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Bow+Melee Hardening

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Mirikon

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« Reply #15 on: <08-27-17/1709:57> »
There are options to do many, many things in Shadowrun. When you deliberately go outside the realms of the established options for 'this shit would be cool', or whatever, then yes, you pay more for that, and you aren't going to be on the same level as someone paying less for a more basic option. When you take things that are distinctly not designed to be weapons and use them as such, you suffer from lower accuracy. Of course, for most people when you're in the situation where you're using improvised weapons you're so far in the shit that anything is a step up. So no, no sympathy for people who deliberately dive into the shit because they think shit is cool.
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Shinobi Killfist

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« Reply #16 on: <08-28-17/1139:50> »
There is a middle ground between as good as a weapon designed for it and the absolutely useless range that is improvised weapons.

Officerzan

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« Reply #17 on: <08-28-17/1228:21> »
There is a middle ground between as good as a weapon designed for it and the absolutely useless range that is improvised weapons.
Yeah, it's called not using a bow as a primary melee weapon. ;D

Mirikon

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« Reply #18 on: <08-28-17/1255:41> »
There is a middle ground between as good as a weapon designed for it and the absolutely useless range that is improvised weapons.
Yeah, it's called not using a bow as a primary melee weapon. ;D
#TRUTH

Seriously, Shinobi, Improvised weapons are like that because they are NOT actual weapons, and they are really only good in a bar brawl or similar, where the most armor someone might have is an armor jacket or similar. And even then, you can do called shots to hit unarmored areas (i.e. clocking someone over the head with a pool cue or stabbing them in the throat with a broken bottle). Called shots reduce the dice pool directly, so even if you reduced a 15 dice pool to 7 for a called shot to the neck, you're not losing much with an accuracy of 3. Remember, Improvised Weapons are supposed to be desperation weapons.

There are ranged weapons that are also designed to be used in melee. They have these things called bayonets, or other features specifically designed for melee. Now, if you want a bow that is functional as a bow, but also is designed and balanced to be used in melee effectively, that is certainly a worthwhile endeavor, but it would have to be a special design, just like trying to make a sword that can be used to attack at range would be a special design.

Yes, scenes like you see in Arrow are cool, and no one who grew up in the 90s can deny that Gambit's card tricks are badass. But in Arrow, attacks with the bow are almost always as a 'get out of my face' thing, or to set up attacks with actual weapons (like fists and feet). And Gambit's power is controlling kinetic energy, which is why his cards fly like they do, and why they go boom. Neither of which remotely suggest that a Shadowrun character should be as effective using a bow in melee as someone using an actual melee weapon.
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Shinobi Killfist

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« Reply #19 on: <08-28-17/1257:28> »
There is a middle ground between as good as a weapon designed for it and the absolutely useless range that is improvised weapons.
Yeah, it's called not using a bow as a primary melee weapon. ;D

Lol. Then melee hardening just shouldn't be in the game. But, they did put it in it should actually be somewhat useful. Not amazing, or as good as a full weapon but not useless either.

Mirikon

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« Reply #20 on: <08-28-17/1423:18> »
There is a middle ground between as good as a weapon designed for it and the absolutely useless range that is improvised weapons.
Yeah, it's called not using a bow as a primary melee weapon. ;D

Lol. Then melee hardening just shouldn't be in the game. But, they did put it in it should actually be somewhat useful. Not amazing, or as good as a full weapon but not useless either.
It is somewhat useful, Shinobi. It allows you to go 'oh shit, not the face' with your ranged weapon and still have a working ranged weapon afterwards. That is exactly what improvised weapons are for. Melee Hardening simply turns it from an improvised weapon to an improvised weapon that won't break when you hit a troll upside the head with it.

Now, as we've said, you want a bow that is actually designed to be used in melee, good on you. there are a couple ways you can do something like that (I'm partial to adding blades onto the bow and making it some kind of sick bat'leth bow thing, myself). But that would NOT be a standard weapon with a piddly 500 nuyen. Hell, even the description of the melee hardening says "such as when the firearm is used as an improvised melee weapon".

