DC3 - Combat. Comments and doubts

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Oddball
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DC3 - Combat. Comments and doubts

Post by Oddball »

Bona dia!

Following my pleasant reading of the new Conspiracy Rules, I’ve finally arrived to the Combat chapter. For me, it’s always the most expected. I know, I know… the last resource; roleplaying is not only about combat, etc, etc. But it’s Dark Conspiracy, not The Call of Cthulhu. They bleed…well, most of them…

The overall impression is quite good. So, my congratulations to the developers. As usual, it’s the densest part of the game. So, I open this thread to try to solve my doubts and say what I like in this chapter and what I don’t like. Probably, I will go by parts, while reading another time the chapter to make sure I don’t miss anything. Understand that any comment to any rule is a personal opinion born in the deep interest that Conspiracy Rules have aroused in me. As DC fan, I would like to see this new initiative with good health and enjoy it with my playing groups. It’s the first opportunity to speak with the developers of a game I love! I can’t miss it!

1. It’s a suggestion. But I think it’s an important one. I’ve found the structure of the chapter somewhat confusing, especially with compared with the previous chapters. I think that the chapter organization can discourage some future players or referees (especially the new ones), making the rules harder to be understood. Let me explain this. Everything it’s ok until the Fire Combat part. Then, basically, some concepts are introduced before needed while others, more important or more used in a normal DC game, are introduced latter. For example the reader will found an explanation about the penetration of APFSDS before the explanation about the concept of penetration, or he/she will read about a targeted shot before knowing about impact locations or acout that a location roll is needed after an impact. I must read the page 117 about the effects about recoil after have read about rifle scopes, expertise or shotguns. Without reading the recoil paragraph, I cannot have a clear idea about how to solve a simple SA fire action. But before that, all the rules about automatic fire (including those regarding automatics shotguns) have already been introduced. Things like laser pointers or reflex sights could be explained latter. Once all the explanations about the procedures are finished, the reader will understand clearly the consequences of the special equipment.

2. Burst and SA Fire. I like the rules about bursts. A great improvement, from my point of view. In my case, coming from Twilight:2000 v2.2, this will help to give some sense to the automatic fire. Hmmmm… I must be careful in my next gaming session. There will be much more lead flying around! You will see I have some questions and doubts. I think that most of them are due to the organization of the chapter and the way it is written and not due to what the developers had in mind.

2.1 In page 111: “The Aimed Shot allows only one shot in the active phase, but does negate the effects of the Quick-Shot difficulty modifier.” This is somewhat confusing. As per v2.2 T2K rules, I can translate the previous sentence as: “The Aimed Shot allows only the first shot count as aimed in the next active phase following the aiming action, but does negate the effects of the Quick-Shot difficulty modifier in any subsequent shots after the first.” Ok, this is my interpretation. Am I right?

2.2 Following with the aiming action. As written in page 114: “Aiming and called shots are not possible with spray fire.” Taking this, I’ve deduced that aiming is allowed in burst fire. Am I right? This is ok for me. Essentially, there’s not difference between the first shot of a burst or the first shoot in a rapid SA fire sequence. In that case, the advantage of a burst over SA fire in terms of precision would be only in short range, because hit factors of the burst would be reduced beyond that distance.


2.3 The recoil. I like the rule and the effects. One doubt. In SA fire and in burst fire I understand that the increase in the difficulty level are only applied in the shots or burst fired after the recoil exceeds Strenght, not to all the shot or bursts in the combat phase (as in v2.2), I am right? Example: Strenght 4, SS Recoil 3 and the character fires three quick shots in the same combat phase at short range. The first two shots will be Difficult while the third will be Formidable. I like to keep the Recoil Burst of Spray Fire limited to the recoil produced by one single burst. The reduction of hit factors, both for recoil and

2.4 Damage reduced by recoil. This is not necessary. I can’t see any logical reason to do this. If you’ve modified the chances to impact and you have reduced the hit factors (both for recoil and for distance), there’s not any need to reduce the damage due to recoil. I mean, if, as stated in the rules, consider that the damage of a bullet is the same for all the ranges, introducing a rule that reduces the damage in automatic fire due to recoil seems to add an unnecessary exception.

3. Expertise. Great! A little modification with the important result to give a distinctive touch to your character. This is always welcome and woks good with the Fire Combat Rules.

4. Penalty for unskilled characters in Marksmanship. As in the case of damage reduced by recoil, I see it like an unnecessary exception. If you’ve stated that unskilled difficulty shift is -1 level (harder) and using the controller attribute, there’s no point into create an exception in the Fire Combat Rules (-2 difficulty shift). Small arms weapons, like the crossbow before, are the great equalizer. Anybody can, nearly instinctively, aim the end of a stick-shaped weapon, press a trigger and to try to obtain an impact. Sad, I know. But I think that if characters can try other more difficult skills (being unskilled in them) with the -1 shift, it’s unfair and unnecessary to make an exception with any marksmanship skill.


Ok! It’s enough for a post. Have a nice day. My next gaming session will be with the new Conspiracy Rules on January 12!!!
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Zvezda
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Re: DC3 - Combat. Comments and doubts

Post by Zvezda »

Not in the slightest way involved in the development in DC3 but a proud owner of "Conspiracy Rules" I take the liberty to answer some of the questions, write my opinion to others and also add additional confusion to some questions.

2.1 Yep, I agree. It would not make sense if you could fire only one shot in the phase. The first is aimed the others are quick.

