4e Mechanics & Rules Discussion

[Heffe]

I like that idea. Unfortunately, early consensus seems to be that opposed recon rolls can't be helped (at all). I'm still waiting for a few more people to weigh in before I decide if it's kosher or not.

Here's another question: An enemy soldier lobs a grenade over a wall towards the PCs. He can't see them, but he has an idea where they are (he saw them move into [suspected] position the previous round). The rules say that for a ranged attack, the attacker must have LOS or they have to use the Indirect Fire rules. Looking at the latter, indirect fire requires a Forward Observer with LOS to the target. So, it appears that the rules don't allow for a grenade attack like the one described above. That's really unrealistic. Am I missing something

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We're probably getting into some hairy complications of the rules here, but I seem to recall that grenades can only attack hexes. So long as the thrower has LOS to the hex itself, then it would likely be okay.

You might now be asking yourself, "well how would you know on which side of the wall the grenade would land", and you'd be right for asking that question. The only info we have regarding the answer is found on page 68 of the Player Manual under the Blast Damage section:

COVER: Solid cover (page 58) provides protection
against shielded hit locations, just like for a ranged
attack unless the explosion occurs in the same hex
as the target.

In short, I don't think the rules are particularly helpful here, and a Referee ruling would probably be in order.

[Claidheamh]

Here's another question: An enemy soldier lobs a grenade over a wall towards the PCs. He can't see them, but he has an idea where they are (he saw them move into [suspected] position the previous round). The rules say that for a ranged attack, the attacker must have LOS or they have to use the Indirect Fire rules. Looking at the latter, indirect fire requires a Forward Observer with LOS to the target. So, it appears that the rules don't allow for a grenade attack like the one described above. That's really unrealistic. Am I missing something

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I'd allow the soldier to make an attack on the hex that he assumes the PCs moved into. I wouldn't be dogmatic about the specific indirect fire rule here, but obviously the attacker couldn't target anything but the _area_ he assumes the enemy is in.

[Tegyrius]

The thrown grenade should target the hex, not an individual PC. I mean, yeah, technically, the -3 "target in full cover" penalty should apply, but it's hard to not know where an adjacent hex is, even if it's on the far side of a wall.

- C.

[Raellus]

Practical Application

Thanks for the advice and council, fellas. Applying it, I rolled up an encounter and narrated the results in the post-apoc fiction sub-forum. (See post #28.)

https://forum.juhlin.com/showthread.phpp=94938#post94938

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[Ursus Maior]

You might like to look at the mod's answer to that in the official forum. I added rules from UrbOps to that: https://forum.frialigan.se/viewtopic.phpp=83750#p83750

Short version: UrbOps p. 19 has you answer for Close Quarters Combat. For regular combat, HE and frag hand grenades are aimed at hexes, so the wall is a penalizing feature at best.

AT hand grenades would be a different thing, since you need to aim it at a specific target. And yes, I'd argue, if you try to lob your RKG-3 anti-tank grenade against someone you cannot see, but are beyond close quarters combat, you'd be incredibly lucky to hit your target at all.

[Raellus]

Called Shots v. Vehicles

The rules are pretty clear on this, but I want to run it by y'all because what they say doesn't seem correct/realistic. Here's the scenario:

The PC machine gunner, operating a vehicle mounted DSHk HMG is shooting at a Zil-131 truck, which is approaching head-on. He wants to put his first burst into the truck's engine block. Aiming for a specific component means this is a Called Shot. So far, so good. Here's where the rules butt up against realism.

Called shots will never penetrate armor. (p.86)

The Zil has front armor of 1. That means a 12.7mm round (Damage 4, Armor 0) can't penetrate the truck's front grill Huh A hit, since it can't penetrate at all, can't damage the engine as engine is in the Penetration Damage column of the Component Damage table (p. 84). I'd have to use the result from the No Penetration column instead. In the engine row, the Non Penetration damage result would be "weapon", of which the Zil-131 is equipped with none. Basically, a hit on a Called Shot as described in the scenario, in this instance, produces no damage to the target.

The rules as stated basically nerfs the HMG and buffs a soft-skinned (i.e. unarmored, IRL) truck in the case of a Called Shot.

Am I missing something

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[Heffe]

Rae - I think your read of the rules is correct, but I also think that's just a poorly written rule.

I imagine the intent here was probably to avoid munchkin players from always aiming for ammunition or fuel in order to bypass the vehicle hit chart, but the rule ends up removing quite a bit of player agency. IMO, a houserule is probably in order here.

If it were me, I'd probably stick with the -2 for a called shot, but on a hit roll again to see if hitting the engine block actually has the expected outcome (presumably disabling the engine).

[Raellus]

Rads

Thanks all. I feel better equipped to handle a called shot v. vehicle situation in the future.

I pulled the Rain of Ash card from the random encounter deck. Looking at the rules for rads in the Player Handbook (p. 80), there doesn't seem to be any penalty for accumulating permanent rads (other than the sickness that can be caused by exposure to "new" rads, temporary and/or permanent). According to the rules, a PC that starts with six permanent rads doesn't appear to have any disadvantages compared to a PC that starts with 1, and that holds true if any additional permanent rads are accumulated during the course of the game. For example, if they are both exposed to any "new" rads, they both have the same chances of becoming sick, and the same symptoms if they fall ill. That all seems a bit strange. It's more intuitive that the PC with more rads should become more ill.

