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Old 03-17-2023, 09:16 AM   #1
Donny Brook
 
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Default Reality testing firearm rules

Case: Myself
I have no trained skill level in any firearms. I can count on two hands the number of occasions I have fired any gun. I recently tried out a rifle at a gun range. The experience included a briefing and supervision during the shoot. I would say my experience plus the coaching might qualify me for a single Dabbler level in Guns (Rifle), which would put me at a basic level of DX-3.

My second mag was 10 rounds shot at 50 yards (-8) on a target with a hit zone of about 10 inches at most (-5). I was using a red-dot sight (+1 to skill), the gun was braced (+1), and I could take time to Aim up to say +3. At this point, GURPS calculations have me at DX-11 to hit.

Out of 10 shots, I had 7 on-target. This seems high to me based on GURPS expectations. Does anyone have any ideas of what accounts for this?
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Old 03-17-2023, 09:33 AM   #2
TGLS
 
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Default Re: Reality testing firearm rules

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Originally Posted by Donny Brook View Post
Case: Myself
I have no trained skill level in any firearms. I can count on two hands the number of occasions I have fired any gun.

Out of 10 shots, I had 7 on-target. This seems high to me based on GURPS expectations. Does anyone have any ideas of what accounts for this?
Well:
1) There's up to a +3 bonus for range shooting (see Tactical Shooting)
2) The Acc of the rifle was probably closer to 5 or so, and then you add for longer aiming than a second.
3) 1 skill point != 200 hours of training
4) Given that people who have seen Die Hard probably get a default on Guns, I think that having had the occasion to fire a gun at all probably puts you over and above default. Having at least six occasions (not shots?) is probably at least a dabbler level
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Old 03-17-2023, 09:39 AM   #3
Fred Brackin
 
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Default Re: Reality testing firearm rules

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Originally Posted by Donny Brook View Post
C

Out of 10 shots, I had 7 on-target. This seems high to me based on GURPS expectations. Does anyone have any ideas of what accounts for this?
It's the way the gun rules are nerfed to prevent players who have made characters with unrealistic skill levels from achieving unrealistic results with full auto fire.

The result is rules from specialist supplements that say you should have been giving yourself a +10 just for being on a gun range.

I usually don't follow strict rules that far. It's also easier to limit gun skill levels to realistic ranges or just accept that mooks will die like flies.
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Old 03-17-2023, 09:44 AM   #4
kenclary
 
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Default Re: Reality testing firearm rules

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Originally Posted by TGLS View Post
Well:
1) There's up to a +3 bonus for range shooting (see Tactical Shooting)
This point in particular...I think the advice for "doing routine things not under the stress of combat" is to give a bonus, often +4 or more. (Maybe less of a bonus if this was a competition...)

And in general, yes, plinking at a target is much easier than shooting in combat.
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Old 03-17-2023, 09:49 AM   #5
Ulzgoroth
 
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Default Re: Reality testing firearm rules

If the target was a circle rather than a 10" tall human silhouette that's a +2 to the target SM over what you scored it as.


Combined with the corrected aiming (which should give ~+7 not +3) and the actual range shooting rules (+7-+10 depending on the the range) that puts you up to DX+2 to DX+5...
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Old 03-17-2023, 09:59 AM   #6
Varyon
 
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Default Re: Reality testing firearm rules

Yeah, plinking gives huge bonuses. The only time I've fired a handgun, it was a 6-shot revolver, shooting at an aluminum can probably 10 yards or so away. I'm not sure I aimed for a full 3 seconds (for Acc+2, or most likely +4) between shots, but of the four shots that were actually aimed at the can (the first wasn't really aimed, just pointed at the backstop, to tell me what recoil felt like - because I had literally never fired a handgun in my life, and had only fired a .22 rifle once before - and the second was aimed at a specific point on the backstop to show me where relative to my nominal aimpoint the bullet would go), all four hit. An aluminum can probably has an SM around -7 or -6 (depending on if it counts as getting a +1 for being an "elongated box"), 10 yards out is -4 to hit, my range instruction consisted of "Here, you try," the range was actually just more-or-less someone's backyard, and the backstop was just a tree the can had been placed in front of. So unless playing First Person Shooters and Light Gun games somehow gave me a markedly improved default, I was at (assuming I have DX 10, which seems probably about fair) a net Guns (10-4-7-4+4)= -1 before "plinking" bonuses. Which means unless I got lucky enough to have fairly-above-average performance, I needed at least a further +14 to skill to manage 100% hit probability with four shots.

Plinking is a poor indicator of skill.
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Old 03-17-2023, 10:08 AM   #7
Rupert
 
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Default Re: Reality testing firearm rules

With a modern rifle of Acc5, +1 for your sights, +1 Braced, All-out Attack +1, and 3+ seconds aiming for +2 you have +10 overall.

