Guns Are Too Slow in Hero

[RDU Neil]

On ‎3‎/‎16‎/‎2018 at 9:04 AM, Surrealone said:

Glad to see I'm not the only one who feels that range penalties have always been generous in Hero.  It's not a huge problem, but for those who want more realism your proposed RM changes seem solid.

 

On the subject of range modifiers... I just read the following about the XM17 tests...

 

"The handgun should have a 90 percent or more chance of hitting in a 4-inch circle out to 50 meters consistently..."  from the Wikipedia article. 

 

Uhm... while I'm sure there are some very good, highly trained pistol shooters who can hit four inches at 50 meters... that still seems like a nearly impossible shot for most people, especially in a combat situation.

 

Is this some kind of "standardized" or automated test of the "gun" instead of the person firing it? Like... the gun is set on a mechanical stand and ranged to hit such a target in a locked position, and then mechanically fired in the same locked position several thousand times to see if the bullets keep going to the same place? That is the only thing I could think of to make sense of this.

Do you have any insight, Surrealone?

Thanks!

 

 

[Surrealone]

3 hours ago, RDU Neil said:

 

On the subject of range modifiers... I just read the following about the XM17 tests...

 

"The handgun should have a 90 percent or more chance of hitting in a 4-inch circle out to 50 meters consistently..."  from the Wikipedia article. 

 

Uhm... while I'm sure there are some very good, highly trained pistol shooters who can hit four inches at 50 meters... that still seems like a nearly impossible shot for most people, especially in a combat situation.

 

Is this some kind of "standardized" or automated test of the "gun" instead of the person firing it? Like... the gun is set on a mechanical stand and ranged to hit such a target in a locked position, and then mechanically fired in the same locked position several thousand times to see if the bullets keep going to the same place? That is the only thing I could think of to make sense of this.

Do you have any insight, Surrealone?

No idea as to how it was tested.  That said, there are many firearms that are more accurate than the people who wield them. (i.e. Just because the firearm is capable of something doesn't mean the person pulling that firearm's trigger is capable of making the firearm do what it's capable of doing.)

[Lord Liaden]

 

[Surrealone]

That video has less to do with the speed of knife attacks ... and more to do with the speed with which someone can cross distances to use a knife, fist, or other attack on someone who is defending with a firearm.  (There's a subtle but important distinction between those things.)

[Lord Liaden]

Agreed. But IMHO it's still a relevant consideration when discussing the "realism" of speed of different attacks in Hero System.

[RDU Neil]

2 hours ago, Lord Liaden said:

Agreed. But IMHO it's still a relevant consideration when discussing the "realism" of speed of different attacks in Hero System.

 

And agreed as well, if the knife guy and gun guy both had their weapons out and ready. If one attacker has the weapon out, and the other has to draw it... that is a major issue.

 

While ten feet or less if both had the weapon out, I'd see that getting into "gun guy gets cut/stabbed, knife guy gets shot (maybe multiple times)" and then it comes down to how well they hit, lucky blow, vulnerable spot hit, etc.

 

If gun guy and knife guy both have to draw their weapons, I'd be interested in that as well. In this case, charging while drawing a knife MIGHT be easier than backing up while drawing a gun... but I'd like to see it. At what range (I'd think less than 21 feet, which is 6 meters, basically, which is close range by Danger International range mods) with gun drawn and knife drawn, can gun guy fire multiple shots before getting hit with the knife?

 

I'd like to see those tests as well. Surrealone speaks to that at a 3 meter/5 meter/7 meter spread...   So 3 meters, ten feet, gun out, you are emptying your clip into the guy, especially if he is trying to close. If he gets to you first, that is more a matter of better DEX, faster SPD, than weapons speed.

[Lord Liaden]

Well, that is what the video I linked to attempts to test in its second half. With more permutations than in the first video on this thread.

[massey]

Well, 21 feet is approximately a half-move for someone with 6" of Running.  So it makes sense that he gets there about the same time the other guy has drawn his gun (also a half-move).

[RDU Neil]

1 hour ago, Lord Liaden said:

Well, that is what the video I linked to attempts to test in its second half. With more permutations than in the first video on this thread.

 

Fair... I didn't watch the entire second video until you pointed that out. I think that clearly points to "both weapons drawn, gun wins unless knife guy is already on top of him"

[Cantriped]

5 hours ago, RDU Neil said:

 

Fair... I didn't watch the entire second video until you pointed that out. I think that clearly points to "both weapons drawn, gun wins unless knife guy is already on top of him"

Which also supports giving firearms a few points of Lightning Reflexes as a general rule: So that if both weapons are already drawn, the wielder of the gun shoots first (baring a significant difference in Initiatives otherwise).

[Ninja-Bear]

I was going to suggest lightning reflexes for guns. You could also separate ranged attacks go first then resiove hth attacks.

 

one thing to keep in mind about the 21 ft rule. The main point isn’t that a knife wielder won’t end up dying, it’s that he can (and has) still end up killing a cop. I remeber in psy class, psychologists can’t pin down why one soldier gets a non lethal wound and dies in combat and the guy next to him takes more shots and keeps fighting. 

