Are ray guns actually rays?

[andrew_kenrick]

So I'm writing up some rules for classic sci-fi ray guns and it occurred to me, are ray guns actually rays? In other words, should they use the ray rules and just require a ranged touch attack?

After all, if you take the most obvious ray gun in sci-fi, the Star Trek phaser, it seems to be a touch attack! It just needs to touch the target, no matter how well armoured they are, to stun them and bring them down.

So would a ray gun actually work rather well as a ray, or is it just a case of semantics?

 

[Roudi]

In my upcoming book Tesla's Legacy, the two main types of weapons (Tesla coil weapons and microwave death rays) are indeed ranged touch attack weapons. Whether it's an arc of electricity or an invisible beam of concentrated microwave, no armor is going to do you much good (unless it happens to be armor specifically designed against those weapon types, natch).

 

[Rhun]

I think you could go either way here...of course, if you are planning on making your ray guns do as much damage as a Star Trek phaser can do (and basically disintegrate someone in a single shot), it might be worthwhile to make it harder to hit someone.

 

[Roudi]

I dunno. In a case where "what's good for the goose is good for the gander" applies, then I don't see why insta-kill ray weapons shouldn't be ranged touch attacks. In Star Trek, both sides in any opposition generally have access to the same range of lethal weaponry. So if a Starfleet Officer can vapourize an opponent with one shot, ignoring any armor... then so can the enemy

Star Trek has a number of "other" balance features, most of them built right into the setting. These include the fact that most main characters are noncombative characters, and various ine-game consequences to firing high-powered phaser shots willy-nilly. Even if these balance factors are not present, a creative GM can still find new ways (such as providing lots of cover for both sides to utilize, phaser ammo capacity, ingenious enemy tactics, interference from a 3rd party, exotic planetary / spatial conditions, etc.)

 

[Hjorimir]

This stems from the fact that armor making one harder to his is completely ridiculous. What armor does is mitigate damage. Just one of those quirky D&D conventions.

 

[Roudi]

This stems from the fact that armor making one harder to his is completely ridiculous. What armor does is mitigate damage. Just one of those quirky D&D conventions.

I agree. I believe in the modern context, armor should be DR. Vigilance recounted a brilliant way to handle weapons & armor in modern that was stunning in its simplicity and depth; it's deep in another thread, somewhere on this forum.

 

[DanMcS]

So I'm writing up some rules for classic sci-fi ray guns and it occurred to me, are ray guns actually rays? In other words, should they use the ray rules and just require a ranged touch attack?

After all, if you take the most obvious ray gun in sci-fi, the Star Trek phaser, it seems to be a touch attack! It just needs to touch the target, no matter how well armoured they are, to stun them and bring them down.

So would a ray gun actually work rather well as a ray, or is it just a case of semantics?

Depends on your source. In Star Trek, various tough aliens (who would have natural armor) and some high-tech armors sometimes resist phasers. Which argues against it being a touch attack, really. Why don't starfleet security normally wear such things? No idea, maybe their tech isn't quite up to it, or maybe they could build armor to resist phasers but not disruptors (which most of their enemies use) so it's not worth the effort.

In Star Wars, armor is ubiquitous and completely useless- storm trooper armor never stopped a single shot in any movie. So why do they wear it? Again, who knows.

In the Lensmen books, armor exists that is proof against most beam weapons for at least a time, and it is worn into battle. Actually, their armor seems to be more useful against beams than against impact, such that they use pickaxe type "space axes" in close-quarters combat when they expect their opponents to be similarly armored.

In short, in scifi, all armor and weapons are subordinate to the plot, and exactly as useful as the author wants. We don't even have any historical examples of high-tech weapons and armor to compare them to, so do what you want.

 

[Roudi]

In short, in scifi, all armor and weapons are subordinate to the plot, and exactly as useful as the author wants. We don't even have any historical examples of high-tech weapons and armor to compare them to, so do what you want.

Excellent point, and one I can agree with.

 

[Venport]

In Star Wars, armor is ubiquitous and completely useless- storm trooper armor never stopped a single shot in any movie. So why do they wear it? Again, who knows.

I agree that none of them stoped a blaster bolt in Star wars however if you think of it in terms of the RPG a storm trooper gets hit and lets say only one point of Wound damger gets by his DR he needs to make a save or fall uncontious. if they have low saves (wtich most due) almost every storm trooper will fall from a blaster bolt. dose this make DR uselss? no it could save their lives...

however this istuation will not happen all that much with storm trooper armor being DR 5 and the average Storm tooper only have 12 WP and no VP and blasters doing 3d8 Damage they are to fall like flies...

just some food for thought

 

[Nac_Mac_Feegle]

We don't even have any historical examples of high-tech weapons and armor to compare them to, so do what you want.

We sort of do, when the musket was intorduced, it made plate mail virtually obsolete, as the projectiles power was spread over such a small surface area, it punched straight through. It has taken many years to come up with a way to stop bullets, and its all about energy transfere, you still get knockback and bruising

The Judge Dredd d20 system uses armour as Damage Reduction, and uses a system similar to monks in D&D to up thier AC slightly with level, but the majority of it still comes from dexterity.

If you want to use "Lasers" but dont want every shot to hit home, perhaps use the reflex save +10 base as a virtual AC.

Just a note, in one episode of star trek, a phaser was set to wide angle kill, so its both a single beam, and a cone, and why its not used in massive corridor fights is beyond me, but thats episode inconsistencies for you

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