Repeating Blaster Issues

[Camero]

Hi all
In looking through weapons stats (thanks again Gry) I have a hard time understanding the multiple blast per shot of repeating blasters and a couple other weapons. I only saw two descriptions that attempted to explain it but while they were similar they were not clear.

Light Repeating Blaster
"On constant-fire mode the blaster fires a burst of 6 blasts per shot. Once a hit is established, all following shots against nearby (1 meter) targets are one difficulty lower."

Merr-Sonn Underslung Rotary
Blaster Carbine
"On constant-fire mode, each “shot” fires three blasts; holding the trigger down will fire four “shots” per round. In game terms, once a shot hits in a round, all following shots at the same or immediately adjacent target
(within one meter) are one difficulty level lower"

These are the only two with descriptions that I saw - but I assume that other repeating blasters (maybe not other carbines) have this too, why else are they called repeating?

So how do you understand these descriptions? In "normal mode" these blasters fire one blast and do their set damage BUT in "constant fire" mode they fire multiple blasts each with the full set damage? Or do you reduce the damage of all of the blasts a little?

And if so is it one roll (one action) for all the "blasts that" come from that one "shot"? Or do you assign multiple action penalties?

The description says all other "shots" (after a hit) to the same area are lower difficulty, not other "blasts" after a hit - so it seems that a all the blasts from one shot are one action, I had never thought of it that way and I guess that makes repeating blasters nastier.

How do you all see it working?
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"What a wonderful smell you've discovered"

[Pel]

I've always treated the damage code of the repeaters as if they are on rapid-fire all the time. The reduced difficulty to hit additional targets near the original one, is a reflection of the massive rate of fire.

Take an automatic weapon out some time and spray some lead around. Very easy to hit massed targets. Maybe not where you want to shoot them, but you'll probably score a few hits.
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Aha!

[Gry Sarth]

Indeed, WEG never really nailed the whole repeating blaster thing. It's quite messy and incoherent... But let's take a look at it.

Here's the Espo Riot Gun, which seems to follow about the same principle established for the repeating blaster, but it has a more detailed entry:

[Krapou]

I think there is no need for rolling multiple damage : IMHO the high damage rating of repeating blasters already covers the fact that multiple 'blasts' may hit the same target during one 'shot'...

Otherwise it would be overkill... I mean : 25 damage rolls ?

[Gry Sarth]

This is something I found a long time ago, so I thought I'd add it to the discussion. It's not mine, and I don't think it's quite it, but here it is:

