One handed light guns become light pistols. Light pistols use clips of 10 rounds each. It takes a minor action to replace a clip.
Two handed light guns become assault rifles. Assault rifles use magazines of 10 rounds each. They actually have more than 10 bullets, but they are assumed to be fired in short bursts. It's still considered a single attack on a single target. It takes a minor action to replace a magazine.
One handed heavy guns become heavy pistols. Heavy pistols also use clips of 10 rounds.
Two handed heavy guns become shotguns. They are assumed to be using slugs or a small spread area, so that it's still one attack on one target. Shotguns hold 5 rounds but do not use clips or magazines. It takes a minor action to load a single new round into a shotgun.
Each of the four types of weapons uses different rounds.
What do you think?
Not to mention the game balance.
But if you like tracking such detailed minutae, go for it. While you're busy counting bullets, I'll finish a second encounter.
I expect you want people to track ammo for their non-gun ranged weapons too.
This way, you get the "I have 10 rounds of ammo" feature but you don't have to keep track of every type of bullet, rocket, arrow, bolt, shuriken, stone, coin, or whatnot during the game.
In my game, one of my players has one of those toy disc guns that was modified to shoot sharpened quarters. Quarters that he found in the parking meter club that he uses for melee.
In your system, how can you have a gun like that without going through the rigamarole of taking into account a player's imagination and it's effect on the game?
You can't. I don't suggest you go backwards and add that level of detail to your game, but instead just hand out a card that says "AMMO" on it (or poker chips, or M&Ms...well, then players would be eating their bullets...). Keep it generic but just allow for players to find ammo. They have ammo if it's recorded and they keep track of how much they're using so long as they have some way to represent their remaining stores.
I would go the card route. Just get a bunch of business card printer sheets, print "AMMO" 4 - 5 times on each one (40 - 50 ammo entries on a standard avery business card sheet), punch out the ammo cards, cut them into their individual ammo entries, and hand them out.
This will give a tactile feeling to the game, but it's going to slow combat down a bit as well as finding ammo (ancient junk table). Do they get 1? 2? 10? 50? Be prepared to do a lot of cutting, printing and handing out of ammo cards or waiting for players to write it down...then the'll forget to mark off their ammo. At least with the cards, you can physically take ammo from them as they use it.
One handed light guns become light pistols.
While I see what you are attempting, I don't see what renaming the categories accomplished. Your just as capable of saying "this category has this many shots and takes this long to reload" without renaming it needlessly.
While you're busy counting bullets, I'll finish a second encounter.
In 25+ years of gaming I've never seen a significant time savings from discarding or including ammunition rules. Seriously, how long does it take for somebody to mark one thing on their character sheet while the GM is handling other people's actions? Or for the GM to say "you find 30 bullets and 2 cannon shells with the loot" and then let the players fight over it while throwing down the map for the next encounter? That being said, I overall like the abstraction system in GW and wouldn't use the OPs, simply because one of my companions at the last game was firing cans of spam at the enemy (and at one desperate point, parts of a swarm PC that got to close) and that's just plain groovy.
they find extra ammo during an adventure or bargain for ammo in a settlement then they mark the extra ammo as in, ammo x2.
Now this is a system I can get behind. If the guy with the stale M&M firing shotgun finds a few bags in an old vending machine, it makes perfect sense he now can go full throttle for an extra encounter or so. Abstract recharges. And this wouldn't change anything happening during an encounter since the normal rules are applying there... It might even encourage people to pay attention to their environment more, looking for potential reloads.
I don't think tracking every round is that time consuming or a bad idea. go for it. I decided for a modified house rule on the abstract ammo rule. I have players track extra ammo abstractly, for example a player would have ammo x 1 on the gear sheet. If they conserve ammo and only shoot once an encounter they retain ammo. If they shoot more than once an encounter then they loose all thier ammo. If they find extra ammo during an adventure or bargain for ammo in a settlement then they mark the extra ammo as in, ammo x2. If a character is lucky they can stock up on ammo like, ammo x 3 or ammo x 4. A player knows for each extra ammo they have an encounter they can fire as often as they wish without having to worry about running out of ammo. Anyway we like the rule. I like the abstract rule, and feel the need to limit ammo in a post-apocolyptic settings. But sometimes it's fun to just blast mutant monsters with fire arms.
