BAZOOKAS

[Axelmania]

Bazookas are cool. RMB p 38 had a scenario where 2 men using a "heavy duty bazooka" attack a tank. It is under the heading "Mega-Damage, S.D.C. and M.D.C. Interestingly...

The player of the tank pilot rolls a twenty-sided die (1D20),
the player of the bazooka team does likewise, to determine initiative.
The high roll goes to the bazooka team; they have initiative, which means they strike first.

I didn't notice the oddity till now, but it sounds like 2 characters are sharing 1 initiative roll. Normally I would envision a bazooka team being 1 guy firing while the other reloads and/or spots targets. If it was a very heavy weapon which took the strength of 2 men to lift/aim then this seems to set a precedent of sharing an initiative roll.

This would be simple enough if they had no/equal bonuses but I wouldn't know how to do it if they had different ones. I figure use the lowest as the weak chain in the link.

This exchange also gives an interesting example of cover:

As the bazooka team gets ready to fire another shell,
it's the tank's turn to strike/counterattack.
It aims, and the cannon is fired at the compact car the two men are hiding behind.

Even though it's a counter, it's actually launched at their cover instead of them. But why?

Since this is done instead of firing at the men directly (we are only told "the car is destroyed", not of them being hurt) it seems like they were able to fire the bazooka while staying behind cover, or else got to duck back behind cover as a free action before the tank got to fire back.

I might have attributed that to the tank running out of attacks if it wasn't explicitly happening immediately after rolling initiatives...

I don't know if this example made it into RUE. Pg 355 has a "Mega-Damage and M.D.C." section which is the closest I could find.

We know the CR-1 Rocket Launcher (RMB p 204, RUE p 258) made it through, but I was wondering about alternatives that won't get you persued by the CS by having stolen tech.

RMB p 243 had a "Conventional Weapons" section with a smattering of SDC stuff. 244 had "Heavy Weapons" which included a "Rocket Launcher" called a "Super Bazooka". Compared to the CR-1 (18,000 + 1,000 per rocket) it was cheap if you could probably only get 1 shot off (merely 900 credits) and it had a better blast radius (50 feet) than any Short Range / Mini / Medium. Only some LRMs had equal/better radius. The range was less, but 3,600 was still better than all rifles except railguns and JA-series. The damage was not impressive, but it didn't need to be if you were targetting SDC targets, and in terms of harassing a group, 1D4 with 50 foot radius could still do more total damage than frag's 5D6 at 20 feet, or maybe even plasma's 1D6x10 at 15 feet, depending on how your enemies are spaced, or how well protected they are.

I'm curious if the Super Bazooka did make it into RUE. I haven't been able to find it. RUE 261 has "common gear" but it doesn't seem to include weapons.

It seems like the "Conventional Weapons" SDC content was largely merged into RUE 328's "W.P. Modern Weapons" section, with damages listed alongside bonuses from the training. Which is cool and all.. except I can't see any prices like RMB had, so it wouldn't lead GMs starting with RUE much of a guide to go on how much it would cost to get these weapons, or how much they would sell for.

RUE 239's "W.P. Heavy Military Weapons" does have the "Portable Mortar / Rocket Launcher" but it's clearly a different weapon, only doing 2D4x10 SDC to a meager 15 foot radius, though it does have a better (4000 ft) range than the Super Bazooka. I also get the sense it is reloadable whereas I sorta got a "one and done" impression from the Super Bazooka (similar to that 10 mile Medium Missile Launcher in Mercs) since there was no split weapon/ammo cost.

While the PMRL sounds like a useful tool for taking out packed SDC groups. The extra 400 feet of reach gives it a competitive edge with the Super Bazooka, if I had to take out an unarmored juicers sniping lasers from 4000 feet for example.

It's still sad not to have a price for the PMRL, or to be able to find the Super Bazooka anymore. Does anyone know if the SB made it into any other books? I think it is a great setting feature, as are many other SDC weapons, in terms of giving cheap ranged combat to credit-lacking folk.

