This thread/ question was inspired by Bruenors link to the different scale models... (cut pasted from a post I started and edited there)

Ya know looking at those smaller scale resin models reminds me.
I have passively been debating moving from 25-30mm to 10-15mm for my Shadowrun games. I know it would kill any detail on the minis for me (as i stated before most are unpainted =/ anyway)

But the real point is the firearm ranges. Given a basic 1:60 scale layout, I can hardly get to extreme ranges with a pistol. much less with and lmg or anything else.

Hell the largest map I made gave me a sniper shot at 60" or 60 meters/yards. Thats crapola, I measured out a *long range* sniper shot and it was 500" thats 41' away... as in out in the middle of the street infront of my house... Sometimes I swear firearm play is just a pita.

Vehicle traffic is worse, I mean you can see a chopper coming in say.. 5km away... which is within range of some of the missles and so on.

So, anyone have thoughts on that? Has it come up in your modern games and what do you do about it.

Even in fantasy, longbows can shoot farther than the length of most gaming tables.

D&D example. The Longbow has a range "increment" of 100', and can be fired up to 10 increments at maximum range (and with hideous penalties to hit).

1000', in 1" : 5' scale, is 200", or not quite 17'. My living room is barely that big at the diagonal.

It's hard to do with a WorldWorks display, but when I'm doing just regular gaming, I will frequently draw on the whiteboard a double-squiggley line and write "300'" between them, representing additional distance between.



One solution, albeit not the most practical, for the modern stuff is to simply make LOS impossible at such ranges. Design the encounters and scenarios such that nobody can ever line up a shot that goes beyond table range.

Easier said than done in Shadowrun (magic and technology)

It isnt uncommon for odd things to happen, like levitating your sniper for that oddball shot. (yeah air currents and so on make it tough to shoot but that doesnt mean they wont try and often succeed)

Or robot/ drones with rifles and so on. That is one of the appeals and problems with Shadowrun, it is quite open ended as far as what the characters can do, try to do or come up with.

Vs Fantasy games that tend to be a bit more limited by nature.

Cities are complex, structurally. Sure, you can levitate/hover at a considerable height, but if the target isn't targettable from any distance from any angle other than straight overhead, then the target and shooter are still on the same board (albeit one's sitting on a "500' up" elevation marker thingy). Set up the scenario such that there's no clean line of sight.

It's really not all that different from the D&D Wizard with Levitate and Fireball memorized. A 5th level (still fairly low) character with a range of 10' (in actual board scale).

I guess I'm just not seeing why having buildings, construction, traffic (does Shadowrun have flying vehicles? That's multiple heights of traffic!), etc making any sort of long-range sniping impractical at best.

I think Slymoon is coming to a realization that I'd come to over a year ago... That the mini scale creep has really killed the tabletop for anything more than a handgun battle across a two lane road.

15mm is the scale for wargaming.

GW has crept up its scale in my eyes only to justify the pricing, until recently their figures were nothing to really write home about.

28mm (whatever) is great for Westerns or Skirmish in a close combat setting ( caves or Fantasy urban) but if you want to run real style gun battles or armies across a landscape - 15mm

Oh and 15mm Mayhem looks so much sexier!


In another vain think about Car Wars in 15mm then try and do the same layout in 28mm.... yea just that I thought.



Lord Abaddon of Wormwood

Or you could take a deep breath and a step back and remind yourselves it's just a game played for fun and not an historically accurate simulation...

.................



Fun? Only a game...




Lord Abaddon of Wormwood

There was also that Canadian sniper who claimed to kill a target at 2.5 miles in Afghanistan. But I would offer that these are the exceptions rather than the rule. For every remarkable shot, there are hundreds and even thousands of misses. Though you don't hear about it, I would wager that even the best, most famous snipers missed more often than they hit.

The fact is that when someone is shooting at you, or when you fear that someone is going to shoot at you, your anxiety level skyrockets resulting in a corresponding loss in concentration and the ability to calmly put the crosshairs on the target. Toss in the fact that the target is afraid of being shot and attempting, at least minimally to avoid so, and the chances of scoring a hit his not very high.

My point is that, for action sake, most mini rules that I've seen generally make it too easy to hit the badguys. So, by making targets more difficult to hit, you can, in a sense shrink the battleground.

I'll bet there's some study somewhere that has determined the average range of a small-arms engagement, though it's likely none of us here have a security clearance level high enough to see it. I'll bet it's really close, within 100 yards maybe.

I believe last I read several years back, for the average small arms (read police) engagements was 13 yards.

Long arms engagements is 45 yards.

You dont need security clearace to find those stats.

and I dont even recall if sniper shots are included in that, though it wouldnt matter if they were, sniper being what less than 1% of the ammo swapping engagments?