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Old 01-29-2017, 05:23 PM   #1
Andreas
 
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Default [TS] Lack of psychological pressure and shots at people

On page 9 in the Non-Combat Bonuses box, Tactical Shooting says "Lack of psychological pressure gives a bonus, but never for shots at people".

What is the rationale for this rule? Why would psychological pressure hinder shots against other targets that much, but make no difference for shots against people? It even seems to insist that there should be no exceptions to that rule.
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Old 01-29-2017, 05:24 PM   #2
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Default Re: [TS] Lack of psychological pressure and shots at people

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What is the rationale for this rule? Why would psychological pressure hinder shots against other targets that much, but make no difference for shots against people? It even seems to insist that there should be no exceptions to that rule.
For most neurotypical humans lethal violence against other humans is psychologically traumatic.
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Old 01-29-2017, 05:30 PM   #3
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Default Re: [TS] Lack of psychological pressure and shots at people

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For most neurotypical humans lethal violence against other humans is psychologically traumatic.
Well, in those cases there would be psychological pressure. What Tactical Shooting seems to say is not that shooting humans is accompanied by psychological pressure, but that lack of psychological pressure don't help in those cases (Edit: On second thought, I guess what you said is a valid interpretation as well, but is would that not be double counting the effects of the Pacifism disadvantages?).

Also there are multiple traits in GURPS with which it would probably not be psychologically traumatic. Callous for example.

Last edited by Andreas; 01-29-2017 at 05:36 PM.
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Old 01-29-2017, 05:35 PM   #4
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Default Re: [TS] Lack of psychological pressure and shots at people

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Well, in those cases there would be psychological pressure. What Tactical Shooting says is not that shooting humans is accompanied by psychological pressure, but that lack of psychological pressure don't help in those cases.
Lack of psychological pressure doesn't exist those cases, hence no bonus.
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Also there are multiple traits in GURPS with which it would probably not be psychologically traumatic. Callous for example.
Callous is a disadvantage, and definitely shouldn't give +1 to hit in combat. If you want to simulate this, you should probably just buy your skill up.

The plinking rules are there to mainly resolve arguments about how much harder combat shooting is than range shooting, they aren't likely to actually be useful in most games. Most shots in GURPS are in combat, and one of the design decisions in 4e was that normal uses of skills under adventuring conditions shouldn't get routine modifiers (unlike 3e's "buck fever" modifiers).
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Old 01-29-2017, 05:40 PM   #5
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Default Re: [TS] Lack of psychological pressure and shots at people

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Lack of psychological pressure doesn't exist those cases, hence no bonus. Callous is a disadvantage, and definitely shouldn't give +1 to hit in combat. If you want to simulate this, you should probably just buy your skill up.

The plinking rules are there to mainly resolve arguments about how much harder combat shooting is than range shooting, they aren't likely to actually be useful in most games. Most shots in GURPS are in combat, and one of the design decisions in 4e was that normal uses of skills under adventuring conditions shouldn't get routine modifiers (unlike 3e's "buck fever" modifiers).
There are quite a lot of combat scenarios that involve shooting at targets which aren't people (fighting zombies, robots and monsters etc), so this does not seem to fit with the reason for not getting those bonuses being that violence against other humans often is psychologically traumatic.
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Old 01-29-2017, 05:43 PM   #6
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Default Re: [TS] Lack of psychological pressure and shots at people

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There are quite a lot of combat scenarios that involve shooting at targets which aren't people (fighting zombies, robots and monsters etc), so this does not seem to fit with the reason for not getting those bonuses being that violence against other humans often is psychologically traumatic.
Tactical Shooting wasn't written with unrealistic scenarios in mind, pretty much at all; in the real world until very recently nobody has ever had to fight robots, and they never ever have had to fight zombies or monsters. The bonus shouldn't apply to shooting anything in combat, generally. If you want +1 to hit all the time (it actually matters) you need to buy +1 to skill.
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Old 01-29-2017, 05:48 PM   #7
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Default Re: [TS] Lack of psychological pressure and shots at people

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Tactical Shooting wasn't written with unrealistic scenarios in mind, pretty much at all. The bonus shouldn't apply to shooting anything in combat, generally. If you want +1 to hit all the time (it actually matters) you need to buy +1 to skill.
Well, the introduction of Tactical Shooting says that while it is about realistic shooting rather than cinematic gunplay, "It can also be applied to fictional or downright unrealistic settings, including GURPS Action, Autoduel, Cyberpunk, Horror, Infinite Worlds, Reign of Steel, Steampunk, Technomancer, Traveller, and WWII: Weird War II."

So, it seems to at least have the ambition to be applicable for realistically shooting at unrealistic targets.
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Old 01-29-2017, 05:51 PM   #8
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Default Re: [TS] Lack of psychological pressure and shots at people

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Well, the introduction of Tactical Shooting says that while it is about realistic shooting rather than cinematic gunplay, "It can also be applied to fictional or downright unrealistic settings, including GURPS Action, Autoduel, Cyberpunk, Horror, Infinite Worlds, Reign of Steel, Steampunk, Technomancer, Traveller, and WWII: Weird War II."

So, it seems to at least have the ambition to be applicable to realistically shooting at unrealistic targets.
It's applicable to other games, but it wasn't primarily based on fictional sources. I know that at least for me in the playtest, I drew on my actual training and combat experience rather than movies and books. I think you can safely substitute "known sapients" for "people" in the plinking rule when extending it to games where "people" doesn't just mean "humans".

But really the spirit of the rule is that you can't claim any free bonus for all shots in combat.

Last edited by sir_pudding; 01-29-2017 at 05:54 PM.
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Old 01-29-2017, 05:55 PM   #9
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Default Re: [TS] Lack of psychological pressure and shots at people

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Originally Posted by Andreas View Post
On page 9 in the Non-Combat Bonuses box, Tactical Shooting says "Lack of psychological pressure gives a bonus, but never for shots at people".

What is the rationale for this rule? Why would psychological pressure hinder shots against other targets that much, but make no difference for shots against people? It even seems to insist that there should be no exceptions to that rule.
That is the wrong question. It's not that psychological pressure makes no difference for shots against people. It's that you are to presume that shooting people is always a situation of psychological pressure. It's to cut off all of the "But my character is a casual killer with no fear or guilt so free to hit bonus" munchkins. This does not mean that that shooting attacking zombies or robots is a stress free situation either.
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Old 01-29-2017, 06:01 PM   #10
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Default Re: [TS] Lack of psychological pressure and shots at people

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It's applicable to other games, but it wasn't primarily based on fictional sources. I know that at least for me in the playtest, I drew on my actual training and combat experience rather than movies and books. I think you can safely substitute "known sapients" for "people" in the plinking rule when extending it to games where "people" doesn't just mean "humans".
Do you mean only sapients or things like zombies and animals as well?

If it is not about how psychologically traumatic it is to kill humans, it does however bring back the question of what the rationale for the rule is. You earlier mentioned 4e desiring to avoid normal uses of skills under adventuring conditions getting routine modifiers, but the psychological mentioned in that rule box does not seem like they would be applicable during most adventuring situations, so they would not be routine modifiers.
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