High Damage Ranged Weapons

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High Damage Ranged Weapons

Unread post by flatline »

There are a number of high damage weapons in the game if you're willing to
pay the points for them. Some are easy to use, some require more care. I
only have the splicer main book, so if there are others from rifters,
please feel free to mention them.

Mega Acid Nodules: 4d8MD for 1d8 melees averages 81MD per acid nodule in
the volley with no upper limit on the number of nodules in a volley. It's
not a quick kill, so your enemy may still kill you while you wait for it
to die. However, it's still an incredible amount of damage. 125 points
will buy you Acid Blood, 11 Acid Nodules, and the Mega Upgrade. Each
volley of 11 will average 891MD which means 4 average volleys (3564MD)
will destroy a Sentry Tower (3200MDC) and put you within spitting
distance of destroying a Land Dominator (3600MDC). You get 6 volleys
(12 with the Ultra upgrade) every hour. However, the acid is pretty
much useless against force fields and biologicals...

Mega Casting Cannon: 4d8X10MD (+20MD if a Lithovore) only costs 125
points, but you can't get there until level 5. The optimal progression
for doing damage quickly is Thrower->Launcher->Mega->Rifle->Cannon. You
average 180MD per burst (200MD if Lithovore) and get 15 bursts (30 if
ultra). You can't reload during the fight, but you can reload multiple
times per day.

Mega Flying Blades: 2d4MD per blade with no upper limit on the number
of blades makes this truly frightening if you have lots of points
to spend. At 126 points invested, you average 95MD per attack (not
impressive), but at 250 points, you average 250MD per attack. Since
there's no upper limit, you could go as high as you have points for,
but I suggest that diminishing returns kicks in once you hit 290 points
(average 300MD...enough to reliably kill a Steel Trooper in one hit).

Mega Heat Projector Cannon: 2d8x10+20MD (avg 110MD) for 90 points (Resist
Heat, Cannon, Mega). Good range, no ammo concerns, and no rate of fire
limitations makes this an excellent bargain.

Mega Needle Death Blossom: 2d12x10 (avg 130MD) to everything within 30
feet of you (including allies!!!) four times a day only costs you 80
points. Eight times a day for an extra 10 points. 60 foot radius for an
extra 35 points. If you're surrounded by lots of targets, the amount
of damage you can do is absolutely astounding! But this can't be your
main weapon.

Paired Mega Omega Blasters: 235pts gives you 8d8x10MD (avg 360MD) with
20 foot blast radius once per melee. An additional 20 points lets you
fire twice per melee. An additional 35 points gives you an almost 2 mile
range and 40 foot blast radius. Expensive, but awesome. Biggest drawback
is that it take 3 attacks to fire (no idea why the armored plates can't
open automatically, but I'm sure this is a game balance mechanism)

Mega Organic Rockets: 125 pts lets you shoot a volley of 15 for 15d10x10
damage total (avg 825MD). But then it takes hours to regrow the
rockets. Excellent supplemental weapon, but it can't be your only
weapon system.

Mega Long Ranged Spore Discharger: 100 points for a 8d8MD (avg 36MD)
plus 2d8MD each melee for 3d4 additional melees (an additional 67.5MD
over time) with a 40 foot "splash" radius. 35 extra points gives you an
80 foot "splash radius". If you have lots of machines around you, the
total damage done can be staggering. Of course, it's completely useless
against force fields and biologicals.

Mega Super Light Cells: by my reading, the largest legal volley is 6,
for a total of 12d10MD (avg 66MD) for a cost of 128 points. I don't
really consider this to be very competitive, but lots of people
speak well of these, so I decided to include it. Good range, no
ammo concerns, but compares poorly to other weapons in this list.

Just food for thought.