This could also work with the card system. "You found ammo!" (Imagine AOL's "You've Got Mail!" coming from an Android...heh) then you give the player an AMMO card.
Whenever that player fires his gun more than 1 time in an encounter, he gives up an ammo card. If he has more cards then he still has ammo, but you now have an easy way to represent ammo in the game that supports what sirkaikillah is talking about with the tactile feel of what I like to strive for in games.
The Ammo rules as written work just fine. If you want to count bullets & biscuits in your games, knock yourself out. As for me and my mutants, we'll use the RAW.
Yep each to his own. The wonderful thing about pen and paper Rpgs, is they are flexible and can be tweaked to fit the gaming needs of individual gaming groups.
I don't think tracking every round is that time consuming or a bad idea. go for it. I decided for a modified house rule on the abstract ammo rule. I have players track extra ammo abstractly, for example a player would have ammo x 1 on the gear sheet. If they conserve ammo and only shoot once an encounter they retain ammo. If they shoot more than once an encounter then they loose all thier ammo. If they find extra ammo during an adventure or bargain for ammo in a settlement then they mark the extra ammo as in, ammo x2. If a character is lucky they can stock up on ammo like, ammo x 3 or ammo x 4. A player knows for each extra ammo they have an encounter they can fire as often as they wish without having to worry about running out of ammo. Anyway we like the rule. I like the abstract rule, and feel the need to limit ammo in a post-apocolyptic settings. But sometimes it's fun to just blast mutant monsters with fire arms.
This could also work with the card system. "You found ammo!" (Imagine AOL's "You've Got Mail!" coming from an Android...heh) then you give the player an AMMO card.
Whenever that player fires his gun more than 1 time in an encounter, he gives up an ammo card. If he has more cards then he still has ammo, but you now have an easy way to represent ammo in the game that supports what sirkaikillah is talking about with the tactile feel of what I like to strive for in games.
Combining these two, how about each player with a gun has an AMMO Card, thar reads like
AMMO
Single Shot
Encounter
Free Action Personal
Effect: You may make a ranged basic attack or use a ranged attack power with the weapon keyword using a gun. Tap this card.
Special: If this card is tapped, you cannot make ranged basic attacks or use ranged attack powers with the weapon keyword using a gun.
Keep Firing!
Enconter
Free Action Personal
Effect: You may make ranged basic attacks or use ranged attack powers with the weapon keyword using guns until the end of the encounter. Tap this card, and turn over this card at the end of the encounter.
Special: You may use this power if this card is already tapped from using Single Shot.
On the back, the card would simply read
OUT OF AMMO
Effect: You cannot make ranged basic attacks or use ranged attack powers with the weapon keyword using a gun. Do not ready this card at the end of an encounter.
Special: Discard an EXTRA AMMO card to turn this card over and ready it.
Then, you could give out EXTRA AMMO cards as loot.
Tracking ammo is just fine if you want to do it. It's more worthwhile if you're dealing with equipment and wealth in a less abstract seat-of-the-pants way than the game expects. For instance, rounds of ammo could be a base unit of currency, along with Dark-Sun style 'survival days.' There, now you have a little resource-management for the PCs, and a vague basis for a post-apoclyptic economy.
The more you want to delve into dark, gritty, or (shudder) 'realistic,' the more stuff you can track. Healing surges, wounds, radiation and toxin exposure, disease, non-Omega expendables, fuel, medical suplies, etc, etc...
Tracking ammo is just fine if you want to do it. It's more worthwhile if you're dealing with equipment and wealth in a less abstract seat-of-the-pants way than the game expects. For instance, rounds of ammo could be a base unit of currency, along with Dark-Sun style 'survival days.' There, now you have a little resource-management for the PCs, and a vague basis for a post-apoclyptic economy.
The more you want to delve into dark, gritty, or (shudder) 'realistic,' the more stuff you can track. Healing surges, wounds, radiation and toxin exposure, disease, non-Omega expendables, fuel, medical suplies, etc, etc...