[Eagle]

The thing that always bothered me about that example is that KS talks about how machine guns won't hurt the tank because it is an MDC object, but the bazooka can hurt it because it is a mega-damage weapon. Then when you look at the stats for a 20th century tank and a bazooka, you see they're both SDC.

[Zer0 Kay]

The thing that always bothered me about that example is that KS talks about how machine guns won't hurt the tank because it is an MDC object, but the bazooka can hurt it because it is a mega-damage weapon. Then when you look at the stats for a 20th century tank and a bazooka, you see they're both SDC.

Ah. Bit that example doesn't matter anymore. Initially it was an example of an MDC not found in previous books vs. A machine gun where individual rounds do less than an MD but a burst could go over 100 SDC while a bazooka could do over 100 with a single shot. Old rules made it as long as an individual round from a weapon couldn't inflict 100+ damage it would be impossible for that weapon to penetrate even a single point of MDC no matter how many rounds were thrown at it. But while the bazooka is an SDC weapon it can do 100+ damage enabling it to damage an MDC structure.

That entire thing was thrown out when they took away burst multipliers and started giving weapons individual burst damages allowing some machine guns with SDC single shots to do MD.

[Axelmania]

The thing that always bothered me about that example is that KS talks about how machine guns won't hurt the tank because it is an MDC object, but the bazooka can hurt it because it is a mega-damage weapon. Then when you look at the stats for a 20th century tank and a bazooka, you see they're both SDC.

What stats? The "Super Bazooka" in RMB does "1D4 M.D. or 1D4x100 S.D.C.". I don't think we got tanks until Mercs. Although 96 had modified ones... so I guess it wasn't basic stats for tanks.

Contemporary Weapons 156 had some. The Brazilian ENGESA EE-9 Cascavel Armoured Car had 1D4x100 high explosive rounds and 1d6x100 HEAT rounds, so those would've been able to damage MDC. France's AMX-30 Main Battle Tank had inferior HE rounds but superior HEAT rounds. Best is 162's Challenger Main Battle Tank, it could do 3D4x100 per shot, same with 167's T-72 Main Battle Tank.

I think they meant they could damage MDC, not that the damage was necessarily described as MD.

The main difference I think would be in how to deal with MDC remainders. 2 MD will destroy something with 299 SDC while 200 SDC will leave it with 99 SDC, if I remember right.

Fun thing about Merc notes, is if you use the "specially converted M.D. ammunition" rules, 1/20 SDC to MD, it says 1D4x100 SDC converts to 1D4x5 MD, which is pretty decent. ~5D4 is still less than 5D6 from mini-missiles, but when you take into account the superior blast radius and the cheap cost, and no need for an expensive CS launcher investment, very appealing.

[RockJock]

I always took it as a two man team, loader and shooter with the shooter using his bonuses.

I go with the Super Bazooka being a reloadable weapon because pretty much every weapon I know of called a bazooka is reloadable, plus there is a real series of weapons called the "Super Bazooka" with a roughly 9lbs rocket, firing about 3,000ft out of a roughly 5ft tube. The below is a cut and paste from Wiki.

Look up the M20A1 Super Bazooka for reference.

[Axelmania]

If it's reloadable then I'm not sure whether 900 creds is the cost of the launcher or for the rocket.

[RockJock]

Most of the weapons in that section only list one cost, not separate for weapon and ammo. Look at the recoilless rifle and under barrel grenade luancher. Unless they are totally different from the real world weapons they are meant to be reloaded.

[Axelmania]

Hm yeah... it clearly must be the cost of weapons, anyone recall the 1st rifts book to assign credit costs to ammunition for ANY of these weapons?

RMB 235 did mention ".22 caliber shells, about 40 credits for a box of 100" under the black market cybernetic finger gun. So that would be suitable for the first half of the very first "Conventional Weapon" the ".22 or .25 Revolver" on 243.