--flatline
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Re: High Damage Ranged Weapons

Unread post by Snake Eyes »

Nice points there, yeah the mega upgrade really changes the playing field and gives a much needed boost
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Re: High Damage Ranged Weapons

Unread post by Witchcraft »

Isn't it awesome how customizable they are? I can't help but feel like a kid in a candy store...or at a build your own sundae bar!
There is no spoon.
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Re: High Damage Ranged Weapons

Unread post by flatline »

Witchcraft wrote:Isn't it awesome how customizable they are? I can't help but feel like a kid in a candy store...or at a build your own sundae bar!


I love optimization problems and host armor design is one really complicated optimization problem.
That's why I've been breaking my posts into categories so that I can tackle it in bite sized chunks.

--flatline
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Re: High Damage Ranged Weapons

Unread post by flatline »

Tactically significant levels of damage
---------------------------------------
30 Cable Snakes, Poppler Mine legs
60 Skitter Pod
--->1xA (66)
100 Assault Slayer FF
110 Poppler Mine (don't be near it)
--->1xB (110)
130 Hunter-Searcher Probe
--->1xC (130)
--->2xA (132)
160 Sewer Prowler head
180 Sky Fighter main jet
--->1xD (180)
--->3xA (198)
200 Battle Track plasme arm
--->1xE (200)
210 Sky Fighter wing
--->2xB (220)
230 Battle Track particle beam arm
240 Slicer Robot, Flying Strike Ship
250 Sentry Tower cannon
--->4xA (264)
--->2xC (260)
270 Steel Trooper
320 Sewer Prowler
--->5xA, 3xB (330)
--->2xD, 1xF (360)
--->0.5xG (412) --splash damage
--->3xC (390)
--->2xE (400)
440 Sky Fighter
--->4xB (440)
--->7xA (462)
--->4xC (520)
540 Battle Track
--->3xD (540)
--->5xB (550)
--->9xA (594)
600 Assault Slayer, Repair Wagon
--->3xE (600)
--->6xC (650)
--->10xA, 6xB (660)
--->4xD, 2xF (720)
--->1xG (825)
1000 Land Dominator force field, Sentry Tower force field
--->5xE (1000)
--->16xA (1056)
--->8xC (1040)
--->10xB (1100)
--->6xD, 3xF (1080)
--->2xG (1650)
3200 Sentry Tower
--->16xE (3200)
--->49xA (3234)
--->18xD, 9xF (3240)
--->25xC (3250)
--->30xB, 4xG (3300)
3600 Land Dominator
--->20xD, 18xE, 10xF (3600)
--->55xA (3630)
--->28xC (3640)
--->33xB (3650)
--->5xG (4125)

Key:
A: 66 Mega Super Light Cells volley of 6
B: 110 Mega Heat Projector Cannon
C: 130 Mega Needle Death Blosssom
D: 180 Mega Casting Cannon OR Dual Mega Omega Blasters splash damage
E: 200 Mega Casting Cannon Lithovore
F: 360 Dual Mega Omega Blasters
G: 825 Mega Organic Rockets volley of 15

You can read this chart two different ways. The first way is to find the
amount of damage you're interested in inflicting with your weapon and
then looking for the first line below it for your weapon of choice. The
multiple for your weapon is the number of times you need to hit with your
weapon to have at least a 50% chance of doing that amount of damage or
more. For example, if you have a mega heat projector cannon and you're
interested in destroying a Sky Fighter, the line that applies says '5xB'
which means you need to shoot the Sky Fighter 5 times to have a 50% or
better chance of killing it. The more the parenthetical number exceeds
the target number, the better chance you have of reaching that number
(although this chart won't help you figure out the actual chances...for
that you need to actually do the math).

The other way to use this chart is to decide how many hits you want to
take to kill a particular target and then looking below the target line
to see which, if any, of the listed weapons can accomplish this. So if
you want a 50% or better chance of killing a Steel Trooper in 2 hits,
then looking below it you'll find that D, E, F, and G meet that criteria
and that F and G exceed that criteria since they can kill a Steel Trooper
in one hit at least 50% of the time.

I've purposefully left Mega Flying Blades and Mega Acid Nodules off this
chart since their volley damage is dependent on volley size and their volley
size has no limit. If there's interest, perhaps I'll address this problem in
another post.