Quit whining about how something that would look cool isn't practical, and either invest in a custom weapon, or suck up the accuracy penalty and focus on called shots.
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Marcus

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« Reply #21 on: <08-28-17/1443:29> »
Accuracy 4 paired with staff damage is hardly a strong weapon. It's just not useless and I'm happy with that.
That character will be much better off shoot someone, and the penalty for shooting someone at point blank really isn't a big deal,
so in the long run more this is more of an asethic choice then an optimal one. Thus making it not useless is good in that sense.
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Mirikon

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« Reply #22 on: <08-28-17/1515:35> »
You start letting people whine their way into perks, and that's a slippery slope to go down. There's clear rules on the issue, and overturning them because someone wants to reenact a TV show is a bad idea. There are other, better ways to improve the accuracy, and they are actually legal under the rules, they just cost more than 500 nuyen. Giving in to whining is a bad move as a parent, it is a bad move as a teacher, and it is a bad move as a GM.
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Spooky

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« Reply #23 on: <08-28-17/1528:01> »
While the discussion has valid points, I think most of you are missing mine: melee hardening + skill training gives better accuracy. Note: must include training to get better accuracy. Heck, just make it an Exotic Melee Skill: Melee Bow, with, oh, every 3 ranks of skill giving +1 accuracy. That means a character not only spends money, but also invests karma in doing the cool stuff with the trick bow.
Spooky, what do you do this pass? Shoot him with my thunderstruck gauss rifle. (Rolls)  8 hits. Does that blow his head off?

Mirikon

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« Reply #24 on: <08-28-17/1625:19> »
And when everyone else with a weapons skill whines about wanting more accuracy because of their skills? Gotta keep your rulings consistent, or you're playing favorites and things get nasty.
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Marcus

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« Reply #25 on: <08-28-17/1658:09> »
You start letting people whine their way into perks, and that's a slippery slope to go down. There's clear rules on the issue, and overturning them because someone wants to reenact a TV show is a bad idea. There are other, better ways to improve the accuracy, and they are actually legal under the rules, they just cost more than 500 nuyen. Giving in to whining is a bad move as a parent, it is a bad move as a teacher, and it is a bad move as a GM.

I don't accept your premise, we aren't talking about a "perk" here. A question was asked and an answer was needed.  What we are talking about is something that is undefined in the rules, from a straight effectiveness perspective the character would be much better off putting xp into other things, but if a player wants some breadth of over depth I'm not one to argue with them, melee hardening is in the rules, and I don't see a reason it couldn't be used on a bow. What that does is not defined in RAW, one of the jobs of a GM is answer those questions. I have my answer, if the Devs want to make an official choices that's fine with me, and I'll revisit the topic then. 
« Last Edit: <08-28-17/1711:10> by Marcus »
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Spooky

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« Reply #26 on: <08-28-17/1716:15> »
And when everyone else with a weapons skill whines about wanting more accuracy because of their skills? Gotta keep your rulings consistent, or you're playing favorites and things get nasty.

Sure, they can have an accuracy bonus, as long as it is an Exotic Weapon skill. Would it be more palatable at 6 ranks = +1 accuracy? I can work with that as well.
Spooky, what do you do this pass? Shoot him with my thunderstruck gauss rifle. (Rolls)  8 hits. Does that blow his head off?

Shinobi Killfist

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« Reply #27 on: <08-28-17/1818:14> »
You start letting people whine their way into perks, and that's a slippery slope to go down. There's clear rules on the issue, and overturning them because someone wants to reenact a TV show is a bad idea. There are other, better ways to improve the accuracy, and they are actually legal under the rules, they just cost more than 500 nuyen. Giving in to whining is a bad move as a parent, it is a bad move as a teacher, and it is a bad move as a GM.

Who the bleep said anyone was whining?  No one said there player was whining for more. It was a question on what people thought it should be ruled as. People answered, some people disagree with you.

The Wyrm Ouroboros

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« Reply #28 on: <08-29-17/0230:28> »
Mirikon is arguing for a) system consistency (i.e. you remain consistent with the standard rules) and b) game consistency (i.e. you remain consistent with your long-term rulings as applied to your game).  He argues that giving a specific Improvised Melee Weapon (because it's designed as a ranged weapon, and is not from the beginning designed as a melee weapon) a higher Accuracy specifically because the Player wants to do Bow-Fu is an error in judgement -- that giving a bonus or perk (1 Accuracy above the original thought) only because of that is a bad decision.  I agree with this point of view - listen to the arguments one way or the other, make an informed decision based upon the rules and how your item would best fit in.  IMO, the best way to do this is to decide how you would rule it if it were in the hands of an NPC.

