Problems with firearms?

[Viehl]

I hear a lot of complaints about the way d20 Modern handles firearms. Would anyone care to elaborate on what's wrong with the system, and/or suggest a better one?

-V

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

I hear a lot of complaints about the way d20 Modern handles firearms. Would anyone care to elaborate on what's wrong with the system, and/or suggest a better one?

-V

Hmm. Actually, I can`t, because I like the system at is.
But possible problems:
The different weapons are all quite similar, there are only few statistics for them. (Which I see as a good thing)
Some people seem to dislike Burst and Autofire, but I don`t know why exactly. (Missing Recoil? Feats are neccessary).
Shotguns are very underpowered. (Well, a nice switch if you know Shadowrun, where they are the ultimate killer weapon - though many people seem unable to notice that)

Mustrum Ridcully

 

[Bagpuss]

I think one of the complaints is Autofire uses a square template for its effect, so say you place this template 40' away, how do the bullets get to that point without passing through the space inbetween? Also why do they suddenly stop at the end of that square template? Surely they would carry on to hit things behind that square target area. Also daft things like burst fire making things harder to hit were as in reality burst fire is designed to ensure you are more likely to hit your target.

So anyone that is a little bit interested in firearms knows that it is a very poor simulation of reality, and lots of modern gamers are at least moderately interested in firearms.

That and the guns are all the same (which like the previous poster, I don't think is that big a problem).

 

[BrooklynKnight]

Actually, there is an easy way to solve that.

If anything is between you and the squares you are targetting for autofire, those squares receive a cover bonus. You're trying to hit DC 10. IF you happen to miss due to the cover (be it a person or object) then that object has to roll a reflex save instead of the original target. To represent some bullets still getting through, you can say that whatever is in the original targetted area still takes damage, but only half.

Basically under the cirucmstances they get evasion for free, or something like that.


As for Bullets going further..hows about this.

Elongate the area by two additional 10x10 areas

In the end you'll have a 30x10 area lengthwise.

The target is the center 10x10 area. Anything beyond in in the tertiary 10x10 area, takes 1 die less damage.

Anything in front, grants cover as i mentioned above.

that might work for a solution.

 

[Plane Sailing]

Things like double tap adds 50% to the damage at the cost of two bullets... why isn't it firing two bullets and each one getting a chance to hit (or something). While one can accept melee combat including many swings before a hit, with ranged weapons every bullet is a distinct entity.

 

[S'mon]

Twilight 2000 had the best ever rule for autofire: roll a d6 for each bullet, on a '6' it hits the target.

This was modified by eg cover, or range, which could make some bullets automatically miss, or firing a burst with more recoil than the firer's STR, or using suppressive firer, hosing a general area (50% automatically miss), but the fundamental 'hit on a 6' mechanic was the simplest and most accurate for modelling actual use of autofire in combat that I've seen.

 

[ddougan]

I hear a lot of complaints about the way d20 Modern handles firearms. Would anyone care to elaborate on what's wrong with the system, and/or suggest a better one?

-V

In terms of weapons specifications, I think it lacks detail... there is very little differentiation between weapons.

I'd prefer to see a lot more modelled in the weapons:

• recoil (affecting multiple shots and area fire)

• penetration as a separate value from damage (allowing shotguns to do big damage to unarmoured targets, but probably little more than stun/knockdown to armoured targets)

• bulk (eg easier to train a pistol on different targets than a rifle - especially in close quarters situations)

• more granular damage (instead of lots and lots of 2DX, even for different calibers, I'd like to see 2DY+1, 2DY+2, 2DX etc)

In terms of rules, I'd like to see automatic fire rules given better handling. Someone has already posted Twilight 2000s approach to this (which I also think is great - but prefered the v2.2 edition, whereby you rolled a D20 as a task for each round - which gave highly trained shooters a bit of an edge, whilst still leaving rock-n-roll as more luck than skill).

I also think that vehicle combat rules are somewhat lacking - especially in terms of difficulty to hit (taking out tyres is *really* easy) - and increases in the maximum +AC for speed.

Thats not to say I don't like D20 Modern, its just that I use a modified Spycraft system in my modern games

There's nothing fatally flawed in D20 Modern (and I think the D20 system is fully capable of handling modern games), but for my campaign styles, it does need much more house-rules than say DnD does "out-of-the-box". But I guess they are more military oriented than the "Modern day DnD" flavour of Urban Arcana (which I bought anyway, and is a rather good read)

 

[JimAde]

I think d20 Modern was really going for cinematic feel more than realism. That's fine with me as I already get plenty of realism but not nearly enough high-flying adventure in my life

 

[Cowpie Zombie]

So anyone that is a little bit interested in firearms knows that it is a very poor simulation of reality

"Some might say that the d20 System isn't realistic. They're right. It isn't. It's heroic, designed to help adjudicate larger-than-life adventures. In the case of d20 Modern, those adventures model action movies." (D20 Modern core rulebook, page 188)

So the criticism that d20 Modern doesn't model reality well is essentially stating the obvious. That never was the game's purpose.

Anyone who wants a realistic game with realistic firearms rules is invited to try GURPS: www.sjgames.com.

 

[pensiv]

penetration as a separate value from damage (allowing shotguns to do big damage to unarmoured targets, but probably little more than stun/knockdown to armoured targets)

How about giving certain ammunition a trait that ignores DR or Defense up to a certain point?