of your body actually moving sooner. While it's true that none of this implies that your muscles will be able to pull harder and therefore send your body or extremities moving at any greater velocity once you get going, the net effect to an observer is still going to be that you reacted much more quickly.

<more snip>

The problem I have with the way you're breaking this down is that it's aside from what actually happens with vanilla ATR.

Vanilla ATR has the wonderfully unphysical effect of getting you up to a greater velocity without making you pull harder :) You don't hit harder, you don't jump farther, you don't carry more, you don't need any increased structural capacity to endure the doubled, tripled, etc acceleration, and so forth.

Trying to argue biophysics with ATR or ETS is basically going off at right angles to the game abilities - neither of which has much to do with biology or physics.

[vitruvian]

Originally Posted by Bruno

The problem I have with the way you're breaking this down is that it's aside from what actually happens with vanilla ATR.

Vanilla ATR has the wonderfully unphysical effect of getting you up to a greater velocity without making you pull harder :) You don't hit harder, you don't jump farther, you don't carry more, you don't need any increased structural capacity to endure the doubled, tripled, etc acceleration, and so forth.

Trying to argue biophysics with ATR or ETS is basically going off at right angles to the game abilities - neither of which has much to do with biology or physics.

Where was I talking about ATR? That post was all ETS.