I have no desire to play GW gritty and realistic. I like the silly, humorous version of the game, it fits my personality. I do not want to play the resource management game either, but what I want is the opportunity for Pcs to go hog wild with guns, without the worry of running out of ammo, once and a while. The rules as RAW encouraged conservation of Ammo, one shot an encounter. I like the idea of conserving ammo in a post- apocolyptic world and the rule RAW works great at that, without having to track every round. But I want to encourage my players to horde ammo they find and the opportunity to use that ammo when they feel the need and have the ammo to let loose with the firearms. The change I make comes from the desire to give my players the opportunity to go in guns blazing once in a while, without suffering the consequences of runnning out of ammo for not being conservative at all times.
What do you think?
Rather than lambast you for wanting more gun options (which I honestly don't understand. I mean really people, plenty of people want to use GW as a serious post-apoc setting, why don't you go bother THEM if your so hung up on more guns) I will give you a constructive suggestion:
If you want solid, well-balanced 4E rules for guns, go buy a copy / order a pdf of Amethyst: Foundations. Amethyst is a fantastic resource for injecting technology into 4E games whether you are using the Amethyst setting or not. Not to mention the fact that the setting is a great read even if you arent using it.
Go grab a copy of Amethyst, and use what you want from it. No need to complicate things, AND you'll have something 'RAW' to give to your players too ;P
Well, you could just hand out a lot of ammo as rewards.
I could, but to me, Pc finding ammo everytime they us it up, by shooting more than once an encounter is lame. the rules RAW, when you find ammo and have not run out, by shooting more than once an encounter, it changes nothing. Finding ammo is only important if you shoot more than once an encounter. I don't like that. I think it would be more fun for our group to find ammo and stock up on it for that moment when they need to blast themselves out of a situation.
What do you think?
Rather than lambast you for wanting more gun options (which I honestly don't understand. I mean really people, plenty of people want to use GW as a serious post-apoc setting, why don't you go bother THEM if your so hung up on more guns) I will give you a constructive suggestion:
....
Really I don't want a more serious GW experience. I like the wacky GW, the wackyness is what really excites me about the game. But I do want more fun with gun play. I also want to impress on the players the importance of hording ammo in a post apocolyptic world (which the current rules really don't encourage). So my constructive criticm is to follow my suggestions posted above. I think they provide a simple alternative to the current ammo restrictions which really discourages gun use. If the above ideas do not work for you then try some other alternative.
Amethyst provides stats for specific guns, rules for heavy weapons like rocket launchers and plasma cannons, and rules for clips / reloading / ammunition.
The OP can pick and choose at his leisure, but what he described is essentially what Amethyst provides, with the addition of ammo types, which could of course just be removed if you didnt want to track it that carefully.
It works quite easilly with your suggested houserule, sirkaikillah. One simply assumes that 'You found an ammo box with a variety of stuff in it', and when you fire your guns, you used one up and threw out anything you couldn't use at the time.
I have been working on a setting that combines Gamma World, Fallout, The Postman, The City of Ember (a vault), Paranoia (a vault), and Loguns Run (a vault). Not all vaults are made by VaultTech. I enjoy resource management, and I am a simulationist (I want my fantasy to be internally consistent . . . with things like economies that players can interact with in meaningful ways).
To such ends I have the following system:
(1) Bullet [5 tv / 10 tv]: Ammunition is in high demand in the wasteland and is stamped by competing banks and serves as a near universal form of currency. Most bullets have a trade value of 5 in civilized areas, and 10 in uncivilized areas.
(2) Gold Coin [100 tv]: The same banks that manufacture bullets also mint gold coins that can be traded in at a bank for various amounts of bullets. A 20-Bullet Gold Coin is about the size of a dime.
(3) Food and Drink [30 tv a day for just about the cheapest food consisting of radiated water and radiation healing cave moss]: Preservatives keep food edible indefinitely.
(3a) Radiation free food and drink is especially valuable. Radiation free food sells for 10 trade value per meal (Cave Moss is an exception). A well that produces clean water could make a wastelander quite wealthy (10 trade value per meal).
