Help a noobie understand critical hits

[Varyon]

Originally Posted by Colonel__Klink

Ok... please explain to me *WHY* you would list the weapon as 5d6 damage if it's not capable of doing 5d6 damage to the player because of blow through?

Generally you shouldn't be shooting your players at all. Unless they're really disruptive, anyway. :P

But more seriously, a good reason to still list a weapon as 5d even if using blowthrough rules that limit it when used on humans is that GURPS doesn't assume you're only shooting humans. Maybe you're actually shooting a bear, an elephant, a Tyrannosaurus Rex, or something even larger. The houserules I linked earlier - which generally result in a lower blowthrough cap than the official blowthrough rules - have SM+2 targets with a blowthrough cap of 5d, so anything that size or larger is basically going to take full damage from a 5d pi rifle.

Now, there have been discussions in the past on if having both Armor Divisors and Wounding Modifiers is really necessary, considering they're largely the same effect just stated differently. Personally, I prefer them as they are, but I could see cause to pare things down to just one or the other.


As for your suggestion to set handguns at around 1d and rifles at around 2d(2), if you want anemic firearm damage in your setting that's certainly an option. As a player I would certainly find it bizarre that the advanced firearms in a cyberpunk world are so pitifully weak, but I'm not playing in your campaign, so as long as it works for your players, go for it.