The Duke

Let's face it lots of people enjoy the fighting part of CP2020 so it's no surprise the guns get talked about so much!

The character part is important - I try to ensure that a killing is not paid-back by revenge but by bad dreams and P.T.S. Disorder, making the player work harder.

With regard to API the I part is carried in an AP bullet that 'injects' the super hot (depleted uranium anyone?) core. Usually requires a large calibre.

Rantmode:off.exe

With brawling I let players create their own bonuses by adding IPs to punch grapple, headbutt etc instead of the core skill. An example of how this works is Brad Pitt's character in 'Snatch'. He has a side-step/dodge and punch routine that sees him through every fight in the film.

I've known a few people who practised a couple of boxing moves which they always found to be effective. The practise, combined with having picked the moves 'cause they suited them made for a lethal combination. I've learnt loads of kicking in Martial Arts but I wouldn't deserve a good 'rating' at it as I've never used it.

I sold all my sourcebooks years ago but I think you'll find the T-14 in the Militech Corpbook

Just to chuck in my tuppence, it's amazing what you can learn by accident and what can happen in a fight.

I have decked a guy with a single smack in the nose. I've seen a guy take a complete kicking from a bloke who really knew what he was doing and get up and fight back, dragging the bloke to the ground and throttling him. People's resilience is incredibly variable and fights are really random.

Talking of Tyson, he really knows how to bust someone up. He mashed up some geezer while he was inside with one punch to the guts - nothing fancy just a REALLY hard slug.

Of course if you know where to hit and how to do it you have a great advantage but I firmly believe that your mental attitude and resilience to pain can win a fight. If you've got both you're on a winner. Oh and practice makes permanent.

Deffo. on the western AK variants - when Fin, SA and Isr all use weapons based on AK's, you know that's reliable - just about the broadest range of climates you can see!

As I understand it the AK in 7.62 suffers from a looping trajectory - something that I had but down to the cartridge being too short hence the longer cartridge for the dragunov - which means accuracy suffers a little. Reliability-wise they are lauded by all and sundry.

Out of interest a couple of sources have indicated that the 9mm Makarov is a fairly high energy round (and generates a lot of heat!) is this untrue in any 1st hand experiences?

BTW if anyone would like to see a good example of excessive violence/ brawling and the sort of consequences it can have I must recommend 'Once Were Warriors', a great and terrible film.

LOL@Wilphe!!

Non-lethal's are great - I recommend the web gun in the chrome series. Did a great ambush/kidnap on a corp with a 'borg bodyguard, one web was the shaped explosive (for the borg) the other was a stun web (for the corp.) Knackered the 'borg, captured the corp, cleanest extract I ever did.

LOL Chrysalis! Ah, here's where having an old rule book comes in to play - I never had the 8pts to the head is a kill, so I had to come up with brain damage rules - A good rule I think Levi, I shall use it in future (although the brain damage was a fairly persuasive way of stopping people running bare-headed into gunfights

Do remember that the full-auto was taken off for a reason BookWyrm. In Vietnam there was a huge wastage of ammunition through the use of fully automatic weapons - 50,000 rounds for each enemy casualty. Accurate fire has a lot more going for it than heavy fire, particularly when you're using a round that can be deflected by light cover.

Not being US I have no experience with firearms on a practical level but I do know it is rare for criminals to use a very traceable, obvious weapon. regarding the power, 4D6 seems a little on the low side. There have been uncommon large caliber revolvers about for years and in every article I've read the damage was compared very favourably to a .44 Magnum.

Personally I'd use a heavy, medium to large caliber bullet that is subsonic as a dum dum - the size but lack of velocity don't make for great penetration but it'll put you're average GI Joe out of action with a good hit. FBI believe a '9mm will only drop a target with a hit to the spine or tibia(sic)' where the 9mm heavy should have a bit more impact. Remember that you're average hit with a 9mm only does 7pts (3+3+1) of damage - a light wound to any strong or very strong body types. Even with an average head shot (14 pts - 3 for BTM) you wouldn't kill them. That wouldn't be much use with the 'one shot, one kill' motto expounded by most sniper schools.

Like it dude! Do I fill in an online character sheet and mail it to you? If you don't mind I'd like to use an old PC of mine 'Jump', basically a drinker and a brawler, who's worked as a bodyguard to a number of Fixers in NC before working as undercover security for a Corp-aligned fixer in Europe.