If you only take one thing away from this post, let it be this: since
the Steel Trooper is the most common robot you're likely to encounter,
you should know that it takes 5 shots with maxed super light cells,
3 shots with maxed heat cannon, 2 shots with the maxed casting cannon,
or one shot with the maxed omega blasters to have a better than even
chance of killing one.

Edit: This chart assumes that you haven't softened the target up at all before
engaging it with the listed weapons. If your target is not at full MDC, then you
can either shift the target line up by the amount of damage or you can shift the
weapon lines down by the amount of damage.

--flatline
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Re: High Damage Ranged Weapons

Unread post by flatline »

Acid Nodules require different treatment than most of the other weapons
in this thread because their damage isn't calculated at the time of the
attack, but rather once per melee for 1d8 melees, starting the melee of
the attack. The book doesn't say when the damage is applied, but the most
pessimistic ruling is that the damage is applied at the end of the melee
after the victim has used all its attacks, so that's what I'll assume.

There's no difference between having 10 Mega Acid Nodules and 20 regular
Acid Nodules, so there's no benefit to purchasing the Mega upgrade unless
you plan to have at least 11 Mega Acid Nodules. In this post I'm assuming
we're talking about Mega Acid Nodules, but if you understand the post,
you'll have no trouble adapting it to regular acid nodules.

I'm also assuming the Ultra upgrade since it's such a bargain for this
weapon.

Each Nodule does 4D8MD at the end of each melee for 1d8 melees starting
in the melee of the successful attack. On average, that means it will
do 18MD each melee for 4.5 melees for an average total of 81MD. So if
you successfully attack an undamaged Steel Trooper with a volley of...
...1, 2, or 3, he'll probably survive
...4, he'll probably die at the end of the 4th melee
...5, 6, or 7, he'll probably die at the end of the 3rd melee
...8 through 14, he'll probably die at the end of the 2nd melee
...15 or more, he'll probably die at the end of the 1st melee

So, if you want a Steel Trooper to have a life expectancy of three melees,
you probaby want to be using 6 or 7 nodules (you probably want better
odds than 50/50 which is what a volley of 5 gives you). With a payload
of 12 shots per hour per nodule that seems pretty limiting until you
realize that you can always purchase more nodules. 6 nodules gives 12
6-volleys an hour, but 12 nodules gives 24, 18 gives 36, etc. You can
completely determine your effective payload by multiplying the number
of nodules by 12 and dividing by your expected volley size.

And, of course, you can always adjust your volley size to be appropriate
for whatever you're up against.

So damage and payload aren't really issues? Is there an issue?

YES!

Unless you're using large enough volleys to kill in one melee, you're
going to want to cover your enemies in acid and then get out of there so
they're not shooting you while the acid dissolves them. If it takes 3
melees for that Steel Trooper to melt, then that's 18 attacks he gets
against you and your allies before he croaks.

And that is the key problem I have with Ultra-Mega-Acid Nodules. They're
great when it's just you or a small group that can engage and disengage
quickly, but in larger engagements, by the time your acid kills the
target, the target would probably already be dead from overlapping spore
discharger splash effects.

Oh, and acid nodules are useless against force fields and biologicals.

Because of all this, I consider acid nodules to be a niche weapon best
suited for ambush or blitz attacks where you cover your enemies in acid
as quickly as possible and then get away and wait for them to die.

--flatline
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Re: High Damage Ranged Weapons

Unread post by flatline »

Rappanui wrote:IMo, Having run the numbers against non Metal targets, Any dreadguard that isn't using his bioweapons didn't plan his arsenal .. especially at the low levels.
But in any Robot engangement, Any Dreadguard pack that doesn't have a Outland Rider with a heavy beast is going to be either losing, or on the losing end of any robot engagement.


I'm not sure I understand what you're saying.

Can you give an example or two of what you mean?

