Boehm said:

Based on that roll, auto-fire as currently written that attack could probably have dropped 2 PCs at once for 18 (2 hits + 2 damage) & 21 (3 hits) points of damage (after assuming 4 Soak on each hit).  Prior to the Week 10 update, it would have been worse as 20 and 27 damage respectively.

With my suggested fix it would have only been 3 hits, with 2 advantage left over for other uses.  Still dang dangerous, but a PC *might* survive it if they have good Soak.  The left-over advantages would let a PC grant a Boost die, or recover some Strain.

With Lethal Dose's preferred fix, it would have been 3 hits + 4 damage.  Similar results, but the +4 damage significantly increases the post-Soak damage on one of the hits since they don't have to be spread between the hits evenly.

As for the concept I've seen that turning an auto-fire weapon against a PC is 'GM ass-hattery', that's the clearest indicator that the mechanic (as it currently stands) is broken.  PCs will be perfectly willing and able to 'one-shot' their Nemesis once they've gotten their hands on an auto-fire weapon, if the mechanic can't *fairly* be used on the PCs as well, it needs to be dealt with.

I'm also inclined toward the idea of adding a Challenge die rather than a Difficulty die for auto-fire.  If for no other reason than to provide more opportunity for an auto-fire weapon to run through it's power supply.

 Auto-fire also shouldn't be nearly as effective at long range (due to the inaccuracy of spray fire), it shouldn't benefit from aiming and it shouldn't benefit from the use of a telescopic optical sight either. And that's all in addition to the fact that it should consume ammunition incredibly fast and possibly overheat the weapon.

In reality, Auto-firing a weapon is a pretty desperate tactic that rarely pays great dividends compared to its drawbacks. Many RPGs incorporate this truth into their autofire rules. I cite FFG's Warhammer 40K line for its semi-auto and full-auto rules, which I think paint a more accurate picture of the pros and cons of such an attack..

As presented here, Auto-fire has all of the benefits with fewer of the drawbacks, which makes it a potent option for anyone possessing a high Ranged (Heavy) score.

Kallabecca said:

Yeah I remember those threads - I partook. Still, the despair is an out of ammo possibility which is going to affect the players more than npcs with this suggested change.

As for upgrade/adding, my players fear the red die more than a few black dice - for some reason, I think because of the despair result. Statistically I know, its a lot of yada-yada mumbo jumbo, but from experience during play and testing I don't really feel the fear or problem anymore. Its a step away from the binary good/bad, hit/miss next ones go that we know from most other games.

In this instance the idea is to add a challenge die, which is worse/better than either setback or difficulty. I also think that the adversary talent will cause a lot of mayhem and grief in the time to come - as long as I remember using it.

A comment on GM play style (being a dick vs. pulling punches):

The main issue for me here is that even if you pull punches as a GM, the players are NOT going to pull punches when they hit your main villain and roll 4 advantage.., so, what?  You cheat?  You use a destiny point?

Auto fire needs a cost increase (2 adv) to be playable, otherwise people are just going to house rule it in one way or another.  What are the devs seeing that is making them so reluctant to increase the activation cost?  I really don't get it.  Play a couple of Stormtroopers Sergeants against a group of players with 5 soak each and see who wins.  Autofire is ridiculously overpowered.  Still.

… And as a side note, I love the "challenge die" idea - not upgrading existing difficulty, but just adding a challenge die to the pool.  I'd slap this in on top of the activation cost increase.

That is what I'm thinking too. Add challenge and increase adv cost. It is easier than adding a reduced auto-fire damage mechanic - although I can see that being a good idea too - except it might not make sense. Unless you could agree that the repaid energy cycling does decrease the power in each blaster bolt… it adds math though (or auto-fire setting could get a number after it, similar to stun grenades - which becomes the auto-fire damage). That way you could easily keep it at 1 advantage, add challenge die and say as a default that auto-fire decreases the based damage by 4 or 3 or something. Heavy blaster rifle could have auto-fire 6 or 7 - so it still packs a punch, but not nearly as bad.

Although I am more keen on the increased advantage cost and challenge die addition.

 First I want to say I haven't had a true playtest of Autofire but I really don't understand the huge disrurbance in the force its causing. Just goofing around with the dice app and taking an average player who doesnt have a high brawn, adding diff for cumbersome and other modifiers it took me several tries to even net one advantage. The time it takes to set up allows player reaction to possibly take down the gunner or get away from the frakking thing. I know this is a rpg and there needs to be balance in a lot of its components but it does seem to be striving for some sense of realism. Look at today's military grade weaponry, most will kill a soldier in one shot. Just my two cents I will now go back to quietly lurking around the boards.