(3b) A radiated meal of one food item and one drink item is worth 10 trade value (5 each), and causes four points of radiation damage (2 each, can not be healed normally).
(3c) Food and drink that heals radiation is in a high demand. Cave Fungus farms dot the landscape. Cave Fungus is a bad tasting, but nutritious, slimy moss that heals radiation. One unit of Cave Fungus heals 1-point of radiation damage and has a trade value of 1. Five units of cave moss make up the food portion of a meal. Preserved Cave Fungus looses half of its potency and has a trade value of 2 per unit of radiation healing. Radiation healed by most foods, such as Cave Moss, heal the radiation slowly over the course of a day.
(3d) Depending on the season fresh food can be more or less valuable than preserved food. Fresh food tastes better (and is more nutritious), while preserved food, depending on harvests, can be a good investment for the winter months.
(4) Medicine: Differing forms of medication are highly prized:
(4a) RadAway [20 tv] a liquid designed to be used, that removes 20+ Science (?) radiation. If imbibed it heals 20 radiation and causes 2d8 damage (save for half).
(4b) StimPack [20 tv] a syringe with miraculous sci-fi healing medicine that instantly removes 10+ Science (?) damage.
(5) VaultTech Ration Token [25 tv]: Each VaultTech Ration Token is good for a meal at a VaultTech vending machine. Each VaultDweller is awarded three VaultTech Ration Tokens per day.
Some vaults have immense warehouses buried deep within the earth that are maintained by computers and robots. VaulTech also has regional warehouses unassociated with a specific vault. While these warehouses are mainly stocked with radiation free food, other items of value are found within. These robots refill the Vualts vending machines and follow strict rationing guidelines.
The computers and robots running the warehouses see VaultTech Ration Tokens as valuable, and will often trade non-foodstuffs for them (some VaultTech warehouses ran by enterprising computers and robots have turned into thriving markets). VaultTech Ration Tokens are dispensed to insure the survival of a given vault. Often the tokens distributed are not enough to sustain a vault or the inhabitance of a vault, or additional foodstuffs are desired for bartering with outsiders, and as such are in high demand by vaultdwellers.
NucaCola Bottle Caps [1 tv for normal caps]: Computers and Robots keep NucaCola running. They make NucaCola, keep bottling plants running, service a fleet of vehicles, fill vending machines, trade for supplies, and work hard to ensure that its customers remain customers. NucaCola Bottle Caps may be traded into a NucaCola bottling plant for fabulous prizes. This can be done either by saving individual bottle caps, or finding an instant winner cap. One bottling plant has taken to enslaving primitive tribes (non-customers) and training them as household servants as one of the prizes to be won.
As bullets are a form of currency, a resource to be managed, I would prefer them to be counted.
In short they are as follows:
Ammo
As in GW you either have ammo or you haven't. You start with ammo for your gun. Whenever you roll 1 on the attack with this gun, you can choose to reroll the attack, but that means that you are out of ammo (kinda Gamma World ammo rules meet Dark Sun weapon breakage rules)
Rations, Overland travel and Barter
Party will have survival days which they need to spend to replenish their "movement points". Those survival days (food, shelter, water, other needed things) serve as currency.
(1) Bullet [5 tv / 10 tv]: Ammunition is in high demand in the wasteland and is stamped by competing banks and serves as a near universal form of currency. Most bullets have a trade value of 5 in civilized areas, and 10 in uncivilized areas.(2) Gold Coin [100 tv]: The same banks that manufacture bullets also mint gold coins that can be traded in at a bank for various amounts of bullets. A 20-Bullet Gold Coin is about the size of a dime.
Problem the first: You rate every bullet at equal value, which makes no sense whatsoever.
Relative value of different ammo aside (one can easily argue that a magnum bullet is worth more than a .22), there's the fact that different bullets require different amounts of actual material to make.
Just the slugs alone (not the powder or cases), a .22 weighs about 2 grams, and a 357 magnum is 8 grams. So you can make four 22 slugs from the same material as a single magnum... but they both have the same value? M-16 bullets are 4 grams, but use more brass for cases. AK-47 ammo weighs twice what M-16 ammo does.
