Ultra Tech setting with shotgun, handling range and armor
 

Hi, my first post on forum YAY!

Some of my friends and I play a ultra tech setting somewhere in starwars. I am currenly considering a new character and begun thinking about using a shotgun, perhaps a Gauss CAW 18.5mm from UT 142

However it got me thinking.

How do I deal with strong armored foes? The typical stormtropper have DR 50 torso, DR 30 on arms and 20-10 on head. Not that we meet them often, however I would like to be able to do something beside running away in fear.

I noticed that there is armor piercing rounds, however not allowed in Gauss weapons. and other shotguns already suffer from lesser dmg.....

Secondly can I somehow modify the shotgun to get lowered range to take advantage of the Shotguns and Multiple Projectiles rules in B409 ? for a more easy hit without going 20 yards away from my enemy (asumed shotshells from UT154 )

I really dont know if it is a decent weapon choice in UT, however it could be fun, and I always wanted to try it out. Note: I might be making a HRD human replica droid that may also be a doctor for the other players (meetbags) there proberly are not a ton of points for weapon training.

Re: Ultra Tech setting with shotgun, handling range and armor
 

Note: You are likely to break a Star Wars setting if you use Ultratech projectile weapons without extreme GM control.

You Are Warned.
You should definitely ignore those 'not available for gauss and rail guns' clauses in reference to the Gauss shotguns, which quite obviously do not already use AP ammo. (If you can't get that approved, perhaps you should use a rifle instead of a shotgun.)

That said, the classic anti-armor load for UT shotguns is the HEMP warhead from page 155. Takes DR 210 to stop it.
Lowering the 1/2d range would require lowering the muzzle velocity of the weapon, and thus the damage. Note that this is allowed with no modification: p141 says that for EM guns "Ammunition velocity can also be varied, exactly as for a liquid-propellant slugthrower", and low velocity mode for an LP slugthrower halves range...but also damage, so that may not be helpful.

Re: Ultra Tech setting with shotgun, handling range and armor
 

A Hemp round should be sufficient overkill at 210 points of penetration against most lightly armored foes like that.

But overall the big benfit of the shotgun is the ease of hitting with shot at 135 pellets/second on lightly armored targets for a +7 to hit. But the 2d damage will not be enough if they have armor.

But you can get a rof of 15 on the HEMP rounds too for +3 to hit.. for a LOT of small explosions all over the place form the high number of missed rounds.. so autofiring those in a place with burning materials/explosives/civilians gets messy...

You should really have enough strength to carry a lot of ammunition, carry a lot of ready loaded clips and have fastdraw ammo. Shotgun ammo in the quantities that an autofiring weapon will chew through is heavy.

Re: Ultra Tech setting with shotgun, handling range and armor
 

At TL10, an 18.5mm APHEx round can nearly bring down a starship. There are so many choices of ammunition type for a shotgun, other than shot—in a game with commonly-encountered armor, there's never a good reason to use shot.

Re: Ultra Tech setting with shotgun, handling range and armor
 

Yeah, UT firearms are kind of overpowered compared to anything seen in star wars...

Yes, unless you use the over penetration rules, that DR 50 stormtrooper is taking 64 points on damage on torso hits and is kind of out from combat and most likely very dead..

Yes, the close range=1 shot is a problem with shotguns when firing against low armored targets and shotshells, so just make sure you have armor on and fire something with fragments on autofire at the ground.. all those 15 shells ARE going somewhere.. with likely several being fairly close to the target(and anyone close to them like their friends), the +4 for hitting a ground square certainly helps in getting close.. and against any actually armored foes you need to hit them with something heavier than shotshell anyway...

Overall I would carry a LOT of hemp ammo.. and for even less Star Wars feel homing ammo is always good.. :)

Re: Ultra Tech setting with shotgun, handling range and armor
 

This doesn't really work well with the rules. The only GURPS mechanic that will allow you land a burst of Rcl 3 fire in a relatively small area is the Rapid Fire vs. Close Stationary Targets rule...

Also, 18.5mm fragmentation is really weak, so your 'low armored' targets had better be very, very low armored!

Re: Ultra Tech setting with shotgun, handling range and armor
 

Yes, but here the reduced muzzle speed should help as that should lower the RCL a lot.. though like a lot of Ultratech there is no such actual rule but as a GM I would definitely lower RCL along with the damage and ST on low power and increase on the high power shots.

And art say RCL 2, low range and +3 for rof and +4 for ground you are getting fairly many hits and couple of close misses(<5 yards)

As in "uuh I use double/half the power and the weapon kicks as much?"

Yes,very much so, but so it the shotshell, really in UT if you are firing a weapon with 2d damage(the gaus CAW with shot as indicated by OP) you expect the enemy to have absolutely no armor. even the lowest armor stops such.

For any type of armor on enemy you need to use a weapon with any sort of penetration and get a hit.

There are a very few things that fall in the category: "reasonable chance to damage with 2d and and unreasonable with 1d as UT armors go". In low tech settings there is a huge difference between the two as many LT armors are in the 5-8 DR range, but in UT even the 2 lb TL 9 Reflex Vest has DR 12.

Re: Ultra Tech setting with shotgun, handling range and armor
 

Two things which make it complicated are that heavy weapons have MORE POWER while smallarms seem about as effective as 1930s firearms (maybe with more armour penetration), and that the movies probably use a Mook rule so after the boarding scene in A New Hope stormtroopers die whenever they are hit. In the end, if it feels right to faitfull and his group it is the right GURPS interpretation.

Re: Ultra Tech setting with shotgun, handling range and armor
 

I think he's thinking of commonly encountered jedi.

Re: Ultra Tech setting with shotgun, handling range and armor
 

HEMP and APEX rounds as previously mentioned are very useful. Also, consider the smartbaton rounds: they may not hurt anyone in armor, but when you knock a guy 5yds away from where he is standing, it's quite effective.