241 had a mini-machinegun forearm blaster but didn't mention cost of reloads even though it repeated e-clip costs for the other weapons' benefit.

I remember Mercenaries had caseless rounds but they were more expensive if I recall.

[RockJock]

And caseless isn't generally interchangeable with standard bullets.

No clue about a first listing, but part is in RUE, page 268 listed some of the small arms sdc bullet costs. I'm sure New West has at least some listed.

[Axelmania]

30 to 60 per box of 100... 40's within that range, guess it works.

I thought .22 was bottom of the barrel though so makes me wonder what costs only 30 per 100 (3 creds 10 shots)

[RockJock]

I think you are reading way too much into prices being consistent and logical. Price by location and availability on Rifts Earth is going to vary. You can always look at a real life source, say Cabellas to give pricing per box, or at least the ratio of say .22LR to .223. That doesn't help you find prices for shells/rockets, but you can always use a mini-missile as a guideline.

[CyCo]

In regards to the initiative bit, my take on it would be use the loaders initiative, the shooters weapon skill. At the very least, if it were player characters, it would mean both get to roll some dice for that combat round rather than one.

[boring7]

Speaking of odd mechanics. Machine guns of the "I shoot so many bullets it might do MD" variety vary WILDLY. While trying to exploit my way into one-rounding a Vampire Intelligence (I am an incorrigible cheaty pete) I found a gun that does 2d6+3 MD in Merc Ops but a mere 2d8*10+20 SD in the revised vampire book. I have the silver for bullets, but there's nothing going to chew through 1000s of Hp at more than a crawl.

[glitterboy2098]

part of that is because the guy who wrote mercops was clearly ignoring the official burst rules from RUE. when 100% of your bullets are hitting, instead of the 25-30% of the official rules, your guns are way more powerful.

[Axelmania]

Wouldn't be the first time burst rules got ignored... RMB had made it pretty clear a burst of SDC shots wouldn't harm 1 MDC even if they added up to over 100, but then later we got bursts which did that, SDC on single shot and MD on bursts.

[glitterboy2098]

Wouldn't be the first time burst rules got ignored... RMB had made it pretty clear a burst of SDC shots wouldn't harm 1 MDC even if they added up to over 100, but then later we got bursts which did that, SDC on single shot and MD on bursts.

actually not ever 'later'.. we had burst firing SDC ammo MG's doing MD in the RMB itself.

[Axelmania]

There was a lot of that implied but never totally specific...

226right the Speedster had "1D4 M.D. per burst of 50 rounds," from a total payload of 600
227left the Wastelander mentioned a 4000 credit machinegun without stats, presumably same one as Speedster since it was also 4000 to add on...
except also on 227 left the Highway-Man cost 6500 for a machinegun with same stats.. but I figure that's just because it's trickier to fit a gun on a 6ft 240lb cycle compared to 9ft ones weighing 700/800lbs.

Since we're never actually told how many rounds hit, or the damage of a single round, it could theoretically be a situation where each shot inflicts 1 MD but only 1D4 shots out of 50 manage to hit their mark.

241's Forearm Blaster 5. Mini Machinegun could be a similar story, maybe 2D4 MD is 2-8 shots of 1 MD hitting. It doesn't actually mention how many shots there are per burst (just that the gun can hold 30 bursts) which makes it hard to speculate.

1-4 shots out of 50 hitting (2-8% accuracy, average 5%) does seem pretty horrible... but let's compare to the competition...

