Black Powder Rules

[Irving the Meek]

Ah, yes. GURPS High Tech. Lovely, lovely book. Fun stuff.

I'll concede that guns are asy to use - at least when we're tlaking ab out flintlocks. Wheelocks are less so, and fiddly things to boot, and let's not go into matchlocks. And reloading is a far trickier prospect that shooting, at least before premeasured shots.

Let's bear in mind too that in Ravenloft, technology does not march on. It's at a dead halt. We will probalby be stuck at the wheelock level for a while - the'yre complicated pieces of machinery (and thus expensive), and I believe they do take some intricate maintenance.

[Undead Cabbage]

Question, would it not make more sense for Fire arms to negate a character's armor AC bonus? Because really, it otherwise doesn't make sense that fire arms have displaced armor in the high culture realms. The idea behind fire-arms is that they essentially rendered the armored knight useless. It's kind of hard to play out Dementlieu's supposed technological advantage over Falkovnia when their armor still applies towards a musket.

To balance this, you could rule that characters from CL 8+ realms have Canny Defense ala the Duelist class. In such realms, finesse and style are being implemented withing war-fare: students take fencing lessons withing their respective universities, soldiers learn how to best take cover from musket fire. Really, it's in the higher CLs that warfare is studied as more of an art.

My GM ruled that guns were 18-20/2 on the critical hit, and while I can see how this works, I think they should actually be x4, because it's not easy to hit a weak spot with a 1" ball, but should you hit it, it's done for.

Wait a tick here, this sounds mighty familiar.

Welcome to the Frat Pariah

[ewancummins]

Armor plate made to a certain strength was still quite useful against gunfire, at least at a fair distance.Armorsmiths would actually fire weapon into the armor, marking the dent as a ''proof'' of it's resistance at such-and-such a distance to a musket ball. I'm talking 1600s here, not modern high velocity weapons. Point blank fire is still nasty.
The real reason for the decline in armor was that it was heavy[esp. if it was thick enough to stop a musket ball] very expensive, and uncomfortable. People died of heat stroke ,while wearing full plate. When armor became less economical, being not as protective[but far from useless] against firearms and costly to boot-it was phased out. Hence, we see half and three quarter plate suits become more common than full plate. Eventually, only heavy cavalry retained steel cuirasses. An infantryman with a musket and a buff coat was cheaper to equip than a fully armored soldier. Pikemen can hold off the heavies, while your musketeers pour out a deadly volley into their ranks.
The rapier was primarilly a civilian weapon. Rapier espada=sword of the robes. It wasn't really designed with the battelfield in mind, although some soldiers did use it. Many preferred a stout broadword or saber. Fencing academies will be popular to teach citizens self defense. That's basically what they all started out as. I doubt many citizens will walk around in full plate, so defeating heavy armor isn't important.
Even in a medieval domain, who really walks around in full armor? Knights? Nope, unless they are riding to a battle. Men at arms and militia on duty, sure. Not likely full plate , though. In an advanced domain , the average citizen could much more cheaply and easily buy and use a pistol and rapier than a set of full armor. At point blank range, that wheellock pistol will pierce steel plate[in the unlikely event he faces plate wearing alleymen]. A rapier is fine for unarmored thugs, providing you know what you are doing with it.

I reccomend anyone looking at fighting styles in the advanced domains do some research on the martial arts of Early Modern and Late Medieval Europe. Their were all sorts of school of combat , armored and unarmored alike, taught all over the Continent. Guns finally killed off everything but the sport forms[boxing, fencing, savate, etc.] because once firearms are good enough, learning all that fancy stuff seems less useful to most people.

[Irving the Meek]

Hmm. Okay, brining it back into focus a bit then, what weapons should be available to your average Ravenloft investigator/adventurer?

Now we're digging into things like laws and such, which aren't always fun. But it's worth noting that in Azalon Rex's domain (or Irina Borcas, or any of the other thugocracys in Ravenloft) you simply can't walk into a blacksmith's shoip and buy a greataxe and full plate.

