should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how hard?
 

I was watching the OP for Batman TAS and of course when he disarms a pair of gunmen using a single Batarang this got my GURPS wheels turning...

https://youtu.be/MhdZtFWyZGo

You don't actually see Batman catch his batarang so it doesn't contrast with B226's Thrown Weapon: Stick.

LT72 says "returning versions are unsuitable as weapons and in any event wouldn’t return if they hit." but we're not actually talking about returning to the thrower, just hitting a 2nd target in an adjacent hex after bouncing off the 1st.

The best I can think of is using P166's optional rule for Ricochets but it's defined as a non-realistic rule to emulate comic-book physics. If taking a "Batman is realistic he's just a skill god" approach I'm wondering how much tougher than "-2 per bounce" you should be when using this rule.

I was thinking maybe something like when using the speed/range table, instead of just adding the 2nd distance (between thugs) maybe you should progressively double the distance of each extra step?

So for example if it was 3 yards to the first thug, 2 yards between 1st and 2nd, 1 yard between 2nd and third, you would do 1*3+2*2+1*4 = 11 yards, instead of just treating it like 6 yards.

- -

Also regarding what Batman does immediately after... does that seem like a Flying Tackle where he used Breakfall to turn the normal result of a Flying Tackle (you fell on the ground) into just a Crouch?

I'm thinking the way Batman goes on the defensive (dodges 3 punches: a left cross, a right upper, then another right cross; Batman does a left uppercut to the body to Stop-Hit the guy's 4th punch, a right haymaker) that maybe he's doing Evaluates to regain some Action Points?

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

Richchet won't get you there. It allows you to bounce your attack off surfaces, but it is still an attack against a single target. It does not permit you to use a single attack to affect multiple foes. There's little doubt that Batman's batarang would have disarmed three thugs of their firearms, if there had been three thugs that reasonably close together. As such, it seems clear that what is occuring is an attack with an Area Effect enhancement.

Not quite doubling the distance from 6 yards to 11 yards only gives a further -2 penalty on the speed/range table which amounts to a "one more bounce" penalty which seems inadequate. Among the factors that a realistic physics rule for "richochet" attacks would need to account for, P166 calls out DR and HP of the surfaces involved as well as angle of incidence. It sounds like something you'd need to be dead lucky to pull off, likely a -10 or more, and that's before adding in a -2 for the very first bounce and any lighting penalties. A realistic skill-god Batman needs at least a batarang skill 20+ to have a fifty-fifty chance at a richochet shot.

- -

Possibly, although I'd be more inclined to think of it as a successful use of Breakfall coupled with Acrobatics as a complementary skill.

That entire sequence starts about halfway through the six second mark with Batman's Stop-Hit just a tiny bit after the eight second mark, so the whole thing takes two seconds, or two GURPS turns. Batman takes an All-Out Defense for his first turn, and Defend and Attack for his second. There's no time for him to take an Evaluate maneuver.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

why's it need to be all-out defense? I doubt he'd actually need the +2 to dodge from AOD:determined

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

In a realistic game, it simply doesn't work because objects don't actually bounce that way.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

. . . you'll fail to match many of his tricks. He clearly talked his original GM into a really nice limitation value for "not obviously superpowered" and sticks to the letter of the wording, but has worked on his image to the point where people believe he can do all sorts of things. See "I'm Batman, and I can breathe in space!"

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

He doesn't. I was thinking in 3e terms, where you normally made one attack and one acive defense per turn. If you made two attacks, you lost your active defense and it was called an All-Out Attack. Likewise if you took two active defenses, you lost your Attack and it was called an All-Out Defense. It was my short hand for Defended twice (with no attack) in the first second. Sorry for the confusion.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

My two cents, from a similar discussion of Captain America's shield:
http://forums.sjgames.com/showpost.p...8&postcount=19

Running a Batman with strictly real-world rules gives you a corpse in a funny suit.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

Indeed.

(Humorously, The Adventures of Dr McNinja take place in a cinematic setting. It's indicated to be a worldline that exists at the intersection of our own mundane world and The Radical Lands, a world of over-the-top cinematics. So a weird mix of mundanity and cinematic awesomeness suffuses the world, creating... interesting effects.)

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

I've done it two different ways:
- Originally I made the shield a gadget with a ricochet or multiple target IA. Effectively the "return to hand" was a special effect.

- My preferred approach now is to use Imbuements. Cap and Thor use Project Blow so their weapons "return" at the end of the turn. Batman can explain any number of tricks as throwing batarangs (Annihilating Weapon + Telescoping + Extra Attack or Rapid Strike in this case).

