Quote from: jibbajibbaI understand what you mean about atacks of opportunity. In fact this system introduces a degree of meta game where you are trying to out think your opponent (we added feints and the like into the system as hard rules but got rather too complex). The fact that melee blows to the body and head could kill meant that these were the areas people defended which meant that blows to the arms and legs were actually easier to succeed with and so from a round about position you actaully endeded with melee combat fits focusing here.

My only concern, coming from playing with those old Lost Worlds books, is that it becomes more a matter of out-guessing an opponent than out-thinking an opponent.  Basically, I'm concerned about it playing out like the battle of wits between Vizzini and the Man in Black in The Princess Bride when trying to figure out which hit location to attack or defend:

   Man in black:  [turning his back, and adding the poison to one of the goblets] Alright, where is the poison?  The battle of wits has begun. It ends when you decide and we both drink - and find out who is right, and who is dead.
Vizzini:  But it's so simple.  All I have to do is divine it from what I know of you.  Are you the sort of man who would put the poison into his own goblet or his enemy's?  Now, a clever man would put the poison into his own goblet because he would know that only a great fool would reach for what he was given.  I am not a great fool so I can clearly not choose the wine in front of you...But you must have known I was not a great fool; you would have counted on it, so I can clearly not choose the wine in front of me.
Man in black:  You've made your decision then?
Vizzini:  [happily] Not remotely!  Because Iocaine comes from Australia.  As everyone knows, Australia is entirely peopled with criminals.  And criminals are used to having people not trust them, as you are not trusted by me.  So, I can clearly not choose the wine in front of you.
Man in black:  Truly, you have a dizzying intellect.
Vizzini:  Wait 'till I get going!!  ...where was I?
Man in black:  Australia.
Vizzini:  Yes! Australia!  And you must have suspected I would have known the powder's origin, so I can clearly not choose the wine in front of me.
Man in black:  You're just stalling now.
Vizzini:  You'd like to think that, wouldn't you!  You've beaten my giant, which means you're exceptionally strong...so you could have put the poison in your own goblet trusting on your strength to save you, so I can clearly not choose the wine in front of you.  But, you've also bested my Spaniard, which means you must have studied...and in studying you must have learned that man is mortal so you would have put the poison as far from yourself as possible, so I can clearly not choose the wine in front of me!
Man in black:  You're trying to trick me into giving away something. It won't work.
Vizzini:  It has worked!  You've given everything away!  I know where the poison is![/i]

Basically, this isn't really a challenge of wits.  It's a challenge of guesses and, ultimately tricks.

Quote from: jibbajibbaI know what you mean about ranged combat as well. But generally a trained even half trained shooter can hit a target the size of a football from 10 yards nearly all of the time. The problem in combat isn't accuracy its nerves.

If the target is moving?  If the shooter is moving?  From what I've been able to tell, movement and aiming make huge differences.  You can even see that in action in the combat video games where you have to shoot zombies or whatever attacking you.  When they are moving around rapidly, it's hard to get a lock on them but once they come straight at you or stop moving, they're pretty easy to hit.  One figure I heard is that it takes 3 seconds for a person to take aim on a moving target (used as a rule for how long a person should stay in the open before finding cover when moving from cover to cover).  So what I've done is taken a good basic chance to hit assuming both shooter and target are not moving, modified down by the shooter moving or the target moving and then modified up by taking time to aim.

Quote from: jibbajibbaThis is something else that doesn't feature in enough games really the fact that in a gun fight most people are bricking themselves. It seems less true of melee combat I guess because you are in a sense engaged unlike in a firefight where a shot from an unknown assailant can kill you outright without you ever even seeing the guy.

Moralle and coolness are huge factors in real combat, which is why most war games have moralle or coolness checks and have units involuntarily break if they fail a moralle check.  Most normal people don't want to die and will run or hide if they think they are going to die.

Quote from: jibbajibbaWe have played with all sorts of 'coolness under fire' rules but never came up with anything that worked very well and so just assumed that all our heroes would be immune to such concerns. In reality its probably the single most important aspect.

You might find this article interestings.

Quote from: John MorrowIf the target is moving?  If the shooter is moving?  From what I've been able to tell, movement and aiming make huge differences.  You can even see that in action in the combat video games where you have to shoot zombies or whatever attacking you.  When they are moving around rapidly, it's hard to get a lock on them but once they come straight at you or stop moving, they're pretty easy to hit.  One figure I heard is that it takes 3 seconds for a person to take aim on a moving target (used as a rule for how long a person should stay in the open before finding cover when moving from cover to cover).  So what I've done is taken a good basic chance to hit assuming both shooter and target are not moving, modified down by the shooter moving or the target moving and then modified up by taking time to aim.



Moralle and coolness are huge factors in real combat, which is why most war games have moralle or coolness checks and have units involuntarily break if they fail a moralle check.  Most normal people don't want to die and will run or hide if they think they are going to die.



You might find this article interestings.

Totally agree with moving. What I am saying is we start with a "you can't miss his head if it doesn't move" option then we add modifiers for movement etc. The tricky bit is do you add variable modifiers depending on skill or do you have a sjkill stat but ignore it for static shooting etc.
Most games elect to have a skill or a target value modified by skills and experience. You have 50% in pistol or you need a 13 to hit a target. In reality shooting a static target in the weapon's short range with a targeting device and the change to hit should be close to 100%. Proof of this - I watched a show on telly where a British journalist investigated the phenomena of game hunting in South Africa where you can shoot say a lion if you like and can afford it (the animals are bred just for this 'sport'). In the example a city girl from the US trained for a day with a x-bow and then shot an impala from about 15 yards. She managed a one shot kill hitting the target sweet-spot which is about the size of a coffe cup lid. The organisers said that it was very very rare that anyone missed and if they did it was just panic.
Obviously hitting an impala while its running or hitting an impala while its running from a moving jeep would be a whole different proposition.

The question in game design terms is 'do we base our chance to hit on a standard static condition or do we treat that as the exception and just give that condition a huge bonus and base our chance to hit on some vaguer not defined combat situation with a degree of movement and nerves etc incorporated into it?' Not a simple one to answer

I think it depends heavily on what game your playing. In Icar, if you have cyberware, you're skull-crushingly lethal up close without any kind weapon but then if you're a squishy human with a piece of multi-barrelled obscenity:



then you're going to cause a lot of grief at range. In fact, being a long way from your target is normally advisable. This does make Icar lethal but with body upgrades, you can shy off damage a lot easier.