MGT Only: To SMG or Not - Comments Needed

[mike wightman]

A TL11 trooper with his electrothermal advanced combat personal weapon system is going to look at a TL7 assault rifle the way we look at a brown bess.

Where is the target acquisition sensor? Where is the target threat response level designator?
Where is the projectile selector switch? How do you fill the projectile reservoirs? How do you fill the propellent reservoirs?

Good job all you have to do it point the sharp end at the enemy and press the activation button.

 

[aramis]

Are these categories actually all that relevant according to your refereeing experience? Availability sure isn't in my games. Players buy weapons at whatever tech they can during their travels, then keep them. In any case, player characters usually have other high-tech equipment (among other things, a starship) so even in theory I don't see where low-tech availability suddenly becomes an important factor for guns. Given a choice, I cannot see any player choosing "black powder weapons" above something more useful.

Repair seldom comes up (there are mostly no rules for this anyway), assuming that basic maintenance is carried out regularly. Has never been a factor in my games.

I've had a player take Chakram skill (in play). Yes, combat frisbee.

I've had a player who wasn't a barbarian take skill in black powder - he was a hunter. It was useful to him, because he also had chemistry, and thus could field manufacture ammo for the black powder pepperbox rifle he had made.

It helps to understand - at that time, of my 6 players, 3 were competitive shooters (RM, BWS, and SF), one was a US Army Special Munitions troop (BP), one was a navy cook with .50cal qual as well as pistol qual (DK), and one was a medic in a ranger battalion (RH). Every one of us could be called "gun nuts"... And then the part-time players were Cryton and a marine 02-series (WCP3). I was also a competitive shooter in HS.

We were gun nuts, one and all. Even the cook loves to shoot.

They took some off the wall weapons skills. One took Polearms and Atl-Atl, and used them with Battle Dress, and had them up-massed (using BTRC's 3G³) for superdense. A spear hefty enough to punch through combat armor-12.

 

[atpollard]

If I had to choose between the usefulness of weapon skills =

1. Proto-Traveller EVERY weapon is a separate skill*
2. Black Powder - Slug Thrower - Energy*
3. Handgun - Rifle - Heavy*

Then I would definitely find #3 the most useful in play.
YMMV.


* or some similar variation.

 

[rancke]

Then I would definitely find #3 the most useful in play.
YMMV.

That last bit is the crucial part. My mileage definitely does vary. Usefulness depends on what sort of play you like. I like the possibility of giving my players a bit of trouble to overcome if the weapon they nomally use is unavailable for some reason. A skill that doesn't cover a wide range of different weapons definitely helps there. OTOH, it really isn't too much of a handicap to be restricted to, say, slug handguns, because PCs tend to carry around weapons that they can use. And having PCs that can use a pistol but not a rifle and vice versa also helps differentiate PCs and provides a bit of niche protection.

Personally I'd combine 2. and 3. into six different skills (With appropriate defaults). That seems a nice useful option, not too many, not too few. But the main point seems to me to be that rules with pretensions of genericity should provide more than one option. For example (in this case) one simple, one complex, and a middle-of-the-road default option.


Hans

 

[whulorigan]

If I had to choose between the usefulness of weapon skills =

1. Proto-Traveller EVERY weapon is a separate skill*
2. Black Powder - Slug Thrower - Energy*
3. Handgun - Rifle - Heavy*

Then I would definitely find #3 the most useful in play.
YMMV.

* or some similar variation.

Here's a thought:

What if Laser was a default (Level-0) skill for everybody, regardless of size/configuration (i.e. separate it out from other weapons altogether, energy or otherwise)? It has no recoil and is pretty much "point-and-shoot" (no drop due to gravity or wind-effects, nor even lead-time; just hold the beam on target for a fraction of a second).

Or even give the skill a default level equal to the highest level of Handgun or Rifle possessed by the character? If so, then #3 above works even better.

Is there something that I am overlooking regarding skill in using lasers that justifies a level of distinctive specialized training?

 

[Tobias]

Players may not choose it (unless they are Barbarians), but we have these things called NPCs, who may live on low-tech worlds, who also need skills to describe what they know how to do.

Yeah, but so what? They have either Handgun, Long Arm or Heavy Weapons skill. Unless they live on really low-tech worlds, in which case they may rather have melee weapon skills of some sort.
Realistically, you'd have to differentiate skills by each tech level. Taking Black Powder Weapons as an example, a Handgonne is a very different weapon from a Musket, which is again very different from a Colt Walker revolver - lumping them together under "Black Powder Weapons" makes as little sense, less even, as lumping together a Mauser bolt action rifle and a laser gun.
That's why I prefer a more abstract approach. Three categories, covering what is appropriate for them by TL, and if really needed, I improvise some familiarization procedure for weapons outside of a character's technological experience.

