High-Tech - LAW Damage

[Phil Masters]

In the Light Antitank Weapons Table in High-Tech (p.148), all these shaped-charge warheads do armour piercing (crushing, divisor (10)) damage with a linked crushing explosion. However, in each case, the AP damage is also listed as ex for explosive. This implies that they're doing large amounts of armour piercing damage to everything in the vicinity of the impact point.

I didn't think shaped charges worked like that. Surely the AP damage should only affect the thing it actually hits, on which the blast is focussed? The linked damage would be explosive, of course. In Ultra-Tech, the armour piercing damage for shaped charges isn't explosive (but is incendiary).

(And actually, now I look, the guided missiles in High-Tech are statted the same way.)

Is this an erratum?

It must be admitted that my WWII game character has just been getting far too desperate with a Panzerfaust in a confined space.

[DouglasCole]

Originally Posted by Phil Masters

In the Light Antitank Weapons Table in High-Tech (p.148), all these shaped-charge warheads do armour piercing (crushing, divisor (10)) damage with a linked crushing explosion. However, in each case, the AP damage is also listed as ex for explosive. This implies that they're doing large amounts of armour piercing damage to everything in the vicinity of the impact point.

I didn't think shaped charges worked like that. Surely the AP damage should only affect the thing it actually hits, on which the blast is focussed? The linked damage would be explosive, of course. In Ultra-Tech, the armour piercing damage for shaped charges isn't explosive (but is incendiary).

(And actually, now I look, the guided missiles in High-Tech are statted the same way.)

Is this an erratum?

It must be admitted that my WWII game character has just been getting far too desperate with a Panzerfaust in a confined space.

Basic Set, p. 414:

If an explosive attack has an armor
divisor, it does not apply to the collateral damage. For example, the shapedcharge warhead of an anti-tank rocket
has an armor divisor of (10), but this
only reduces the DR of a target it actually strikes; those nearby get their full
DR against the blast.

[Anaraxes]

B414 says that the AD doesn't apply to targets in the blast radius.

Originally Posted by B414

If an explosive attack has an armor divisor, it does not apply to the collateral damage... this only reduces the DR of a target it actually strikes; those nearby get their full DR against the blast.

But it does seem odd that there's linked damage to (I assume) represent the general HE effect, even though any "ex" damage has that effect. Perhaps some weapons are designed with a larger-than-default amount of all-around splodyness than just from the shaped charge damage, and they'd need some extra Linked punch to represent that?

[Phil Masters]

Originally Posted by DouglasCole

Basic Set, p. 414:

If an explosive attack has an armor
divisor, it does not apply to the collateral damage. For example, the shapedcharge warhead of an anti-tank rocket
has an armor divisor of (10), but this
only reduces the DR of a target it actually strikes; those nearby get their full
DR against the blast.

Okay, thanks, and that works fine for the ATGMs and bazookas and such in the Basic Set, which just have the one lot of damage listed - but the similar weapons in High-Tech have primary damage and linked damage, which comes out looking weird. Each shot ends up doing two lots of crushing explosive damage to stuff in its vicinity.

Plus, as I said, the shaped charge rounds in Ultra-Tech don't work that way.

[Tyneras]

I figured that it meant that anyone on the other side could be hit by an overpenetrating explosion from the AP damage.

[Anthony]

The initial damage of the LAW is listed as 6d*6; the actual amount of explosive in a LAW only justifies 8-10d damage. So yeah, basic got things wrong by oversimplifying.

[Rupert]

Originally Posted by Phil Masters

In the Light Antitank Weapons Table in High-Tech (p.148), all these shaped-charge warheads do armour piercing (crushing, divisor (10)) damage with a linked crushing explosion. However, in each case, the AP damage is also listed as ex for explosive. This implies that they're doing large amounts of armour piercing damage to everything in the vicinity of the impact point.

I didn't think shaped charges worked like that. Surely the AP damage should only affect the thing it actually hits, on which the blast is focussed? The linked damage would be explosive, of course. In Ultra-Tech, the armour piercing damage for shaped charges isn't explosive (but is incendiary).

(And actually, now I look, the guided missiles in High-Tech are statted the same way.)

Is this an erratum?

It must be admitted that my WWII game character has just been getting far too desperate with a Panzerfaust in a confined space.

I would assume it's wrong, and do things as UT does.

[Ulzgoroth]

Originally Posted by Rupert

I would assume it's wrong, and do things as UT does.

Per DouglasCole's citation, HT is correctly following the guidance of the Basic Set in designating the penetrating aspect as ex.

That said, UT's substitution of cr inc does seem like a better approach, and one that makes the linked explosion blast effect structure actually make sense. It almost looks like HT tried to combine the UT approach (linked penetrator effect and blast effect) with the Basic approach (explosion with armor divisor) and came up with a result that loses the logic of both its ancestors...

[Rupert]

Originally Posted by Ulzgoroth

Per DouglasCole's citation, HT is correctly following the guidance of the Basic Set in designating the penetrating aspect as ex.

Except to follow Basic it shouldn't have a linked component.

That said, UT's substitution of cr inc does seem like a better approach, and one that makes the linked explosion blast effect structure actually make sense. It almost looks like HT tried to combine the UT approach (linked penetrator effect and blast effect) with the Basic approach (explosion with armor divisor) and came up with a result that loses the logic of both its ancestors...

Pretty much. Or it's just an oversight.

[Willy]

Originally Posted by Phil Masters

In the Light Antitank Weapons Table in High-Tech (p.148), all these shaped-charge warheads do armour piercing (crushing, divisor (10)) damage with a linked crushing explosion. However, in each case, the AP damage is also listed as ex for explosive. This implies that they're doing large amounts of armour piercing damage to everything in the vicinity of the impact point.

I didn't think shaped charges worked like that. Surely the AP damage should only affect the thing it actually hits, on which the blast is focussed? The linked damage would be explosive, of course. In Ultra-Tech, the armour piercing damage for shaped charges isn't explosive (but is incendiary).

(And actually, now I look, the guided missiles in High-Tech are statted the same way.)

Is this an erratum?

It must be admitted that my WWII game character has just been getting far too desperate with a Panzerfaust in a confined space.

OK, as far as a Newbie understands the Rules. Isn´t there the saying " Said the apprentice to the master..." ? First take a look into the Basic Set 4th. Ed. page 381 it states, if I´m right, that both damages apply to the primary target. There is nothing written about bystanders, but logically only the linked effect should count for them, because shaped explosives are shaped so that the most damage goes in one direction. Realistically a detonated warhead that didn´t penetrate the armor would have a bigger blast for the nearby area, but that´s overly complicated. In fact the RPG´s in the Basic set have no linked damage, but´s that´s another matter.
As for shooting RPG´s and other similar stuff from indoors it´s a very bad idea, beware the backblast High Tech 4th. Ed. page 147. Your trooper is likely to get toasted.