--flatline
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Re: High Damage Ranged Weapons

Unread post by Shark_Force »

lots of crazy damage stuff that a regular host armor can bring to the party. the best stuff takes a bit of time to get going, but even the early stuff can be pretty danged good. not saying that warmounts aren't awesome (or that certain warmounts aren't frequently better than others for general use), but a dreadguard can pack a big punch too, easily enough to take on the machine 1v1 against most common enemies. the problem, of course, is that the machine doesn't fight 1v1 if they can help it.

and on a side note, my main dislike for the acid nodules is that the damage is not very front-loaded... to get maximum efficiency out of them, you need to leave your target alive for a long time. coupled with a short range, that's a real deterrent.

naturally, the spore discharger is in the majority of situations going to be the significantly superior option for most anti-machine purposes.

bio-e vents are pretty good for an inexpensive all-around useful weapon. frankly, at 10 bio-e, i consider them a good buy for almost anyone. the hand-held versions aren't bad, but suffer from a drastically worse payload (the hand-held use up in 1 minute what the built-in can make last 1 hour). for a hand-held, the super light cell rifles are a very nice choice, in terms of offering fair damage, good range, and unlimited payload... though carrying around a bio-e rifle if you don't have an armor with it built in so that you can open up with the big guns first is also well worth it.
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Re: High Damage Ranged Weapons

Unread post by SAMASzero »

flatline wrote:Because of all this, I consider acid nodules to be a niche weapon best
suited for ambush or blitz attacks where you cover your enemies in acid
as quickly as possible and then get away and wait for them to die.

--flatline


More or less. The idea behind acid is that you need something that continually does damage so that you can keep hurting them even when you aren't directly attacking them. I think they're less for melting Steel Troopers and more about melting the guns and sensors off the big robots: Fights that are likely to already be protracted. If you're waiting for Steel Troopers to die, you're doing it wrong.
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Re: High Damage Ranged Weapons

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Flatline... Are you a Librarian? What Great House are you from?
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Re: High Damage Ranged Weapons

Unread post by The Galactus Kid »

Premier wrote:Flatline... Are you a Librarian? What Great House are you from?

Lol
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Re: High Damage Ranged Weapons

Unread post by flatline »

The Heat Projector Cannon description states that you can have two cannons, but says nothing about whether or not they can fire as a volley of 2. Is that clarified anywhere?

If they can fire as a volley, then at 125 points for 220MD on average, they become an even better bargain.

--flatline
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Re: High Damage Ranged Weapons

Unread post by The Galactus Kid »

There is an upcoming upgrade that will make weapons of the same type fire linked. Stay tuned...
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Ziggurat the Eternal wrote:I'm not sure if its possible, but if it isn't, then possible will just have to get over it.

Ninjabunny wrote:You are playing to have fun and be a part of a story,no one is aiming to "beat" the GM, nor should any GM be looking to beat his players.

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Re: High Damage Ranged Weapons

Unread post by Shark_Force »

The Galactus Kid wrote:There is an upcoming upgrade that will make weapons of the same type fire linked. Stay tuned...


i'm thinking that will do more for bio-e weapons than for heat projectors =S

(and on a side note, fire-linked spore dischargers are going to make mass slaughter of robots way too easy).
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Re: High Damage Ranged Weapons

Unread post by The Galactus Kid »

Shark_Force wrote:
The Galactus Kid wrote:There is an upcoming upgrade that will make weapons of the same type fire linked. Stay tuned...


i'm thinking that will do more for bio-e weapons than for heat projectors =S

(and on a side note, fire-linked spore dischargers are going to make mass slaughter of robots way too easy).

There will be restrictions, but like any of the additional enhancements like the mega, opti, omni etc they will come at a cost.
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Ziggurat the Eternal wrote:I'm not sure if its possible, but if it isn't, then possible will just have to get over it.

Ninjabunny wrote:You are playing to have fun and be a part of a story,no one is aiming to "beat" the GM, nor should any GM be looking to beat his players.

