Re: RFACS

As I've said before, I agree wholeheartedly with what Tom is saying
about
certain of the HWs in SG as used vs. infantry.

However, a couple of comments re Tom's last post:

>** In fact, under that system, it'd be far more pragmatic to have a
>manually fired SAW (given you get to roll the FP die of d10 or d12)
than
>a weapon fired by a basic firecontrol (d6). I'm arguing the basic
>firecontrol must be relative to the time - 2183 basic would of course
be
>considered ultra advanced by today's standards. So we have a
firecontrol
>which is very sophisticated, stabilized in three axes, and
incorporating
>better-than-current software, firmware, and hardware.... and it can't
>hit anywhere near as effectively as a good old eyeballed shot from the
>gunner. And this ignores the fact the vehicle mounted cannon may spit
>out rounds two or three times faster (cyclic) than the basic SAW *and*
>it has better sustained fire.

This is more of a "philosophical" comment about our assumptions about
the
GZGverse.

Tom is advocating one of technological development in the GZG universe -
that being most if not all technology (particularly the military stuff
we're interested in) will by necessity advance far beyond what we have
today, given the present rate of technological development, and how far
we've come in, say, the past 100 years.  Therefore, a "basic" FC system
in
the GZGverse will make our advanced stuff look like bubble gum and
rubber
bands, and their "superior" FC systems would look like magic to us.

I'm not so sure about this.  Maybe the weapon producers of the GZGverse,
particularly those of the further-flung areas of human space (ie out on
distant or small colonies) will use tried and true systems that do not
require a heavy industrial infrastructure - or perhaps I should say a
really high tech infrastructure...  Who's to say that they don't use
weapon
systems that are remarkably similar to what is around today, simply
'cause
they know it works and it is easy to make and maintain in the field.  We
could go on arguing ad nauseum about the possible directions that
industrial production might take, but the fact of the matter is, the GZG
books themselves suggest that though there is technology of a
sophistication that we can only dream about (FTL, Gravitic tech, etc),
in
most cases they're still using rifles that use explosives to propel a
slug
at the enemy, and still using wheeled or tracked armoured vehicles with
big
guns, carting PBIs around the battlefield to take and hold the important
spots.	It just isn't THAT different from today, and I believe that was
by
intention on the part of the designers.  The game system is designed to
be
generic, and to enable fun play of squad and platoon level infantry
combat.
 The GZG Canon universe is not that different from ours today, with some
advances in technology to give it sci-fi flavour and enable it to be set
out among the stars.  But it isn't so far gone from today as to be
completely unrecognizable and pure fantasy...  Like I said, it still
comes
down to a PBI with a rifle taking a hill away from another PBI with a
rifle
sitting on the hill...

The same might be said for the technology.  Sure there is some stuff
that's
"far future wonderous" relative to us.	But is ALL of it that way?  Why
should it be?  Is it necessary to humanity that we give up on stuff that
works well simply because we MUST advance beyond what we have right now?
Of course not.	There are many examples of technology that we use today
that has not fundamentally changed in centuries, just because it works
well.  Will we replace a steel kitchen knife with a "electro vibro sonic
wave motion monomolecular matter destabilizer device"?	Why would we?
Steel
knives have worked perfectly well for centuries, are cheap to produce
with
very limited technology and do not require mass industrial
infrastructure.
And in that kind of case, we're lazy.  We don't need to replace the
knife,
'cause whether it is 1750, 1950, or 2250, a steel knife is still going
to
cut a steak or carve a turkey (if we're still eating that kind of food
in
2250 and not ingesting pills a-la the Jetsons cartoon...).  There's no
indication that we will abandon all of our technology of today in the
GZGverse.  Infact, I would suggest that a critical reading of their
histories and their weapon/vehicle designs/descriptions suggests that
much
of what they have then is similar to what we have now.	Yes there are
all
kinds of examples of stuff that is WAY more advanced than today. 

But what I'm boiling down to at the end here, is that (to put it
prosiacally) an armoured vehicle build on a fringe colony world, using
Petrochem or some other relatively simple power system, riding on tires
made from locally grown rubber or some kind of synthetic, and mounting a
25mm auto cannon - might have a mounting system that is not much more
complicated than a series of hydraulic or electric servos to move it
around, some simple sighting systems, and a guy behind it not trained
too
differently from my friends who serve in the Canadian reserves today... 
It
is a "basic" fire control system in the GZGverse/Stargrunt sense... and
it
may indeed be quite basic.  Because that is all they need, and can
economically produce and maintain, in that kind of environment...

If we assume that their "basic" firecontrol systems are all fully
stabilized with radar motion trackers, inertial guidance and having full
spectrum scanners with UV, IR, etc etc capability, how does the game
system
then accound for the colony world that has a converted agricultural
transport mounting a simple mechanism for it's heavy autocannon, and
carring a squad of troops in the back.

I suggest that a Stargrunt Basic fire control system is exactly that. 
Basic.

>** And just to illustrate that this argument isn't tied to preconceived
>notions: I don't care if the rifle of tomorrow is a 10mm caseless round
>or a 5mm binary propellant round or a 3mm explosive tipped needle, not
>do I care that the RFAC is 20mm with API, APDS, APKE or any other kind
>of weapon. The point is the niche this weapon fills - that of a weapon
>effective against light armour and effective against infantry - will
>still exist and whatever version of the weapon existent in 2183 would
be
>more effective <comparatively> than the 2183 SAW **** OR ELSE WHY WOULD
>THEY HAVE IT ****?  It has marginal performance against armour (d10
>penetration vs d12 for even level 1 armour) and crappy performance
>against infantry (d8 impact, d6 to d10 fire control). Heck, I'd almost
>rather take the FSE AR vs. light armour. Or a decent SAW.... the impact
>is about the same due to the particulars of level-1 armour... and the
FP
>yields a much better chance of a hit vs. infantry targets. **** and
this
>is the crux of it! The performance is just not good enough to justify
>its existence as a weapons system - it would have been done away with
in
>favour of the SAW or some other system... ****
>

Hang on a second.  Remember that under the current rules, there is a
significant difference between an RFAC/1 with it's impact of d10 hitting
an
armoured vehicle than a infantry rifle with impact d10 hitting the same
vehicle.  Infantry small arms can not penetrate anything other than
armour
class 1, and only ever have a SMALL chance of doing serious damage. 
They
are treated completely differently by the rules than the RFAC, even
though
they have the same impact.  I draw your attention to the different
sections
on pages 37 and 38 of the rulebook which explain the differences between
small arms vs. point targets and heavy weapons vs. point targets.

Clearly if you want to take on a vehicle, having an RFAC/1 with impact
d10
is far better than having a SAW with impact d10 - it is far superior in
potential effect.

This doesn't take away from the fact, however, that a 20mm vulcan cannon
would shred an infantry formation, and the rules don't support this...

Just some food for thought, on this cold, blustery and snowy Sunday
evening.  And curses to all you Ozzies who are sitting around in your
nice
warm summer.  I just scraped 5 or 6 cm of snow off my car... <g>

Adrian