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

Rich sadist who beats up homeless drug addicts and impoverished minors also works.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

I tend not to make Mjolnir a gadget at all. There are only a handful of people in the universe who could actually pick it up, let alone steal it (granted one of them is a teammate), and it always returns. The fact that it is an object that he can throw is a special effect.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

+1. They just don't.

Now if you want to replace the word "realistic" with "cinematic," then by all means toss in whatever Enhancements/caveats one pleases.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

Are you saying it's impossible for a boomerang to bounce off a physical object and retain enough kinetic force to disarm a man?

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

It might retain enough energy, but it won't retain enough accuracy. After the first impact, it's on a tumbling non-aerodynamic trajectory in a mostly random direction, and there's not really much skill can do about it. Replace the boomerang with a hard rubber ball and it would maybe be possible.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

As a kid I threw boomerangs at things often enough - not just high in the air to get them to return.

Bear in mind they are rotating and aligned mostly parallel to the ground and rely on that to generate lift. If you interfere with that (by hitting something) it tends to randomly.go somewhere very close with not much force and fall to the ground. Particularly if it strikes against the rotation.

It's not that it won't bounce, it's that it is not controllable or predictable, and usually doesn't have much energy left. A deliberate ricochet would be very, very hard because of the rotation - you can't know which part of the boomerang will hit first.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

He might not be, but I will. It’s not a matter of “kinetic force”, its a matter of rotation. A flying boomerang is a rotating wing, and there is no way for it to maintain the necessary speed or plane of rotation through a collision. After it hits something a boomerang is a tumbling stick.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

While Thor's hammer has been used by more people (more than a dozen and counting) than any gadget I've had in even long running games, I'd agree that it shouldn't qualify for "Can Be Stolen".

Thor does lose access his hammer quite often even though it's usually not stolen. It functions more like equipment than he usually has than an intrinsic power with a hammer effect. We had a thread about gadgets that can be taken from you or that you might have to surrender voluntarily. The net result was that's worth about -10%.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

Since it's not truly random and since skill has no upper limit in GURPS seems like it's just a matter of the proper penalties. You and I can't conceive of planning the aerodynamics because we're not skill 40+ ultradetectives

I think it only seems random because it's hard to control exactly which part hits exactly what part of your target, but high-skill Bats could prob do that.

As far as "not much force", Batman probably throws it super-hard compared to us, so he'd have more left over.

A bigger question might be "does the burglar drop his gun so easily that the gun doesn't provide enough resistance to bounce off". You'd need to predict the firmness of the grip to figure the bouncing angle since how the gun shifts in response to getting hit can alter that angle of ricochet.

Obviously initials horizontal speed plus rotational speed will drop, but there's bound to be some backlash horizontal momentum that could be redirected a couple feet away.

The issue with him is it's only Can Be Stolen to the minority of people who either have that right mix of physical strength and/or purity of heart.

I might have a gadget that is "requires IQ roll, hard to use -12" that's largely unusable by average people who aren't geniuses like my char... but there isn't really any 'requires ST roll' limitation like for other attributes.

Also something like "required disadvantage" for his Code of Honor?

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

Plane - the question posed was "realistic". The answer is "no".

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

A realistic game would not have a character with 30+ skill.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

Nor is any interpretation of Batman realistic.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

If the question is not about realism, but about how one could model such a thing via obscene skill levels...

Call it -10 per bounce.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

Target motion in the time between throw and impact is sufficient to render it random, and skill cannot compensate for that. Also, there isn't any solution where the batarang keeps spinning in a normal way after the first impact.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

Why not? Skill involves leading/predicting foes who move evasively.

I agree, the spin won't be the same or normal, the issue is if it could be thrown hard enough that despite this it retains enough force to make the 2nd guy wince in pain and drop his gun

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

There's a difference between 'evasion' and 'random motion'. The problem is that we're in a chaotic regime so an error in target position of a millimeter means you miss the second target by meters. Given a gun being held in a bench rest and a computerized launcher and you're still going to get pretty much random results.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

This sounds a lot like sniping and adapting the speed/range table

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

You asked if it was realistically possible. It's not. If you want to bring in cinematic factors to enable it then go ahead. But it's not realistic, for all the reasons already given by numerous people. It's cinematic, and absolutely fine in that context,

The aerodynamics of a bullet are nothing like a boomerang.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

Sniping also has the problem that it's impossible to compensate for unpredictable target motion after the bullet has left the gun, though GURPS doesn't do a particularly good job of implementing that.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

There's the long range shots rule in Tactical Shooting.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

so this makes it harder accounting for bullet delay?

there's less in the way of batarang delay though

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

If you were to take this kind of approach to this problem, you are going to fall well below the resolution of 3d6 probability. This is the random motion of a small object tumbling in free space colliding with the random motions of a slightly larger object attached to an arm. Can it happen? Sure. You can also win a state lottery jackpot, just not with odds of 1/216 or better.