I also don't get the obsession with guns and weapon skills in general. Makes as much sense to me as dividing Medical skill into half a dozen subskills would make. (Ironically 2300 AD, which always appeared to me as far more militaristic and gun-⌧-obsessed than Traveller, had the exact same three categories I now use from the very beginning.)

 

[rancke]

I also don't get the obsession with guns and weapon skills in general. Makes as much sense to me as dividing Medical skill into half a dozen subskills would make.

That could make perfect sense. Medicine and surgery are about as far apart as any two other skills I can think of, and if a player wanted his character to spezialize in plastic surgery or geriatics, why shouldn't he be allowed to do so?

It all depends what sort of adventures you're running. If you were doing a Bureaucratic Infighting campaign it would make sense to reduce the list of weapon skills 'Fighting', but in most Traveller campaigns I've heard of weapons tend to crop up a lot more often than Medical (except First Aid, of course).


Hans

 

[Vladika]

That could make perfect sense. Medicine and surgery are about as far apart as any two other skills I can think of, and if a player wanted his character to spezialize in plastic surgery or geriatics, why shouldn't he be allowed to do so?

It all depends what sort of adventures you're running. If you were doing a Bureaucratic Infighting campaign it would make sense to reduce the list of weapon skills 'Fighting', but in most Traveller campaigns I've heard of weapons tend to crop up a lot more often than Medical (except First Aid, of course).


Hans

This prompted me to start a new thread. Hopefully it will be productive one.

 

[Garyius2003]

Players may not choose it (unless they are Barbarians), but we have these things called NPCs, who may live on low-tech worlds, who also need skills to describe what they know how to do.

Also, there could be legal or society reasons. Example in the current US, without getting into the government judgements involved...

"Black Powder" hunting seasons in many states give a great deal of extra time to hunt--at least for deer if not more species--with less hunters overall in the field. Some states also treat black powder rifles the same as shotguns for the purposes of hunting in less rural hunting safety zones.

Because the black powder legal definition is usually something like caseless muzzleloading black powder or black powder substitute, with a separate priming, the difference in our era has turned into a slower rifle to reload, with the same basic power and accuracy.

In my case I purchased a rifle with a primer slot that is very easy to load, unload and is protected from weather, fiber optic front sight with adjustable aperture rear, copper bullets with a semi sabot plastic skirt that shoots from a front and rear rest into about 1.5" at 100 yards, and black powder substitute pellets that are easy to load, very uniform, and much easier to clean. As a bonus, the rifle costs half of a basic regular bolt action rifle, even when purchased from Walmart.

So there can be reasons other than tech: social, archaic legal, no longer valid safety concerns, religious... at least in game.

As for tech, if we (modern countries at TL7/8) can make, market, and sell a modern black powder rifle for $200 or 250, when a modern bolt action costs $425 to $550 for the same basic quality level and with faster reloads, how cheap could a TL9/10 world make the same quality level black powder rifles, primers, powder pellets, and bullets, and pack them up into several shipping containers for the PCs to carry to a TL3 world?

Edit to add: I forgot, but there is a special skirt/sabot bullet with a thin rod on the bottom that holds two pellets, and you then purchase plastic cylinders to hold the bullet combo. That plus a device I didn't buy that feeds primers into a ready slot for super fast depriming and repriming, means your field reloads when hunting are really a matter of how quick you can pull the rod, push the round, and return the rod. The plastic skirt makes the pushing much easier.

 

[Tobias]

That could make perfect sense. Medicine and surgery are about as far apart as any two other skills I can think of, and if a player wanted his character to spezialize in plastic surgery or geriatics, why shouldn't he be allowed to do so?

Because if you design a game with the philosophy that it should allow such narrow specializations for every imaginable campaign, you'd end up with several hundred skills?

 

[rancke]

Because if you design a game with the philosophy that it should allow such narrow specializations for every imaginable campaign, you'd end up with several hundred skills?

MgT already has several hundred skills. There's Trade (butcher), Trade (Baker), Trade (Candlestick Maker), and so on and so forth. I'd say you'd have the option to end up with the number of skills that you are comfortable handling.


Hans

 

[mike wightman]

Perhaps what you could/should do is have a very broad general skill and then allow the player to add specialism fluff to it.

You could have

ranged combat
armed melee
unarmed melee

There are a couple of things that have always bugged me about CT skills - and most other versions of the game.

First, the skills are not balanced, a skill level of 1 in revolver is as hard to get in character generation as engineering. The latter requires you to be able to understand, maintain and fix fusion power plants, manoeuvre drives, jump drives etc. revolver 1 you can shoot a revolver at a bonus of 1. Doesn't come across as balanced to me.

