Fields of Fire: New and Improved

SR3 Fields of Fire Update

>>>>>[Fields of Fire was one of the most useful books for any Shadowrun Campaign. Originally FASA did not include any of the rules presented in the book in the new third edition rule book, nor did they give us any suggestions as to how they should be converted until Cannon Companion came out. Here are my house rules, that are now obsolete. ]<<<<<

Covering/Suppression Fire

When a character is making a ranged attack with a firearm, he or she has the option to provide covering or suppression fire. This means simply that the character is directing his or her fire into an area to force his or her opponents to keep their heads down for fear of being shot.

Each round fired can effectively cover a 1-meter area for a limited time in the combat turn. Multiple rounds may be targeted into an area to increase the chances of a hit. All areas covered by covering fire must be directly adjecent to each other.

Covering/suppression fire lasts until the next Combat Phase of the character making the attack. If the character has no more combat phases in that Combat Turn, the covering or suppression fire will last until the end of the next initiative pass.

If during that time, any target crosses or exposes themselves to the fire zone they might be hit. A Ranged Attack test is resolved against the potential target using a number of dice equal to the number of rounds fired, plus any dice allocated from the attacking character’s firearm related skill that he or she wishes to add. However, the character just gets his or her base skill rating to allocate among any number of targets that may present themselves. Combat pool may be added up to the number of skill dice add. The Target Number equals a base of 4 modified only by cover and any damage modifier the attacker must add. Every 2 successes generated results in 1 round striking the target, up to a maximum of the number of rounds fired into the area.

Damage is resolved normally using the number of successes generated from the initial ranged attack test to determine the overall number of successes for damage purposes. However the attacker can not use the successes to stage damage up. Any character hit and suffers a wound during suppression fire loses their actions for that Combat Phase.

As an option, the Game Master may require character’s to pass a Willpower Test to move or attempt to act in an area covered by suppression fire. The Base Target Number should be equal to the number of rounds being fired into the area and modified by any damage modifier that the character has.

Example:

Two members of the Danzig’s Raiders gang have set up a make shift machine gun nest with a stolen Ingram Valiant. Reaver is attempting to get past the nest and throw a nasty satchel charge into their building, but to do so he has to cross 20 meters of open terrain!

Initiative is rolled. The gang members get an 11 and 7. Reaver rolls and manages to get a 12. Reaver starts the turn by dashing to a nearby wreck of a car. He takes a pot shot at one of the gangers and misses! On 11, the gang member with the light machine gun decides to uses suppression fire to cover the distance between the car that Reaver is hiding behind and the next closet car which is 4 meters away! The gang member allocates 4 rounds to the first meter between the cars, and 3 to each meter area after that, effectively covering 3 of the 4 meters. On 7 the other gang member covers the other side of the car with his submachine gun allocating all 10 rounds to the area just in front of the car. Poor Reaver is effectively trapped behind the car, until other gang members arrive or they run out of ammo.

On the 2^nd Initiative Pass, Reaver decides to dash to the next car. Unfortunately by doing this his exposes himself to at least 3 meters worth of fire! The gang member having only a heavy weapon skill of 3 allocates 1 die to each meter with 1 extra combat pool to each meter, for a grand total of 2 additional dice to roll. As Reaver runs out of his hiding place, the gang member rolls 4 dice for the number of rounds and 2 extra dice for his skill and combat pool allocations for a total of 6 dice. The target number is 4. The gang member only rolled 3 successes, indicating that only a single round struck Reaver. Reaver must now resist

Layered Armor Degradation

It is a fact of combat that armor degrades, regardless of how many layers of protection you are wearing. As with normal armor degradation, every time a character takes a moderate wound or greater from an attack his or her armor degrades. The outside piece of armor loses 1 point for every multiple of the total amount of armor protection that the power rating of the attack equals or exceeds. The power of the attack is then reduced by the armor protection and compared to the secondary piece of armor to determine degradation.

Example:

Jim just happens to be wearing his trusty armored jacket (Rating 5/3) and a Vest with plates (4/3). His total armor protection is 7/4, a nice total! Feeling confident, he decides to say no to the gangers who want to give him some magic beans for his cool Euro Westwind 2000. Needless to say a firefight ensues.

One of the gangers is caring a T-250 shot gun and manages to wound Jim for a moderate wound. The power on the shotgun is 10S. Since 10 is greater than 7, his armor jacket degrades 1 point. The Jacket now has a rating of 4/3. We then compare the power of the attack minus the total armor protection. 10 minus 7 is 3. Since 3 is not greater than the vest’s protection of 4, his armor does not degrade any further. Jim now has 6/3 armor protection.

Example 2:

Reaver is wearing the typical long coat (4/3) and a vest (2/1) for a total armor value of 5/3. His GM wonders why he doesn’t buy an armored jacket, but Reaver claims that he wants to look like a typical shadowrunner.

Reaver is attacked by some yakuza agents armed with SMGs. One of them manages to hit Reaver with a burst doing a base damage of 10S. Fortunately Reaver stages it down to just a moderate, but now he has to deal with armor degradation. Since the power of the attack is two times greater than his total armor, Reaver loses 2 points of ballistic protection from his long coat. Its new rating is 2/3! The original total protection value is subtracted from the power of attack (10-5=5) and compared to the vest’s protection value of 2. Sadly the vest loses all its ballistic protection. Reaver’s new armor rating is now 2/2. He would have come out better with just an armored jacket!

Second Weapon In Melee Combat

Sometimes a character may want to learn combat techniques that allow them to effectively use two melee weapons in combat. The character must first acquire a special skill that represents the use of both weapons. Examples are Rapier and Dagger, Katana and Wakizashi, and so on. The second weapon must be physically smaller and lighter than the dominate weapon, unless they are both small weapons (reach 0) such as daggers or knives and both weapons must be one handed weapons.

When the character attacks with both weapons he or she will roll the special two-weapon use skill as a complementary skill. Every two successes from the complementary tests adds one success to the overall attack success test. The special skill in no way affects the amount of combat pool that may be added.

If the character has specialized in both weapons that he or she is using to attack with, the overall levels are averaged together. Bioware, such as Enhanced Articulation and Reflex Recorders, which grants bonuses based on active skills can only be applied once to either the attack roll or the complementary skill roll.

Damage is resolved using the average of the Power of the two melee weapons involved. If one weapon has a higher Damage Level than the other one does, subtract 1 level from the higher Damage Level and use the result as the Damage.

Example

Shakespeare has finally tracked down the Yakuza adept responsible for the death of his brother. Shakespeare is armed with a Katana and a Wakizashi. The character has an Edged Weapons skill of 8 and a special skill Katana & Wakizashi of 4. Shakespeare attacks, and rolls his complementary skill first. The base target number is 4, since both combatants are armed with Reach 1 weapons. Shakespeare gets 15, 5, 3 and 1 on his roll. Since the Target Number was a 4, he has two successes with his complementary skill. This adds one extra success to his total. Now he rolls his Edged Weapons Skill. Shakespeare decides to use most of his combat pool and throws in 6 dice for a total of 14. On his attack roll he gets only 7 successes. The extra success from his special skill gives him a net total of 8. The adept rolls his attack dice and combat pool, and only gets 6 net successes. Shakespeare wins the combat round with a total of 2 net successes.

Shakespeare has a Strength of 7. His Katana would do 10M, and his Wakizashi would do 8M. The average of the two Power Ratings would be 9M. With two successes the Damage Level is raised to 9S. The Yakuza adept will not be feeling too good after this.

Last Updated 11.21.2000