In my campaign, all of the PCs are either nobles or their servants, so legal issues aren't much of a problem. You can raid the manorial castle for plate mail if you really want it. For an earthier campaign, though, it might be worth noting that longswords and full plate are the domain of the military, and not entirely easy to acquire.

Guns may not be as limited, at least by law - the cost is the real limiting factor. On the other hand, ITL wheellocks were occasionally outlawed as assassin's weapons, so who knows?

[Pariah]

In the high culture level areas, I'd think the following weapons would be more common place:
Rapiers, for fencing.
Parthian Rapier, though probably illegal due to not really being used for fencing, it would either be black market or for very high up nobles.
Pistols, for self defense mostly, a person can't mug you with a hole in their chest.
Muskets, not as much as pistols, but they could be sold for hunting wild game and not people. Otherwise they would probably be restricted to the military.
Daggers, they will always be around...someone tries to mug you, you beat them, take their dagger. Voila.
Shaving Razors, personal use...and more! I really enjoyed this addition to the weapon list..
Regular bullets, if you start asking for cold iron and silver bullets people are going to get suspicious, and/or charge a lot for them (I don't even see most places carrying around most of the special materials anyway)

That's probably it for personal weaponry, and even some of it is stretching the boundaries of the law...

[doctor-evil]

Hi everyone - this is my first post to the board so be kind.

here are my house rules for firearms if they are useful:

If you come from a setting with a cultural level of 8 or 9 – you do not need the feat Firearms proficiency. Pistols are covered by a proficiency in simple weapons.

Muskets by a proficiency in martial weapons. If from a cultural level lower than 8, Exotic weapon proficiency (firearms) is required.

Although firearms do not inflict necessarily more damage than traditional weapons, they do negate some of the effects of armour – armour bonuses to AC (natural or worn armour) are halved (rounded down) when the character is using a firearm e.g. chain mail only gives +2AC instead of +4AC

Matchlock & wheelock weapons

Reloading: Reloading takes two full round actions that invoke attacks of opportunity. If the character has the “Rapid Reload (firearms)” feat – this is reduced to 1 full round action
Misfiring: a natural 1 means a misfire – 10 rounds and a Craft (firearms) roll (DC 14) is required to make the weapon serviceable. Misfring of a matchlock weapon also inflicts 1-3 pts damage to the firer.
Bad weather: this increases the misfiring chance – heavy fog, snow or light drizzle – 1 or 2; heavy rain 1, 2 or 3 (although damage is not take for a precipitation induced misfire)
Dexterity bonuses: due to a lack of rifling and the poor state of barrels, skill at aiming is negated – dexterity bonuses to not apply for “to hit” rolls with these weapons.

Flintlock weapons

Reloading: Reloading takes two full round actions that invoke attacks of opportunity as with the above weapons – except:
4 barrel pistol – reloading takes 3 full rounds, 2 with the “Rapid Reload (firearms)” feat
Ferguson rifle – reloading takes 1 full round, or a move action with “Rapid Reload (firearms)”
Misfiring: a natural 1 means a misfire, only in bad weather.
Dexterity bonuses: Due to rifled barrels, dexterity bonuses apply for “to hit” rolls with flintlock weapons.


Reloading & injury: if you are wounded while reloading a firearm, you must make a Concentration check (DC 15) or you have to start the reload from scratch (the injury has caused you to spill powder/drop the bullet etc).


I use the weapons table from d20 past for the availability of different types of firearms. In my current campaign the characters have mostly been in Souragne, Invidia and Kartakass and I allowed them access to weapons produced up to the 1650s for the former and the early 1600s for the latter.

[doctor-evil]

If any of you happen to be in the London area, have a look at the collection of "parthian" type weapons in the Tower of London.

Henry VIII apparently had a thing about them (e.g. maces that fired bullets when striking, parthian spears etc), there's an interesting staff that also converts into a trident.

Such weapons might add flavour to an adventure set in Borca for example, with a more renaissance feel (and assassins with black powder enhanced weapons). Dragon magazine had an article a few months back that had some nice rules for such black powder goodies.