There's a lot of ways to do this in GURPS. Area Affect on innate attack, Throwing Art Rapid Strike, wildcard points from Ninja! etc.None of them should actually pay any attention to the actual physics here, because Batman.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

They allow shooter skill to compensate. It would be better to just give a skill cap or a separately rolled miss chance.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

If you think of guys who throw a spinning axe in a way "I'm guaranteed to hit with the sharp end" with enough skill, isn't it conceivable when Batman throws a batarang he's competently planning "the last inch of the right wing of my batarang is going to hit the barrel of this gun" ?

If he can guarantee that outcome and predict where the gun will be held, and where the 2nd gunman will be holding his gun (ie they're both going to be pointing the gun at him, obviously) it seems like he should be able to know how that rotation from right-wing to pistol-barrel is going to spin off to the next guy?

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

That's the problem. He can't. It's not a hard task, it's a task that requires information he doesn't have (absent precognition or other supernatural abilities), and is therefore impossible.

May I ask why you even bothered to ask this question if you were unwilling to accept that the answer is "no"?

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

An impact on the last inch of the wing will exert a lot of torque and stop the rotation, whereupon the boomerang will stop flying.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

Even if he just throws it without hitting anything, it won't return in most situations. Real returning boomerangs require a huge amount of space and even experts have trouble getting them to come back to their point of origin.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

The above quoted for truth.

When a boomerang is flying it rotates a lot faster than it moves. It has to for the side that is rotating opposite to the gross motion to produce lift (the fact that it produces less lift than the side rotating forward is what makes the boomerang's path curve in the air). The result is that when a boomerang collides with something it does so with a tip, and the collision checks the rotation. Which is why boomerangs stop flying when they hit something, and fall to the ground not far from the point of collision.

The thing that happens in the OP's cartoon show is not realistic.

I'd say it was more extreme than cinema. I'd call it "cartoonish". If I saw it in a movie, no matter how good the CGI animation, I wouldn't react "wow!" but "bull!".

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

I think of most axe throwing as an exhibition trick, with carefully controlled range and timing.

Batman may be thinking that, but Batman isn't real, and can't be real. It's fundamentally a poetic license to do "badass" imaginary stuff.

Batman can, but that's a perfect example of how Batman isn't realistic.

In GURPS, it's most straightforward to do it with cinematic (etc) mechanics. It's probably comparatively painful to do it with "just" very-high skill levels. And you're welcome to do it that way. Doesn't make it realistic (doesn't make those super-high skill levels realistic, either).

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

No one in real life exists who can "guarantee" this. Not with an axe, or a knife, or anything rotation. At fixed distances and unmoving targets, the success level can be extremely high. As soon as the distance isn't the same, the stance isn't the same, the target isn't the same or is moving, success plummets.

GURPS is generous when it comes to success and damage of thrown rotating weapons, because it's below the granularity of the system to deal with this, so it's abstracted into a simple mechanic. That's good - it fits the system and it works and lets people have fun. It's still generous.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

Batman's knowledge of the criminal element probably borders on precog: he can't literally see the future but he can imagine it pretty reliably.

It stops rotation in the original direction (unless maybe it sliced through due to being a sharpened baterang) but then there is also force exerted in the reverse direction (like a bouncing basketball) which I'm positing could send it to a tertiary location.

Like for example in this dribble pass: https://giffiles.alphacoders.com/561/5616.gif

We're not talking about it returning to Batman (who looks to be 3-4 yards away) but rather to hit the gunman adjacent to his buddy (looks to be only 1 yard away) which should be easier because it only requires a 90-degree turn instead of a 180-degree turn, and has to travel a shorter distance.

When a thrown object hits another object and bounces off, it has to go somewhere.

If that somewhere could include hitting a 2nd gun, then it would be possible.

If it's possible then there are variables an expert might adjust to make it more likely to happen.

Batman and many DC fighters are obviously meant to be higher skill than the best fighters on our earth. I don't think someone being higher skilled than IRL necessarily means "unrealistic" though.

Realistic to me just means "no supernatural or exotic stuff" and "no rules that make difficult things too easy".

Not looking for a guarantee here: even Batman can crit-fail with 30 skill punches or whatev. Just the possibility and what penalties should be applied to actually achieve such an outcome.

