Droids with sensors, and ambushes...

[garhkal]

Got this 'argument' from over on the Sparks Yahoo group. Apparently, someone felt the GM 'gyped' him, by not allowing the droids with sensors, to detect an ambush... But another gm, piped up with "did they make periodic rolls, were they under orders from their owner to check?"

That got me a thinking. How would you have handled it?

Also, would having droids flying around (repulsors) sending out sensor sweeps, not be more of a detrement to a sneak n peak style mission, or many others, by giving the imperials a heads up that you are there?
I say that, cause IMO even if those droids only have 1km of sensor detection range, their buble of sensor energy would still be able to get detected by more powrful sensors....
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[Liam (Gunman) Kissane]

I think it depends greatly on the ambushers and their situation.

If the ambush team is hidden, not moving, and not creating a signal that the droid can pick up on (eg. not using powered armour or commlinks) then I see no reason for the party to suspect an ambush.

Additionally, I concur with your view of the droid's (active) sensors possibly drawing unwanted attention.

[scott2978]

There are probly rules for this sort of thing in the specforce handbook or one of Craken's, but as I've never run into the problem I'll give you my opinion instead.

If the PC's placed a driod "on watch", then I'd say yes the driod would do it's best to alert it's master of anything coming near. If not, and the droid was just "there", then I'd rule that the droid would do what it normally does. If it normally sits around and doesn't "do anything" unless the PC owner tells it to, then that's what it does. Nice mental image of an R2 calmly watching a squad of Stormtroopers walk by towards it's master there... :) In other words, I'd "role play" the droid. What would the droid do? Is the droid smart enough to do anything, or to understand what an approching squad of stormtroopers means for it's master? Does it even know that it's master is on the wrong side of the law? Does the droid secretly hate it's master for all the ill-treatment it receives?

On the other hand, if it's an imperial droid and the PCs are trying to sneak around, It depends. Obviously the imperial droid is programmed for exactly this kind of mission. The problem for the PCs is: 1) Do they even know there is a droid out there? 2) Do they know what it's capabilities are? 3) How can they circumvent this security measure without alerting the empire that they are around? The answers depend on the situation.

[Boomer]

Ambush!
Wait, from where? Don't I get a perception roll?
No, you never said you wanted to...

Ambush!
Wait, from where? Wouldn't my droids sensors pick it up?
No, you never told him to use them...

They are both the exact same situation. What do YOU think the correct answer is?

Honestly, if the droid has sensors, you take into account the sensors during the perception roll before the ambush.
Why, for the same reason the gand takes in his UV vision.
For the same reason a lot of races take in their infrared and sense of smell.
For the same reason certain creatures take in their advanced hearing.

Yes, the droid gets a sensor roll. That is not an order, that is just what the droid does. Unless for some reason it has some kind of high-end sensor package which must be powered up and down, the droid always gets it's sensor roll.
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[Ejacobs]

IMHO, droid sensors should work just like a Jedi power that can be "kept up". If they are keeping it up, then there should be the MAP to take in to account. If not, then you are correct, just like a living creature, they would have to actively say they are watching out for ambush. Now, the GM or module might say that a Perception or sensors roll can be made to detect the ambushers, but the GM doesn't have to allow that.

E

[garhkal]

[Jedi Skyler]

[Boomer]

[scott2978]

[garhkal]

Well said, and that is what i was trying to get at.

Case and point, where i had this come up once before (3 yrs ago iirc). The player controling the 2 droids, seekers modified with a low power sensor system (1km range), i specifically asked how often his droids would perform sensor sweeps and what they would be looking for. Later on, when they walked into the ambush (not one made the perception versus the imps sneak roll) he whined that his droid should have spotted them before hand.

When i pointed out, that his group had moved up 3km since the last sweep, and it was still 5 min before the droids next scheduled sweep, he soon shut up, though still grumbled about it.
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[Jedi Skyler]

That's a good example. You asked for specific information, they gave it, and then they still walked into the ambush. The guy had no reason to keep grumbling. Crying, maybe. But not grumbling.

Boomer, Scott and I are definitely in agreement that the situation should dictate what's been done... and by "situation" that includes the characters defining frequency of sensor sweeps, or at what range they're performed, and narrowing down the variables so it becomes easy to determine whether or not they're going to be able to (let alone succeed) detect the ambush.

[scott2978]

One thing you can do to mitigate the crying if you realize that the group's pre-ambush warning system will fail, is to plant the suggestion in their minds that their precautions are only partially effective in the first place. A pair of seeker droids scanning every 5 minutes at 1km or less will still leave a window of opportunity for skillful or well-informed enemies to take advantage of.

I think garkhal's group would have had better results from the much simpler tactic of telling their droids to "watch out for anything suspicious, but keep a low profile" instead of specifying a specific search pattern. A veteran RPG group would probably not make this mistake, but it depends on what style of GM they are used to.

At any rate, if you tell the players from the git-go that their plan has a chance of failure, they will be less prone to whine than if you let them believe their plan is fool proof when you know it's not. Just suggest that while their plan does have it's disadvantages, you can't think of everything and time is limited.

[Boomer]

Also, something to consider.
What makes having a droid superior to simply having a computer system, auto sensor, or anything else?
If the droid is so frickin' helpless it needs to be told to be on the lookout for something that might endanger itself, and than you need to describe what constitutes said danger, and THAN you need to hope it still makes it's own roll, than why the bloody hell did you bring a droid? It's apparantly no good if it cannot preform the basic functions we see droids carrying out in the games, the books, and, the movies.

Now that all really depends on the type of droid of course. But a droid that cannot lookout for an ambush for a party is one that cannot lookout for an ambush for itself is my only point there.

But I still have yet to read anymore of the situation in question other than there was an ambush, a player wanted the droids sensors to warn him, and the GM said no.
That is terribly vague. I'd love to give an answer to a situation I did not make up myself.
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My backpack has jets!
I'm Boba the Fett!
And I bounty hunt for Jabba Hutt,
to finance my 'vette!

[garhkal]

[scott2978]

You're right about the intelligence of droids Boomer. Many droids are fairly smart and "streetwise" and might possibly know what an ambush is. But while C3PO is certainly an intelligent droid, do you think he would know an ambush even if he walked right into one? Judging from his Cloud City experience, probably not. If you equipped C3PO with fancy sensors and told him to watch out for an ambush, how well do you think he would do?

Now on the other hand, if you took a droid like those little Imperial seeker droids seen in the remake of ANH, cruising the streets of Mos Eisely, and told it to "watch out for an ambush", even though it's not even in the same league as C3PO intellect wise, it would probably be excellent at spotting ambushes. The one constant thing is that both would have to be told to be looking for an ambush.

Compare it like this. If the PCs hired an NPC instead of buying a droid, would you allow the NPC more chance to spot the ambush than the characters themselves, especially since nobody was expecting an ambush?

Also, garkhal did explain the sitaution in his later post above. The PC had two seekers and told them to scan every few minutes at a range of about 1km. The ambush happened during one of their "downtimes" and the sneak roll of the Imps beat the passive Spot roll of the characters. I'd call that perfectly fair in that particular instance, but to rehash what I think about the whining afterwords, telling them straight up that their plan has holes would make them realize it was not a fool proof plan.

The bottom line is that if the characters were EXPECTING an ambush, they should have been SAYING they were specifically looking out for one. Sine they clearly were not expecting it, they had no reason to take additional precautions, and clearly the Imps knew they were there (thus the ambush) so they could take precautions to avoid the passively scanning seeker droids.