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Re: High Damage Ranged Weapons

Unread post by flatline »

Shark_Force wrote:
The Galactus Kid wrote:There is an upcoming upgrade that will make weapons of the same type fire linked. Stay tuned...


i'm thinking that will do more for bio-e weapons than for heat projectors =S


We've kind of had this discussion before, but I don't remember how it ended. If the pilot is the reason why you're limited to 5 shots per melee, then if you have 1 bio-e vent that you shoot 5 times per melee or 5 fire-linked bio-e vents that you shoot one time per melee, then that's it unless you want to incur the penalties.

Or is my interpretation incorrect?

--flatline
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Re: High Damage Ranged Weapons

Unread post by Shark_Force »

flatline wrote:
Shark_Force wrote:
The Galactus Kid wrote:There is an upcoming upgrade that will make weapons of the same type fire linked. Stay tuned...


i'm thinking that will do more for bio-e weapons than for heat projectors =S


We've kind of had this discussion before, but I don't remember how it ended. If the pilot is the reason why you're limited to 5 shots per melee, then if you have 1 bio-e vent that you shoot 5 times per melee or 5 fire-linked bio-e vents that you shoot one time per melee, then that's it unless you want to incur the penalties.

Or is my interpretation incorrect?

--flatline


your interpretation is correct.

i'm not sure you've thought through all the implications of it though.

front-loaded damage is the best kind of damage any time you have enough of it to one-shot your opponent. also if you have some method of making it so that nobody can target you while you are also unable to target anyone.

for example, suppose we have an opponent that can deal, oh, 10 damage per action, has 6 actions, and can take 200 points of damage before being destroyed (not using the palladium system, just giving a generic example). now, if you also have 6 actions and have the option of dealing 200 damage in your first action, or dealing 40 damage per action for a total of 240, which is best?

well, it depends. in this case, the opponent dies on your first action. if the opponent needed 210 damage then the 40 damage per action would be better. but so long as your front-loaded damage is enough to finish off your opponent in one action, front-loaded is better because it means your opponent isn't damaging you for all those actions. even if we made it 100 damage per action, usable a maximum twice per round (for the sake of argument), you'd be better off using the higher damage per action.

and now, let's consider some other possibilities:

same situation, except your opponent regenerates 10 damage per action as well. front-loaded not only prevents the enemy from damaging you, it prevents their regeneration.

same situation, but both of you are using weapons with a range of 500 feet and you're slightly faster. you move in, shoot once for 200, then move away for the other 5 actions. move back in, shoot, move out for 5 actions.

being able to deal all your damage in one shot at the expense of not being able to deal damage with every single action can be very worthwhile in the right situation. the fact that you can (for example) hit something with a big alpha strike, and then potentially still have plenty of weapons to use on your other actions (or the ability to put the fight on hold for example by stepping out of range or by hiding) you can really use a massive first strike to your advantage, by preventing an enemy from being able to retaliate effectively.

plus, better yet, the actual rule is that you get 20 uses per minute, not per round. if you have 5 vents all fire-linked, you can use that 4 times in your first round to make the scales tip firmly in your favor, then switch to something else that might pack a little less punch, but thanks to the fact that you may have already removed 3-4 opponents from the fight, is more than enough to finish a fight that would have been much harder had you been using that weaker weapon the whole way through.

granted, this is somewhat a function of the fact that the way PB represents things, an opponent with 1 MDC left is just as threatening as an opponent with 200 MDC left, but that's how it is =S
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Re: High Damage Ranged Weapons

Unread post by flatline »

Shark_Force wrote:
flatline wrote:
Shark_Force wrote:
The Galactus Kid wrote:There is an upcoming upgrade that will make weapons of the same type fire linked. Stay tuned...


i'm thinking that will do more for bio-e weapons than for heat projectors =S


We've kind of had this discussion before, but I don't remember how it ended. If the pilot is the reason why you're limited to 5 shots per melee, then if you have 1 bio-e vent that you shoot 5 times per melee or 5 fire-linked bio-e vents that you shoot one time per melee, then that's it unless you want to incur the penalties.