You can say for example it's "unrealistic" to shoot a Falcon flying at max speed (Move 24) in the eyeball but it's technically achievable in a "realistic" using -9 hit location, -4 SM, -7 speed/range, for a total of -20 to hit. You just need skill 30ish with your gun :)

For it to be "realistic" to have skill 30 with your rifle then you'd prob use B294's "Maintaining Skills" requiring it to be used once per day 'in the field' (or 1 hour study outside the field) to avoid the IQ check to see if you lose a level.

Batman, who we know actually has trained to use a gun (forget the name but trained w/ some sniper while becoming Batman) probably doesn't have it beyond skill+10 since there's no way he shoots a guni n the field daily (and def wouldn't have time to train an hour per day with it)

He might in theory have it at skill+10 though since that only requires practicing once per 6 months, which he probably does with all his skills.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

If it's good enough to be useful, it's good enough to be a supernatural ability.
It doesn't, but the things you are looking for aren't skill, they're supernatural abilities.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

Batman is a ninja with TBAM. He can use Rapid Strike with Throwing Art.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

You literally used the word guarantee. I responded accordingly.

Which is completely unrealistic. It's fine for a game, but not for real life. You asked if it was realistic. It's not. Once you get past that, you can have whatever you want and it's no problem.

Harking back to another comment you made about a boomerang bouncing and saying the rotation would bounce back. At that point the boomerang falls to the ground. I don't know if you've ever thrown a boomerang? If they aren't rotating, they are utterly useless when thrown. Worse than a straight stick in many ways. Even a proper hunting one (not one designed to return).

Skill 30 isn't realistic. Regardless of maintaining it, to even get there. It's perfectly fine in a game if you want that. But if you want realism, it's just not.

Anyway, this is dragging on. You want it to be realistic. Everyone has offered an opinion saying it isn't. GURPS isn't reality. It's not a simulator.
It has a defined granularity and uses abstractions to enable its core mechanics. It can be reasonably realistic if that's what you want, to a certain scale. It can be completely unrealistic if that's what you want, to a certain scale. It's your game, and calling it realistic is 100% OK if that's what you want to do :-).

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

MA120 seems like the thing he'd do throwing multiple batarangs but I don't know if either of them cover "single batarang hits secondary target"

I was thinking that something along the lines of MA136's Extreme Dismemberment would be closer.

Like instead of the 1st limb providing cover DR for the 2nd limb, you subtract the damage you do to a 1st target (force loss) from the damage done to the 2nd target.

That damage can't be enough to destroy the limb (otherwise it wouldn't bounce off) but instead whatever force is lost by hard DR (like metal) subtracting from it.

Like if basic damage isn't resulting in actual destruction of matter (reducing HP) then that force (negated by the DR) has to go somewhere... like in flinging the attacking object in another direction.

IE the whole "bullets bouncing off of Superman and hitting bystanders" type situation, instead of the whole "they flatten out, losing all their force, dropping slugs at his feet with no risk to anyone"

Whether you get dangerous deflections or non-dangerous drops I think could depend on whether it's a head-on hit (all force goes into Superman's DR and reflects into flattening the bullet itself) or an angled one (bullet retains some of it's force as it angles off a curved part of Superman).

Excerpt in the Batman scenario, the gun with steel DR 3 or whatev is Superman, and the Batarang is the bullet.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

They don't fly if they spin backwards. So even a boomerang that is made out of superball and so counter-rotates after a collision (which would have to be at precisely the right angle, but that's not my objection) would tumble to the ground close to the collision.

Why did you bother to ask this question, given that you won't accept our answers and don't care what we reply? If you think we don't know and are making it up as we go, why ask? Why argue?

Farmer and I, and I expect DanHoward too, have made and thrown boomerangs. We aren't answering without knowledge, and we don't find groundless suppositions and speculations informative. You asked "is it realistic?". My answer is "no, it is unrealistic". Believe me or don't believe. Either way I'm done with arguing.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

I care about the replies, that's why I'm responding to them.

Basically I think the ricochet is possible but I'm asking how much harder the cinematic ricochet rules should be made in non-cinematic applications, since the Powers rules for ricochets didn't seem realistic enough.

It's a matter of increasing the penalty and establishing impossibility via soft-cap instead of hard-cap.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

The basic problem you'll have is that, if you start applying 'reasonable' penalties, there are much easier solutions that are within Batman's skill set, such as 'throw two batarangs at once'.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

True but maybe he only had one left or was conserving ammo. Basically we try to fulfill the 'Batman always has his reasons' premise to justify why he used a single rang vs 2 guns.

One thing I thought of was how you can use a Dual Weapon Attack with both sides of a long reach-2 weapon like a staff, you could probably hit 2 guns that way.

