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Message: <blockquote data-quote="blaskowicz" data-source="post: 1727443" data-attributes="member: 17799">This is example is just loosely based on an actual gaming experience.Consider an elite soldier, manning a .50 heavy machinegun (an M2HB, for example), entrenched behind sandbags, in a roughly circular clearing in a forest, about 100 feet in diamenter, of fairly level terrain. He is wearing a tactical vest, carrying an MP5 submachinegun, and is in perfect health.For the stats: Strong Hero 3/Soldier 3, Str 16 Dex 18 Con 16, HP 65. His defense is 24 (+4 class, +7 armor, +3 dexterity). He has partial cover against enemies shooting from the forest. Among his feats are: Advanced Firearms Proficiency, Burst Fire, Weapon Focus (M2HB), Medium Armor Proficiency, Point Blank Shot and Precise Shot. His equipment is a mastercraft M2HB (+1 to hit), an MP5 machinegun (which is already mastercraft), a mastercraft combat knife and a mastercraft tactical vest (+1 to defense).His full attack is +11 with his M2HB (2d12+2, from the specialization of the soldier advanced class), +10 with his MP5 (2d6), or +9 with his combat knife (1d4+5, +2 from improved melee smash strong hero talent).Now, our other character is an unmounted, completely out of place, medieval knight. He is carrying a bastard sword, a heavy steel shield and he is wearing full plate armor. He is also in perfect health.For the stats: Strong Hero 6, Str 18 Dex 16 Con 16, HP 60. His defense is 26 (+3 class, +9 armor, +3 shield, +1 dexterity). Among his feats are: Exotic Weapon Proficiency (bastard sword), Heavy Armor Proficiency, Lightning Reflexes, Weapon Focus (bastard sword). His equipment is also mastercraft.His full attack is +12/+7 with his bastard sword (1d10+7, +3 from improved melee smash strong hero talent).The knight is attacking the machine gun position, coming from the forest. The soldier only notices him when he enters the clearing, 55 feet from his trench, when combat starts. The soldier rolls better initiative and goes first.His options, at this point are: - Shooting the area where the knight is, which he must roll to hit AC 10. He can only miss if he rolls a 1 (which could be considered the event of the gun jamming, or some other outside ocurrance that disturbed him). The knight's reflex save is +8, so, he has to roll a 7 or better to negate the damage, which is fairly easy (70% chance). - Use the burst fire feat and shoot directly at the knight. Since he is flat-footed (even though he knew he was going to get shot...), his defense is reduced to 25. His attack is reduced to a +7 (-4 from burst fire). He has to roll an 18 to hit the knight (a lowly 15% chance).In either event (unless the soldier rolls and confirms a critical hit with his burst fire option, a less than 5% chance), the knight is still standing, and, the chances are good that he is still unscathed.The knight goes next. Since his fast movements are not a factor in this battle (his full plate and shield are doing all the work), he decides to run towards the soldier's position, jumping the trench at the end of his movement (we'll not go into detail at this point, but it isn't hard to perform this leap if the knight has maximum ranks in the jump skill).The soldier goes again, and he is in a very bad situation, with a sword wielding, full plated warrior already inside his trench, threatening his square. The knight is still without his dexterity bonus to defense (from running), and his defense is 25. The soldier's options at this time are: - Shooting the area where the knight is, same as above. - Use the burst fire feat and shoot the knight. His defense is reduced to 25 from the run action. His attack is reduced to a +8 (-4 from burst fire, +1 from point blank shot). He has to roll a 17 to hit the knight (only 20% chance).In both cases, he provokes an attack of oportunity from the knight. He can also: - Draw his knife and attack the knight, with which he needs a 16 to hit. It is actually better to stab a man in full plate than it is to shoot him with large caliber machine guns. - Take a 5-foot step and draw his MP5. He can shoot the knight without automatic fire with this weapon, having to roll only a 14 to be able to inflict 2d6+1 points of damage (from point blank). This is perhaps his best option.Chances are the knight is still standing after his action.From now on, there is only a slim chance the unlucky soldier will win the battle. Being unable to fire his machine gun without provoking an attack of opportunity, he either has to keep taking 5-foot steps and shooting with his MP5, without burst fire, or use his combat knife. And there is a high probability that the knight will just get tired and sunder the MP5 before he gets to inflict much damage.I cannot begin to imagine what is exactly happening when the soldier misses the knight. Is he dodging the bullets? Or perhaps the anti-aircraft rounds are bouncing off his medieval armor and shield (which would seem to be generally the case, since the greater defense bonus comes from them)?Realism aside (to put it lightly...), I want your thoughts on this. Is this really how it happens, or am I missing something in the rules? Or, if this is correct <sigh>, do you have any sugesstions on how the rules should be changed? My friend and I are working on a complete d20 based modern setting (with a sci-fi tone), and we want firearms to be deadlier than this.I know this system is supposed to be cinematic or whatever, but these two characters are at the same level, and the guy with fewer feats and only a basic class undeniably has the upper hand in the battle, which sounds wrong to me.</blockquote>

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