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Old 09-02-2020, 04:01 PM   #11
Black Leviathan
 
Join Date: Sep 2018
Default Re: Drawing a handful of something

There's a difference to readying a pocketful of stuff and readying a weapon or ammunition. One is specifically a weapon's prerequisite for use, the other is just an ordinary ready action. You don't have much control of what you grab. coins could be of any value, you could be grabbing gemstones that you tossed in your pocket, keys, you're just grabbing random contents.

If your pocket is full of coins and you want to throw them into the crowd during a chase you can ready some random number of coins from your pocket and basically drop them by tossing them aimlessly up.

Drawing exactly 8 copper coins from your pocket would require some training in fast draw specifically to accomplish that feat, I.E. a multi fast-draw roll. Pulling a fistful of bullets as a way to abridge the time to reload would not allow you to load any faster unless you were practiced in cambering bullets from a fistful of ammunition, IE Fast-Draw Ammo.
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Old 09-02-2020, 05:09 PM   #12
Varyon
 
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Default Re: Drawing a handful of something

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Originally Posted by MrFix View Post
While I appreciate your post, I explicitly asked for anything that doesn't involve multiple fast-draw. What you describe is from the same box and is a variant of multiple fast-draw.

It's dubious that the only way to draw 5 coins out of your pocket together is to roll Fast-Draw at -10. Or that a handful of sand has to be collected with -2 per 1 grain.
While it's under that header, it only requires a single fast-draw roll, and I thought from your post you were trying to avoid making multiple fast draw rolls, not specifically wanting to avoid those rules. "How do you do X without using the rules explicitly for doing X?" seems like an odd question.

As I noted, however, doing it with very small objects, like bullets, should probably be markedly easier. Looks like Celjabba found a possible option, although sadly it lacks any sort of scaling (and could technically be meant to represent a character fast-drawing one round, then loading it, then fast-drawing another, and so forth, until their weapon is fully loaded, but only requiring a single roll against Fast Draw). Still, from that, I'd say that as long as the GM agrees you could comfortably hold (that is, without it making it hard to manipulate them without dropping some) that many rounds (or coins, or whatever) in your hand, a single Fast-Draw roll to draw them all as a free action seems appropriate. Offhand, I'd be tempted to say doing it as a Ready maneuver is also possible, requiring either a straight DX roll or a roll against an appropriate Fast-Draw skill at +4. This is starting to get into houserule territory, however.
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Old 09-02-2020, 11:26 PM   #13
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Default Re: Drawing a handful of something

Alright, thanks. Guess I'll hash it out with whatever GM I end up playing with as a house rule.
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Old 09-03-2020, 07:49 AM   #14
bocephus
 
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Default Re: Drawing a handful of something

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Originally Posted by MrFix View Post
Alright, thanks. Guess I'll hash it out with whatever GM I end up playing with as a house rule.
I dont have the books in front of me, so I cant quote RAW as requested.

To my mind, you have two separate issues in your query.

1 Can I grab a handful of X as a single motion. I would say this has been covered, and I would allow it as one roll.

2 Does that shorten loading time for ammunition. This would be a no.

Because Ammunition is directional no matter how many you end up with and it's slippery. Assuming you reach into a bag of 357 ammo, and dont even care if you get extra (you'll just drop leftover), to load a revolver. I would say you might have 2-3 that will be facing the correct way and you have the control to insert them. I would allow 1 roll for fast draw (handful), then each bullet would have a roll to be inserted based on a skill check.

I can tell you that this reflects real world quite well. As someone else pointed out this is why we have spare mags, loaders or speed strips.

Even Dropping 5 bullets out of a box, that holds them in a single orientation, into your hand you still end up with a jumble that will have you fumbling at least 2 of the 5. I did this at the range just last week and remember thinking how stupid it was that I had forgotten my speed strips. That was loading 5 bullets in a range situation not under stress and in an odd position behind cover.
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Old 09-03-2020, 03:56 PM   #15
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Default Re: Drawing a handful of something

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Originally Posted by MrFix View Post
Ten years ago, in a long dead thread, author of High Tech SAFisher made this statement - holding a handful of shells in your hand removes the drawing part of reload process - shots are already drawn.

The question is thus:

How do you draw a handful of something WITHOUT making multiple fast-draw? What is the maneuver to reach into your pocket to draw a handful of coins, raisins, spy bugs, shotgun shells etc? Is that covered anywhere in the rules? Is that just 1 ready maneuver? Is that more than 1 ready maneuver?