A thrown weapon isn't reach 2 so it doesn't work that way but maybe you could emulate it via techniqe adaptation?

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

Because it looked cool on screen. There's nothing wrong with stupid batarang tricks in a cinematic game, just don't pretend they're realistic.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

The difference between realistic and cinematic in GURPS terms isn't "you can't have high skills, they're cinematic" but rather the degree to which you apply requirement for doing things.

MA127 is a good example where cinematic allows more than 2 attacks via rapid strike. This doesn't mean you can't do multiple attacks w/o this rule though, since you can do that by taking Extra Attack advantage.

MA128 even moreso w/ Chambara's special rules like ignoring the halving for Jumping During Combat. Doesn't actually mean long jumps would be impossible w/o cinematic, just that they'd cost more.

MA125 also defines sort of a middle ground too:

most or all of the optional rules in this chapter that aren’t
strictly unrealistic but that are possibly optimistic

If we're moving from cinematic > optimistic > realistic rules things become progressively harder and costlier to achieve.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

It's not a problem with "make difficult things easy" it's "make physically impossible things easy."

Having skill higher than 25 or so (this would vary from skill to skill, etc) is probably meaningless to the point of impossible. This batarang trick is impossible. Curving bullets like the Wanted movie is impossible, though a GURPS supplement might define rules for doing it with a skill penalty...

Case in point:

Precognition and "bordering on precognition" are fictional TV/movie nonsense. Batman can do them, but Batman is a comic book superhero who just has "I'm just a ridiculously driven human" as his superpower --- the results are still blatantly nonsense, from a real-world perspective.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

I think the point others are trying to make here is there is no such penalty that makes sense.

Physically impossible certainly isn't something that can be overcome directly with higher skills. And while hitting something usefully with a ricochet might not be physically impossible, it's not something you can reasonably make more likely with greater skill. In a sense what you want isn't a bigger penalty, it's a more modest one with skill cap, along the same lines as a Wild Swing. If you're terrible, there's no hope at all, if you are good, there's a chance random stuff breaks in your favor. If you are fantastically amazing, well, being amazing doesn't actually increase the chance purely random stuff breaks in your favor, so you can't beat the skill cap. That may not be what you want, but that's more or less what people are telling you, and I think it's true for genuinely realistic ricochets, you simply cannot be good enough to predict how something this complex is going to bounce off a random surface.

There is one exception though, if you stand a fixed distance away from a surface you have prepared and tested before, you might be able to get the [same] bounce more consistently, so if you set things up so that particular higher probability trajectory would hit the target.... Crazy prepared characters like Batman or Xanatos might be able to sell that as non-cinematic in specific cases. You couldn't do it in a random fight, but for a rehearsed scene or circus act, well, maybe.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

In a realistic setting there is no way to realistically train the ricochet-disarm move with a boomerang (or batarang), and no amount of skill would ever pull it off in a situation where it would be useful.

You might as well ask what penality a normal human in a realistic setting would have to spontaneously fire laser beams out of their eyes.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

Is it actually physically possible for the batarang's bounce-off path to hit the other gun, or just inconceivable to have a grasp of physical movement allowing one to engineer it reliably enough to be worth the attempt?

In the case of it's like math guys it'd probably allow them to do 3-hit rapid-strike combinations (-12) combined with targeted attacks yet still have max odds of hitting.

Bouncing a thrown object isn't the same as curving a bullet.

I might conceivably for example throw a left-handed "outside curve" with a tennis ball so that it bounces off the right side of the jaw of a gunman in my front-right hex so it ricochets off sideways and hits his buddy in my front-left hex.

I lack the skill to probably even attempt that at skill 3 so it'd be like an automatic miss, but I bet Batman could try it at skill 4 or 5.

There are cases where exotic or supernatural abilities with proper limitations are considered realistic to apply to characters, like buying DR 1 (crushing only, ablative, tough skin) to emulate an ability to absorb blows w/o extra HP.

I'm not sure where but I think I remember someone coming up with some kind of "stuff you could realistically predict" limitation for precog. Or maybe I'm thinking of a skill?

Even "Danger Sense" and "Empathy" are mundane advantages allowed to normal humans in GURPS even though both seem supernatural to me.

Why wouldn't skill be able to analyze secondary attack vectors?

MA78 has "Return Strike" for example for the Kusari/Flail. I could see something like this adapted to emulate something like "I throw a tennis ball to miss my opponent and it bounces off the brick wall behind him and then comes back and smacks him in the neck".

Wild Swing of course has back kick / back strike / elbow strike though but you pay a skill penalty when designing a technique to ignore an inherent skill cap.