Or is my interpretation incorrect?

--flatline


your interpretation is correct.

i'm not sure you've thought through all the implications of it though.

front-loaded damage is the best kind of damage any time you have enough of it to one-shot your opponent. also if you have some method of making it so that nobody can target you while you are also unable to target anyone.

for example, suppose we have an opponent that can deal, oh, 10 damage per action, has 6 actions, and can take 200 points of damage before being destroyed (not using the palladium system, just giving a generic example). now, if you also have 6 actions and have the option of dealing 200 damage in your first action, or dealing 40 damage per action for a total of 240, which is best?

well, it depends. in this case, the opponent dies on your first action. if the opponent needed 210 damage then the 40 damage per action would be better. but so long as your front-loaded damage is enough to finish off your opponent in one action, front-loaded is better because it means your opponent isn't damaging you for all those actions. even if we made it 100 damage per action, usable a maximum twice per round (for the sake of argument), you'd be better off using the higher damage per action.

and now, let's consider some other possibilities:

same situation, except your opponent regenerates 10 damage per action as well. front-loaded not only prevents the enemy from damaging you, it prevents their regeneration.

same situation, but both of you are using weapons with a range of 500 feet and you're slightly faster. you move in, shoot once for 200, then move away for the other 5 actions. move back in, shoot, move out for 5 actions.

being able to deal all your damage in one shot at the expense of not being able to deal damage with every single action can be very worthwhile in the right situation. the fact that you can (for example) hit something with a big alpha strike, and then potentially still have plenty of weapons to use on your other actions (or the ability to put the fight on hold for example by stepping out of range or by hiding) you can really use a massive first strike to your advantage, by preventing an enemy from being able to retaliate effectively.

plus, better yet, the actual rule is that you get 20 uses per minute, not per round. if you have 5 vents all fire-linked, you can use that 4 times in your first round to make the scales tip firmly in your favor, then switch to something else that might pack a little less punch, but thanks to the fact that you may have already removed 3-4 opponents from the fight, is more than enough to finish a fight that would have been much harder had you been using that weaker weapon the whole way through.

granted, this is somewhat a function of the fact that the way PB represents things, an opponent with 1 MDC left is just as threatening as an opponent with 200 MDC left, but that's how it is =S


Or even more egregious, you could just accept the -2 attacks per melee (or whatever it is) and fire bio-e vent volleys every attack, knowing that the penalties don't stack.

--flatline
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Re: High Damage Ranged Weapons

Unread post by SAMASzero »

The Galactus Kid wrote:
Shark_Force wrote:
The Galactus Kid wrote:There is an upcoming upgrade that will make weapons of the same type fire linked. Stay tuned...


i'm thinking that will do more for bio-e weapons than for heat projectors =S

(and on a side note, fire-linked spore dischargers are going to make mass slaughter of robots way too easy).

There will be restrictions, but like any of the additional enhancements like the mega, opti, omni etc they will come at a cost.


Though personally, I think those may be a little too high, at least the Mega- is for a flat cost. I think something like 70-80 percent of the cost of the weapon itself (including previous versions of said weapons) would be better, if for no other reason than to make it worth taking for some of the lighter weapons.
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Re: High Damage Ranged Weapons

Unread post by Shark_Force »

flatline wrote:Or even more egregious, you could just accept the -2 attacks per melee (or whatever it is) and fire bio-e vent volleys every attack, knowing that the penalties don't stack.

--flatline


yes, that is another option. it all depends, really (on what the alternate weapon is), but there definitely is a very real possibility that taking the penalty when those attacks are each dealing dramatically more damage will work out better than using a different weapon.
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Re: High Damage Ranged Weapons

Unread post by flatline »

Shark_Force wrote:
flatline wrote:Or even more egregious, you could just accept the -2 attacks per melee (or whatever it is) and fire bio-e vent volleys every attack, knowing that the penalties don't stack.