I can see Autofire being realistically deadly to be a fair arguement.  But you can also argue that storm trooper do not have weapons that are capable of autofire.   The only content that says a storm trooper rifle can do that is in the  Dark Forces video game and that's only when Katarn gets ahold of one.  Maybe Storm Trooper training denies them the use of such a feature because of the added difficult and use of ammo.

Zar said:

Regular Stormies have regular blaster rifles, but the "Imperial Stormtrooper Sergeant" henchmen described in the book is rocking an HBR (also explicitly mentions AF in its description).  These don't seem very uncommon.

It's not so much a concern about these being held by minions (which is terrifying), it's about the not infrequent henchmen that suddenly becomes a death machine.

-WJL

 Again, playing developer's advocate here. Has there been a rash of PC deaths related to the "unnerfed"  Autofire rules in actual gaming situations? Just asking.

mwodom said:

It wasn't a "rash" because I changed the rule in my games. During the final scene in Crates of Krayts, 2 players went from 0 damage/0 crits to incapacitated and 1 or 2 critical injuries on subsequent rounds from AF attacks. After that, the [now injured] soldier picked his HBR back up and iced Tol Cordol in a single burst.

When we realized what could have happened with better rolls (the rolls that produced the results above weren't really impressive), it was pretty clear to us that, at least in our games, the RAW for made the game practically unplayable if those weapons were used.

Seriously, I think roll that took down the character that wasn't a solider had a net result of 2 successes and 1 adv. The first hit hurt, the second one (bought for one adv) exceeded this threshold and caused a crit.

Neither the players nor the GM (me) thought it was "fun".  Hence the change, which has worked out fine on our subsequent games.

-WJL

 Okay, I'm asking because I'm genuinely curious not trying to be critical or start anything. In your example was the gun mounted on a tripod? You said he picked the gun back up an iced on of the characters. Was this in the same round? The description in the book states that it typically takes two rounds for a two man team or three rounds for a one man team to bring the weapon to bear.

 @Mwodom

I believe what LethalDose said in his play example was an HBR (Heavy Blaster Rifle) and not what you are thinking, which is the Heavy Repeating Blaster. The HBR is very usable one man and fully capable of autofire. My group recently found out the truth of this in the last play test we did … As is, it seems a bit tasty, least in my opinion :) .

M.

 My mistake. Had a dyslexic moment. I still believe these weapons should be considered extremely deadly and need to be feared by the players. I guess we will just have to see what the devs think in the final update or possibly the finished product.

Marachai5 said:

This is correct.  I was abbreviating "Heavy Blaster Rifle" as HBR.  

I think the light repeater bears mention, here, as well.  In the EotE book, they are described as "tripod-mounted support weapons for military and mercenary units."  Light repeaters have previously been presented but personal (and scary as hell) weapons, and this is the first time I have seen them described as "tripod-mounted" in any star wars game (RPG or otherwise).  These repeaters are also very accessible in this system because of their large HP total and the weapon sling mod.  

My point being: The HBR does not represent a peculiarity where the AF mechanic will be seen and be problematic, but instead represents the less severe of the two options that, I suspect, will be frequently seen in PC groups, and are reasonable load-outs for some henchmen and nemeses.

-WJL

Concerning the Autofire issue.  I'm actually torn.  I do like the idea of the rather than the difficulty being increased, a die is upgraded to a challenge die.  At the same time, if an enemy is carrying an auto-fire weapon, the perhaps the characters should simply not fight them.  They might consider sneaking around or running away. 

Now, I know that flies right in the face of most players, but this is something that bothers me with a lot of games.  The notion that if an enemy is there, they're meant to be fought.  There's no shame in running.  Han Solo ran (or at least flew the Millennium Falcon away from a Star Destroyer).  Not every problem can be solved by a judicious use of brute force.  If the PC's have a weapon and use it the enemies they face should logically learn and adapt.  A good example of this is this man.

http://www.badassoftheweek.com/hayha.html

This man had artillery strikes called in, in an attempt to kill him.  Spoiler:  It didn't work. 

The point is, there are somethings that are really tough, even outright devastating and will get you killed.  Perhaps we as gamers have to learn that there are things we can't face head on, and we should try to use what nature gave us: the ability to think (well most of us were given that gift anyway… well.. maybe just some of us ). 

I understand why people feel that the rules are 'broken', but it may be our thought processes of needing to defeat everything thrown at us that is broken.  Defeat doesn't necessarily mean kill.  GM's when you're running a game and the Player's start firing autofire weapons.  Have the enemies surrender.  For the most part, people don't want to die.  Have this happen a bit till the players are comfortable.  That's when you attack them with a sniper.  I know who you should base that sniper on by the way.

As to a sniper, I know a lot of people are upset at the assassin's loss of deadly accuracy.  I have a feeling that that particular talent is going to show up in a solder class Sniper specialization in Star Wars: Age of Rebellion.