[inca1980]

Right back where we started...*sigh*.  Would  a dev please save us?!!  

Ok, we understand how to do shooting through a barrier.  Now we need to know how to destroy a barrier with a burst.  

So would the DV of a NARROW FULL BURST which the barrier rolls Armor x 2 against be:

1. 2 DV + hits from an Agility + Firearms test?

2. 2 DV + hits + 9 DV damage modifier=11 DV + hits?

3. Or since it says "2 DV per bullet" would it be 10 bullets x 2 DV + hits =20 DV + hits?

I personally think option #1 makes the most sense given how it's done when trying to shoot through a barrier.

[FastJack]

SR4A implies that it is #3. As I stated before though, you'd still have to make the attack test, which can be difficult with the -9 Recoil modifier unless you have ways to compensate for it. Most likely, people will use the Long Burst rule instead, since the -6 Recoil is easier to compensate for. This brings us to 6 bullets => 12 + hits DV.

Granted, that means the barrier would likely last 3 IP/Rounds instead of 2 IP/Rounds, but if you're sitting there blasting through a wall for more than one round, you make a nice target.

[The_Gun_Nut]

And a lot of noise.  The guys on the other side will likely start shooting through the hole you just made, or toss a grenade at you.

Demolitions is much better for this, because the damage occurs in an instant, and you can be through a moment later blasting the surprised targets.

[inca1980]

SR4A implies that it is #3. As I stated before though, you'd still have to make the attack test, which can be difficult with the -9 Recoil modifier unless you have ways to compensate for it. Most likely, people will use the Long Burst rule instead, since the -6 Recoil is easier to compensate for. This brings us to 6 bullets => 12 + hits DV.

Granted, that means the barrier would likely last 3 IP/Rounds instead of 2 IP/Rounds, but if you're sitting there blasting through a wall for more than one round, you make a nice target.

AAHHH!  Wait, but that's how I was doing it to begin with!!!   But then we come back to the same problem.  Say you take a 15 armor 15 structure barrier....let's say it's 2 foot thick plexi-glass so you can see through itl.  Now bullets can't make it through that in real life.....but just for the sake of argument let's see how this would work.  Let's say i'm jumped into my lynx drone and am shooting a mounted white knight at someone behind the wall.  I open fire with a full burst with no recoil and i'm using Sensor 6 + Gunnery 5 + Hotsim 2 =13 and I score 4 hits, the guy behind the wall rolls Reaction 4 + Good Cover 4=8 and scores 2 hits.  White Knight has AP -1 so i'm comparing base damage 6 DV + 2 net hits = 8DV against 15 armor and this means the shot doesn't even penetrate the wall. 

Ok so now I decide i'm going to fire a full burst to blow a hole in the 15 armor 15 structure clear barricade.  I roll 13 dice and scores 6 hits let's say.  If we do it where each bullet does 2 DV, then i'm shooting with 20 DV + 6 hits= 26 DV.  The barrier resists with armor x 2 = 30 + AP-1= 29.  let's say it scores 8 hits.  This would blow a 1m x 1m hole in the 2 foot thick plexi-glass.  That's just completely insane! 

When trying to shoot through the barrier there is virtually no chance that I will penetrate the barrier, and when I shoot to destroy it's almost a guaranteed 1m x 1m hole in the wall. 

It seems like it should be even harder to make a 1mx1m hole in a while than just a tiny one to let some bullets through....and this would be reflected if we the rule where the DV to shoot through a barrier is 2DV + hits only.   So which one is RAW!!!?

[voydangel]

I stand by my original interpretation.

When firing a burst you get a (# of bullets in burst - 1) bonus to your DV. So its Base DV 2 when shooting the barrier, then add +2 or +5 or +9 for the burst to that base. So, in your example of the long full auto burst, you would be doing 2DV + 9DV + [net hits]DV vs the armor x2. The end. You don't need to compare the DV of the attack to the armor in this case as it's a barrier, not an armored person and therefore can't take "stun" damage.

[FastJack]

Minigun vs. Tree

Now, taking that Shadowrun is going for a CINEMATIC set of combat rules, then we can say that maybe, just maybe, we can cut some slack and say that the game would let us blow the hole in the barrier.

I'm appreciating the debate here because it's making it easier to understand the rules, but at some point we have to handwave the difference between real-life and the game world.

[Chaemera]

Perhaps we're looking at this wrong. You still need to make the attack test. So, a Sammy takes out his Ares MP-LMG and lays into the door with a full-auto/full burst. That means his Dice pool is Agility 4 + Automatics 4 - Recoil 12 (9-3=6x2=12), which means the test can only succeed with Edge dice.