--flatline


yes, that is another option. it all depends, really (on what the alternate weapon is), but there definitely is a very real possibility that taking the penalty when those attacks are each dealing dramatically more damage will work out better than using a different weapon.


I'm half-ways tempted to just drop the bio-E weapons (vent, rifle, and pistol) from the game entirely. That, or every time you surpass the limit, you lose one bio-E point off your next growth spurt (level up event). I mean just what the heck are these weapons shooting and why do they do more damage based on the physical fitness level of the pilot?

Makes no sense to me.

--flatline
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Re: High Damage Ranged Weapons

Unread post by The Galactus Kid »

flatline wrote:
Shark_Force wrote:
flatline wrote:Or even more egregious, you could just accept the -2 attacks per melee (or whatever it is) and fire bio-e vent volleys every attack, knowing that the penalties don't stack.

--flatline


yes, that is another option. it all depends, really (on what the alternate weapon is), but there definitely is a very real possibility that taking the penalty when those attacks are each dealing dramatically more damage will work out better than using a different weapon.


I'm half-ways tempted to just drop the bio-E weapons (vent, rifle, and pistol) from the game entirely. That, or every time you surpass the limit, you lose one bio-E point off your next growth spurt (level up event). I mean just what the heck are these weapons shooting and why do they do more damage based on the physical fitness level of the pilot?

Makes no sense to me.
The bio-e weapons need to be clarified, that's for certain. I will say that they are always good back up weapons and can be useful in a number of situations. That said, the energy is bio-energy pulled directly from the pilot or user which is why it is dependent on the PE of the user. I think the penalties need to be better defined, especially for someone with multiple bio-e weapons, such as one built into the armor, a bio-e blade and a hand-held bio-e rifle.
--flatline
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Re: High Damage Ranged Weapons

Unread post by flatline »

Assuming a PE of 20,

5 bio-e vents (50pts)
mega upgrade (50pts)
fire linking (X?pts)

100+X points for an attack that does 200 + 10d8 (average 245MD).

That's one heck of a bargain.

For comparison, 125+X points for fire linked mega heat cannons would average 220MD.

--flatline
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Re: High Damage Ranged Weapons

Unread post by Premier »

flatline wrote:
Shark_Force wrote:
flatline wrote:Or even more egregious, you could just accept the -2 attacks per melee (or whatever it is) and fire bio-e vent volleys every attack, knowing that the penalties don't stack.

--flatline


yes, that is another option. it all depends, really (on what the alternate weapon is), but there definitely is a very real possibility that taking the penalty when those attacks are each dealing dramatically more damage will work out better than using a different weapon.


I'm half-ways tempted to just drop the bio-E weapons (vent, rifle, and pistol) from the game entirely. That, or every time you surpass the limit, you lose one bio-E point off your next growth spurt (level up event). I mean just what the heck are these weapons shooting and why do they do more damage based on the physical fitness level of the pilot?

Makes no sense to me.

--flatline


Flatline I can completely understand your concern and reasoning for making this call. As one who supports House rules/adjustments. I too would make some adjustments “if” I felt the BEEE was being abused or not balanced.

For example, being that the Bio-Energy Expulsion Vent(s) are basically a bio enhancement that channels & enhances the bioelectricity (lifeforce) residing within a pilot. I have often approached the BEEE affects as follows:

(Splicers Pg 98) Payload: Effectively unlimited, However , firing more than 20 blasts a minute (that’s 5 per melee round) weakens the pilot, causing him to lose two melee attacks/actions per round and reduces all of his combat bonuses by half for the next 1D6 minutes.

Chuck’s adjustment: Because this Enhancement is something that is physically exhausting the PE /body of the pilot, there is a period before the full taxing fatigue penalties that is described above kicks in. Thus, I reason the first burst is for a fresh Pilot. However, the 2nd, 3rd and so forth burst of BEEE are from a pilot’s body that is no longer fresh and is being fatigued slowly every melee action. Thus firing more than 10 blasts a minute (that’s 3 per melee round) weakens the pilot and is the pilot’s first detection that something is sort of fatiguing him, causing him to lose one melee attacks/actions per round. However I don’t reduce his combat bonuses unless he surpasses the 20 blasts.

