From: sl9b4@cc.usu.edu (Deep Six)
Newsgroups: rec.games.frp.misc
Subject: Re: GURPS: Knockback
Date: 9 Sep 92 11:01:21 MDT
Organization: Utah State University

In article <u894793.716026298@bruny>, Timothy D Little writes:

> In my last gaming session, I was involved in a high-tech gunfight, and
> the question came up of how much knockback a laser gun should do.  I voted
> 'practically none', since the momentum of a laser shot is practically zero.

The correct answer is ``absolutely none.'' Knockback only applies to bullet,
crushing and cutting damage. Lasers and Guass weapons do impailing damage.

On a similar note, there was a thread some time ago about the validity of
the Knockback rule so far as it applies to bullets. It was decided, and 
proved IMO, that bullets do not have enough energy or mass to cause the 
amount of Knockback prescribed in GURPS.

Among the other arguments presented during that thread were: Even at very
high speeds, bullets just do not have enough mass to move something as 
massive as a person. Knockback must be proportional to the weapon's recoil
(Tim mentioned that). And, most of what is considered Knockback can 
actually attributed to the human body's reaction to being shot -- that is, 
an all-over body spasm (yeah, it sounded ridiculous when I heard it too). 

Most of the GURPS games I have played in have been in the High Tech periods
(TL~7.5), and so I've had to deal with and think about bullet Knockback a 
lot. The system I have adopted for the games I GM is a watered down Knockback
rule. Only projectiles over .40 caliber do Knockback, and even then, the max
Knockback for one projo is 1 hex. This keeps the PCs from being pushed all
over the battle field as if they were being shot with fire hoses.

I do, however, think that a character's aim should be affected when he/she
is hit (regardless of if the hit got through armor). It actually hasn't 
happened that much in any of my games (or I've missed it, forgot etc.), 
but I think at least a Will roll is in order, and penalties for other 
circumstances (maybe -2 to Will roll per incident of Knockback, or maybe
-1 per hit). And obviously, if the character were knocked out of view of 
the target he/she was aiming at, then the aim is lost.

> This is not limited to high-tech weapons, a sword swing should have a much
> higher 'knockback' for a given amount of damage, than a (cross)bow.

Okay again, arrows do impailing, so they do NO Knockback. But yeah, I think
I would keep the real Knockback rules in place for hand weapons (not too 
common in my games, and never has anyone done more than 8 points of damage). 
 
> In general - the faster it moves, the more damage it should do for the same
> knockback; and vice versa - less knockback for same damage.

Sounds good in general, because GURPS seems to have done a pretty good
job at prescribing damage for hand weapons (weapons with more mass do more
damage).

> Also in the rgf.advocacy thread was talk about how a running person was
> basically a sitting duck for firearms.  I consider this to be a problem with
> GURPS speed/range system - speed is undervalued by a large amount. GURPS 
> just adds the speed to the range, so that for Move 5 (average human
> running), there is no penalty for any distance over 15 yd - the speed isn't
> enough to put the range into the next category.
> 
> I propose making Speed a separate modifier - dividing speed by target size
> and using the same sort of table as the existing size-range table.
> For a human, it works out so that:

[Home-brewed system deleted]

Sounds alright at first blush, are those penalties in addition to the 
range/speed mod? I'd have to try it out to really say if I could use it. 
One thing that I've considered is an extra penalty for evasive movement.
That is, when a character is running under fire, he/she can run erraticaly 
(weaving slightly, crouched slightly, varying speed slightly). Characters
could voluntarily sacrifice Move points and apply the inverse to their
opponent's To Hit. So, a character with a 5 move could voluntarily move
at 3 and apply the -2 to the opponent's To Hit. Character's whose Basic
Speed is higher than their Move could apply a -1 to their opponent's To
Hit with no penalty (then -1 to move thereafter). The justification for
that would be that the character with a Basic Speed of 6.5 (Move of 6)
has ``untapped'' speed with which to move erraticaly.

> Dodging is *also* applied, if the target can see the firer - but dodging at
> anything over a jog is likely to result in a fall (diving aside, etc).

Yep, I guess that would apply in any case.

Okay,
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Chadd VanZanten SL9B4@CC.USU.EDU + ``My karma ran over my dogma.'' --Unknown