A Repeat on Repeating Blasters

O.K. you got yourself a repeating blaster but you aren't really convinced its repeating. The only benefit seems to be increased damaged and greater range. But, doesn't the fact that it repeats (i.e. launches multiple blaster fire) give some kind of extra bonuses. WEG doesn't seem to thinks so, but I do.
How many times do you find your character running down a large corridor chased by a dozen stormtroopers and when you tell your GM that your character turns around and sprays the corridor behind you, the first thing he says is "how many are you trying to hit". Your natural response is - "huh, I'm spraying the corridor I'm trying to hit them all." Then when your GM tells you that you'll be firing at a -11D penalty, you start rethinking your options, and the profound words of C- 3PO come to mind: "Surrender is a perfectly reasonable alternative." I mean nowadays you can just tweak up a blaster rifle and get 6D of damage out of it. Well if this scenario is all to familiar to you, you don't need a new GM all you need are new rules. And here they are.
Well first off, a big question I find to be asked about a repeating blaster is just how many blasts are fired in a round and do I get penalized for each blast beyond the first according to multiple action rules. If this is a question you have I think you need to change your perspective on how repeating blasters work in your campaign. As I see it repeating blasters fire a burst of shots with each action (imagine trying to fire just one bullet from a fully automatic machine gun). With this in mind, characters now are penalized for multiple bursts fired in a round as per the multiple actions rules. Well you might ask how many individuals can I target with one burst. The answer is only one unless your ‘spraying' the area. (See Spraying below).
As stated above a burst from a repeating blaster consists of multiple shots. Due to this a character firing a repeating blaster has a better chance to hit a target. This increased chance to hit is reflected in its Fire Control attribute. So now characters have a much better chance to hit using a repeating blaster, which is as it should be.
Spraying
Spraying, going full auto, laying down a blanket of fire, whatever you want to call it, has until now been an action you weren't capable of doing, at least not practically. Spraying an area is good when you want to target a large fairly compact group of targets. There is no limit to the number of targets you choose to spray, because when you spray an area your pretty much targeting everybody in that area friend or foe. Sounds good, but, you pay a price:
(1) You fire at a -1/2D blaster skill penalty (rounded down) to hit (Each additional action beyond spraying adds an additional -1D to hit.) (i.e. If you have a blaster skill of 7D when spraying that skill is reduced to 3D)
(2) For purposes of multiple actions in a round spraying is considered to be 4 actions.
(3) Targets at medium range are at a +5 difficulty to hit. Targets at long range are at +10 difficulty to hit. (Thus spraying only becomes realistic at short ranges; unless your some marksman)
(4) A fire arc of 90 degrees can be covered at no additional penalty or a fire arc of 120 degrees can be covered at an additional -1D penalty or 180 degrees at - 2D penalty.
(5) When spraying you consume 1 ammo for every 2 individuals in the area being fired upon, rounded up.
(6) The weapon's fire control does not apply when spraying an area.
Example: Irdrid the brutal (blaster: 8D; dodge 6D) is a Merc carrying a light repeating blaster (fire control: 1D; damage 6D). While strolling along the corridors of the Death Star he stumbles upon a group of 9 stormtroopers (blaster: 4D; dodge: 3D; after armor modifiers) as he turns a corner. Irdrid, being the aggressive type, decides to spray the group of stormtroopers who are all at close range and informs the GM that he wishes to dodge any return fire, thus, Irdrid is performing 4 actions (3 for spraying the area and 1 for dodging). The stormtroopers see Irdrid in time to perform a combat dodge and also wish to fire upon Irdrid. The GM determines that the difficulty number to hit the stormtroopers is 7. Irdrid is penalized -5D to hit (-4D for spraying (1/2 x 8D = 4D) and -1D for the additional action of dodging) for a resulting skill roll of 3D. The GM decides to speed things up by rolling the combat dodge for the group of stormtroopers as a whole. The stormtroopers dodge of 3D is reduced to 2D because they are conducting 2 actions each. The GM rolls and gets a 6. Thus, Irdrid's modified difficulty is 13. He rolls for each one getting a 14, 6, 12, 15, 9, 9, 15, 11, and 5. Thus, Irdrid hits 3 of them. Let's say for sake of brevity the 3 stormtroopers hit are incapacitated. The other 6 fire back on Irdrid who dodges (at a -4D because he is performing 5 actions: 4 for spraying and 1 for the combat dodge) rolls 2D6 and gets 8 and adds this to the stormtroopers difficulty of 7 for a total modified difficulty of 15. The stormtroopers roll 3D6 each to hit Irdrid. The rolls are a 14, 13, 8, 4, 12, and 7. Irdrid gets lucky and they all miss. So Irdrid checks off 5 rounds of ammo and continues on into the next round of combat ... with a grin on his face.
Many of you GM's might be thinking that this makes repeating blasters far too powerful. However, I think if you review the rules above and play test them you'll see that you need a high blaster skill to realistically attempt to do it and since it is only useful against groups of 5 or more chances are your not going to kill off everybody in the group and your going to leave yourself open to attack by the survivors. In the example above Irdrid was lucky that the remaining 6 troopers missed. Odds were that one of them was going to hit. Furthermore, I am a GM who believes that repeating blasters are strictly military issue only and that carrying one is illegal under both Imperial and New Republic laws; even in cities where carrying a blaster is legal (e.g. Mos Eisly) repeating blasters are outlawed, or at the very least require a military permit, in my campaigns.