That said, I disagree with 3 being the appropriate Accuracy for a bow used as an improvised melee weapon; it should be a 4.
Quote from: Shadowrun 5th Edition, p.168, Melee Combat, 'Accuracy'
Melee weapons, those that were made for combat, have an average Accuracy of 5. Improvised weapons — items that can be used, however awkwardly, to inflict damage but are not designed for combat, such as a golf club or frying pan—usually have an accuracy of 4. Random objects used as weapons that are very unwieldy or heavy (like a chair, barstool, or refrigerator) generally have an Accuracy of 3.
IMO, a bow fits into the second category - an item that is awkward, but can be used to inflict damage, therefore ACC 4.  This should be able to be improved by standard in-game methods, or an outright one-shot expensive bow that in this case is designed from the get-go for melee combat.

Shinobi has been arguing that 'Melee Hardening' means that the bow is designed from the get-go to be a melee weapon.  In this, by RAW as well as RAI (as by very strict RAW you can't apply Melee Hardening to anything but a firearm) he is wrong; melee hardening does not mean that it was designed as a melee weapon, only that it can be used in melee combat without doing damage to the weapon's standard functionality - because being used as a melee weapon when it isn't designed for it can damage or break your gun (which will consequently lower your Accuracy by 1.)

Quote from: Hard Targets, pp. 181-182, The Wetwork Toolkit
Melee Hardening
Strongly favored by practitioners of the Gun Kata martial art and helpful for anyone who is rough on their firearms, melee hardening reinforces the firearm’s mechanical and electrical components to protect them from damage from hard impacts, such as when the firearm is used as an improvised melee weapon.

'... such as when the firearm is used as an improvised melee weapon.'  This is simple reinforcement, not redesign; you're still using the weapon as an IMW.

Finally, Spooky and Marcus are arguing that a skill-rank-based bonus to the accuracy of a weapon (or the improvised melee weapon, in this case) is entirely reasonable; IMO, it is not. This is because of the simple fact that there is so much effort that is put into increasing Limits (adept enhancements, spells, item add-ons), that unless this is applied to all skills (which is a particularly bad idea), this simply becomes a favoritism issue - not to mention makes those above-mentioned enhancements, spells, add-ons, etc. functionally useless.

Limits are part of the system's balance sculpting -- you may be great, but if you have crap tools, or your body isn't up to it, or whatever, you can only go so far unless you get really lucky, i.e. use Edge.  This makes things thematically interesting - how does the gun-bunny act when they have to leave their favorite toys at home and use 'sub-standard' items, that sort of thing.  Making it so that the gun-bunny makes their weapon more accurate simply because of their skill (which is what Accuracy is, after all, limiting) is self-defeating, no matter what the point is at which the skill gains the bonus.

The solution to most of these is, simply, to have the player search for a person with an Armorer skill of 9+ who is willing to design and build for them a bow that is not only made to shoot arrows into people, but also balanced to whack trolls over the head.  Done right, this becomes an interesting personal downtime project / pseudo-adventure.  If you want to make it more interesting, involve the other players, you make it so that the character's Hattori Hanzo is somewhere that will require the entire team to enable the player to get face time with the fellow - in prison, in a remote location, deep in a corporation, in another country, in a wasteland, or whatever.  One of my GMs had my Hattori Hanzo recently shipped off to Yomi Island, because he pissed off the wrong people by refusing to make a weapon for them, and boy wasn't that an interesting series of adventures.

TL;DR: 4, or talk to the guys at Victorinox into making a staff-bow out of memory materials.
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Shinobi Killfist

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« Reply #29 on: <08-29-17/1538:18> »
That really wasn't my argument so I guess I should have bee clearer. I think I expressly stated it shouldnt be as good as a weapon designed for melee. My point is the intent is that it could be used in melee and people who buy this see it as option they want to use. So choosing a accuracy that is too low goes against that entire intent. There is some discretion in what a GM assigns for a improvised weapon. Melee hardening if a miracle happens and you hit it won't be damaged isn't a big selling point Imo.(honestly the entire idea that your pistol gets jacked up on someone's skull seems off to me in the first place). So you should pick a accuracy that while not as good as the melee weapon it closest emulates but not as bad as accuracy 3 seems appropriate. I'd go with 4 as suggested in your post. Heck I think hardliner glove are in 5e those are still a better option for most characters designed around this at accuracy 4 so I don't think you are breaking things.