[DL] Firing and HtoH

["Roy Spence" <roy.ster@virgin.net>]

I tried sending this to the list yesterday, however as I haven't 
seen any reply or had it mailed back to me so I assume that it's got 
lost in the big bad world wide web - so I'll have to retype <sigh>  
However if it did get through then I apologise for wasting more 
bandwidth.

I was asking peoples thoughts on a situation, when one PC, say Player 
A is fighting in hand to hand combat with a thug (wielding a knife 
with a skill of 3) and another PC, say Player B decides to shoot into 
the combat.  Both PC's are going for head shots in order to take the 
thug down as fast as possible.  As far as I can work out the mods for 
the PC's actions are as follows

Player A: 15 (5 + 6 (head shot) + 3 (thug's skill) +1 (knife DV))
Player B: 11 (5 + 6 (head shot))

For two players trying to do the same thing, the person in hand to 
hand seems to get penalized.  Player B, to my mind, has the harder 
action with the thug moving around dodging and weaving and Player A 
probably getting in the way.  My only problem is how to balance out 
the shooting into combat situations without straying into the "look I 
can dodge bullets" territory.  Does anyone out there have any 
solutions?  I realise this has probably come up at sometime before, 
but I couldn't see anything, hence this post.

I came up with a couple of thoughts that could even out the perceived 
imbalance, using the example above.

Player B  shooting at the thug who is in hand to hand would gain 
a penalty  equal to half their targets fightin' skill, round up - 
i.e. for shooting the thug a 2 point penalty.  Also if the thug is 
aware that someone is going to shoot them, they can opt to take a 
penalty to their roll to hit Player A (say maximum equal to 5), this 
penalty is also applied to Player B's shot.  Effectively the thug is 
trying to keep Player A's body between himself and Player B, making 
Player B's shot harder.  This penalty would be in effect for 
Player B until the thug moved, fought on his next action again.

If more than one PC is trying to shoot into the combat, the thug 
could opt to split his penalty between them, or focus it on one 
player.

I also feel that there should be a greater chance of Player A getting 
hit by Player B's bullet than the normal innocent bystanders rule (he 
ain't a bystander and he most definitely isn't innocent).  I have 
sorted out the following guidlines for what happens when Player B 
shoots.

^Player B makes his roll to hit the thug: Roll 1D6 as per normal 
innocent bystanders rule.  * - replace the location with whatever 
the called shot location was or roll a random location if it 
wasn't a called shot.

On a 1: As well as hitting the thug in the head*, Player B has 
managed to hit Player A in the head*. Determine damage as usual, with 
the person hit first taking full dmaage and the person hit next 
gaining an armour effect of 1.  For instance if Player B was standing 
behind Player A while shooting at the thug with a 3D6 pistol - Player 
A would take 5D6 to the head and the thug 5D4 - oops.

On a 2: As well as hitting the thug in the head*, Player B has hit 
Player A.  Player B can shift the location by the number of points he 
succeeded his roll by - however keep it sensible if he aimed at the 
thug's upper body, he should hit Player A in the Arms or Upper Guts.

On a 3-6: Player b manages to hit the thug in the head and Player B 
feels his hair get parted by a bullet.


^Player B fails his roll to hit the thug: roll 1D6

On a 1or 2: The Player B has completely missed the thug, however he 
has managed to hit Player A in the head*.

On a 3 or 4: Player B completely misses the thug, but get's Player 
A in a random location.

On a 5 or 6: Player B completely misses the thug, and everyone else 
as well.

This may seem pretty severe, however I get mighty peeved about one PC 
trying to snatch another PC's glory, when he is just after another 
notch on his gun and generally wastes things for everyone else.  Also 
I feel that trying to shoot someone when they are in HtoH should be 
pretty dangerous to both parties fighting.  

For some folks simply banning called shots into HtoH may be an 
option, however as my group have already done it I though that 
putting together some guidelines may help.  What do you all think?

I have already tried this out in my own group, and while it 
didn't have the desired effect immediately it produced a 
satisfactory result in the long run. I included a fully 
description of what happened in my original post, which went 
astray, but I won't bother here for the sake of brevity (I know this 
is anything but brief :)) and out of sheer laziness.  If anyone is 
interested in the full story then drop me a note and I'll post it 
later when time permits.

Cheers

Roy