[SG] Discussion about weekend questions

[Allan]:

The rules are clear on this one. Page 40. 
You roll FC + QD
for the DFFG vs. Range Die for the infantry. 
Casualties are
determined as per small arms fire. The 
impact die, though,
is D8 versus the infantry's armour.

[Tomb] Okay, I've learned something. 
However, let me point out that if you are 
rolling a DFFG/5 or an APSW, you get the 
same D8 for FireCon and the same D8 for 
impact. Fascinating.....

[Tomb] Re HAMR: Yes, I think it is 
overblown, but the RFAC still comes up 
short relative to the much smaller Gauss 
SAW. I think an RFAC/1 (20-30mm) really 
requires an impact in the range of 2d6* or 
2d8* or something or at the very least 
D12*. Unlike some of the weapons (HVC 
firing HE, etc), the RFAC fires probably AP 
or API or some such kind of rounds that 
likely will do impact hits. Giving it a D8 
impact seems utterly inadequate, and even 
giving it D10* (since the * will never play 
into an infantry firefight due to the fact it 
only matters attacking vehicles) isn't much 
better. I've relegated the HAMR to d12* in 
my world also. 

[Tomb] As an aside, Adrian well described 
the battle but he forgot to compliment the 
FSE/ESU side for being good sportsmen 
and playing out a retreat action after it 
became obvious they'd get slaughtered if 
they tried to press the attack. 

[Tomb] Now, on the matter of crew bail 
out, I think if the crew commander yells 
"out out out!", the infantry probably should. 
And although Ryan makes a good point 
about bailing out at the wrong time, he 
makes assumptions about training. 
Probably well trained infantry won't bail out 
unless the armour crew commander orders 
a general bail out. Perhaps a green infantry 
squad inside a disabled vehicle should take 
a panic test, and if they fail, bail out 
anyway even if the crew stays.

[Tomb] As to the abstract turn sequence 
and vehicles and embarking/debarking 
infantry.... I don't really think that the 
abstract turn sequence is anything but a 
red herring here. The point is a vehicle that 
double moves has spent all the actions it 
could possibly spend in one round moving. 
It couldn't go any further. So does it then 
make sense that an infantry squad could 
debark from the vehicle and move freely? 
(yes, I concede they spend one action). 
Ultimately,  you get three actions worth of 
movement when any other unit could get 
but two. 

The way I usually run it: Embark/debark 
costs 1 action for both vehicle and troops. 
You can only embark on an unactivated 
vehicle and only debark from an activated 
one. So, you have vehicle activates, moves 
or fires, debarks troops. Troops, then 
having automatically been activated, take 
their one remaining action. For 
embarkation, troops activate, move to the 
vehicle, spend an action to embark, then 
the vehicle takes its one remaining action, 
usually drive away. No bookkeeping 
complexity. Of course, another interesting 
point was brought up: If a vehicle with 
troops aboard decides to fire, instead of 
move, why can't troops simultaneously 
debark? The answer is, they probably could.
As to Tony's comment about how often 
does this come up? For me, just about 
every second game I see 3-6 vehicles on 
the board, of which 50% are likely to be 
APCs so quite regularly.... 

[Tomb] As to the resolution of vehicle fire 
without special rules, (and yes, this makes 
them a bit tougher):

1. Range bands are multiplied by weapon 
size class. So an MDC 5 has 60" range 
bands. (This is nasty.... a less nasty option 
is just giving vehicle mounted heavy 
weapons a 24" range band). 

2. When firing at infantry behind a brick 
wall, for example, ignore the cover. 
Rationale: You aren't firing at the infantry. 
You're firing at the brick wall. You're a tank 
gunner.... you know your round hitting the 
wall will punch down the wall and throw 
bricks (or melt them) and anything behind 
the wall is in a world of hurt. I'd give the 
grunts the armour shifts, but the truth is 
that a tank doesn't have to work too hard 
to hit a small shack at 400m. Or, do what 
Brian and I did when we worked on the 
bunker rules. Assign the wall an armour 
value (brick, say armour 1.... thick stone 
maybe armour 2). Fire at the wall (call it a 
size 1 chunk of wall). If you hit the wall, 
roll damage (remembering to double if 
major impact) and roll armour for the wall. 
If you penetrate subject everyone inside to 
D8 attack (or alternatively, you could keep 
track of how much you penetrated by and 
use that to figure how many casualties 
then apply that many D8 attacks or 
something like that). 

A DFFG/5 in DS2 has a 6km range and 
anything in the closer range bands dies 
when it points at them. At 400m, it ought 
to be a VERY BAD THING to have this 
pointed at you. 

Tomb. 

---------------------------------------------
Thomas Barclay
Co-Creator of http://www.stargrunt.ca 
Stargrunt II and Dirtside II game site

No Battle Plan Survives Contact With Dice.
-- Mark 'Indy' Kochte