[Old Man]

I'm not sure that's a psychology question.

[Hyper-Man]

Physiology maybe?

[Ninja-Bear]

3 hours ago, Old Man said:

I'm not sure that's a psychology question.

It is, because mind set has a lot to do with survival. Another rare but verified example is “Broken Heart syndrome” people have died from grief.

[Old Man]

I feel as though mindset has to do with survival in less acute situations like brokenheartedness or being lost in the woods.  Whether or not you get up from being shot in the chest, to me, seems like it has more to do with shock, adrenaline, blood loss, and the precise nature of the injury.  But then again I'm not a doctor or a psychologist.

[RDU Neil]

We are now discussing heartbreak in Hero.

 

I love thread drift.   

[Ninja-Bear]

8 hours ago, Old Man said:

I feel as though mindset has to do with survival in less acute situations like brokenheartedness or being lost in the woods.  Whether or not you get up from being shot in the chest, to me, seems like it has more to do with shock, adrenaline, blood loss, and the precise nature of the injury.  But then again I'm not a doctor or a psychologist.

To be sure those are factors too. But mental shock plays a critical roll too. Physiology is adrenaline, which everyone has. Phycology is how you deal with it. Ever freeze in an adrenaline dump? Another non war is the rock climber about 5 years ago which had his arm pinned for 127 days? He had to amputate his own arm? 

[Old Man]

22 hours ago, RDU Neil said:

We are now discussing heartbreak in Hero.

 

I love thread drift.   

 

Would it be like an Ego Attack with the Does Body advantage?

[Christopher R Taylor]

Quote

Well, 21 feet is approximately a half-move for someone with 6" of Running.  So it makes sense that he gets there about the same time the other guy has drawn his gun (also a half-move).

 

Something people don't think about much, because we almost never ever get into armed combat with a melee weapon, is reach.  Its a lot further than you think.  A normal man with a sword can hit anything within nine feet of them with a single step forward.  That's a 9' radius circle of impact all the way around them.  It can be even more with a small move forward, easy to do in combat.  You may think you're out of range but you're comfortably within striking distance at six meters.

[Lord Liaden]

Excellent point. Moderns tend to think of only knives as an alternative weapon to guns, because guns have made longer bladed weapons obsolete in most combat situations. But for the Dark Champions genre a sword is not an unlikely weapon to be used in a street-level fight.

[massey]

On 3/22/2018 at 8:57 PM, RDU Neil said:

We are now discussing heartbreak in Hero.

 

I love thread drift.   

 

A bullet through your left ventricle will cause heartbreak every time.

[Christopher R Taylor]

Quote

Excellent point. Moderns tend to think of only knives as an alternative weapon to guns, because guns have made longer bladed weapons obsolete in most combat situations.

 

Even with a knife, step plus arm gives you a 6' reach.  You're not nearly far enough away at 20 feet, so yes I can easily see how a knife is very scary at that range.

 

Neither of these two idiots is well trained but they still show how easy it is to nail someone with a knife in a fight.  You're gonna get cut up.  I've even seen a video where a martial artist went up against a guy with a felt tip pen and his arms were all marked up.  He whupped his opponent but....

 

The problem we have these days is an almost total ignorance of the real life consequences of fights with these weapons.  We see gunshot wounds on TV and in the movies, so that makes some sense to us even in a dramatic, stylized way.  But its physically damaging and painful to get cut, so its all simulated and movie fights with knives and guns are 99% what looks cool and 1% what is effective.  Watch this little sequence from a show.  Its all wrong but it looks nifty.

 

 

 

[Old Man]

Back when I was into martial arts we did some experimental sparring with knives.  Literally every fight would have resulted in horrifying injuries to both parties.  Granted none of us knew anything about knife fighting, but it was really eye opening (for the remaining eyes anyway).

[RDU Neil]

21 hours ago, Old Man said:

Back when I was into martial arts we did some experimental sparring with knives.  Literally every fight would have resulted in horrifying injuries to both parties.  Granted none of us knew anything about knife fighting, but it was really eye opening (for the remaining eyes anyway).

 

we did the same thing. Stripped to the waist, we each took markers, and went at it. We were all horribly mutilated after a just a few flurries. Most of the fights were "won" by the person who was able to take the cuts in less lethal areas, but delivered the first cuts to abdomen, throat, etc. 

There is a reason you pick up a chair and keep that maniac with a knife at bay, no matter how good you are at hand to hand.

[Old Man]

The other thing that struck me about knife fighting* was how vulnerable the knife hand and wrist are.  Knife fighting just does not translate to unarmed combat at all, because it opens up the whole body to crippling injury.  Bad guy throws a punch, you can put up a forearm to take the blow.  Do that against a knife and now you have an impairing arm injury and there's blood everywhere and it's yours ohmigod ohmigod.

 

Oddly enough I read somewhere online about cavalry fighting at Waterloo and how 80% of the cuts suffered by cavalrymen were to the sword arm.  Makes you want to invest in a sleeve of mail.

 

 

* Aside from the other guy's knife, repeatedly.