Pg 196 the UAR-1 enforcer's C-50R Enforcer Rail Gun fires an 80 round burst, each shot doing 1D6 MD, and does 1D6x10, meaning only 10 out of 80 rounds hit. 1 out of 8 is 12.5%.
Pg 198Left the Spider-Skull walker is in the same boat, the C-100R Spider Rail Guns do 2D4 per round, 2D4x10 total, only 10 out of 80 are hitting.
Pg 198right the Mark-V APC as well, its C-40R Rail Guns have identical stats to the Enforcer's.
Pg 215(left) the T-001 is similarly 1 round 1D4 80 rounds 1D4x10, only 10 in 80 are hitting.

5% accuracy vs 12.5% accuracy isn't unbelievable when we consider the CS and Titan Robotics are supposed to be higher-tier than whatever generic company is making these motorcycle machineguns.

[Colonel_Tetsuya]

There was a lot of that implied but never totally specific...

226right the Speedster had "1D4 M.D. per burst of 50 rounds," from a total payload of 600
227left the Wastelander mentioned a 4000 credit machinegun without stats, presumably same one as Speedster since it was also 4000 to add on...
except also on 227 left the Highway-Man cost 6500 for a machinegun with same stats.. but I figure that's just because it's trickier to fit a gun on a 6ft 240lb cycle compared to 9ft ones weighing 700/800lbs.

Since we're never actually told how many rounds hit, or the damage of a single round, it could theoretically be a situation where each shot inflicts 1 MD but only 1D4 shots out of 50 manage to hit their mark.

241's Forearm Blaster 5. Mini Machinegun could be a similar story, maybe 2D4 MD is 2-8 shots of 1 MD hitting. It doesn't actually mention how many shots there are per burst (just that the gun can hold 30 bursts) which makes it hard to speculate.

1-4 shots out of 50 hitting (2-8% accuracy, average 5%) does seem pretty horrible... but let's compare to the competition...

You know, usually, you misinterpret this stuff in comic ways... but this time.. gotta hand it to you, you might be right. We're never told these are SDC machineguns that are doing MDC on bursts. The only damage ever listed is MDC.

You might actually be onto something here.... especially given what im about to say next (how your math and conclusions are entirely wrong, but the truth of the matter is even MORE of a potential boost to your argument).

Pg 196 the UAR-1 enforcer's C-50R Enforcer Rail Gun fires an 80 round burst, each shot doing 1D6 MD, and does 1D6x10, meaning only 10 out of 80 rounds hit. 1 out of 8 is 12.5%.
Pg 198Left the Spider-Skull walker is in the same boat, the C-100R Spider Rail Guns do 2D4 per round, 2D4x10 total, only 10 out of 80 are hitting.
Pg 198right the Mark-V APC as well, its C-40R Rail Guns have identical stats to the Enforcer's.
Pg 215(left) the T-001 is similarly 1 round 1D4 80 rounds 1D4x10, only 10 in 80 are hitting.

You've drawn the wrong conclusion here. You are using simple math, to get basic numbers, but they aren't necessarily correct. However, your math is actually being really, really freaking generous to these rail guns. Their accuracy may be even lower than your assumptions.

Example: The C-50R. 1D6 MD per round, burst is 1D6x10 for 80 rounds. Since each round can do up to 6 MD.... a burst that isn't full damage might have even WORSE accuracy. For example, you could hit with just FIVE rounds and do 30MD (half the potential damage of the entire burst).

So.. your math was bad, but in the direction that favors the Railguns too much. They may be just as inaccurate as the machine guns.

5% accuracy vs 12.5% accuracy isn't unbelievable when we consider the CS and Titan Robotics are supposed to be higher-tier than whatever generic company is making these motorcycle machineguns.

Dont disagree with this statement. (Company in question likely being NG or Wellington).

[Colonel_Tetsuya]

Speaking of odd mechanics. Machine guns of the "I shoot so many bullets it might do MD" variety vary WILDLY. While trying to exploit my way into one-rounding a Vampire Intelligence (I am an incorrigible cheaty pete) I found a gun that does 2d6+3 MD in Merc Ops but a mere 2d8*10+20 SD in the revised vampire book. I have the silver for bullets, but there's nothing going to chew through 1000s of Hp at more than a crawl.

in Merc Ops, it was probably firing Ramjets or Explosive rounds.