EDIT: I missed something in the rules, as usual.

"Every time you gain a rad, you must immediately roll for STAMINA to resist radiation poisoning (see Diseases on the next page). The virulence of the disease is equal to +4 minus your total rad count." (p. 80)

So, someone with more permanent rads has greater odds of suffering symptoms of radiation poisoning.

The question below, however, still stands.

What happens when a PC reaches the maximum number of permanent rad points accommodated on the standard char-sheet (there are 10 boxes total) Death

It seems like something's missing, or maybe I'm just missing something.

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[Heffe]

New houserule proposal: Radiation Induced Cancer

Roll for the onset of cancer. Based upon the number of permanent rads the character has, they roll a corresponding die anytime they're exposed and gain a new permanent rad. On a roll of 3 or less, cancer has started growing somewhere on the players body.

If a character develops cancer, every month without treatment the player must subtract a die from an attribute of their choice. When the character has an attribute drop further than D, the character dies.

Permanent rads:
7 rads - 1d12
8 rads - 1d10
9 rads - 1d8
10 rads - 1d6

[Raellus]

New houserule proposal: Radiation Induced Cancer

Roll for the onset of cancer. Based upon the number of permanent rads the character has, they roll a corresponding die anytime they're exposed and gain a new permanent rad. On a roll of 3 or less, cancer has started growing somewhere on the players body.

If a character develops cancer, every month without treatment the player must subtract a die from an attribute of their choice. When the character has an attribute drop further than D, the character dies.

I like this idea. To make it a little less harsh, I think I'd modifying it so that the PC only starts rolling once they've accumulated more than 10 permanent rads.

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[Tegyrius]

The question below, however, still stands.

What happens when a PC reaches the maximum number of permanent rad points accommodated on the standard char-sheet (there are 10 boxes total) Death

It seems like something's missing, or maybe I'm just missing something.

It's not well-articulated at all, but radiation sickness' inclusion on the disease table on p.81 makes me think the design intent is for it to be treated as any other disease, albeit with a different method of "infection." Thus, if a character is suffering from radiation sickness, he's taking damage and is unable to heal damage, the same as any other disease - and he can die if incapacitated. A character with more permanent rads will be dealing with a more severe virulence modifier, and thus will find it harder to recover on his subsequent infection rolls.

- C.

[Raellus]

Languages

One area in which I think the 4e rules fall well short is how they handle languages. In 4e, it's pretty much all or nothing. You can either speak a language very well, or you can't speak it at all. The only wiggle room in the rules as written in the Nationality (Languages) subsection of the Character Creation chapter. It states (paraphrasing here) that everyone speaks a little English, and that Warsaw Pact personnel all speak a little Russian.

A PC can learn another language in the game by using skill points to take the Linguist Specialty. However, according to that rule, adding that specialty could conceivably take a PC from not being able to speak a lick of another language to being mistaken for a native speaker of it! That's simply not realistic.

INGUIST: You know another language of your choice, well enough to be taken as native on a successful PERSUASION roll. (p. 51 of the Player's Manual)

As anyone who's learned a second language can attest, it takes time to learn and build proficiency and fluency- sometimes years! I lived in South America for 6 years as a teenager and I still wouldn't consider myself fluent in Spanish.

In v2.2, at least, you could be a little proficient, or moderately so, or fluent, by allocating skill points to a second language. It was tricky (and pretty subjective) to determine how well a PC could speak another language in that ruleset because it wasn't really clearly explained what the numbers meant, but at least there were degrees of proficiency.

How have other 4e ref's dealt with second languages

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[Tegyrius]

I share your irritation.

My solution is to allow each PC one non-native language for each Empathy rank above D. They have limited vocabulary and can never pass as a native speaker, but they can hold a basic conversation. I've kept Linguist working as written. My table has been happy with that arrangement so far.

- C.

[Heffe]

Agreed here as well - the language system in 4e seems to have been pretty intentionally left simplified, and the version suffers for it.

I've had my crew be able to speak a smattering of Polish simply from osmosis in the default setting (by Ref fiat), and then linguist allows for additional languages as written. It's not great a great system though, especially when no one happened to get the linguist specialty on character creation. As a result, there are a fair number of Poles that speak English. :|

[Claidheamh]

Languages

I've been mulling how to deal with languages for the players in my forthcoming campaign as well. I'm considering a three tiered approach to languages:

- 1 rank - speaks a pidgin of the language, can generally make themselves understood, but no nuance and plenty of misunderstandings. -1 penalty for Persuasion checks, -2 for any sort of disguise or subterfuge.

- 2 ranks - speaks language well, but with noticeable accent and some malapropisms. -1 penalty if trying to disguise as a native speaker

- 3 ranks - equivalent of Linguist specialty, character speaks language like a native.

Since I'm also dabbling with some alternate character creation mechanics (around starting equipment), I'm going to roll this fluency into character creation. I hadn't thought about experience points and development, need to roll that around a little more.