So,

The week before last I attended a UK army firing day, it's part of the officer training, cadets are shown live firing exercises on a weapon by weapon basis and on a joint task force basis to familiarise themselves with their future tools.  I think the intent may be to give them some respect for the ordnance before letting them loose with live firing training directly.

We saw snipers, small arms combined fire, helicopter gunships, aerial bombing raids, mortar fire and a variety of ground to ground missile fire and tank weaponry.

It was all very impressive, rather intimidating given the sheer impact but impressive.  A tank by the way when firing gives so much backpressure that even wearing ear protective muffs and in-ear sound dampeners it is bloody loud - plus it makes your intestines vibrate from the force.

Anyway, more on that later, as it is quite relevant to gaming with modern weaponry, but what struck me was that few contemporary rpgs really reflect this stuff at all well.  By well I don't necessarily mean detailed rules, just rules that reflect even in a descriptive way how this stuff works.

And autofire and burst fire, the latter being the normal mode for most rifles these days in rpgs as best I can tell, are complex and a pain to administer.

So, are there exceptions?  What games get right the feeling of modern military hardware?  Anyone any thoughts?

I've often considered what you're talking about here, especially when I've played with idiots who thought their characters could fire two Desert Eagle 50 cals - one in each hand - with any degree of accuracy.

That being said, I don't know of too many games that handled this sort of thing well. Maybe Twilight 2000?

I've always heard that Phoenix Command was a real stickler for realism, but I've never played it.

T-Willard has a lot of nice things to say about the Blood & Guts series of d20 supplements from RPGOBJECTS, but I don't have any experience with them. I know one of the RPGOBJECTS guys hang out here. Maybe he can offer some advice?

I don't have any actual experience with firearms, but my brother has, and we've talked a lot about the topic relating to RPGs

My brother says that full realism is not going to happen. Having said this, hes quite happy with BRP and WoD systems. He says that, if the GM really takes into account environmental modifiers (light, smoke, and the like, that many GMs ignore), they are verisimile (sp?) enough.

Generally speaking, he thinks that, the most a systems boasts about its realism, the most chances are that the system is actually a crock of shit.

You're probably right, Imperator.
I'm not the biggest stickler for that sort of thing, I just try to draw the line at egregiously stupid.
Oh, and if ever you end up in my neck of America, look me up. We'll go out to the firing range for a baptism by gunpowder.

I'm cool with that

I'm not a big fan of firearms, but I am not specially against them. My interest in them comes only from gaming, but having a brother in the marines (he served for 8 years, and now is bodyguard to a Basque politician) is quite useful

Quote from: ImperatorI'm cool with that

I'm not a big fan of firearms, but I am not specially against them. My interest in them comes only from gaming, but having a brother in the marines (he served for 8 years, and now is bodyguard to a Basque politician) is quite useful

I'm no gunbunny myself, but I enjoy shooting them on occasion.

Classic unisystem does modern firearms remarkably well.  First, they do a lot of damage - a direct hit from a shotgun or high caliber rifle can and will drop regular people.  There's optional rules to keep your head when being fired upon, and checks when you're actually hit to do something other than lay there screaming.  With a semi-auto weapon you can fire as many times as you like, with a -1 on each shot to reflect recoil.  Empty the clip in a round if you like.  With burst fire, each success, rather than adding onto the base damage indicates another round hit.

Opening up on a PC with a full auto weapon is a bad, bad deal.  The idea is - don't get shot .

Quote from: mattormegI'm no gunbunny myself, but I enjoy shooting them on occasion.

Oh, I'm sure of that But weapons law here in Spain is a world of difference with the US, AFAIK. We have our gunbunnies here, but they usually are (a) policemen/military or (b) hunters. Just that. The idea of having a weapon at home is quite strange outside of these cases.

Quote from: mattormegI've played with idiots who thought their characters could fire two Desert Eagle 50 cals - one in each hand - with any degree of accuracy.