Light Repeating Blaster
Model: Atgar A-150 repeating blaster
Type: Repeating blaster
Scale: Character
Skill: Blaster: repeating blasters
Ammo:100
Cost: 2,000
Availability: 2, X
Range: 3-50/ 100/ 300 m
Fire Control: 1D
Damage: 6D

Medium Repeating Blaster
Model: Atgar A-500 repeating blaster
Type: Repeating blaster
Scale: Character
Skill: Blaster: repeating blasters
Ammo:100
Cost: 5,000
Availability: 2, X
Range: 3-50/ 100/ 300 m
Fire Control: 1D+2
Damage: 7D
Game Notes: Due to its size individuals carrying a medium repeating blaster suffer a -1D penalty when dodging while carrying it.

Heavy Repeating Blaster
Model: Atgar A-1000 repeating blaster
Type: Repeating blaster
Scale: Character Skill: Heavy Weapons
Ammo: 100
Cost: 8,000
Availability: 2, R
Range: 3-50/ 100/ 300 m
Fire Control: 2D
Damage: 8D
Game Notes: Heavy repeating blasters are too bulky and heavy to be fired without a tripod, thus any individual firing a repeating blaster suffers a -2D penalty to all combat dodges. In the A-1000 the power battery is part of the tripod so that there are only two pieces to the A-1000 making it easier to transport.
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"He's Gry Sarth, of course he has the stats for them."

[Camero]

Yeah, I had the same complaint the author of that long explanation had. Repeating blasters aren't that much more powerful - a little modification and your blaster rifle or carbine can be more powerful - and how useful is reduced difficulty of one level for hitting a target in the same area when most targets dodge so the difficulty to be is now their dodge.

I will have to re- read that explanation a few times and see what I can do with it but it does seem pretty close, especially if you enforce a partial repeating blaster ban - make them illegal everywhere unless in direct military use.

The spray rules seemed good but the ammo used probably should just be the number of blasts you got off that round not his idea of dividing by the number of targets. So in a full auto round you could blow 30 ammo.

The rest of the spray rules do make it necessary to have a high blaster roll to be effective - so that is good - but it still leaves the repeating super nasty for one target. If you have your light repeating blaster and just one target so you do one shot (one action), and assuming you make that one hit roll, that pumps 3 blasts into him and does 18d damage!!! NASTY, but then again 3 rounds center mass from a M-60 would tear you apart too.

One idea I had for a possible house rule was that these repeating blasters (at least the light and the medium repeating blaster) had a normal setting (just a single blast) as well as the "constant fire" setting mention in the description - and the way they mention it in the description seems to imply there are other settings - and that the normal setting does the full damage (6d) for that one blast and you could then have the constant fire setting do half damage per blast and blame it on the fact that the energy and the blast gas have to combine much faster and so the combo isn't as potent (or less blaster gas is used, like how more blaster gas is used in the Heavy Blaster). That way a three blast (one shot) damage would be 9d (3+3+3) and for the guns that do more (6 blasts) it would be more (12d = 3+3+3+3+3+3).

If we added this function to the other guys spray rules it might bring the repeating blaster back down to game balance and still give it the feel of a repeating blaster because it fires more and not just because it has a couple of pips or die more damage, etc.

What do you think?
Any other ideas?
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"What a wonderful smell you've discovered"

[Pel]

I like these interpretations. It makes the repeating blaster the battlefield heavyweight that it should be. It also meshes well with the WEG literature in which a 'light repeating blaster' is a feared and somewhat rare weapon, at least in Rebel hands.
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Aha!

[garhkal]

Nice combat example for those rules, but one nitpick. A combat dodge REPLACES the range difficulty to hit, not adds to it.

As to spray rules, how's this.

When using a light repeating blaster to 'spray an area' you take the area's size as a penalty to the users blaster score. THEN he rolls his to hit pool (remaining) and shoots. Any targets in the 'sprayed area' get a dodge roll, as normal.
So say you were spraying a 20x20 area, which we could use my firearms spray rules as a guide line, gives a -3d. If you hit, all those hit, take the 6d damage.
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Confucious sayeth, don't wash cat while drunk!