An eeeevil petting zoo
Souragne

[ewancummins]

Yeah, combination firearms were very cool. The Germans seem to have made quite a few. Like a boar spear with a gun barrel attached. Hard to miss your shot when the thing's stuck in the boar. When reloading is so slow, such weapons make a certain ammount of sense. A much later era produced the Elgin cutlass-pistol. It was a sort of heavy knife pistol, combo. I've even seen museum pices of cutlery with tiny guns built in. I'm sure those clever Lamordians could rig up all sorts of such things .

Sorry if my earlier posting seemed very long, or too opinionated. Just love the whole Early Modern Europe era, and primitive firearms are a minor interest of mine. One of these days I will get around to buying a flintlock.

[Waldi]

Yes, german nobles where said to love those martial playthings (The combination "mace + pistol" seemed to be quite popular) . But there are two major disatvantages about those combination-weapons: There where very unprecise and they got broken very easily.
Much more popular where hidden pistols, for example in a walking-cane.

Another very "ravenloftian" way to include blackpowder-weapons would be an adaption of the german opera "Der Freischütz" (Freischütz is difficult to tranlate; litaraly its "The Free Gunman", but that does not catch the sense of it.)
The basic story is, that a hunter sells his soul to the demon Samael to get the spell for creating "Freikugeln", magical bullets, that never miss their aim. Perhaps, this would make a fine story for Ravenloft...

[ewancummins]

The staff/trident sounds like a brandistock.

Roger Moore wrote an article for Dragon, years ago, that had some pretty nifty enchantments for primitive firearms. It was called something like' Sixguns and Sorcery'-despite having nothing to do with revolvers[the weapons covered are much simpler designs]. That might be a good resource for enchanted firearms in Ravenloft. I cannot remember the issue number, but I think it was 200 something.

Do the rules distinguish between belt pistols and horse pistols? I haven't got my books here with me[they are in the States]. Those cavalry wheelock pistols were pretty long, and big bored , too! Definitely should do more damage.

[Ronia Sun]

In the Ravenloft I'm running, the Core is, for the most part, quite advanced. For example, Barovia is still a bit of a backwater, much like Transylvania in the late 18th, early 19th century, but guns are in use there. However, it doesn't mean they've replace more "traditional" weapons. Some nasties just require more primitive means of killing...(and when you've got a drooling werewolf at your throat, the last thing you want to think about is trying to reload the gun!)

However, I think a modified version of the Rapid Reload feat might not be bad. The British rifleman regiments during the Napoleonic wars were famous for their ability to fire three (or even four, if they were very, very good) rounds in a minute. They'd fire the first shot (keeping the balls they planned to use in their mouths), bite off the top of their powder charge (it was a twisted packet of paper), pour the powder, spit the ball into the rifle, tamp, fire, repeat.

I could see a character with proper training being able to do this--but with the remaining disadvantage that you can't do this when the enemy is right on top of you. You have to keep a distance, whether that's by sniping or by moving around to stay out of reach.

I agree with the x4 damage on critical. Let's face it, a 1" ball of lead can do a whole LOT of damage if it hits the right spot...

[doctor-evil]

However, I think a modified version of the Rapid Reload feat might not be bad. The British rifleman regiments during the Napoleonic wars were famous for their ability to fire three (or even four, if they were very, very good) rounds in a minute. They'd fire the first shot (keeping the balls they planned to use in their mouths), bite off the top of their powder charge (it was a twisted packet of paper), pour the powder, spit the ball into the rifle, tamp, fire, repeat.

It sounds like someone has been reading or watching the "Sharpe" series. "Waht makes a good rifleman private? Firing four rounds a minute under fire sahh!"

I agree with the x4 damage on critical. Let's face it, a 1" ball of lead can do a whole LOT of damage if it hits the right spot...[/quote]

I'm certainly adding the x4 critical to my house rules.

To answer the question above question about the difference between horse and belt pistols in the d20 past rules: a wheelock belt pistol is 2d$, horse pistols are 2d6, and muskets are 2d8.