Game mechanics which attribute to govern firearms

[bladamson]

My observations on handling firearms whilst growing up on the farm:

I'm of the opinion that both "manual dexterity" and "perception" come into play.  Probably perception moreso than dexterity.  It is much harder to shoot straight in low light situations when you can't focus on the sights well.  It's also interesting to note that most people shoot handguns more accurately with their _weak_ hand, probably because your muscles twitch more in your strong hand.

But IMO these statistics come to nil when compared to the actual skill of the shooter.  My father, who is getting rather old and can't see so well any more still routinely kills varmints shooting offhand at distances of 200 yards or more.  I could never do that even if I didn't drink so much coffee.

So I'd say go with a firearms stat or something.  It's hard to say really.

One big point that I'd like to make that hasn't been covered yet (and you didn't really ask for, but I'll tell ya anyway :) is that I feel that the damage caused by a firearm (and I will extend this to such things as melee weapons as well, though I have no experience with such things) is _directly_ linked to one's skill and has _very_ little to do with with the relative stopping power of a particular cartridge.  It all depends on how vital a spot you hit something in.  Sure, it would be pretty hard to kill a mutant super-bear with a .22, but if you consider any centerfire rifle or handgun cartridge, I think it holds.  It always irritates me to no end when I open up a firearms sourcebook and see such wide variances in damage values.

But that's all probably more detail than you want to go into. :)

[ZeOtter]

I want to thank everyone who has posted to this thread, you have really got me thinking in new directions, which is exactly what I was hoping for.  I think I have found a mechanic I am happy with and will talk about it as soon as I think it is polished enough.  

I have had a really hard time trying to get my game off the ground, I sometimes have a hard time motivating myself.  I don't have anyone to game with at the moment that I can talk game creation ideas with.  I moved in July to Yucaipa and cannot find a game store anywhere in California's inland empire that hasn't closed down.

I have been driving my wife nuts and my non-gaming friends nuts talking about the ideas I have for this game.

So The Forge as become my refuge, and I really appericate each of you for taking the time to read and repond to my posts, as vague as they are.

Happy birthday, and thank God(s) for you The Forge  =)

[Bob McNamee]

If you need a gaming fix, or get your game ready to playtest. THere is a whole group of folks from the Forge and such that meet for gaming over the internet.
We meet at Yahoo Group #indie-netgaming
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/indie-netgaming/

Feel free to stop by,

[bladamson]

If you need a gaming fix, or get your game ready to playtest. THere is a whole group of folks from the Forge and such that meet for gaming over the internet.
We meet at Yahoo Group #indie-netgaming
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/indie-netgaming/

Ah ha.  I was going to ask about that if it didn't come up at some point...

But unfortunately I'm a FSF-supporting wierdo using a Power Macintosh 8500 running Debian Gnu/Linux.  Meaning the blackdown java2 SDK won't run on the powerpc.  Meaning I can't run the chat applet.

I don't suppose there is any way to get into the thing with IRC?  Maybe I can coax this junky old PC into working again...

[Bob McNamee]

I forget who is running Mac and Linux in our group...That Chat java thingy on Magicstar doesn't seem to work for anybody.
Nathan? is it Raven who runs the Mac?

[Mike Holmes]

It is I who am the Macuser, Bob.

And the chat he's talking about is the Yahoo one. Which we don't use at all. We play by all sorts of different media, but not using the Yahoo chat, for various reasons (one of which is that it sucks).

We mostly play via IRC and PBEM. I even have one game that we're doing by Wiki. So stop on by, and check it out. Your setup won't hinder you in the least.

Mike