Guns are only weapon you need in modern RPG setting?

[ahenobarbi]

I remember reading an article (blog post?) saying that guns are only weapon you need in modern RPG settings. I'd like to re-read it bu I can't find it, could you help?

[Hylas]

But then how do you kill vampires and ninjas?

[ahenobarbi]

That's one of things I want to check

Well I World of Darkness you can use sodium bullets to deal aggrevated damage to vampires IIRC. I don't know about ninjas.

[NikitaDarkstar]

Knives don't need to be reloaded. :p

[Yora]

You also need knives. You always need knives in any setting. Since the moment humans thought about improving a rock or a stick, knives have been around and almost every person alive ever since would have access to one. I would say that more people have been killed and injured by knives than all other weapons combined (excluding rocks and sticks).

[Water_Bear]

Well, there's a reason modern soldiers don't carry anything stabbier than a utility knife; in terms of killing people ASAP the gun is just an awesome weapon. Heck, with rubber bullets, maloderant/tear gas bullets and the XREP (mini-Tasers which shoot out of shotguns) you can even do a passable job not killing people with a gun. So, yeah, the rules should probably reflect that in any simulationist RPG.

And a cite on the sodium bullets? I know incendiary bullets in nWoD would work (though the Armory book berates you for thinking about using anything cool), and Old WoD was pretty wild west, but sodium bullets?

[Kelb_Panthera]

That idea only holds if the only thing modern about your setting is the technology level.

Throughout large portions of europe and even larger portions of asia the difficulty in aquiring and the consequences for having fire-arms are so overwhelming that even organized crime syndicates only pass them out to high-level agents for very important events.

You don't give guns to minions that are cheaper to replace than the guns.

[Kalmarvho]

What about knives and FYST though? Handguns and long guns are pretty important, but you can't open a tin of baked beans with a rifle. Unless you want beans all over you.

[Morty]

I'm not sure where you heard about sodium bullets in the World of Darkness, but it doesn't work.
Anyway, it's the answer to this question obvious? We live in a modern setting, after all. Firearms are strictly superior to melee weapons in terms of making people and things die. However, people still use the latter for a variety of reasons.

[Jerthanis]

Heck, above and beyond the consequences or rarity of guns on a strategic level, what about situations where weaponry is restricted for other reasons? What if the Predator scares you into firing all your ammo blind into the jungle, and have to make makeshift traps or improvise bows? What if you've just been knocked into the water and your bullets are soaked? What if your path is blocked by a bullet resistant piece of glass and you're trying to undermine its structural integrity enough with a metal baseball bat before you can get through it? What if you're on a plane and no one can fire without risking depressurization? What if you're trying to make no noise? What if you're pretending to be an actor in a play that has swords in it to get close enough to the ambassador to assassinate him, and swapping a prop sword for a real one is your plan?

I mean, I'm now kind of interested to read this article too, since the person has a controversial position and I'd be excited to hear them defend it. Unfortunately my Google-fu doesn't appear to be up to the task.

[Yora]

Originally Posted by Water_Bear

Well, there's a reason modern soldiers don't carry anything stabbier than a utility knife; in terms of killing people ASAP the gun is just an awesome weapon.

I think most handheld guns don't kill someone faster than a knife. But with a gun you can kill someone without getting close enough to be stabbed yourself. I've read about american civil war soldiers who would rather reload their muzzle loading muskets during combat inside buildings than to go stabbing with the bayonet. Because the moment you have your bayonet in your enemies chest, you will have the bayonets of his three buddies in yours. And then there will be no crawling away to safety with a grazing cut in your leg, you just will be stabbed until you stop moving because you're still close enough to them to fatally stab them.

If someone is shoting at you, you can hope that you hit them before they hit you, and if you get hit, you might be able to retreat and survive the single injury. With knives and bayonets, there will be a chaotic slashing of blades all over the place with probably everyone getting injured several times, and it will likely stop only when the last enemy has stopped moving.
If you give someone the opportunity to stab you, you will probably die. That's the real reason everyone is chosing guns over knives whenever possible.

[Water_Bear]

Originally Posted by Kelb_Panthera

That idea only holds if the only thing modern about your setting is the technology level.

Throughout large portions of europe and even larger portions of asia the difficulty in aquiring and the consequences for having fire-arms are so overwhelming that even organized crime syndicates only pass them out to high-level agents for very important events.

That's why you don't set games of Hunter; the Vigil in Melbourne, and why British zombie-apocalypse movies focus so heavily on the military. Gun Control is great for keeping people from being shot IRL, but in a game it's a really obnoxious handicap for the action.

