Alejandro wrote:Crazy Lou wrote:Alejandro wrote:With laser weapons I don't allow dodges. None at all. These are weapons that fire at the speed of light...doesn't matter if you're claiming you're "just dodging where the shooter's aiming" of if you're actually trying to dodge the beam. I increase the difficulty to hit but a weapon like that is entirely reliant on the shooter, not the target.
No, I don't use the -10 rule either.
Wait then... Do you allow people to try to dodge rail gun burst fire? Do you allow people to try to dodge ramjet rounds? Do you even allow people to try to dodge normal gunfire? Because your rationale is completely applicable to pretty much any type of fire arm, energy or otherwise.
If you don't acknowledge the fact that diving away from where someone is about to shoot you will improve your odds of survival, then how do you explain the proven usefulness, in real life, of the tactic of doing exactly that then maintaining a crouched position as you run away from a shooter at an angle? It is necessary to start moving away from the intended target area for this to work. It doesn't really matter whether the thing being fired at you moves at 1000 ft/sec or 186,000 miles/sec. Both are rates of lateral movement so far above human, even superhuman, such as a juicer, capability that by your reasoning anyone who knows anything about firing a gun should virtually NEVER miss!
If you continue this to the realm of Rifts, which is really at the heart of this discussion, then any time a character with the proper weapon proficiency fires his gun, he should have, just at first level, a BARE MINIMUM of a 60% chance of hitting his target? That's absurdly high. Extremely unreasonable.
If it's got recoil you can try to dodge it but if you're firing a weapon that is going to instantly hit when you pull the trigger then no, no dodge.
It's really just that simple. Lasers have no recoil, nothing to hamper them, nothing to interfere. If the person makes his strike roll then that's it, end of story the target gets hit. Considering there are no man-portable laser rifles that are powerful enough to shoot through a modern day tank out there on the market, I'm REALLY getting a chuckle out of people trying to bring modern day weapons & ballistics into the scenario as absolutely no weapon we have today is equal at all to the laser weapons in Rifts. As there is no comparison to draw to, we're left with a simple setup from Siembieda himself: Lasers have no sound, instantly hit what you aim them at, and you can't see them. It's not me bringing too much reality into a game it's most of you leaving too much out.....
Factor in what a laser weapon can do and how I'm not applying physics to such an insane degree beyond "if you aim right, you hit" I'm honestly just amazed at such a tremendous backlash.
Here's a counter question to the haters: If you allow laser dodging, then do you allow dodging of explosions? Can your characters safely clear the explosive radius of a grenade when it goes off? If your character has the reflexes to dodge a laser beam then surely they can scoot fast enough to clear the explosive radius.
Ok. I'm not entirely sure you caught my point... I am well aware of the fact that we do not have any weapons in real life which are anything like those laser rifles described in Rifts. However, I am making a comparison here and saying that the laser rifles are superior. I acknowledge that fact and I will address it further here.
When someone goes to dodge gunfire in the context of the game, as well as in real life, they ARE NOT TRYING TO DODGE BULLETS. I apologise for the all caps, but this is a key part of my point here, and I want that understood. I recognize that no human can dodge a bullet. As such, the question of whether a human can dodge a laser beam is moot. I'm not arguing about that. So your insistence on instantaneous connection between shooter and target is not part of this either. The idea of dodging boils down to this: when a person is attempting to shoot you, they ARE NOT trying to hit wherever the hell you are about to try to jump. They're shooting (if they're trained and being efficient and professional) at your center of mass, which is the easiest target to hit, as it's the slowest to move and the largest target. HOWEVER, you, as the potential victim, do not want to be shot. So you try to get out of the way. For this to be possible, you must know the opponent is about to shoot at you, and you must try to get out of the way (AKA Dodge) before the assailant FINISHES TAKING AIM AND PULLS THE TRIGGER. Again, caps are because this is an important point. Therefore, the difference in the time it takes for the energy or bullet, as the case may be, to reach the intended target area is unimportant. Which is why the comparison to modern guns IS applicable. Because unless somehow you have a gun that's telepathically connected to you and doesn't have to reposition itself to aim, the issue of the time that takes is still relevent, and it is from where the idea of having time to dodge is derrived.
While recoil, or lack thereof, would have some impact on the differences, that has more of a bearing on the accuracy of the shooter, not on the timing possible for a victim to move before the attacker opens fire. This is not, however, significantly reflected in the bonuses comparing MD guns and rail guns (crap loads of recoil) to laser rifles (generally no bonuses or maybe a +1 regardless of the weapon type, and mostly resulting due to how the writer was feeling at the time -- also note that while the +1 is usually only for the rifles, it's almost always attributed to superior scopes or targeting capabilities, not lack of recoil). Therefore I would venture to say that your note about recoil isn't that useful to your assertions on the matter of dodging gunfire/lasers. I would also note that this is a question in which you ARE "applying physics to such an insane degree beyond 'if you aim right, you hit.' " You just didn't make a very detailed or particularly relevent connection to physics.
