GURPS Hellboy - Beam Weapons?

[krank]

OK, I've run into another snag...

The Hellboy sourcebook has a skill for "beam weapons" - but it does not include any stats for beam weapons, even as examples. One of my players wants to play a scientist type who's as TL+1 (as supported by the rules), and I really don't know what to do...

Will I need to invest in GURPS Ultratech just for the sake of one character? Seems a bit excessive, given that the only GURPS setting I want to run at the moment is Hellboy, which doesn't have any kind of focus on futuristic beam-weapons, and such.

Would it be possible for anyone to help me out here? Do Beam Weapons have increased damages, or do they work better against armour than normal weapons, or what?

In which book can I find rules for them? Is it only Ultratech? Or is it in the Basic Set?

[Nikolai]

Are you playing 3e or 4e?
You can find a couple of 4e Beam Weapon stats on p. B280. That should suffice for your purpose.
Ultra Tech for 4e has not yet been published, anyway.
(In 3e, you find the Beam Weapon stats on pp. B208-209 (3e), but they don't have a separate table as in 4e.)

[krank]

Originally Posted by Nikolai

Are you playing 3e or 4e?
You can find a couple of 4e Beam Weapon stats on p. B280. That should suffice for your purpose.
Ultra Tech for 4e has not yet been published, anyway.
(In 3e, you find the Beam Weapon stats on pp. B208-209 (3e), but they don't have a separate table as in 4e.)

GURPS Hellboy is (supposed to be) a standalone game based on a slightly extended version of the GURPS Lite 3e rules...

What is the reason for choosing a Laser Rifle that does 2d in damage anyways? Is it just the weight?

Where can I find the actual difference between shotting someone with a weapon that does "cr" and "imp" damage? Have I understood things correctly if I say that the damage which comes through the DR is doubled?


Shouldn't beam weapons be able to "burn through" normal armour? What kind of armour protects against a laser beam?

Anyways, thanks for the help and the page refs. Much obliged!

[thona]

Have I understood things correctly if I say that the damage which comes through the DR is doubled?

Yes. That is impaling.

Shouldn't beam weapons be able to "burn through" normal armour?

Try common sense, please.

If a laser takes a second to burn through armor - how high is the chance that the beam is staying on exactly the SAME spot of the target for even a fraction of a second when the target is moving? Unless you have an immobile target and a good shooter (of a fixed gun), chances are pretty exactly ZERO.

Yes, in theory a laser beam burns through armor. But we do not talk of a scenario where this effect will come into play.

What kind of armour protects against a laser beam?

Any that absorbs the energy of the beam. What that is depends on the - type of laser. Fo normal visible light, obviously, NOT a glass armor. Anything else will protect.

The differences should be below the granularity of the system.

[Nikolai]

Originally Posted by krank

What is the reason for choosing a Laser Rifle that does 2d in damage anyways? Is it just the weight?

Where can I find the actual difference between shotting someone with a weapon that does "cr" and "imp" damage? Have I understood things correctly if I say that the damage which comes through the DR is doubled?

Normally, yes. For hits to the Torso, Face, Neck or Groin (and Nose and Jaw in 3e). There are other wounding modifiers for other Hit Locations. (Well, probably not in Lite.)

Note that in 4e, the stats of laser weapons have changed considerably. They no longer do impaling damage, but burning damage. (A special form of burning damage, to be exact: Tight-beam burning damage, see p. B399.) In exchange, the damage they do has been increased drastically. They also have an armor divisor, which addresses your question of burning through armor. I'm not sure off the top of my head if there was a similar rule in 3e somewhere in Compendium II or the Tech books.

Bottom line: If you often worry about details like that, you probably shouldn't go with just the Lite rules but change to full-fledged GURPS instead. ;-)
And my advice would be to change to 4e, too. I don't know the Hellboy sourcebook, but there shouldn't be too much conversion involved and 4e is much better than 3e IMO.

[krank]

Well, I think I'm going to stick with the laser rules of GURPS 3e Ultratech (which I just borrowed from a friend). I don't have the time to convert to 4e, sorry. (And besides, I don't have the cash to purchase it).

I was not so much worrying about details as wondering what the reasons for using laser weapons in stead of normal weapons were. Now I have a better grasp of it, thanks.

And, I'm mostly after a "cineamtic pulp" feeling - realism is rather low on my list of prioorities. Hellboys is, after all, comic-book pulp action...

[Nikolai]

Other advantages of 3e TL8+ laser weapons in addition to impaling damage are
a) That they have quite a high Rate of Fire.
b) As per p. B120 (3e), the damage from all laser rounds striking the target in each one-second burst is totalled before substracting DR. That means you don't apply DR separately for each round, as you would do for TL7 (3e) guns. (I suppose one *could* argue that this addresses the "burn through armour" issue.)

[Brother Jim]

Don't own the Hellboy book, but seem to remember when reading through it that one could get special lasers to use against vampires, etc.

But that could just be me getting confused about where I read something.

[NorthSaber]

Three main advantages of lasers (and beam weapons in general) are, IIRC, no recoil penalty, high rate of fire, and impaling damage. Plus they look cool. ^_^

Ooh, and also, a single power cell often gives more ammo than a normal weapon would have.

[quarkstomper]

And if you invented a special UV laser it would probably do nasty damage against a vampire