Please keep answers to something as RAW as possible. Thank you.
Given the assumption (not using fast draw) seems to be "don't bother rolling, one ready puts one arrow in your hand" I'm guessing that you would have to make 1 ready maneuver per each arrow you wanted to hold in your hand.

If we were using a system that involved a DX roll for all readies (just having a large basic bonus to make failure unlikely) then it'd probably make sense to allow 2 arrows in a single ready at -2 or -4 or -6 depending on which rule you were basing it on (2T@once, DWA or RS)

What I would think, whether we're talking arrows or coins, is if you ALREADY have one in your hand (grabbed earlier at no penalty), you should be -2 to grab the next one (you're doing 2 things at once: retaining your grapple on the preceding coin/arrow while opening your hand to grab the next one)

If your hand is empty and you're grabbing 2 at once, that could be at least -2 for both grabs (separate DX rolls are good to allow for only partial success of grabbing one and not the other) since you're probably less likely to successfully grab B while also grabbing A compared to grabbing B while already having a grip on A.

I'm wondering if we could just consider "Fast Draw", rather than a skill to make an ability go for 1sec to free (ie like a "Reduced Time + Requires Skill Roll" limited enhancement) instead just treat it like a 6-point technique used to buy off the -6 penalty for a "Rapid Ready".

If we view the base cost as 6 points then "requires DX roll" would be -10% which isn't enough to get a discount, but two levels of Hard to Use (-6 penalty) would bring that to -20% which is enough to save 1 point on the advantage.

Success on DX-6 (perhaps allowing weapon skill to sub for DX) would mean no -6 penalty to the ready or the attack you're splitting into "Rapid Action: Ready + Attack".

I could also see some kind of way we could incorporate "Limited by Margin" or "Margin-Based" to make it more interesting, so penalties might range from -0 to -6 depending on the MoS. That seems more realistic than "all or nothing -0 or -6)
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Old 09-03-2020, 08:18 PM   #16
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Default Re: Drawing a handful of something

I'm not sure how this would be done by the rules, but the Krag-Jorgensen rifle used something called dump loading. You would have a belt pouch of ammo and take several rounds out and "dump" them in the receiver. For long rounds this may work well enough if you practice, the pouch will keep them facing the correct direction, pistol and carbine rounds would likely get jumbled up due to how short they are. Note that that dump loading never stuck around, stripper clips and box magazines work much better.

One hour forty six minute video describing the Krag-Jorgensen, if you want more details on it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oQAqNqaiQwY
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Old 09-04-2020, 03:45 PM   #17
Taneli
 
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Default Re: Drawing a handful of something

Pulling a handful of ammo is realistic, but inserting those into your gun might then be harder?

Maybe allow up to MoS (DX roll?) pieces of ammunition to be drawn as a single bunch as a single ready action from a pouch or similar while still being able to load them in to your gun with a single ready action on each.

I’d probably allow you to substitute that DX roll with your Fast Draw (Ammo) roll, but the action would still take one second, and you would get 1+MoS rounds instead of just one.

Oh, and this only applies for reasonable sized rounds, so maybe anything from .22 to up to .50?
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Old 09-04-2020, 05:28 PM   #18
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Default Re: Drawing a handful of something

Quote:
Originally Posted by MrFix View Post
How do you draw a handful of something WITHOUT making multiple fast-draw?
You want to draw a handful of something, for what purpose and in what situation?
If it’s inside combat, anything you draw shall require a ready maneuver if you don’t take a fast draw. This assumes you took the precautions required to use it ASAP.

In your example, the guy with the shells in his hand already took some kind of maneuver in order to have them in hand. It could have been a ready maneuver or a fast-draw. This breaks at least into two possibilities:
  • That he took consecutive fast-draws with a penalty (shortening the drawing part and the loading part).
  • Or that he took a ready maneuver to have several bullets in hand (he drew them or somebody gave them to him) and then a fast-draw maneuver to load them quickly.
Moving to drawing a handful of stuff, let’s assume you got a dedicated bag for bulk bullets, you don’t have fast-draw:
  • You draw a handful of bullets from your bag; that’s a ready maneuver.
  • This handful of (random) bullets won’t be ready to get loaded into your gun ASAP; then you shall need another maneuver to sort the bullets.
  • Finally, assuming you dropped the bullets in excess (for free), you take another maneuver to load the gun.
That’s 3 turns if your weapon allows it.

So, you drew a handful of bullets, but you invested one turn getting them out of your bag and another turn sorting them. On top of that, you had to drop some of your precious bullets to the floor. Finally, you will need as much time and turns as your arm requires to load all of these bullets (see weapon specifications).