Originally Posted by Kalmarvho

What about knives and FYST though? Handguns and long guns are pretty important, but you can't open a tin of baked beans with a rifle. Unless you want beans all over you are the best person EVER.

FTFY

[Kalmarvho]

My mistake. That acrid taste of bullet-n-bean is clearly what men look for in their breakfast.

Originally Posted by Yora

I think most handheld guns don't kill someone faster than a knife.

They may not, but they're far more damaging. Shooting someone in the thigh is potentially fatal and crippling, while stabbing someone in the thigh might not impede their performance in the least. Depending on the weapon used, at least. A piddly .22 rifle like kids get for their thirteenth birthday is nowhere near as potentially lethal as a gun made for fighting.

[SowZ]

With super powers, though, melee weapons become far more viable. They are silent and, if you CAN close to melee range, you have a distinct advantage. Super speedsters, teleporters, invisibles, force field creators, even super strengthers may prefer to take advantage of their incredible muscles. Also, modern forces DO use melee weapons in some places.

You could also be surrounded or snuck up on, or out of ammo, or jammed, or reloading when it is impractical, etc. etc. making carrying a melee weapon a reasonable decision. And even if the PCs have access to guns, if most the NPCs don't, having melee skills gives defense to melee as well when wielding a melee weapon in many games. So, that is one advantage. (Though I would agree that gunning them down BEFORE they reach you is superior.)

A stealthy person may prefer the noiselessness and control they have when slitting someone's throat, so I second knife as important. That is another thing. Melee weapons are more controlled. Your attack is less likely to miss and kill some random bystander.

Going into a street or prison riot? A shield and club work wonders. There are also shock stick things to KO people in hand to hand range. Besides, the players may not always get to decide WHAT they have so rules for wielding anything from a pole or a machete should be included even if they are abstracted so that most melee weapons have the same stats.

Guns ARE better, but that doesn't mean a modern setting needs only guns.

[Knaight]

You need knives. Regardless of whether or not guns are nicer (I'd argue they generally are), there are way more people who casually carry knives around, particularly in areas which frown on citizens owning firearms. Similarly, baseball bats, crowbars, etc. are necessary, simply because they see use.

[Tengu_temp]

In very short quarters, it's quicker to draw a knife, charge and stab than to draw a gun, aim and fire. Other than that though, guns are the superior weapon in a realistic setting. Realistic is the key word here.

[SiuiS]

Originally Posted by Hylas

But then how do you kill vampires and ninjas?

Bayonet.

Originally Posted by NikitaDarkstar

Knives don't need to be reloaded. :p

Neither do bayonets ;D

Originally Posted by Jerthanis

Heck, above and beyond the consequences or rarity of guns on a strategic level, what about situations where weaponry is restricted for other reasons? What if the Predator scares you into firing all your ammo blind into the jungle, and have to make makeshift traps or improvise bows? What if you've just been knocked into the water and your bullets are soaked? What if your path is blocked by a bullet resistant piece of glass and you're trying to undermine its structural integrity enough with a metal baseball bat before you can get through it? What if you're on a plane and no one can fire without risking depressurization? What if you're trying to make no noise? What if you're pretending to be an actor in a play that has swords in it to get close enough to the ambassador to assassinate him, and swapping a prop sword for a real one is your plan?

I mean, I'm now kind of interested to read this article too, since the person has a controversial position and I'd be excited to hear them defend it. Unfortunately my Google-fu doesn't appear to be up to the task.

Most bullets and guns are designed to fire after immersion. Or most by per capita (per gun-pita?), as a kalashnikov is designed to fire in every bad situation possible.

Also, on guns killin slow as knives; a good Stab can kill someone in 30 seconds, and most small arms deaths occur from Hydrostatic shock causing brain hemmoraghing. It doesn't matter if the knife kills somewhat faster, because half a minute is still pretty quick, and guns can cause similar death from longer ranges.

Originally Posted by Kalmarvho

My mistake. That acrid taste of bullet-n-bean is clearly what men look for in their breakfast.

We call that coffee, actually.

[Xiander]

Okay, I tend to agree that for killing things guns are great. I still find the notion that no other weapon is necessary rather ludicrous though.

What about when you don't want to kill people?
What about when you want to kill people gunfire and shells fouling up your day?

I could probably come up with other situations where guns were less usable, but the point is, that killing is not always solve all problems.