The 50 caliber Desert Eagle? TWENTY ONE GRAM slugs.
As for gold coins... if they are dime sized, they will weigh 6.5688 grams. Now, if they're alloyed down to 22kt (which gold coins traditionally were, to increase durability), that brings the weight up to 7.1666 grams. Actual US dimes onyl weigh 2.268 grams
Gold is currently $45 a gram. This means a dime sized gold coin is worth over $295. Lets call it $300 for easy math.
So at this rate, 1 bullet is worth $15, and the barest minimum dirty water and moss diet costs $90 a day.
I think your scale is off. By a lot.
In my upcoming I campaign I'm going to use rules, I've found in this blog.
In short they are as follows:
Ammo
As in GW you either have ammo or you haven't. You start with ammo for your gun. Whenever you roll 1 on the attack with this gun, you can choose to reroll the attack, but that means that you are out of ammo (kinda Gamma World ammo rules meet Dark Sun weapon breakage rules)
...
Duuh, why didn't I think of that? It's propably the reason I play games and don't design them. Thanks I like that ammo rule.
The one problem, for me and it is small, is that it again makes finding ammo a boon only if you are out. I want players to get excited when they find ammo and want to horde it.
The only way you can run out of ammo is if you roll a 1 and CHOOSE to run out.
Not only does it make everyone significantly more powerful (why use a ranged weapon when a gun is better in every way AND also has unlimited ammo?), it makes tracking ammo pointless, because you'll never run out!
The real problem with that rule is that YOU NEVER RUN OUT OF AMMO.
The only way you can run out of ammo is if you roll a 1 and CHOOSE to run out.
Not only does it make everyone significantly more powerful (why use a ranged weapon when a gun is better in every way AND also has unlimited ammo?), it makes tracking ammo pointless, because you'll never run out!
That is another good point.
Problem the first: You rate every bullet at equal value, which makes no sense whatsoever. Relative value of different ammo aside (one can easily argue that a magnum bullet is worth more than a .22), there's the fact that different bullets require different amounts of actual material to make.Just the slugs alone (not the powder or cases), a .22 weighs about 2 grams, and a 357 magnum is 8 grams. So you can make four 22 slugs from the same material as a single magnum... but they both have the same value? M-16 bullets are 4 grams, but use more brass for cases. AK-47 ammo weighs twice what M-16 ammo does.
The 50 caliber Desert Eagle? TWENTY ONE GRAM slugs.
I said most. In my homebrew game document (not posted) I have 1/5/10 as the costs. I may change that. It is a draft. I enjoy the imagery of paying for a meal with two bullets more than ten so I think I will change it.
As for gold coins... if they are dime sized, they will weigh 6.5688 grams. Now, if they're alloyed down to 22kt (which gold coins traditionally were, to increase durability), that brings the weight up to 7.1666 grams. Actual US dimes onyl weigh 2.268 gramsGold is currently $45 a gram. This means a dime sized gold coin is worth over $295. Lets call it $300 for easy math.
So at this rate, 1 bullet is worth $15, and the barest minimum dirty water and moss diet costs $90 a day.
The value of gold fluctuates. Mark my words, we are currently in a gold bubble (it is not normal to have so many commercials for gold, nor is it normal to have so many cash for gold stores cluttering up the landscape).
I did not say gold was worth anything. It should be, I think I will make it have a value. However . . . the value posted in the document quoted said you can trade the *bank's* gold coin into that bank for bullets. A $20 bill will buy you X . . . but I can not take any paper and go buy X.
The gold coin could be something other than 100% gold. There are official trade rates and unofficial ones. Perhaps the banks skew the value in there favor, and have hired gunmen enforcing their monopoly (I think I will have at least one bank do this).
I think your scale is off. By a lot.
I find this amusing. The S&P 500 beat 75% of actively managed mutual funds from 2002-2007. 75% of mutual fund managers could not predict our economy . . . and you think you can predict a post apocalyptic wastelands economy?
It is hard to tell over the internet whether someone is trying to be helpful, or snarky. If your intent is to be helpful, than thank you.