In the spirit of continuing the "interesting way to get a good look at the rules" perspective, since I agree with FastJack that it's handwave & accept the cinema, I present the following:

If a character got no hits, then only apply the base Damage Value.

That's from the section titled Destroying Barriers. So, even with zero hits, Sammy still gets his "DV of 2 per bullet", or 20 DV if you want to treat it as a single hit. The RAW, frankly, seem to leave it open to GM interpretation as to whether this should be treated as 10 DV 2 plinks against a wall (for those of you who want more realism) or a single DV 20 (for those of you who want cinema).

Frankly, being an engineer, I'd lean towards the 10 DV 2 interpretation, after all, with net hits (sure, I'll give them to every bullet) that will still produce the infamous "Mini-gun vs Tree" while retaining the realism that you won't seriously hurt a metal beam or reinforced concrete with a rain of bullets. But, that's just me, you wanna murder walls with machine guns, the RAW supports that interpretation, too, as far as I can tell.

[The_Gun_Nut]

Real life supports it, but it takes FOREVER.  And lots of bullets.

[inca1980]

I'm not arguing based on realism, i'm arguing based on the self consitency of the rules with themselves.  It's the inconsistency between shooting at a target behind a barrier and shooting to destroy a barrier.  

With the current RAW, it's very "un-cinematic" that it's virtually impossible to shoot a target behind a concrete wall and RAW is quite clear on this.  It only becomes "cinematic" when you're trying to blow a 1mx1m hole in said concrete wall in which case it's really easy when you use the 20DV interpretation.....it only becomes more consistent when you take the 2DV+hits or even 2DV+9DV+hits interpretation.......

This discrepancy makes me feel that destroying a barrier follows more along the lines of shooting through a barrier because I doubt the authors would want there to be such a huge discrepancy.

Who here feels it should be harder to shoot a 1mx1m hole through a wall than to just get a bullet through the wall to hit something on the other side?  

[FastJack]

The difficulty when shooting through to a target is the fact that you're aiming at something you can't see. The barrier then becomes an armor bonus to hit the target (that is, for all intents and purposes, invisible to you). You're spending you action trying to hit an invisible foe with incredibly good armor, which is lots more difficult than trying to concentrate your fire on a wall to blow a hole through it.

When you're simply trying to destroy a barrier, you don't care what's behind it. And anything that is behind it will quickly move out of the way.

[Chaemera]

With the current RAW, it's very "un-cinematic" that it's virtually impossible to shoot a target behind a concrete wall and RAW is quite clear on this.  It only becomes "cinematic" when you're trying to blow a 1mx1m hole in said concrete wall in which case it's really easy when you use the 20DV interpretation.....it only becomes more consistent when you take the 2DV+hits or even 2DV+9DV+hits interpretation.......

Well, it makes sense and it is cinematic not to be able to shoot a pistol (or other firearm) through a concrete wall, after all, you'd never have chase scenes or enemies making their escape if it were at all easy to shoot through reinforced concrete with small-arms fire.

I tend to agree with FastJack on why it's difficult to shoot through 10cm or more of solid concrete; however, his explanation for why the barrier goes down in two IP leaves something to be desired. A lot of shooting ranges out there shouldn't be around if all it takes to knock out a wall with small-arms is not caring about the far side. To be fair, I'm well aware of the massive amount of technology that really goes into shooting ranges, my point stands that it's NEVER easy to meaningfully put a bullet through a concrete wall, to destroy the wall or to take out the man on the other side.

Which is the point behind my original answer, the RAW is vague on how to handle going all-out with full-auto against a barrier (DV of 2 per bullet can mean that with ten bullets you either have DV 20 or 10 DV 2). I think it's intentionally vague, the book is full of hand-waving and GM-fiat. This isn't an intrinsically bad thing, you get to decide, as a gaming group whether you want a 2 IP hole-in-the-wall from an SMG or to leave demolitions in the realm of demolitions and the group rule's lawyer pretty much has to accept it.

[inca1980]

The difficulty when shooting through to a target is the fact that you're aiming at something you can't see. The barrier then becomes an armor bonus to hit the target (that is, for all intents and purposes, invisible to you). You're spending you action trying to hit an invisible foe with incredibly good armor, which is lots more difficult than trying to concentrate your fire on a wall to blow a hole through it.

When you're simply trying to destroy a barrier, you don't care what's behind it. And anything that is behind it will quickly move out of the way.

Which is why I used the example of a clear plexiglass wall which is 2 feet thick or thicker to have a 15 armor 15 structure.  Use this case, not the blind fire case.