The second is the TL nature of a lot of skills. A TL15 doctor is going to be very different to a TL4 doctor.

 

[rancke]

First, the skills are not balanced, a skill level of 1 in revolver is as hard to get in character generation as engineering. The latter requires you to be able to understand, maintain and fix fusion power plants, manoeuvre drives, jump drives etc. revolver 1 you can shoot a revolver at a bonus of 1. Doesn't come across as balanced to me.

That's why in my house rules (which have a point buy character creation system), you pay for how useful a skill is in the upcoming campaign. You'd pay more for handgun skill than for engineering if the referee suspects that it probably will be used more often than than engineering skill (Which I tend to suspect in the kind of campaigns I run ).

Improving skills once play has begun takes longer for more complicated skills. This does lead players to speculate a bit in getting things like engineering during character creation, but I don't mind min-maxing as long as it is kept out of the actual game play.


Hans

 

[Tobias]

MgT already has several hundred skills.

No, it does not. Saying that any system which includes "crafts" or to use another example languages has thousands of skills because there surely are thousands of different jobs and languages is meaningless sophistry. And meaningless sophistry for the sake of argument is an exit clue for me because quite frankly I cannot be arsed with this kind of "discussion" anymore.

 

[rancke]

No, it does not. Saying that any system which includes "crafts" or to use another example languages has thousands of skills because there surely are thousands of different jobs and languages is meaningless sophistry.

No it isn't. (And the languages are another good example; thank you for that). It illustrates that just because a game allows narrow specializations for every imaginable campaign, you're not going to end up handling several hundred skills.

And, BTW, I missed it the first time, but the term "such narrow specializations" is purely a matter of opinion. You may think that something like plastic surgery and geriatics are narrow specializations, but I can think of adventuring opportunities inherent in both. The geriatics expert could be looking into anagathics and the usefulness of being able to change appearance on occasion is obvious.

The point is, if a player and his referee agrees that a skill specialization is interesting, who are you to disagree with them?

And meaningless sophistry for the sake of argument is an exit clue for me because quite frankly I cannot be arsed with this kind of "discussion" anymore.

I shall treat that remark with all the respect it deserves.


Hans

 

[McPerth]

Repair seldom comes up (there are mostly no rules for this anyway), assuming that basic maintenance is carried out regularly. Has never been a factor in my games.

Yet CT specifies that electronics is used to repair energy weapons (CT:LBB1, page 18), while mechanical skill is used to repair non-energy (in fact kinetical energy ) ones (CT:LBB1, page20). No such specifications are given in MgT.

And in MT there were more detailed rules for repairing them (mostly in suplements where those weapons where described in detail, as it was in most equipment).

MgT already has several hundred skills. There's Trade (butcher), Trade (Baker), Trade (Candlestick Maker), and so on and so forth. I'd say you'd have the option to end up with the number of skills that you are comfortable handling.

That will depend on how broad you take those Trade Skills (BTW, IMHO this name is pehaps not the best one, at least for old hands, as there existed a fully different skill with this name in CT:MP/MT). See that Trade skill is a way to allow nearly any skill you want (most of them mainly for character colour or to earn some money when not adventuring) without making the list endless (e.g. "hey, I'd like my character to be a jeweller, so that we could appraise any jewell's value and I could build beautiful jellwery to sell").

To keep with one of your examples, you have Trade (butcher) skill, but not Trade (butcher: subspecialties swine, poultry, cow, sheep) skill.

EDIT: see that Trade is not a "true" cascade skill, as it does not give you any experience (not even level 0) in other Trade specializations, unlike the "true" cascade skills. That's why I played with the possibility for a Trade specializations to be itself a cascade skill :CoW:

 

[Jame]

And, BTW, I missed it the first time, but the term "such narrow specializations" is purely a matter of opinion. You may think that something like plastic surgery and geriatics are narrow specializations, but I can think of adventuring opportunities inherent in both. The geriatics expert could be looking into anagathics and the usefulness of being able to change appearance on occasion is obvious.
Hans

Yes, though to me plastic surgery and geriatrics both use the "Medic" skill.

My thought with the Ranged: shortarm longarm support was same as with what I'd like to do with Engineer*: narrow down the specializations in the rules as written, so that groups that like a few broad skills have them, while groups that like specializations have skills to add them to.

I myself find that I prefer a few broad skills that can have specializations added to them, especially if I plan on introducing new players who aren't familiar with a game.

