I usually like to make the combat consistent with what the military in the games would be like. (Not that I ever intend to have PC's in battledress with fusion guns), simply because if the combat system doesn't break down with armored troopers firing at each other, then it probably won't with much less armored PC's.
I've just seen too many games where two opposing squads of modern soldiers simply can't kill each other. This usually goes against my need for high tech lethality. (heh). If the armor is so good as to make guns less than effective, someone is going to come up with a better gun. It's just the natural arms race between weaponry and armor.
This is where my obsession with AP comes in. I have no problem if the armor is capable of routinely stopping rounds from low tech pistols (or even high tech sidearms, assuming the armor is of equal tech). I just don't like it when the armor is SO good that the modern longarm (be it ACR or gauss rifle or laser rifle) can't satisfactorally damage an opponent.
As for vehicles, this is kind of problematic. However, I'd rule that the "AR" gained from scale is never subject to AP effects. That should help a little bit. Maybe AR should scale too...vehicle AR is twice what character AR is. That has too many problems to really seriously entertain, but I think if scale "AR" is never allowed to be reduced by AP, that seems ok with me.
While we're on the topic- unless I'm mistaken, a TL14 or so Fusion Gun does 9d20 (don't have book with me). Now then, if a TL13 "medium" battledress has AR10 +5 for vehicle scale, doesn't this mean that a character in Battledress "only" takes 1d20-6 damage? If so, given an average Lifeblood of 12-13 for a Marine, that means the character has a mere 10-15% chance of killing said marine in a single hit. Perhaps I'm just confused having only previously played GURPS Traveller, but aren't single hits from plasma or fusion guns supposed to be IMMEDIATELY fatal, even to guys in BD? They certainly are in GURPS...too bad GURPS has so many other problems as to make it virtually unplayable at times.
I've just seen too many games where two opposing squads of modern soldiers simply can't kill each other. This usually goes against my need for high tech lethality. (heh). If the armor is so good as to make guns less than effective, someone is going to come up with a better gun. It's just the natural arms race between weaponry and armor.
This is where my obsession with AP comes in. I have no problem if the armor is capable of routinely stopping rounds from low tech pistols (or even high tech sidearms, assuming the armor is of equal tech). I just don't like it when the armor is SO good that the modern longarm (be it ACR or gauss rifle or laser rifle) can't satisfactorally damage an opponent.
As for vehicles, this is kind of problematic. However, I'd rule that the "AR" gained from scale is never subject to AP effects. That should help a little bit. Maybe AR should scale too...vehicle AR is twice what character AR is. That has too many problems to really seriously entertain, but I think if scale "AR" is never allowed to be reduced by AP, that seems ok with me.
While we're on the topic- unless I'm mistaken, a TL14 or so Fusion Gun does 9d20 (don't have book with me). Now then, if a TL13 "medium" battledress has AR10 +5 for vehicle scale, doesn't this mean that a character in Battledress "only" takes 1d20-6 damage? If so, given an average Lifeblood of 12-13 for a Marine, that means the character has a mere 10-15% chance of killing said marine in a single hit. Perhaps I'm just confused having only previously played GURPS Traveller, but aren't single hits from plasma or fusion guns supposed to be IMMEDIATELY fatal, even to guys in BD? They certainly are in GURPS...too bad GURPS has so many other problems as to make it virtually unplayable at times.
