09-27-2012, 05:32 PM | #51 | |
Wielder of Smart Pants
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: Ventura CA
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Re: What use is Suppression Fire?
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He was talking about the psychological effect of suppression. Wasn't he? Last edited by sir_pudding; 09-27-2012 at 05:36 PM. |
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09-27-2012, 05:59 PM | #52 | |
Join Date: Mar 2006
Location: Iceland*
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Re: What use is Suppression Fire?
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How can 'You failed your roll, so your character cannot perform this extremely challenging physical or intellectual task' be perfectly fine, but 'You fail your roll so your character cannot perform this extremely challenging psychological task' be a HurtingBadWrongFun violation of player agency? I get it that some people want to roleplay characters who never rattle and never fail to step up to the challenge. I don't understand why it's not okay to require them to purchase the appropriate traits for that purpose and then revel in how they stand out from their peers. Full Disclosure: I use the Tactical Shooting rule for Suppressive Fire as written, with the exception that the maximum penalty for failure on the Will check is -4. Failure by 5 or more means that PCs must Do Nothing until they recover, which is exactly like recovering from Mental Stun.
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09-27-2012, 06:23 PM | #53 | ||
Wielder of Smart Pants
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: Ventura CA
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Re: What use is Suppression Fire?
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09-27-2012, 06:51 PM | #54 | |
Join Date: Dec 2007
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Re: What use is Suppression Fire?
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09-27-2012, 06:57 PM | #55 |
Wielder of Smart Pants
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: Ventura CA
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Re: What use is Suppression Fire?
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09-27-2012, 07:26 PM | #56 |
Join Date: Oct 2008
Location: arlington texas
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Re: What use is Suppression Fire?
lolol, I shoot guns from time to time and carry a sidearm at work and feel very comfortable around guns. I can guarantee you, almost any amount of bullets coming at me causes me to be "supressed". I am super careful when I hear guns going off. ESPECIALLY if they're in my general direction.
Now, if I'm a war trained special ops kind of guy, who lives jumping out of planes and killing other humans, maybe I'm not so worried about a few bullets coming downrange. As a normal human being, I am TOTALLY concerned about it and ALWAYS find cover first and wait for a break in the firing before I even THINK about shooting back. But that's just us mortals.... |
09-28-2012, 12:01 AM | #57 | |
Join Date: Mar 2010
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Re: What use is Suppression Fire?
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Let's replace these "professional" infantry with ordinary people (i.e. All stats 10, no Adv/Disadv, no combat skills) and see what we get. With no Soldier skill, their Will-2 has to beat only a 8, which means 1 out of 4 ordinary people will expose themselves to suppressive fire in any given round, so the average, ordinary person will do so after only 2 or 3 seconds of fire. Assuming +5 for heat of battle (which to the best of my knowledge applies to everyone in GURPS) their 10+5-1 (assuming it applies, not sure where this is from) still hits the same rule of 14 as the soldiers so they still have the same 9.3% chance of failure. So at this point, we have 25% of the civilians popping up every round, and 9% of those who do freezing up with the rest capable of coherent action. For a 12-person "unit", this means that ~3 will pop-up per round, and about every 4 rounds one will freeze. These numbers alone seem extremely high, and that is why I suggested that "ordinary" people should probably have some disadvantages to bring these numbers down. Now, failed fright checks ARE an issue here - once someone fails a Fright Check while exposed they are subject to an automatic attack and assuming no one pulls them back will likely dies within a few seconds. And once that happens, taking your -5 to fright checks as gospel for seeing someone gunned down, about half will fail a Fright Check and freeze up, three quarters if it is Contagious. But the other half/quarter or so will soldier on and keep popping up every 4 seconds or so and freezing up exposed about every 48 seconds or so. I am going to ignore the rest of the tactical scenario you posted, first because it lacks numbers, second because it is uncharacteristic of the vast majority of gunfights in GURPS or reality, and third because I have medical restrictions on my computer time that I have already exceeded and am paying the price for. I do not dispute that you can beat up on people long enough that eventually they will all be too shocked to go on, I just dispute the ability of ordinary people to withstand the early stages as well as they can. |
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09-28-2012, 12:57 AM | #58 | |
Join Date: Mar 2006
Location: Iceland*
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Re: What use is Suppression Fire?
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Start by rolling a Fright Check as soon as combat starts and if he's not prepared for someone to start shooting at him, there will be no +5 heat of battle bonus to that check. Not to mention that Fright Checks can use the Familiarity rules as well as anything else, which means that when confronted by an unfamiliar source of fear, outside all prior experience, a penalty of -2 or more can be assessed. This doesn't mean that all untrained fighters will be unfamiliar with firefights*, but if you're postulating someone who has literally never heard a gun fired in anger before, he's likely to be. If he manages to pass that Fright Check, he can try do something sensible, like take cover. If, however, he tries to leave that cover or just expose himself partially, whether that's to attack or flee, he can move on to the Will-2 check. Again, I'd apply a Familiarity penalty here for someone who had no experience or training. I wouldn't demand much more than a few hours of firm instruction to justify getting rid of the penalty in a narrowly defined situation** and probably not very long before it was entirely gone***. But a civilian with no training or experience? Yep, a -2 unfamiliarity penalty for a firefight, as a confusing situation outside his experience. And even if he manages to do that, he still can't act in any way he pleases. He'll randomly shift between attacking, without a thought for defence or cover, the nearest foe, and going back to total self-preservation mode. Which means that even if he manages to get up from cover, he'll stay up for an average of 1-3 seconds before he Dodges and Drops again. If he's smart, behind total cover. Basically, untrained people, with no combat skills at all, are really in big trouble if they are caught in a combat situation. Even if you don't bother to apply familiarity penalties, they'll still run around like headless chickens until they get killed or have the sense to stay behind cover so they can stop rolling randomly for what they do. *Sadly, plenty of civilians in wartorn areas are all too familiar with them and have learnt to keep their heads and stay low, even if they have no combat skills. **Such as for someone who had been carefully drilled in an emergency response plan for his home village and could thus run to his assigned shelter without an unfamiliarity penalty. But I would apply it again if he tried to deviate from what he'd gone through in dry runs. ***A short and intensely unpleasant week of military instruction ending in a life-fire exercise might justify getting rid of the unfamiliarity penalty in most basic situations.
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09-28-2012, 01:14 AM | #59 |
Join Date: Feb 2005
Location: Berkeley, CA
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Re: What use is Suppression Fire?
To be honest, of that portion of untrained people who manage to do anything at all (i.e. they don't just fail a fright check and gibber in the corner), having 25% be randomly recklessly brave is probably not out of line.
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09-28-2012, 01:47 AM | #60 | |||
Join Date: Mar 2010
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Re: What use is Suppression Fire?
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Last edited by cosmicfish; 09-28-2012 at 01:51 AM. |
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rules, suppression fire |
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