[Joseph Silver]

In the nWoD, at least, guns rule supreme. Even against vampires, who are notably resistant to bullets, the sheer amount of bashing damage you inflict can overwhelm even stronger vampires. Also, if you're willing to take a -3 penalty for a headshot, you can deal lethal damage, and a -3 penalty translates to -1 success (3 dice roughly equals 1 damage).

It gets even worse with Combat Marksmanship, which is the most powerful fighting style in the system. A starting character with Combat Marksmanship 5 can easily overwhelm a vampire or a werewolf's regeneration ability and kill them dead. This is using standard bullets, not Dragonsbreath or silver ammunition. If you use the appropriate ammo, you can take down several supernaturals in one turn.

The only problem with firearms are that they are loud, and they may be illegal depending on where the game is set. A supernatural using guns in London will attract lots of unwanted attention, which is bad for most supernaturals. Even in the USA, civilians ordering large amounts of ammo on a regular basis will alert the feds, let alone using assault rifles with exotic ammunition such as silver, Dragonsbreath, cold iron, etc.

My last vampire character was a Ventrue who had to learn how to defend himself after Elysium got attacked by VII and he had to cower like a little girl because he had no fighting ability whatsoever. My character went ahead and bought a Colt Anaconda (one of the best midgame weapons in Vampire: Bloodlines) and backed it up with Combat Marksmanship 3 (the game died before I could get up to Combat Marksmanship 5). Along with some Kevlar for protection, my character was able to take down more VII vampires in the next combat encounter than the Gangrel Ancilla with Protean 3, from the safety of long range.

[Kelb_Panthera]

Originally Posted by Xiander

Okay, I tend to agree that for killing things guns are great. I still find the notion that no other weapon is necessary rather ludicrous though.

What about when you don't want to kill people?
What about when you want to kill people gunfire and shells fouling up your day?

I could probably come up with other situations where guns were less usable, but the point is, that killing is not always solve all problems.

No, it always solves the immediate problem. It just often causes new, sometimes worse, problems to crop up in place of the one it solved.

[The Glyphstone]

My last vampire character was a Ventrue who had to learn how to defend himself after Elysium got attacked by VII and he had to cower like a little girl because he had no fighting ability whatsoever. My character went ahead and bought a Colt Anaconda (one of the best midgame weapons in Vampire: Bloodlines) and backed it up with Combat Marksmanship 3 (the game died before I could get up to Combat Marksmanship 5). Along with some Kevlar for protection, my character was able to take down more VII vampires in the next combat encounter than the Gangrel Ancilla with Protean 3, from the safety of long range.

Were the VII also using guns? Their unique discipline is basically Vigor: Dexterity Edition, so it's how they should be fighting whenever possible.

[Joseph Silver]

Originally Posted by The Glyphstone

Were the VII also using guns? Their unique discipline is basically Vigor: Dexterity Edition, so it's how they should be fighting whenever possible.

Some of them were using guns, some were using Protean 3 (Claws of the Wild). Also, it was a homebrewed version of VII my ST used, taking from all three of the possible backstories with a dash of Belial's Brood. They were immune to Dominate and Ortam (the Prince was a Gullikan who tried to interrogate a survivor), but not Majesty, and their vitae burned normal Kindred's mouths and caused demonic hallucinations when ingested.

Also, they were like a virus, in that a newly-Embraced VII vampire can Embrace seven childer in rapid succession before dying from the strain, and those childer can themselves Embrace seven childer each before they also die from the strain, and so on. And IIRC, newly-created VII retain their minds and are very confused about the mind-numbing ordeal of the Embrace, until seven days later when they become mindless automatons who exist only to destroy normal Kindred and spawn seven more VII Kindred.

[The Glyphstone]

Ah, okay - if they weren't actual Akhud VII using the Praestantia discipline, then it might not have been as guaranteed-good for them to be gunbunnies.

[TheThan]

Gentlemen, this is why you need a knife.

(thank you sergeant zim).

[Kalmarvho]

Originally Posted by TheThan

Gentlemen, this is why you need a knife.

(thank you sergeant zim).

Is it heresy to like that scene better in the film than in the book? Because if so, then call me a heretic.

I don't need no lectures about spanking babies with axes.

[TheThan]

The movie wasn’t that bad (the second, and third, yeah those were bad). I’m aware that it bears little resemblance to the book. So I just look at it like a different take on the same basic plot.

[Kalmarvho]

Technically, it's the same plot from two different perspectives. Heinlein on the pro-war end, as a moralizing force, and Verhoeven on the anti-war end, where war is silly and everyone dies.

But to bring things back on topic, even Starship Troopers involved melee contact, given that one close encounter in the book where the marauders came up against bug soldiers and neither of them had the space to fire their weapons.