He's an Irish immigrant who used to pit fight for money. Dead handy in a fist fight, not too keen on guns, doesn't carry any weapons but has a fair amount of biotech (inc. level one bone augmentation, big knucks, light skinweave, muscle & bone lace, ref inc. and body inc.) and the hydraulic endoframe giving him the appearance of a slightly heavy boned thug (high-level cyber/bioware was corp. sponsored whilst in Europe). Known for being a little unpredictable but very loyal.

Yeah it's a real double-edged sword. A guy I worked doors with was punch-drunk, he used to be a boxer. He was a really nice guy and his usual expression was confusion/worry and wouldn't scare anyone. But he was dead handy in a fight. I've seen him be stared out, shouted at etc and it never made any difference - he still battered the other guy. And never looked aggro.

If you've had a few scraps, and you're not looking at anything unusual e.g. surrounded by armed ninja, then you're probably not going to be too worried. There is an ancient chinese saying 'The empty vessel makes the most noise' and there's a slightly more modern saying in South London 'Deck the gobby one and his mates will sod off'. I personally believe in both of them.

Besides in the game people have very fixed purposes and tend to fight/intimidate then fight where it's a lot more complex in real life e.g. a car drives past and the troublemaker gets scared by witnesses, starts to rain, all sorts of stuff disrupt fights. Pick your nose and flick it at a guy who's having a go. See what he does. Repeat "See ya. See ya. See ya. See ya. See ya. See ya. See ya. See ya. See ya. See ya. See ya" until they go away. Mess with their heads. That's brawlers and drunks. And hit men don't tend to get too interested in scaring people they just want to shoot someone and get away quick, then deal with the guilt and paranoia by drinking away their PTSD.

The game is a game, keep it fun whilst keeping it real.

I did go with the 'one appropriate weapon per location' when a guy tried to get weapons on inside and outside ankle, so I said that the character had Int: 8 and wouldn't be stupid enough to walk around like John Wayne with the clap in the combat zone, thinking his weapons were concealed. One weapon per limb, two 'J' or one 'N' per torso. More than one torso being rare.

Sounds like a plan Stan!

To clarify - The original combat experience was a modifier as opposed to a skill, registering as a negative modifier on abilities due to fear which lessened as PCs became more experienced.

So you could shoot down the range like a marksman but if you'd never been in a fight the shakes kicked in during combat - 'The more you do it the more natural it becomes, and the better that you'll perform despite stress and adrenaline' - does exactly what it says on the tin!

At ranges where spread is taken into consideration I roll to hit hit the 1m/1.5m/2m squared area that they are aiming for which is pretty easy being a large target, then roll for 1D6 hits. At closer ranges the target takes hits to two locations (can roll the same area twice to reflect heavy impact of buckshot)

OK, so do you think a variation or resurgence in the original Cyberpunk 'combat experience' is called for?

Regarding semi-auto, I allowed a player to fire ref 1/2 # of shots with the same modifiers for automatic weapons applying to every one shot rather than ten. That way you can blast away with a 9mm (as you can do in real life) but hit less unless you are up close.

I eventually began to favour the Bruce Lee Film style martial arts in games ie. Flashy and fun, as they added quite a bit to the game. In real life as a Jujitsu student I favour short simple stuff that really hurts, or groundwork one-on-one, but this doesn't lead to such an enjoyable game.

The damage dealt by punches etc is negligible for brawling and I've always insisted on players having brawling unless they have a career/ life experience that introduces martial arts.

I couldn't agree more. I've restricted the SP to 8, as an armour vest should shurely provide more SP than a skin-thin implant (even with the EV and -ATT figures noted in the Chromebooks)

I think that sounds wise. A similar problem (going off topic a bit) was the amount people can carry. My characters would stick to the weight limits like glue, but they could end up carrying 6 longarms, four pistols, a knife and a katana with assorted armours - on paper anyway.

In real life this would provide more than a little encumberment (one personal favourite of this instance was a guy with high athletics and REF back-flipping off a building equipped as above. I made a basic tech roll to see how well he was strapped up and he landed on his feet with several thousand euros of equipment strewn across the surrounding area).

We have a phrase 'going Manga' from the propensity in Manga films for demons/machines to burst out of people - started it with a solo who appeared meat but concealed more pop-ups than the Partridge family toaster. He 'went Manga' and scared the sh*t out of the PC's who figured him for a Eurosolo.