Aimed Rapid Fire Ranged Deceptive Attack

[MrCrowley]

Say I have a character with Guns (Rifle)-12 and an Assault Carbine with Acc 4 and RoF 15. My boy is trying to shoot some pesky ninjas with high Dodge scores 5 yards away, so he decides to take a Prediction Shot or Ranged Deceptive Attack (MA 121). Now, with the -2 penalty for shooting a target 5 yds away, my only adequately skilled gunman is already shooting at an effective skill of 10, too low for a Deceptive Attack. However, if he takes an Aim maneuver and unloads his full RoF, he’ll add +7 to his roll for an effective skill-17! Now he can eat -6 in Deceptive Attack penalties and give his target -3 dodge.

So, am I understanding these rules right? Do the bonuses from Aim and RoF count for taking Deceptive Attacks? It seemed odd to me that some guy with a decent guns skill could take an enemy’s Dodge from 12 to 9 just like that, or maybe modern weapons just that effective. I don’t know if this has been addressed anywhere, especially since the rules for Prediction Shots were added later on in GURPS

[Plane]

Probably that's why you don't stay in sight for multiple maneuvers so aim can't build up.

[mlangsdorf]

It's actually inefficient to make predictive attacks with low Rcl autofire weapons: You could impose a -3 Dodge penalty by taking a -6 to hit, or you could hit with an extra 3 bullets, which means the defender has to make the dodge roll by 3.

But it is perfectly reasonable that an attacker, making an aimed attack with a lot of bullets, can use those bullets to limit the spaces from which the defender can reasonably dodge.

And Plane is right - the ninja shouldn't be hanging out at range 5 while someone is aiming at him. If he'd spent his turn moving, he could have gotten adjacent to the shooter and then parried his attack since you can parry ranged attacks that occur within your melee reach. Much better for the ninja.

[Maz]

Originally Posted by MrCrowley

It seemed odd to me that some guy with a decent guns skill could take an enemy’s Dodge from 12 to 9 just like that

In this scenario the shooter has spend two actions [1 to aim, 1 to shoot], without the ninja having any actions. That's a little unfair. On his action, the Ninja could have moved further away (increasing the range penalty), moved into cover (giving to-hit penalty), move into CC (giving Bulk penalty), made a move and attack, potentially a slam disrupting the shooters aim.
Or taken an All Out Defense-manouver for +2 to dodge.


In addition, the Ninja can also make a dodge and drop in response, giving him +3 to his dodge and so he is back up to 12. If he is a skilled ninja, he could also make an acrobatic dodge for +2 more to dodge.

So you shouldn't be looking at dodge:12 dropping to dodge:9.
but potentially a dodge:19 dropping to dodge:16. In fact without both Aim and ROF bonus the "average skill shooter" is very unlikely to be able to hit the ninja at all.

Also remember that the shooter has dropped his effective skill down to 11. Meaning he only have slightly over a 50/50 chance to hit. If he miss he has to spend one more turn to aim again, and then one more turn to fire. giving the ninja two more full turns to kick him in the neck.



also, also. If you want more realism. Aimed attacks are suggested requiring All-Out attack in GURPS:Tactical Shooting. You really, really do not want to make an All-out-attack with a ninja within striking distance!

[Varyon]

Originally Posted by Maz

In this scenario the shooter has spend two actions [1 to aim, 1 to shoot], without the ninja having any actions. That's a little unfair. On his action, the Ninja could have moved further away (increasing the range penalty), moved into cover (giving to-hit penalty), move into CC (giving Bulk penalty), made a move and attack, potentially a slam disrupting the shooters aim.
Or taken an All Out Defense-manouver for +2 to dodge.

As the target is a ninja, a decent option for him/her to go for to avoid getting shot is throwing shuriken. While they aren't great weapons, the character cannot defend without spoiling his/her aim, and if the character opts to just take the hit (potentially risking poisoning), he/she must pass a Will check to avoid ruining his/her aim anyway - and even if passing that, there will likely be a shock penalty in play for the shot.

Originally Posted by Maz

also, also. If you want more realism. Aimed attacks are suggested requiring All-Out attack in GURPS:Tactical Shooting. You really, really do not want to make an All-out-attack with a ninja within striking distance!

Douglas Cole's "On Target" Pyramid article is a bit less harsh - it allows for a Committed Attack (which makes defense more difficult, but not outright impossible) to take advantage of Aim in addition to getting a +1 to hit, and boosts All Out Attack to +2 for range attacks. Even if not using the rest of the article (which makes Aim a bit more complex by turning it into a sort of pseudo-attack - personally I like to go a step further and allow the target to Dodge the Aim), that change is a worthy addition to the rules. If it seems too beneficial to get a +2 for going All Out, you could also have the Committed Attack option not give any bonus on its own, but allow for using the Aim bonus - so after an Aim you could Attack at normal skill (meaning you wasted your time with that Aim), Committed Attack at skill+Acc (+1 or +2 for multiple seconds, and an additional bonus for using a scope), or All Out Attack at skill+1+Acc (+ additional bonuses, as above).


As for the original question... on the one hand, it seems odd to be able to turn the bonus from going full-auto into predictive shooting, as in particular GURPS weapons tend to be difficult to control when doing so. On the other hand, the idea you could spread your shots out a bit more - for less chance of hitting the foe (functionally, the foe is actually being attacked at a lower RoF, with the rest of the bullets going into the area around the foe) but leaving said foe with almost nowhere to go to avoid getting hit - honestly makes a good deal of sense. I think I'd allow it.