Ammunition usage can be very controversial. Some people just don't want to track it. I have noticed that game groups I have played with have no issue with tracking ammunition. The one time I had a player that cheated about his supply, he was called out by the other players (he eventually quit the game). I have learned that tracking ammo is not a huge. Where I break from reality is when dealing with ammunition weight and the need for GMs to track reloading for his opponents.
Simply put, I never ask GMs to track the ammo usage of their opponents, and ammunition carried by players is weightless. A player wanting to carry 500,000 rounds may want a talking to but it's the one concession I am willing to give.
With Amethyst, I admit, we didn't make it easy. Weapons all have different capacities; we have different types of bullets with different prices. There are traditional bullets, railgun flechettes, caseless rounds, energy cells, electronically stacked projectiles, and mini-rockets. Clip capacities range from 5 to 500 with each pull of a trigger launching 1 to 10 rounds, depending on the power and the feats you have taken to conserve ammunition. What’s odd is that no one has ever complained about it. They know that a revolver has 5 shots and a Berretta has 15. Some of them enjoy have those options.
I found ammo usage to be a valuable game element. In my first module with the current Amethyst rules, a player entered a module with 500 rounds of ammunition. By the time the adventure was over, (three weeks later) he was empty, and spent the final encounters conserving ammunition by employing more frugal powers. It adds a realistic element to the game that neither he nor I minded.
Now, he's 10th level and carries more bullets than Cage's character in Lord of War.
(Oh, and thanks Chandrak.)
A 30 round clip of M16 ammo weighs a pound. 500 rounds is 17 clips.
That's a ton of weight... it's also bulky as hell.
Standard Army/Marine loadout for combat is only 7 clips.
BTW, what's the logic or in-game rationale behind Omega Tech possibly being depleted after every use? Is it b/c Omega Tech is unreliable & that every usage might end up w/ the tech item malfunctioning?
There isn't an explanation offered for why, just that Omega Tech might "deplete it's charge." Strangely enough they do explain why they're rare-ish and why they can't just be bought.
That it is old and unreliable is one possibility, I suppose. Could be because the PCs are clumsy primatives and aren't using them properly. The text itself doesn't say though, at least in the core book. It explains how Omega Tech can be salvaged by "fixing" it, and that's totally independent of the player's mechanics skill. The intergration of the trading card component is pretty contrived, but whatever.
Alternatively, there's a signature feature on this forum: you can just put all your damage there instead of filling every post with it manually.
All previous 6 editions of GW did not have abstract ammo rules so this version of GW is quite different in that way. I've never heard of Spirit of the Century but d20 Modern, the closest version to the new GW/D&D 4e, did require one to keep track of ammo.
While that is absolutely true, the game itself is substantially abstracted, in a way that allows narrative freedom to prevail over mechanics that don't necessarily make sense (virtually all editions of D&D and its derivatives) - the designers merely recognized it and used it to their advantage to allow more cinematic gameplay. Neither method (abstraction vs. representational) is better or worse, they are simply different.
As some people point out the current abstract ammo rules discourage players from choosing guns over bows/crossbows b/c you can only shoot once per encounter or risk losing all your ammo. This seems inherently illogical. Guns are more lethal than bows/crossbows. That's why modern armies use them & not the more primitive weapons.
Note that guns are more lethal than their counterparts here as well, which is why their use is artificially limited by the mechanics. You are also only forced to choose between the two at character creation: normal ranged weapons can be fashioned from nearly anything, and most humanoid creatures carry a gun or gun-equivalent.
There's something just strange to me that one has a gun but simply has no idea how much ammo one has for it. Or that any modern gun can only be fired once per encounter, that also seems bizarre.
Bear in mind that those neither of those need to be the case. You're reading more into the mechanics than you need to. This is not a representational game, so there is a greater onus on the player to generate the appropriate narrative, but this is not a drawback. When the player has ammo, he has enough ammunition for his weapon not to fire once but to make one meaningful basic attack against an enemy during a roughly 30-second skirmish, and he may or may not know exactly how much that is. Given the ridiculously close ranges at which most D&D-style encounters occur, even a trained soldier might only get off one good, clean shot before being rushed by angry mutant badgers with flails. Said soldier can fire off as many shots as he wants, strictly speaking, so long as he knows he'll have expended the bulk of it when the encounter is over. You simply work that into the narrative without saying "hey my character has exactly 32 rounds of 5.56 ammo." Again, there's nothing wrong with that playstyle, it simply wasn't part of Gamma World's design goals.