I would rather get fast-draw.

In another situation, you want to draw a handful of coins (from a dedicated pocket) and “drop” them while in combat (or a stressful situation):
  • You take a ready maneuver, then you drop the coins (this part is for “free”), this takes 1 turn.
  • If you want to throw these coins at somebody, then you spend a turn using the throwing skill (or a DX roll with its due penalties), this takes 2 turns but a fast-draw could reduce it to 1 turn.
Regarding both the bullets and the coins, you have to reach for the bag, open the bag, take a handful of stuff and close the bag…

Expecting that a part of the handful of stuff you draw will be randomly oriented, is commonplace; so, you will always have to invest certain time to sort it if you want to use it under stressful conditions. The advantage of drawing a handful of stuff is that you draw several items in one move (instead of spending several turns), the setback is that you will have to sort it before you (spend another turn to) use it.

In conclusion, you need a ready maneuver to draw a handful of “stuff”.

Quote:
Originally Posted by MrFix View Post
Alright, thanks. Guess I'll hash it out with whatever GM I end up playing with as a house rule.
What you have to work with your GM is the amount of stuff you draw as a handful.

If you (for example) want to draw a handful of bullets without successive fast-draws during combat, prepare yourself to invest another turn sorting them. Waiving the part of sorting the bullets would make fast-draw less meaningful as a trained skill.
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Last edited by Hide; 09-04-2020 at 05:57 PM.
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Old 09-04-2020, 09:37 PM   #19
Donny Brook
 
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Default Re: Drawing a handful of something

Considering various of the foregoing posts, and upon review of the rules on B382 and 383, and assuming no Fast-Draw, I would elaborate the following from the RAW:

-grabbing a random handful/bunch of items from a pocket - 1 Ready

-if the characters' hand is big enough to hold them, grabbing all of the contents of a pocket in a jumbled handful - 1 Ready

-grabbing a given proportion of the contents of a pocket (e.g. 10%, or 50%) - 2 Readies

-grabbing an unspecified number of items of a given type that makes up most of the contents of the pocket - 2 Readies

-grabbing a given proportion of items of a given type that makes up most the contents of the pocket - 3 Readies

-grabbing an unspecified number of items of a given type that makes up at least 25% of the contents of the pocket - 3 Readies

-grabbing a given proportion of items of a given type that makes up at least 25% of the contents of the pocket - 4 Readies


For more complicated situations use these (elaborated) rules for finding individual items:
-grabbing a specific item from a pocket containing items numbering no more than could be individually felt (depending on factors such as the sizes and shapes and numbers of the contents) in six seconds - 1d6 Readies
-grabbing a specific item in a pocket containing items numbering more than could be individually felt in six seconds, up to a number that could be individually felt in 12 seconds - 2d6 Readies.
--Etc.
--If items in the pocket cannot be distinguished by feel (or some supernatural sense that can be used inside the pocket) a long action must be used to extract and examine them.


In all cases, the character may attempt a DX roll (incl. the benefits of Manual Dexterity). Success will improve these times by -1 Ready. Failure will produce undesired numbers or types of items drawn. Critical failures means items are dropped, or give wrong numbers or types of items if that result is worse in the situation.

Last edited by Donny Brook; 09-04-2020 at 09:44 PM.
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Old 09-05-2020, 06:12 AM   #20
Pursuivant
 
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Default Re: Drawing a handful of something

In some cases, it's easier to grab everything in a pocket or pouch rather than fishing for a single item.

I'd say that it takes just one ready action to pull a random number of multiple items from an easily accessible location. e.g., all the coins in your pouch rather than one or your pocketknife and handkerchief rather than just one or the other.

If it matters how many items you get, roll 1d+2 for items which are smaller than your hand (e.g., 9mm cartridges, coins), or 1d-3 (minimum 1) for items larger than your hand (e.g., arrows, 20mm cartridges). The GM can adjust the numbers for tiny objects like gems or pins.

Fast-Draw is only needed when you need to ready items in no time or you're trying to draw a specific number of items without making multiple ready maneuvers. (e.g., grabbing just 3 shotgun shells or sling stones in a single move).

If it really matters, it is possible to learn to instantly pull more than one item from a container. Treat it as an Easy maneuver which cancels penalties to Fast Draw for attempting to draw multiple items at once. Historically, slingers used this technique to draw multiple bullets or stones from a pouch using their off hand, reducing reloading time.
It's also possible for archers to draw two arrows and hold the extra arrow between their ring and little fingers while drawing the bow with their first two fingers or a thumb ring.
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