The thing about "random" fights is even if Batman is fighting a new goon every time, fights don't seem random to him.

There should probably be some kind of skill like "predict what attack my foe will launch next" which you can roll against (yeah sometimes you're wrong) and if you pass you can consistently set stuff up like that.

I'm thinking like when people plan trajectories during a squash match: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JI3Cvdc3ZMQ&t=1m6s

I'm sure Bruce Wayne plays stuff like that, to keep up yuppie appearances and also learn to improve his hand-eye coordination.

A squash ball obviously ricotchets in a more predictable way (and keeping more force) than a batarang, but you still get that hole "how to throw things at a surface"

The way he analyzes crooks their jaws as they draw guns probably seems like a stationary wall.

We have to keep in mind this is a guy who managed to Fast Draw and fire before Darkseid's Omega Beams hit.

That would be manifesting an attack vector that doesn't exist, whereas throwing things by hand does exist.

A more important question might be something like "would a goon's grip ST on his gun be high enough that enough residual force could exist to launch the batarang at the next guy".

That could be a self-limiting thing, like maybe it could be possibly to bounce a batarang off a wall to hit a gun, but not bounce off a gun to hit another gun, simply because people don't hold guns rigidly enough to create adequate ricochet force?

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

Neither one. It's impossible to engineer it to be reliable.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

It's not possible to do this intentionally.

Here's a list of just a few of the issues (which have probably been brought up, but I didn't see all of them on a quick scan):
- Human senses aren't sharp enough to provide the information necessary to calculate the shot. You would need super senses unless you're doing it in a controlled environment where you could figure that out over time.
- Even perfect information is only accurate if your target is static. There's an unavoidable time between the throw and the hit where the deflection angle will change if the target moves (breathes, twitches, vibrates, etc) even the slightest bit.

Racketball and basketball bounces take advantage of lots of practice against stationary flat surfaces. That is a known environment (usually with marked off distances) with an easy to hit target (surfaces) that can't move. Even so, many of those bounce shots still don't go where they are intended when performed by the best athletes in the world.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

One thing I just thought of is maybe instead of viewing this like "it ricocheted off the gun" it might be something like "the gun was being held so loosely that the force needed to knock it out of the hand wasn't enough to noticeably divert it from it's original path".

I'm not sure how heavy batarangs are, but we know Batman is strong enough to throw some pretty heavy ones if he wants to. These would have a a lot more momentum so if they hit a light pistol (which has little inertia) maybe they could just keep going if the guy didn't have a secure grip on it?

You're probably not going to have a death grip on the pistol since if you have safety training you'll do the whole "finger outside the guard until you've spotted your target" so that could be a vulnerable time where you can't apply full ST to resist disarming from a surprise attack (ie you don't see the batarang drawn, it's thrown too quickly, or even if you see it coming you doubt it'll hit your gun)

You see for example when this guy cuts an apple with a boomerang (I assume a sharpened one?) at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a1KpVMvpZMI that it keeps going, probably because due to the sharpness little force was needed to proceed (would be different w/ blunt boomerang)

Basically it might take less force t cut through something and keep an edged/cutting weapon moving, than to create enough knockback to launch it out of the way (depending on sharpness, maybe armor divisor for Cover DR?)

In the case of Batman, he did not cut through the guns meaning he'd have to knock them out of the way if we're taking the "it continued it's original path, slightly slowed down" approach.

Maybe this doesn't require knocking back the entire gun through (like if you hit it at center of mass) since if it managed to angle the arc where it hits the tip of the barrel, you get the leverage of the barrel helping you twist it out of the way and out of the guy's hands?

IE smacking just beyond the trigger finger (bad leverage) vs smacking the barrel in terms of the force amplification it would put on someone trying to retain a rifle.

This seems to be covered by GMs charging unusual background perks to train Per above 20.

Correct, this requires prediction/leading like what snipers do to moving targets, though more complex since you have to predict 3D rotation not 2D profile.

I guess a first question is: to the Flash (who moves so fast beings seem stationary) what kind of penalties would you give?

There is no absolute "I have so many levels of ATR that you are stationary" in GURPS, we could only do penalties and maybe give him 30x Time Spent (+5 bonus) in a single second for having ATR 30, for example.

Whatever bonuses Flash might get for Time Spent, Batman might get by just having an inherently higher skill level.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

He's a ninja with Throwing Art and TBAM. He can also just do ranged disarms.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

true but this would be like using ranged disarm with a single bullet

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dj3NuBjQSlw

btw here is film showing residual force after hitting a tree vs a riot shield, seems like there could be enough left over to whack a 2nd guy's hand and make him drop his gun too

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

Which if possible, in the campaign may just be with Rapid Strike. This is no more absurd than some things you specifically can already do, and may actually be in Martial Arts already. If only some superninja can do it, it could require a perk. In that case spending, for example, a Ninjitsu! point would do it.