*What I'd do with Engingeer is: Electronics, Vehicle, Shipboard and Architect. Civil Engineering would be Architect, while power plants would fall under the other specialties - a pure power plant would be Electronics with some use of Mechanic during repairs, while an ICE on a car would be Vehicle, and a fusion plant on a Beowulf, Type T corvette AND a Tigress would be Shipboard. Also, Electronics is still used to repair lasers, and computers and sensors/comms and so forth.

 

[SpaceBadger]

I like the possibility of giving my players a bit of trouble to overcome if the weapon they nomally use is unavailable for some reason.

This is where an unfamiliarity penalty is useful. When they first encounter a weapon they've never used before (maybe never even seen before) the GM assesses a penalty based on similarity to what the character already knows.

Could be simply a -1 for a fairly similar weapon, which goes away soon as the character uses the weapon and becomes more familiar.

Could be -2 for a weapon that is rather unlike anything the character has ever used, but eventually this will go to -1 and then to no penalty if the character keeps on using the weapon.

I suppose a -3 is even possible, although that is a pretty hefty penalty in CT.

Unfamiliarity penalties are also dependent on the situation. If the character has an instructor available who is familiar with the weapon and can explain how to use it, the penalties are less or may not be applied.

And if the character picks up an unfamiliar weapon, but it is loaded and ready to fire, that first shot may be at no penalty at all - but he may have trouble reloading or prepping his next shot.

 

[simonh]

The thing is, there are lots of different ways to slice and group the various different skills that make up marksmanship and combat effectiveness. Even with a single weapon, you may end up learning several very different skills in using it.

My main experience is with the SA-80. As an assault rifle, it's a great example of the various different skills you learn in order to make the best use of it. Firing that weapon prone on a range from 400m at stationary targets in single shot or 3-round bursts is a very different marksmanship challenge compared to firing it standing at close (<20m) range at moving targets. It very different again from close quarters room-to-room fighting. In fact even for range shooting, being good at 100m is a very different thing from being good at 400m. A whole additional set of skills in terms of controlled breathing, posture, patience and rhythm come into play.

I serious doubt that the difference between shooting a handgun standing at less than 20m against a moving target, as against shooting an SA-80 at <20m against a moving target, are greater than the difference between shooting the SA-80 in that situation and shooting it prone at 400m against a stationary target. The principles of situational awareness, anticipation, target tracking and leading the target are all the same with only posture and handling being different.

Regarding different technologies, I think focusing on technical differences such as one fires a bullet and the other fires a beam of light is a minor issue. Take the ACR programme from the 90s and the flechette firing rifles developed back then. These fired super-high velocity needles with very flat trajectories and low recoil. In practice the marksmanship techniques you'd use with a weapon like that at most ranges would be very similar to the characteristics of a laser weapon, so should you use slug thrower rifle skill or the same skill as for laser weapons? Also, if you're used to firign a slugh thrower with fall of shot and windage considerations, transferring to a laser with none of those factors should be very easy. The opposite should be much harder because you have to learn those new skills, instead of just setting them aside.

Lets look from a different angle. I trained on the SA-80, a slug thrower assault rifle. I've never handled an M16 or AK-47 in my life, would I be any good with them? They're fairly similar weapons that are used in similar situations, so OK, probably with 30 minutes of practice, mainly learning to operate them mechanically and getting used to the weighting, I'd probably be as good with one of those as with an SA-80. How about a 7.62mm rifle like the FN-FAL? Quite a different beast, I suspect. I think it would take quite a bit longer. How about a BAR?

How long would it take for me to learn to use a shotgun, again in the various different situations I might find myself in - range shooting and close quarters combat. Half an hour? longer than for the larger caliber rifles? If so, how much longer?

Same question for a handgun. Would it really take all that much longer to adapt my knowledge from the SA-80 to a handgun as it would to an FN-FAL? I'm sure there are specific techniques that are possible with a handgun that are quite different from what is possible with a compact assault rifle, but the basics of situational awareness, target tracking, anticipation, etc are pretty similar.

So if you break down marksmanship and combat effectiveness into it's component techniques, I don't think making arbitrary distinctions between say shooting a slug thrower at 400m as against shooting a laser at 400m makes much sense. Similarly, when you compare long range shooting to close quarters shooting, is using a handgun or shotgun inclose quarters combat really very much more different from using an M16 at close quarters, when compared to the different techniques employed using an M16 at long range? Yes they are different, but how different, quantatively speaking? Are the skills at using an M16 in very different situations really more transferable than skills at using different weapons in the same situations in terms of range and target movement?

Simon Hibbs

 

[JimMarn]

Years ago I was told it isn't so much learning the different mechanism, other than the safety. But that the different pistols, rifles, shotguns, have a different balance point. Getting used to that was the bigger problem.

I have no experience in that myself.