Just for the record, I'm the kind of idiot GM that let's players do shit like that.  Not that I'm morally opposed to realistic gun rules, it's just that I'm more interested in emulating action movies rather than actual gunfire conditions.

Quote from: jrientsJust for the record, I'm the kind of idiot GM that let's players do shit like that.  Not that I'm morally opposed to realistic gun rules, it's just that I'm more interested in emulating action movies rather than actual gunfire conditions.

For me, It depends on the game. I was running a gritty special ops game...at least, I was trying to. Everyone had carefully constructed military backgrounds and weapon specialties, and then this idiot comes up and wants to play a guy who carries a katana into combat and wants to be called "Wolf".

What a 'tard.

Quote from: MaddmanClassic unisystem does modern firearms remarkably well.  First, they do a lot of damage - a direct hit from a shotgun or high caliber rifle can and will drop regular people.  There's optional rules to keep your head when being fired upon, and checks when you're actually hit to do something other than lay there screaming.  With a semi-auto weapon you can fire as many times as you like, with a -1 on each shot to reflect recoil.  Empty the clip in a round if you like.  With burst fire, each success, rather than adding onto the base damage indicates another round hit.

Opening up on a PC with a full auto weapon is a bad, bad deal.  The idea is - don't get shot .

Forgot about Unisystem. You're very much correct.

Quote from: mattormegFor me, It depends on the game. I was running a gritty special ops game...at least, I was trying to. Everyone had carefully constructed military backgrounds and weapon specialties, and then this idiot comes up and wants to play a guy who carries a katana into combat and wants to be called "Wolf".

What a 'tard.

I have only met one player like that in my whole life. We laughed so much that he never came back with such an idiotic concept again After laughing, we asked him something like:

'Dude, do you know of any special unit of the army who carries fucking swords to battle? And why do you think is that way?

To be honest, I don't really want Phoenix Command levels of complexity nor do I think it particularly necessary.

That's the problem, almost any rpg aiming for reflecting the real world in military stuff goes way complex, but realism is an impossible goal.  What is needed is verisimilitude.  Verisimilitude can be fairly simple.

So, Phoenix Command, Unisystem (though do you roll for each bullet fired in burst or autofire mode?  That seems a bit odd to me), I'd be surprised if D20 handled it well but it's not impossible.  But is that it?

The point here isn't being into guns, I'm not, it's where one goes if one wants a modern day system with a sense of verisimilitude which doesn't require mastering a thousand charts to resolve each shot.

Quote from: BalbinusSo, Phoenix Command, Unisystem (though do you roll for each bullet fired in burst or autofire mode?  That seems a bit odd to me), I'd be surprised if D20 handled it well but it's not impossible.  But is that it?

GURPS isn't all that bad. Definitely enough damage, armor piercing isn't done badly, either. Interlock can get chart-heavy. Small charts, though

Kult had lots of gun pictures

I have experience with everything from revolvers to machine guns and rockets (including silenced sub-machine guns and assault rifles). This is because I was in the army (plus some experience) and not because I am a firearms wizard who is an expert on guns. I think GURPS does a decent job.

The thing I like about GURPS is how the damage done by weapon varies widely--assault rifles are far more likely to produce a pile of bodies than a 9mm. However: this isn't "realism," it's "meeting my expectations" (or maybe "versimilitude"). I've read some of the gun-porn about stopping power and the arguments about various bullet types and the vicious back-and-forth debate and I have no idea how the physical qualities of a bullet relate to mortality in more than a general sense.

So I like GURPS which, to me, conveys that "decent sense" more than Hero which seemed (at least Hero 3rd) a bit flat (a karate chop, .44, and assault rifle all do about 2d6 KA).

Also things like Snap Shot that force you to aim (but really just force so high a weapon skill that you don't have to aim, IIRC) are pretty good. Finally, having done combined-arms live-fire exercises (CALFX), I think that the psychological element of combat is:
(a) under-represented in games
(b) might not be so fun to do with rules unless they were really, really good*

-Marco
* and by "good" I, of course, mean meeting my arbitrary standard.