Game mechanically it's a trivial thing to combine rapid strikes and disarms.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

I didn't say "difficult" or "nearly impossible." You've left what can be done by the human eye and started entering high detail ladar of surface territory, some material analysis for the elasticity of the object you're hitting, with a complementary physical examination of how much resistance the person holding it will be offering at the point in time of impact. Will it be treated as a giving or hard surface? No way to visually tell and worse the grip can change after the throw.

That's a sniper is playing the odds that a target will be in a certain zone at a certain point. If the sniper is guessing wrong (if you fire where there's not a target) it's an automatic miss. Here you're not doing "just" that easy in any sense. There's simply no way to account for all the variables (some mentioned above) plus how the target may twitch to alter the angle of impact after firing since you can't just "hit" your target.

There are unknowns that can't be determined until after it's attempted. Simply being fast, skilled, and/or perceptive isn't enough. Time loops (infinite tries) might allow you to get lucky... eventually. TK would allow you to "guide" the projectile in unnatural ways. Bottom line, this requires super powers not skills.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

I think Batman just threw his boomerang towards them and they were so scared by him that they dropped their guns.

Which might also be a cinematic use of Intimidation, but is possible with a critical success/crit fail.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

Loads to unpack here. I'd start by advising against using the word "realistic" when you mean "not using supernatural abilities" - the default reading is "can this be done in the real world", to which the answer is no.

So, the next question is "is this possible to do with arbitrarily high skill levels?" That is, do the physics allow it to work in an ideal situation at all. At first glance the answer is yes, since the batarang once connecting with something has to go somewhere. That said, I don't believe enough momentum will remain in something as oddly shaped as a batarang to do more than drop to the ground maybe a foot away. It could be an interesting bit of math to calculate the odds - I'd start with studying the law of conservation of momentum.

Lastly, there's a lack of anecdotal evidence. If it's never been done in a controlled experiment as a party trick, I'm not sure it could actually be done. Cause it would be an awesome party trick.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

The Flash can't exist in a realistic setting either. If he could, and threw a boomerang at speeds comparable to himself, it isn't going to ricochet either because it evaporates from friction with the air before it leaves his hand. Super fast, particularly super fast to the point of near or actual time stop, as it is usually done in fiction, is no closer to realistic than insubstantiality or shrinking, and generally substantially less than teleportation or super strength or super sharpness. Most super powers are like that - you distort the physics of the out-of-human-experience situations so they make "sense" to your audience whose idea of "sense" is grounded in said human experience and not say quantum mechanics or the behavior of objects in viscous fluids. Batman's super powers do that no less than any other hero.

The barrier to precision ricochets isn't really about speed, it's sensory or calculational. You need to control the exact points and angles of contact between the two objects. If they are irregular (and even [microscopic] irregularities might matter) you have to be able to detect those irregularities and control the exact orientation of contact (which for something as asymmetric as a batarang means also being able to see the variations in the air it is travelling through) to compensate for them. And that assumes that's possible at all. Which it often isn't, no amount of skill will let you stand on the freethrow line, hit a basketball backboard and have the ball "bounce" into the team bench, it just isn't possible to deviate that much from the angle of incidence equals the angle of reflection.

Edit: Incidentally the reason we accept that cinematic heroes can bounce a bullet off of something and hit anything depends on our experience that bounces off irregular surfaces are basically random. For the simple case, we know you can only hit specific spots. If you bounce a basketball pass off the gym floor, or a laser pointer beam off a small mirror for example, you know there are only certain places it can go - you can only hit targets you can see reflected in the mirror for example. But when Xena bounces her chakram off of a rock or pillar or enemy's armor and it flies off at some impossible angle, we'll accept it *because* we expect bounces off of irregular things to be so random we can't predict them, so no angle actually seems ridiculous to us.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

Twitching to alter angle of impact is a thing with sniping too, presumably related to rolling the damage dice.

Perhaps that count somehow be one of the variables?

That much is true of attacking in general, like "will they attempt a parry" or "will the parry succeed"

I regret the phrasing causes some confusion.

IMO in the real world we just don't have Batman-tier boomerang throwers, the guys who do it have lower skill levels than Batman

Momentum depends on throwing speed. Imagine a batarang shot out of a cannon or thrown by the hulk?

