The Universal Weapon Construction System

[Hotfoot]

Okay, so weapons in RPGs have been bothering me a lot lately. All too often, things get fucked up no matter what game system you look at. Silencers which perfectly make guns perfectly silent, Low Light, Infrared, and Thermal, all being separate options, and the list goes on.

Add to this some of the mixed messages designers get in terms of reality and game design.

So I got to thinking, instead of having huge lists of weapons in every game, why not break things down into a more sensible fashion: Weapons are broken down into the type of ammunition they fire, the size of the weapon, and the general quality thereof. From that, you have a list of various modifications, upgrades, special ammo, and so forth that players and GMs alike can use to modify weapons to tailor-match player specifications.

Baseline examples could be given, to satisfy the table-loving crowd, but making custom firearms with tons of options would be a snap. In fact, this sort of a system could easily be extendable to almost any modern or science fiction styled setting.

Thoughts?

[frigidmagi]

I think it should be a requirement that if you want to stat weapons, you should have fucking fired them first!

[Hotfoot]

Well then, I suppose I should get started, since I've fired everything from .22 rimfire to 30.06 and .50 cal (pistol). Admittedly I'm a bit lacking in terms of automatic fire weapons and very heavy rounds for the rifle, but I hope I can squeak by there.

Anyway, the focus would be less on the damage, and more on the other miscellaneous things that players like to pay attention to. Since damage would be a focus of the round fired more than anything, you'd first want to set up the available rounds.

Now, the way I see it, you should set it up like this:

Light Pistol
Heavy Pistol
Light Rifle
Heavy Rifle
Light Shotgun
Heavy Shotgun

That should do it for all small arms. Most everything a variation of these six rounds, with some obvious exceptions (P90/MP7, Lite .50, etc)

Light rounds offer less weight, reduced kick and climb, and overall better control. Heavy rounds offer higher damage, longer range (usually), and just better killing overall.

Are there other rounds? Sure, but they're less commonly used. In most games I've played, the ultralight rounds are nearly never used by anybody, save maybe common street thugs that are there to make a player feel awesome. The hell with that.

From there, you choose your frame:

Compact Handgun
Handgun
Compact SMG
Submachinegun
Compact Rifle
Rifle

It's a fairly straightforward scale, stopping just shy of the Barret .50. You can put a heavier round in a lighter frame, but there are often severe complications when you choose to do so. Conversely, there are benefits to putting a lighter round in a heavier frame. Range is modified by the frame, but also by factors such as what barrel you use, etc.

More to come. Thoughts so far?

[frigidmagi]

Shouldn't you have a difference for bolt action, semi auto and full auto rifles?

And pump and auto shotguns?

[Hotfoot]

Yes, that was my next bit. In fact, here are the remaining lists I have so far, complete with design notes:

Barrel
Match Grade (Sniper)
Heavy (Machine Gun)
Compact (Carbine/Holdout)
Standard

Fire Type
Bolt Action
Lever/Pump Action (Combine with above?)
Semi-Auto
Burst Fire
Light Auto
Heavy Auto

Ammo Feed
Standard
Bullpup
Belt-Fed
Top-fed
Extended Mag (Upgrade?)


Stats: Determined by
Damage Round, Barrel
Heat Fire Type, Barrel
Range Round, Barrel
Accuracy Barrel, Fire Type
Weight Frame, Ammo Feed, Barrel

Still working out options, but I'll probably break them down to things that give discrete bonuses to combat to those that don't.

[frigidmagi]

You could maybe combine burst with light auto.

[Hotfoot]

Sounds good, mechanically it would be basically similar. Any other thoughts?

[Hotfoot]

Derived statistics

Weight
Concealability
Kick
Reliability


Other statistics
Accuracy
Range


Kick is going to be one of those things where I'm sort of hashing out a mechanic that should be in many games but isn't. Kick is a combination of how big the round is versus how big the frame is, with a bit tacked on for how many are being shot at once.

The plan currently is to set the number as a threshold, with various things reducing the threshold. If you don't beat the threshold, something bad happens to the shooter.

Frame size will offset kick, as will bipods, tripods, and other such things. The minimum you can reduce kick to is 1, thus allowing fumbles.

[frigidmagi]

Kick should be called recoil and various models have different means of dealing with it. Dealing with recoil for example is one thing that the M16-A2 does really well, one reason why it is more accurate then a AK-47 over a longer distance.

Round size should really be reflected in damage. A .50 cal round does insanely more damage then 5.56 or 7.62 rounds.

[Hotfoot]

True, and that is going to be one of the various modifications available for guns, various methods for dealing with recoil. Of course, the M-16 does have slightly less to deal with in the first place.

And yeah, round size = damage, pretty seriously. I wasn't going to include superheavy rounds to start, but I might as well I suppose.

[frigidmagi]

It occurs to me this will get rather complex.

[Hotfoot]

Modestly so, but it will ultimately be scalable.

Besides, you really don't want to see the other project like this that's been published. They make you calc out powder charges, bullet size/mass, and a bunch of other shit.