[Colonel_Tetsuya]

And caseless isn't generally interchangeable with standard bullets.

No clue about a first listing, but part is in RUE, page 268 listed some of the small arms sdc bullet costs. I'm sure New West has at least some listed.

Merc Ops has a listing of all SDC bullet costs. GMG too, IIRC.

[Axelmania]

You might actually be onto something here.... especially given what im about to say next (how your math and conclusions are entirely wrong, but the truth of the matter is even MORE of a potential boost to your argument).

You've drawn the wrong conclusion here. You are using simple math, to get basic numbers, but they aren't necessarily correct. However, your math is actually being really, really freaking generous to these rail guns. Their accuracy may be even lower than your assumptions.

Example: The C-50R. 1D6 MD per round, burst is 1D6x10 for 80 rounds. Since each round can do up to 6 MD.... a burst that isn't full damage might have even WORSE accuracy. For example, you could hit with just FIVE rounds and do 30MD (half the potential damage of the entire burst).

So.. your math was bad, but in the direction that favors the Railguns too much. They may be just as inaccurate as the machine guns.

My simple math isn't "entirely" wrong or "bad", but rather, it should only represent the average amount of bullets which hit according to the burst. I should have recognized this as only a guaranteed average, not a guaranteed amount of hits.

Your do add to my simple interpretation though, and I agree with your conclusions.

10 MD minimum does only mean requiring 2 rounds (2.5% of burst) to hit: 1 doing 6 and 1 doing 4, or 2 doing 5

60 MD maximum, on the other hand, could represent 60 out of 80 (75%) of the rounds hitting and doing 1 MD each.

The average of the burst (35 MD) divided by the average of 1 round (3.5 MD) does equate to an average of 10 rounds hitting though.

You are right that their accuracy could be lower, but they could also be higher for the same reasons, so my use of average-as-fact wasn't so much generous as limited in scope.

I'll complicate this even further though: I propose to you that a burst can cause a round to do HALF of its minimum damage, too.

WB 5 p 111 the Prowler's 1 A) Railgun always does 2 MD on a single round. Meaning that if all rounds were doing full damage, bursts would always be an even-numbered amount of damage. Yet a burst of 20 rounds does 4D6 damage, which can output odd numbers, which may reflect 1 round hitting for 1/2 damage and only doing 1 MD.

Merc Ops has a listing of all SDC bullet costs. GMG too, IIRC.

Thanks for suggesting! *digs*

MOp120 has a Common Weapons section under GAW Old Style Firearms. Pg121 mentions they "produce every conceivable type of ammunition" (that's kind of impressive... I don't even think Naruni would be capable of that, reading it literally...) pg 122's "conventional guns and ammo" provides a huge list... this looks extremely helpful.

Does anyone know if any ammo types are left out? To find out I think I'd have to compile a list of every gun and the ammo they use and compare it against this...

This also lists ridiculously cheap missiles... only 800 to 2000 for mini-missiles 6000 to 10,000 for medium-range! Mercs 106 for the SAWS said 3000 per mini and 15,000 per medium-range! Golden Age Weaponsmiths is clearly the guy to go to for restocking missiles!

*pouts about short-range missiles getting inferior attention*

GMG 112 has "Costs for Conventional S.D.C. Rounds" but it is nowhere near as detailed as Merc Ops. The problem with MO is it may only be the prices for GAW while GMG are guidelines which could apply to other suppliers.

In comparing the two... GMG says 48 rounds cost 20 to 50 credits. MO is priced per 100 rounds, yet in one case it's still cheaper, like 15 for 100 .22 rounds. Doubling the GMG price to 40 to 100 credits for 98 rounds (getting less than MO's 100) we can see most fall below or in the bottom range of that, except for machine gun ammo.