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

That's not an unknown in the same way. The key thing is unknown behavior after you no longer have control over the projectile, and that simply doesn't occur for melee weapons (it also doesn't occur for guided missiles, and some Batman writers have posited microelectronics in the batarang that make them guided projectiles. It still probably doesn't solve the ricochet case because such controls will only work when the batarang is moving aerodynamically, and after impact it won't be, but it does help for projectiles with less ridiculous shapes).

This is actually one of the general problems with GURPS rules for melee weapons: it's actually possible to change your attack angle mid-attack to adapt to the target's behavior, so melee weapon combat should probably be a quick contest.
Typically, the batarang disintegrates.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

yeah one would assume Bats buys denser tougher batarangs able to stand up to the force of his throws

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

Like it was said below, those aren't the kind of unknowns I'm referring to. It's the "you can't possibly know amount of energy the target will absorb or what angle it will hit a non-flat surface at" kind of details that will inevitably change after it's thrown.

Those details usually aren't important, because usually you're sending all the energy to that target and you don't have to worry how hard he's holding something or if he has some momentum going on. You also don't have to worry about angles when you're just trying to hit someone.

Those will change because humans breathe, twitch, and move in other usually insignificant unpredictable ways that normally don't matter. Trying to hit a precise spot on a randomly moving curved surface is a different ballgame. Skill can't help you with no predictable pattern. This isn't "leading a target" where your margin of error is where you predict your target will arrive along a predictable path. This is "how deep of a breath will he take" "will it sway 1/100th of an inch up, down, right, left, or in a twisting motion"? Will his grip adjust? ... and a thousand other variables, many of which couldn't be assessed visually, even if they weren't going to change in the next thousandth of a second.

From a game perspective, any active defense your target is allowed also screws up any planning you did especially if it's successful.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

Except they don't move randomly and there are predictable patterns to human movement.

Combat's minutiae seems random to us because we're sub-20 combat skills and can't read people like Batman.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

Batman isn't real. Batman isn't realistic. Any benchmark against Batman isn't realistic.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

Low order bits of most natural phenomena are good quality randomizers. Gross motor motion is non-random but position to the millimeter pretty much is.

Note that using a less stupid object than a batarang might mean that fine scale randomness doesn't matter, a double disarm with reasonably bouncy ball is probably doable reliably enough to be clearly more than luck.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

Yeah that could be a better starting point for developing "two attacks per throw" type situations as baseline rules and then deal w/ modifiers for awkward objects later.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

Or you know, he's a TBAM Ninja using Throwing Art.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

Even those with 25+ combat skills can't read people like Batman. He has the power of whatever he needs to do the current plot. You're pursuing the wrong mechanisms in trying to treat his feats as realistic (or in many cases, even plausible).

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

Still doesn't stop us from attempting to decide what kind of penalties you'd face if you tried this in a game.
I for one think it shouldn't be easier than throwing 2 objects to disarm two guns, and that missing the first attempt would ruin the second.

As for actual penalties... you're going for a double attack, so I'd start with a -6 for rapid strike, hitting a pistol is at a further -5, disarming it an extra -2 and then there are the range penalties.
But this is with 2 objects, a single one ? No idea.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

Sure, but if you're evaluating it as a cinematic ability you base the penalties on how useful the trick is, not on how hard it is. Offhand, I'd call saving ammunition (which is the only real advantage over just throwing two whatevers) -1 or -2 in a cinematic game. And sure, feel free to reduce the ammo cost to zero by bouncing it back to yourself.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

If you're doing a realistic game, you should simply not allow it.

In a cinematic game, call it a Deceptive Throw (using the same -2/-1 as melee Deceptive Attacks) or Ranged Feint (MA121).

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

If you are just trying to model Batman and not Xena or the Lone Ranger, then I'm not sure skills are even the way to go. Batman has a lot of tech gizmos after all, maybe the batarang has imaging radar, an adaptive surface to alter its aerodynamics and an onboard AI that picks targets and calculates the necessary shape to assume to steer toward them. Sure maybe the AI occasionally picks a different target than the one Batman intended, but hey, stuff doesn't always go as planned in any fight, and as long as it's IFF is good enough it's hitting his enemies it's still useful.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

Personally I'd do Batman with exactly three skills: Ninjitsu!, Detective! and Playboy!, but YMMV.

Re: should a "Ricochet" attack using boomerang be possible in realistic games? how ha
 

I did Businessman!-14 (WC-2) [6]; Detective!-16 (WC) [24]; Martial Artist!-18 (WC+2) [48]; Scientist-14! (WC-2) [6]; Tactics-20 (IQ+4) [20]

for a budget build, but I like the idea of adding Playboy! as well.