Any type of fair modification like this can help assist in getting it through to your players that they aren’t going to just milk BEEE without seeing some toll. There is also the possibility of making characters physically more tired after a usage of BEEE that should be felt and placed upon the character afterwards. I also would build the player’s tolerance to this fatigue at every 3rd level of advancement.
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Re: High Damage Ranged Weapons

Unread post by The Galactus Kid »

flatline wrote:Assuming a PE of 20,

5 bio-e vents (50pts)
mega upgrade (50pts)
fire linking (X?pts)

100+X points for an attack that does 200 + 10d8 (average 245MD).

That's one heck of a bargain.

For comparison, 125+X points for fire linked mega heat cannons would average 220MD.

--flatline

It appears as though the Mega Upgrade needs to be clarified as well.

1) The mega upgrade as written will cost 50 Bio-e per weapon to be upgraded. Personally, I would allow this to encompass all enhancements of a particular type,but I would limit it to organic rockets, flying blades etc. Any Large weapons like Omega blasters, heat projector cannons etc would be excluded. But that is just how I would run it. By the current rules, its 50 bio-e per weapon.

2) If applying the rule in your example, I would say that it would work as you say, but one person could fire those heat projector cannons all day at greater range and the character using the bio-e vents would suffer some wicked penalties. Just personal taste.
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Ziggurat the Eternal wrote:I'm not sure if its possible, but if it isn't, then possible will just have to get over it.

Ninjabunny wrote:You are playing to have fun and be a part of a story,no one is aiming to "beat" the GM, nor should any GM be looking to beat his players.

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Re: High Damage Ranged Weapons

Unread post by Shark_Force »

my personal ruling is that you can apply any upgrade to a group of weapons that are inherently fire-linked. not sure i'd allow it for weapons that are *made* to be fire-linked however. i'm not a huge fan of getting to the same destination with two wildly-differing costs, and a battery of upgraded bio-e vents that get fire linked at some point would break that if induced fire-linking made them share upgrades.

with that said, at 10 bio-e per vent, you can always just link in another 5 vents and get the same effect as making them mega (at the cost of losing a bit more repeatability). one of the nicest things is that it's very easy to start off with a nice viable weapon and build on it. so long as you get a big enough alpha-strike without eating up too much bio-e that could be spent on other stuff, the massive volley of bio-e vents is going to be worthwhile. see, that's probably the scariest thing about it to me; it scales indefinitely. and it comes in small enough cost increments to be easily upgraded over time. even if the first volley exhausts you, that probably means something big just died. if you don't put a cap on it, you could potentially kill even the biggest machines in one shot.
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Re: High Damage Ranged Weapons

Unread post by flatline »

Rappanui wrote:
The Galactus Kid wrote:
flatline wrote:Assuming a PE of 20,

5 bio-e vents (50pts)
mega upgrade (50pts)
fire linking (X?pts)

100+X points for an attack that does 200 + 10d8 (average 245MD).

That's one heck of a bargain.

For comparison, 125+X points for fire linked mega heat cannons would average 220MD.

--flatline

It appears as though the Mega Upgrade needs to be clarified as well.

1) The mega upgrade as written will cost 50 Bio-e per weapon to be upgraded. Personally, I would allow this to encompass all enhancements of a particular type,but I would limit it to organic rockets, flying blades etc. Any Large weapons like Omega blasters, heat projector cannons etc would be excluded. But that is just how I would run it. By the current rules, its 50 bio-e per weapon.

2) If applying the rule in your example, I would say that it would work as you say, but one person could fire those heat projector cannons all day at greater range and the character using the bio-e vents would suffer some wicked penalties. Just personal taste.


right, weapon upgrades are per weapon, not cluster.
the orgasm of Weapon vents doesn't help.


What about volleyable weapons like acid nodules, flying blades, organic rockets, and super light cells?

--flatline
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