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Need Help With Interaction Time

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Clyax113_S._Xaces

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« on: <01-22-19/2248:15> »
I'm trying to convert the Payday 2 drill system loosely into a Shadowrun campaign about pulling off heists (thus the Payday 2 inspired mechanics), and I'm wondering how to change the amount of time a drill would take to finish so it doesn't take forever, yet it still remains balanced.   For example the most basic drill in Payday takes 3 minutes to drill a standard safe door open.  Let's say the group enters combat and then sets up the drill.  I obviously shouldn't make 60 initiative passes.  Drills in Payday can take 3 minutes for standard safes, 6 minutes for a standard bank vault, 5 for a big bank vault but with a bigger drill, and 7 for the largest vaults and the largest drills. 

Also a vault can be partially open by, say, having the first door to the vault room be opened without the alarm going off while the actual vault is closed.  If the alarm where to go off now the group would be prevented from opening the vault due to the alarm going off and locking the vault down (standard bank security measure), so all normal methods of opening the vault (keys, pass-codes, forensics) are rendered useless. 

Lastly it could be that the group sets up a drill in stealth and the alarm goes off after.  If the drill only took 3 initiative passes, to lower the loud drill time, then the drill would be done in 9 seconds, and the group would want to just rush the safe/vault every mission as opposed to using their resources, and that just doesn't seem rightly fair for a standard safe or above, does it?  I'm ignoring stealth drill times as, unless something happens where the alarm has the potential to go off or the police called, we can just skip that amount of time if the players aren't doing anything.

How long should I let the drill run if the alarm is off and combatants are enroute to keep the game fair (that is if the team decides to use drills and doesn't try to open the safe/vault some other way in either loud or stealth)?  I do believe, as punishment for letting the alarm go off, or for not using their brains and trying to open a safe/vault door by searching for keys, shutting down electronic locks, etc., that trying to brute force your way into a safe should take some long amount of time.  In addition I believe that being forced to take the long way, drilling, should be one of a small number of options if the alarm goes off and the safe/vault isn't open yet as part of that punishment.  What do you say in your experience in Shadowrun?
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Overbyte

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« Reply #1 on: <01-25-19/0155:12> »
This may not be the answer you are looking for but Shadowrun has the same problem as other games (I'm thinking about Champions which I play a lot of) that Combat turns are VERY fast relative to other real world times. The best (IMO) solution to this is to just ignore the fact that combat takes seconds, or in this case drilling takes a short time and just "wing" it. Just merge combat and non-combat actions as you desire to further the plot and keep the action fun.
Nothing is foolproof. Fools are so ingenious.

Clyax113_S._Xaces

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« Reply #2 on: <01-28-19/2023:13> »
I'll try that out and see how that goes.  Thanks.
I demand AT LEAST one explosion a month.