I'd call your skill skill 'default', for DX-4.

Range 50 yards -8, target size (10" circle) -3 (-5 for size, +2 for being circular) = -11.

So far we have a total of 6 +10 -11 = 5. I'd generally give a +4 for easy conditions, and probably another +1 for the coaching). That gives a 10-. Still too low for your results, but an argument could be made that a skilled shooter would consider such a task (50 yard range, no time pressure, etc.) to be 'Very Easy' or 'Trivial', for +6 to +9 to the roll, rather than my +4.

My test is what the game says a shooter would get at 100 or 300 yards/metres (no, I don't go and say 100m is -11 vs 100 yards being -10), against a standard military target (man-shaped, slightly shorter than a man, so -1) if the shooter has a skill or 11 or 12 (i.e. a trained solider or hunter).

With a basic M16 with no optics this gives: 12 +5 Acc +1 Braced +1 AoA +2 Time -10 range -1 size = 10- plus any difficulty mods at 100 yards, and 7- plus mods at 300 yards. A +5 mod brings this up to about where it should be (+6 if you assume a base skill of 11-). This also works out about right for a skilled shooter of 13 or 14 and for a very skilled shooter of 15 or 16.

At the other end, a guy with Guns-9 or 10 banging away (and not aiming in the GURPS sense) in poor light, etc., at 3-7 yards while someone is shooting at them or charging with a knife comes out at somewhere in the 5-7 range, which is consistent with real-world hit rates for people in shoot-outs.

So, as far as I'm concerned it works okay for trained shooters on the range (and snipers), and it works okay for minimally skilled shooters (i.e. most criminals and most cops) in realistic situations. I'm not too concerned about default users, and for the cinematically highly skilled I'm more concerned about them hitting too easily, even without autofire, lasers, and other such game-bending kit.
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Old 03-17-2023, 10:31 AM   #8
mburr0003
 
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Default Re: Reality testing firearm rules

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Originally Posted by Fred Brackin View Post
It's the way the gun rules are nerfed to prevent players who have made characters with unrealistic skill levels from achieving unrealistic results with full auto fire.
I wish the rules were written in the other direction, have skill reflect what a skilled shooter should accomplish under trivial conditions and give us a pile of penalties to toss on for combat conditions. I tire of trying to remember all the 'trivial' conditions bonuses to make plinking fit into the GURPS rules.


For instance, SSR should use both speed and range penalties, not "pick the worst one". (Yes, I know if a target is moving directly towards or away, speed is much less of a factor and the rules were originally more aimed at the closer ranges that archery is useful at, but still, we've had 40 years to update these rules...)
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Old 03-17-2023, 11:42 AM   #9
Varyon
 
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Originally Posted by mburr0003 View Post
I wish the rules were written in the other direction, have skill reflect what a skilled shooter should accomplish under trivial conditions and give us a pile of penalties to toss on for combat conditions. I tire of trying to remember all the 'trivial' conditions bonuses to make plinking fit into the GURPS rules.
That seems like a poor way to design an RPG, honestly. Combat conditions are the situation where the rules are going to be used in a campaign - most aren't going to be focused on how well you do when out plinking, so defaulting to the former rather than the latter makes the most sense.

Of course, I feel there is an aspect of firearms that GURPS doesn't get quite right (and that relates to plinking) - I think a lot of the time a "miss" more represents that you simply don't have a shot lined up and need to try again next second, rather than you actually shooting and missing. I'm not sure how that should be implemented; part of me thinks the current default represents shooting as soon as you think you have a shot, while being more careful should be something like "take a -1 to hit, but on a failure with MoF 4 or better, you simply don't fire and it counts as a further second of Aim," but I'm not sure how well that would actually work.

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Originally Posted by mburr0003 View Post
For instance, SSR should use both speed and range penalties, not "pick the worst one".
It does use both, but they stack before setting the penalty rather than after. That is, if a target is 10 yards away and moving at 5 yards per second, you are at -5 (for 15 yards) to hit rather than at -4 (for the worse, 10 yards) or -6 (-4 for 10 yards, -2 for 5 yards).
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Old 03-17-2023, 12:55 PM   #10
Fred Brackin
 
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Originally Posted by Varyon View Post
T

It does use both, but they stack before setting the penalty rather than after. That is, if a target is 10 yards away and moving at 5 yards per second, you are at -5 (for 15 yards) to hit rather than at -4 (for the worse, 10 yards) or -6 (-4 for 10 yards, -2 for 5 yards).
Yes, that's how it works but it works out badly at larger scales.

If your target is at 100 yards and unmoving that's a-10. However 100 yards distant and 49 yards per second (98 mph) is also -10. Only at 1 yard farther or faster per second does it become -11. This does not pass the small test.

You probably need something like a penalty for distance with a seperate penalty for movement as a fraction of distance.
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