I'm not suggesting unlimited ammo or letting PCs find huge caches, but if ammo becomes a treasure in & of itself, then the hunt for ammo, esp. the right caliber, becomes an interesting part of the game and certainly would be part of any post-apocalypse setting. My experience has been that players did not find it hard to keep track of their own ammo nor did it consume a large amount of game time.
I agree that ammo-hunting is very much a post-apocalyptic theme. One of the primary goals of D&D4 was a further abstraction of the mechanics (or, more accurately, an acceptance of the already abstract nature of the mechanics), and Gamma World, designed for ease of play and maximum allowance for cinematic gameplay and communal narrative construction, even moreso.
BTW, what's the logic or in-game rationale behind Omega Tech possibly being depleted after every use? Is it b/c Omega Tech is unreliable & that every usage might end up w/ the tech item malfunctioning?
That's essentially it, yes, but as previously noted, the entire game is built around the concept of narrative freedom (see also: unspecified origin and weapon fluff), so you're free (nay, encouraged) to explain it however you'd like.
NPCs are under less constraints. An NPC opponent will usually only appear once in the scenario. Therefore, an NPC doesn't have to worry about not having ammo later on in the adventure or in future adventures, as PCs do. An NPC w/ a gun shooting at the PCs might as well shoot as many times as he or she can b/c after this encounter, they will either be dead or the PC will be dead or the NPC will run away & probably never re-appear again. Since most NPC opponents appear only in one encounter, if they have a gun, they might as well shoot multiple times. PCs, however, not wanting to run out of ammo & conserving for future encounters/scenarios, will want to shoot no more than once per encounter. This gives NPCs w/ firearms a significant advantage over PCs.
Morbid, could you please stick to being constructive on these forums, and refrain from inserting your personal CCG baggage into every single thread you post in?
If you do not agree with me or if my perspective brings you down simply don't read my posts. That has to be more constructive than requesting I suspend my own views and match your enthusiasm.
The ammo rules don't apply to NPCs/monsters -- and there are always differences between player stats and monster stats anyway in anything based on 4e D&D. Players and monsters aren't built the same way, and don't function the same way mechanically.
There's that and monsters with ammo have a fairly good reason not to conserve ammo. It won't do them much good if they die.
An NPC w/ a gun shooting at the PCs might as well shoot as many times as he or she can b/c after this encounter, they will either be dead or the PC will be dead
Lets take a look at monsters with guns. Out of the first book, there is only ONE monsters that has an at-will gun attack. The Dabber, doing 2d6+3.
This is on par with a light 2 handed NON-gun. It's also on par with other creatures using non-gun weapons at that level.
Every other creature... guns are an encounter power, recharge or otherwise limited.
Also, as mentioned, monsters get their numbers differently from players.
Lets take a look at monsters with guns. Out of the first book, there is only ONE monsters that has an at-will gun attack. The Dabber, doing 2d6+3.
This is on par with a light 2 handed NON-gun. It's also on par with other creatures using non-gun weapons at that level.
Every other creature... guns are an encounter power, recharge or otherwise limited.
The only other monster that I've seen with an at-will gun attack is the Klicky Looters from Trouble in Freesboro. They do 2d8.
2d8 is a heavy 2 handed Ranged weapon, so it's still not "gun level power"
light throw
one hand +3 1d8 r5
two hand +3 1d12 r10
light gun
one hand +4 1d8 r10
two hand +4 1d12 r20
gain a +1 to accuracy and +5 or +10 range to have a item that can run out of ammo.
heavy throw
one hand +2 1d10 r5
two hand +2 2d8 r10
heavy gun
one hand +2 2d6 r10
two hand +2 2d10 r20
gain +5 or +10 range, and +2 or +4 to your max damage by using an item that can run out of ammo.