2.2 I also agree here. The rules say "For each burst fired, roll a to-hit task using the normal Direct Fire Hit Procedure for a single semi-automatic shot." So, yes. You can aim a controlled burst.

2.3 3+3=6; 6>4; So I would think the second shot will exceed the STR. Therefor the second shot would be more difficult than the first one. I like the old rules better were the exceeding recoil reduces the STR attribute.

2.3 I totally agree on that. I can see the idea behind it, a well aimed shot is likely to inflict more damage than a wild shot which almost accidentally hits the target. I don't see this rule as necessary. Aimed shots don't give you extra damage, and halving the damage of a .45 while not doing anything to a 9mm is strange. I agree with Odball here. The rule is unbalanced and unnecessary, I see however the realism behind it. It might be better as an optional rule like Kevin's Optimum Range rules.

4 Again I agree. I think applying two more difficulty levels to Combat Tasks would be okay. In my opinion, having a high Small Arms skill does not only mean you are good at hitting a paper target but it means you are actually good in gun fighting, field stripping and repairing your weapon, you know the technical details of those weapons and so on. However, the game mechanics simply don't leave enough room for that. Going up two difficulty levels actually means halving the Character's STR for close range shots and therefor making it almost impossible to hit a large, stationary target after taking an aiming action. Let's take a look at the rules in play. The young John Rambo (STR 10 Small Amrs Rifle -) receives his basic training. He is supposed to hit a man sized paper target with a rifle at 10 meters range. The rifle has a Rng of 50 so his roll would be Formidable (Avg -2) he needs to roll a 5 or lower. He is not very likely to hit anything. If he would have the average STR of 5 it would be even more dramatic. His chance would be reduced to 2. Regardless of your STR attribute you only have two skill levels for unskilled shooters the first is for shooting a stationary target at close range there the roll is between 1 - 5, all other tasks are successful on a roll of 1 only (2 for STR 8 -10 for some tasks).

I personally don't use the Unskilled rule at all. If you don't have the skill you have to roleplay your way around the task. If a roll makes sense in some situation than the player might be allowed one. But they don't have a general right to try and program a drone steering software without the computer skill. That is my opinion but I think most people like the Unskilled rule because combined with Luck it can safe many a campaign.
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Oddball
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Re: DC3 - Combat. Comments and doubts

Post by Oddball »

Thanks Zvezda! High and clear.

Hmmmm… It seems I got a Catastrophic Failure in my Mathematics check, too. :oops:

About the unskilled tasks, I believe that, like many other things in any other game, is a matter of common sense. I have no problem in let the player make an unskilled check to use skills like Stealth, Observation, Climbing or Persuasion, providing that my view of the tasks as referee, does not need an specific instruction. So, I can allow the player an unskilled climbing check to access a high window, while he/she will not have any idea of how to perform a rappel if nobody has prepared the cord and the harness. In this way I agree with your example about Computer skill. I will not allow the character to try the task. About the use of Luck, I’ve never used it. Telling the true, I didn’t remember its existence in the old DC rules until I read it in the new ones, though I understand many referees can find it useful.

BTW, talking about aimed automatic fire, there’s another part of the rules with a little information: page 123, under quick kill rule in fire combat: “For automatic fire, aimed shots are only possible with laser or other sights.” This is what I was talking about when I find this chapter somewhat disorganized. In some cases, different clues are given in different paragraphs and it is harder to view the completion of a single procedure.
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Zvezda
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Re: DC3 - Combat. Comments and doubts

Post by Zvezda »

Must have been a natural 20 because the task was at Easy I am affraid.

Yeah you are right again. It is very likely that I would allow some rolls in the same situations too. But that is one of the big strong points of DC, common sense is more important than the rules and you can add or drop rules as you see fit.

Heck, in that case the information on page 123 is in contradiction to the automatic fire rules which explicitly state that the standard direct fire ruless are used. Personally I thought aimed shots always require sights, so that does not make much of a difference though I am not sure what this means. Are non adjustable iron sights sufficient? In that case I have no objection.

The Luck rule is very PC friendly and has often helped to promote the story.
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Re: DC3 - Combat. Comments and doubts

Post by Oddball »

Bona nit!

I'm returning with my doubts, this time about the Wild Fire Procedure.So, I'm talking about the first paragraph of Conspiracy Rules v2 in the page number 117.

1. "All targets in a spray fire Danger Zone are attacked using the shooter’s normal marksmanship asset using the normal difficulty for Spray fire (for example, Difficult at Close range)."

Ok. If the character is using spray fire againt two targets at short range, he will be rolling against a his/her Slug Weapon Asset at Formidable level (two targets). But according to the text above, any unintended target near the designated targets and in the same range band seems to have more probabilities to be hit. Is this a mistake or am I misunderstanding something?

2. "Wild shots are always rolled as an Impossible [Slug Weapons] task at short range, and can be increased in difficulty beyond that by range. Remember that no matter how difficult the task gets, a roll of a 1 on 1D20 will always be a successful hit. When a hit is obtained, roll a die with a number of sides equal to the weapons ROF rating x 2.Divide the result of that roll by 4 to obtain number of bullets hitting the target.

As I understand, the text above makes reference to supressive fire only, as for any missed shot in the normal direct fire procedures we "use the next ROF level less than or equal to half the number of stray bullets". Am I right? I think there's not any other clue in the rules about how to solve suppressive fire.

Thanks in advance!
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