[Orgaloth]

[Camero]

I think the author of the orignal spray rules above ment that +5 for med and +10 for long range attack difficulties could just be added to the dodge rolls of the characters in those areas (for the ones dodging). It just signifies the greater difficulty of having a spray still be thick as it moves out and covers distance. Plus people (meaning not so bright Imperial grunts) at long range might not even dodge since they might not really they are being gunned for. So the difficulty addtions could still be good there.

Right now I like the spray arc rule for modifiying difficulty as well but I am still interested in what Garhkal said was his "fire arms spray rule".

Garhkal, what is your "fire arms" spray rule?

And I agree that if you were using a fire arm or a projectile in rapid fire that each hit would be the full damage (usually less than comparable sized energy weapons) and that would be necessary since most SW armor is better for physical damage (+2d phy +1d energy etc). But in trying to bring light and medium repeating blasters down to a better balance I still like the idea of half damage but mulitiple hits because of the blaster gas and energy pack fast combination (as explained above). And maybe this would encourage more auto fire arm usage since my half damage rule doesn't make sense applied to that - but then again maybe not, blasters are part of the fun in star wars.
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"What a wonderful smell you've discovered"

[garhkal]

Spray fire.
This is the act of moving the guns barrel to the left and right rapidly, while holding down the trigger. It is also a full round action (half move can be allowed), and so can not be used with reaction skills. Unlike FAST, this must have a FULL clip or 50 round belt. It can be used in 2 fashions. Cover fire, or to damage:

Damage sprays.
The gunner makes ONE roll, adding in the bonus dice he gets for the weapon. Each target within the area above 1 (for SMGs and assault rifles) or 5 (for LMG to HMG) subtracts one from this die pool. Then each of those targets gets to add in the recoil value to their individual dodge rolls. If any are hit, the damage is rolled individually.


Cover sprays.
Unlike the former, this is not used to cause damage, but to stop the enemy from returning fire. The user still gets the addition of the FA dice (listed above), but does NOT subtract any dice for targets in the spray field. BUT he does subtract dice based on the AREA of the spray field. The gunner THEN rolls, against a difficulty assigned by the GM (based on range to the area for the cover spray, cover/concealment in the cover spray area and any other factors he deems necessary). If it hits, anyone in the area of cover spray suffers a penalty to their to hit pools of –3 per 5 points of difference between the gunners to hit pool and the diff set.

For cover sprays, you take a penalty to the to hit based on the area you are targeting.

[Rasputiza]

Being somewhat a WWII boardgame fan (and history scholar), i'd like to suggest another kind of fire to be added to our house rules: it was frequently used during WWII, it's name it's FIRELANES.
The repeating weapon (usually a medium or heavy MG) was emplaced and shoot along definite (and preregistered) firelanes. The purpose was not to hit a specific target but to suppress an area (i.e. fill it with lead so that enemies avoided that zone during operations/assaults). I still have no clue about how handle this in d6 though...
Ras

[Pel]

Excellent point, Ras. I'm not sure how one could adapt it to a running firefight, but it's definitely useful for defensive situations. That would mesh very well with Garhkal's table, since most of the repeaters are stationary crew-served weapons (unless you've got a Wook). I'd treat it more as good roleplaying, but planning like that could definitely help during a battle.

WWII History! Yayyyy! -can't get enough of it.
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Aha!

[garhkal]

Thanks pel. And great add on Ras...

How's about for my 'rules set' using firelanes decreases the cover spray area's difficulty by 10.
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Confucious sayeth, don't wash cat while drunk!

[Pel]

With some roleplaying and a little prior planning that could work well. If a player makes a concerted effort to safeguard a site's defenses, then they should get some sort of bonus when the attack actually arrives. Having designated fire lanes and some sort of earthworks or obstacles to channel the attackers into those lanes would provide a bonus like you described. At least that's how I would run it.
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Aha!