CIA Special Activities Division PMO Skill Set

[TheOneRonin]

Originally Posted by johndallman

Here's an example with situational modifiers that would fit into a PMO campaign: shooting someone whom you have to take down, because if he gets to start giving orders, things get a lot harder. He's in a house 100 yards away, visible through the window his desk looks out of; your team is concealed, but will get spotted when you start firing.

Totally naïve calculation: I need to hit the skull (-7) at 100 yards (-10), I'm at -1 for firing through glass and I need to do this on 16 or less. I need Guns (Rifle) + Acc of 34, rifles are Acc 5, so I need skill 29. That is not a skill level that real humans have.

Really optimised calculation: I need to hit the Vitals (-3) at 100 yards (-10) with -1 for the glass, and I'll accept doing it on a 14-. I have a Fine rifle (Acc 6), hand-made super-match ammo (+2), I'm braced (+1), I have a telescopic sight for +4, and two seconds of extra Aim (+2). All-Out Attack (Determined) gives another +1. I need Guns (Rifle) of 12, and while that's better than a DX10 rifleman fresh from basic training, nobody could call a professional sniper with skill 12 implausibly good: indeed, it's implausibly low for someone with all this equipment. Getting the exact range and wind could help some more but may risk alerting the target, who thinks there's only him and his henchbeings within ten miles. There's a rule somewhere about not being able to more than double Acc with equipment bonuses, but I can't find it right now.

The situation when this came up in a somewhat cinematic game a few weeks ago: I want to hit the Vitals (-3) at 100 yards (-10) with -1 for the glass and I have skill 16 (defaulted from Pistol-18) as a generalist commando. I have a Fine rifle (Acc 6), Match ammo (+1), I'm braced (+1), I didn't bring a telescopic sight because this is the first time in the whole campaign that I'd have used it, but I have a collimating sight for +1, and two seconds extra aim for +2. My effective skill is 14-, which will have to do.

For what it's worth, anyone who has passed any of the US Military Sniper Courses should be able to make that shot in his sleep. Heck, I'm no where near a "trained sniper", and I was able to get 100% torso hits at 100 yards with an M16A3 and iron sights, firing from the prone supported position back when I was in the Army. If I had a DMR with a decent optic, head shots at that range would have been 100% doable.

But I do understand your point. I suppose I expect the kind of sniper you get from a Tier 1 unit to be able to do the following:

100 meters, relatively stationary, human target
-5.56mm Carbine w/holosight
-AoA, 1 turn spent Aiming
-Hit Probability: Torso (99%), Head (50%)

Change that to a decent (Acc5) battle rifle with a 10x scope and that sniper should pretty much have a 100% chance to succeed.

Push that target out to 800m+, in bad weather, at night but with a NV optic, and then it becomes challenging.

Or maybe it's only a 30 yard shot, at night, while you are on the deck of a moving ship, and it's a head shot on a somali terrorist, through a tiny glass window of a life boat that is also pitching and moving. Oh, and your two best buddies have to pull off the same shot at the same time.

My guess is that if you put those guys in that same exact situation 100 times, they MIGHT miss 10% of those shots.

And for what it's worth, I don't think that every shot becomes trivial once you hit that level of skill. Especially if you have to fire on the move, or if you don't have the luxury of being able to take AIM maneuvers without getting shot yourself.