Alejandro wrote:[laser rifles] instantly hit what you aim them at
Yes, indeed they do that, but there is a requirement for that to occur. The target has to be where the gun was aimed. If they're moving, and are no longer where the attacker was pointing his very accurate rifle by the time the trigger is pulled, then the laser hits nothing but a lot of air and then whatever was behind his target. Better try to take another shot and hope that one hits...
The issue (and I may be beating a dead horse here, but I want my point to be very clear and to leave no room for misunderstanding or oversight) is that you don't see the timing in the way which accounts for why dodging gunfire and lasers is covered in the rules. It seems this is because you have chosen not to see the timing. However, the sequence goes something like this: There are two people (let's keep this simple afterall). One has a laser rifle, and he is the attacker. The other is some poor schmoe at whom the attacker is busting (laser) caps. This second man is the defendent. I will call the Attacker "A" and the Defendent "D."
A decides to shoot at D. He begins to position his rifle at D's center of mass like he was trained (the GM has announced that A is going to try to shoot poor D and asks what D does about this situation). D is scared out of his mind that A want to kill him, so he starts his movement to dive off to his right (his player decided to dodge the declared attack on his character). Now the strike roll with bonuses is rolled by the GM for A. 9 is rolled on a D20 and gets a +2 bonus for a total of 11 to strike. D is very concerned about this and rolls his dodge. A 19 is rolled (lucky b******) and he has a +4 to dodge because he has a high PP and is trained in Martial Arts. We'll use the old -10 rule to dodge just for simplicity's sake. The total dodge roll was 19+4-10=13. This is very luckly. D wins the roll and the action is resolved. D has managed to dive early enough to save his sorry hide this action, while A was a bit too late aiming and pulling his trigger to get his man.
This is pretty much how it is supposed to work.
Lastly, I would like to requote something for specific address:
Alejandro wrote:If the person makes his strike roll then that's it, end of story the target gets hit.
Ok, from the very heart of my role-playing game enthusiasm, I am grievously hurt by this. The idea is to create a GAME which parallels and simulates real life, but with a story. Now there are rules and there is consideration of balance (yes, even in Rifts -- remember the suggested retroactive modifications to the South America equipment in the GMG? yeah, that's because there was a balance concern.).
Defenders win ties because that's more fair and tends to give a slightly more epic edge to the action.
There are saving throws against magic for a reason. That's because it would UNFAIR for a mage to just be allowed to totally screw over anybody who he manages to hit with a first spell. Same with Psionics -- how FAIR would it be if some random NPC Mind Melter decided he would possess your 1st level character and then start a 1 vs. 20 fight against a bunch of high level gangsters, or jump him off a cliff, just because that NPC was a diabolic nut job? How fair would it be for a Miscreant PC Mind melter to do the same to some big mobster boss? How much fun would that be? None at all. That's why the rules for dodging gunfire (and yes, even lasers) exist. Because the idea that if you can roll over an 8 on a D20 (and like that's hard, especially with sniper, and sharpshooting, and wp, and H2H:Assassin bonuses), you can hit any opponent who's unlucky enough to be your target is totally UNFAIR.
Dodging is the "save throw" against being shot. To be fair, and because it is possible in real life, that is why it is incorporated into the game.
Finally, because it's not quite on the same topic, but very closely related, I will address your question about explosives. Here goes:
Yes, I allow attempts at dodging explosions, and I'll explain (briefly) why. The concept is very much the same as my reasoning on timing above with the lasers/gunfire. The dodge attemt begins as the "grenade-lobber-attacker" is pulling the pin, aiming, in the motion of throwing, and while the grenade is flying through the air. The dodge begins at the beginning of these actions, and if the defender is lucky enough to roll high enough to dodge away from the grenade, he's escaped the blast. Unfortunately there are no definitive, canon modifiers addressing the issue of escaping AoE attacks of variable radius, except where there is specific address in descriptions, such as individual spells. Thus, a successful dodge roll against the strike roll, ignoring modifiers entirely (and now we're entering the realm of house rules because canon is silent on this subject, as I've noted, but entirely UNLIKE dodging laser fire in that regard), as successful dodge will get you away from the center of the radius, sufficiently that you take 1/2 damage from the blast. Now the radius of the blast matters, as does your SPD (if you want to be that picky about it, I generally don't), and the house ruled modifiers for the size of the explosion. If the explosion is all plasma, has a 100 foot radius, and was thrown by an attacker 10 feet away because he's immune to plasma, you're screwed, because unless you can teleport, you can't move that far that fast. But if it's a little plasma grenade with a 6 foot blast radius and thrown by an opponent a more normal distance away for the use of explosives, then you now have a good chance of complete escape.