[Slipperychicken]

Originally Posted by Kalmarvho

My mistake. That acrid taste of bullet-n-bean is clearly what men look for in their breakfast.

The mental image of a man casually shooting open a can of beans is far too awesome. Here, have an internet, both of you.


Modern RPGs need grenades and rockets, too. It's just not the same without high explosives...

[PJ Garrison]

Well, there's a reason modern soldiers don't carry anything stabbier than a utility knife; in terms of killing people ASAP the gun is just an awesome weapon.

Plenty of soldiers still carry large knives and machetes. You never know when you'll run out of ammo, or get stuck with a weapon malfunction that will render firearm useless.

When I was an infantryman, most of us carried a combat knife, machete, bowie, bolo, khukri, or a Kabar or something similar at a minimum. A lot of the time, those big blades were used for camp chores, but it was always understood that they were a viable secondary weapon. I remember a bunch of us going to the PX to pick out knives prior to deployment, specifically looking for a backup weapon.

In 3rd world countries, pretty much anybody who doesn't have a gun will have a machete, and those guys have killed plenty of people. In fact, the genocide in Rwanda was carried largely by soldiers and militia with machetes.

They may not, but they're far more damaging. Shooting someone in the thigh is potentially fatal and crippling, while stabbing someone in the thigh might not impede their performance in the least. Depending on the weapon used, at least. A piddly .22 rifle like kids get for their thirteenth birthday is nowhere near as potentially lethal as a gun made for fighting.

The firearm used has a definite impact on stopping power, but the popular combat weapons (military rifles and service pistols) tend to be of middling power.

Shotguns have good power if loaded with 12 GA buckshot (NOT birdshot), but they've got a VERY short effective range and are slow to load. Also, the ammo is heavy and bulky.

The advantage of a firearm is that ability to engage at a distance. The further away he is, the harder it is for him to hurt you in return.

On the other hand, guns are much less effective at short ranges. At short ranges, a guy with a knife could stab you several times before you can pull your pistol out of the holster or bring your rifle to bear.

Edged weapons can inflict massive damage VERY quickly, especially in the hands of somebody who knows that they're doing. An individual bullet might very well have more stopping power than a stab wound, but people tend to get stabbed repeatedly. It's not uncommon for victims of a knife murder to have dozens of stab wounds.

While gun wounds often do take somebody out of the fight quickly, the wounds are actually quite survivable. Knife wounds on the other hand are much harder to treat because they cut, instead of tear their way through the body. A stab to the heart is an instant kill, and a cut artery will usually bleed you out quickly.

The big knives and machetes on the other hand, can remove limbs.

The bottom line is that a guy with a knife is extremely dangerous to a guy with a gun if he can get close enough to stab him.

Knives are also intimidating. When somebody pulls cold steel and starts coming after you with murder in his eyes, it's really hard to stay calm enough to shoot.

You may want to google Cpl. Samuel Toloza. A few years ago in Iraq, he was surrounded by insurgents, out of ammo, and with a bunch of his squadmates wounded. So he charged the enemy with his crappy pocketknife and started stabbing insurgents left and right, and managed to run them off.

You may also want to look into the Ghurkas who are still known for their prowess with the Khukri, a large fighting knife. They're well know for being amongst the best (and scariest!) soldiers in the world. They'll take your head off with their knives.

Tomahawks have also experienced a surge in popularity in recent years. They're great tools and fearsome weapons.

You may also want to consider the various clubs, batons, and bludgeoning weapons available. Cops love their batons and billy clubs, and the baseball bat is still a classic streetfighting weapon. Crowbars, tire irons, hammers, and cast-off lengths of pipe or rebar are also popular.

[Cuaqchi]

Continuing with the value of blades a simple statistic here. Until the mid 1980's the weapon with the greatest number of kills in human history was the Gladius (The sword of the Roman Legions, which was modified and refined over the years.) This even trumped the standard firearms of the Napoleonic Era and the World Wars when total warfare with millions of casualties became the norm. What finally beat it out? The AK-47 which was in use throughout the war-torn regions of Africa and Central America by all sides.

Also a perfect line that is generally rehashed by anyone with the ability to use one - A knife is more dangerous than a gun. It never jams, never needs to reload, and little protects against it. The last part is the most telling, ballistic cloth/kevlar is resistant to pressure but is a woven fabric and as such is easily cut. To protect against a blade you need a heavier - generally metal or ceramic - plate to absorb the impact. This also results in reducing your own reflexes and reaction meaning you have to be even more careful around some one with a knife.