I was rereading Quicker Combat for Boot Hill by Prismatic Wasteland. I’ve had a cluster of unrefined ideas surrounding firefights in RPGs, and this feels like it could add another piece.
Prismatic Wasteland goes for an Accuracy ability score of 3d6 with roll-under mechanics, which makes it a perfect match for Cairn/Block, Dodge, Parry. We could literally just use DEX.
Next, using a Difficulty score feels like a natural fit; to hit, roll equal-or-under your DEX but above the Difficulty.
This table is quite elaborate, and I think I’d want to simplify it a bit more. I already wrote about combat states before; how, in a game like Helldivers 2, you’re either assaulting or making a stand or retreating. I think these states apply on a smaller scale as well.
In a firefight, a combatant is either in cover, trying to effectively hit a target, or on the move. I’d consider these states mutually exclusive, also for simplicity’s sake:
- If you’re behind a chest-high wall and want to benefit from the cover it provides, you’re focused on cover (defense)
- If you’re behind a chest-high wall and want to effectively attack the opponent, you switch from cover to out in the open (offense) as you need to expose yourself to take proper aim.
- If you’re moving around during your turn (to get into cover or a flanking position), you’re focused on movement (mobility) even though you could still shoot while moving.
Thus, in a firefight, a combatant is one of three states:
| 🛡️ Cover | Boon to defense, penalty to attack (blind-firing) |
| 🎯 Out in the open | Boon to offense, penalty to defense. Good for aiming, but you’re also a prime target. |
| 🏃🏻♂️➡️ Moving | Boon to defense (hard to hit), penalty to attack (hard to aim when running) |
If we then look at Prismatic Wasteland’s DV table, the relevant entries are:
- Target: Obscured +2
- Target: Moving on Foot +2
- Shooter: Moving on Foot +3
Since both the target and the shooter is in one of the three states, we can create universal modifiers that are added together based on the current state of target and shooter.
- Cover: +2
- Moving: +3
Meaning that firing from cover adds a Difficulty of +2, and firing from cover at a target in cover adds an additional +2.
You could argue that firing from cover should increase accuracy as you can brace your weapon on your cover. I’d argue that you’d still need to stick your head out for a few moments, which is an inherent risk, and thus makes you Out in the Open.
It also makes the values ‘symmetrical’ for the sake of ease-of-use.
Further Considerations
This would add an additional diceroll to our Into The Odd/Cairn/Block, Dodge, Parry engine – even worse, it adds a to hit roll, which runs counter to a lot of the core ideas surrounding it. I would thus only use this if the system/campaign is very much interested/focused on gunplay.
A way to mitigate this would be to remove the damage roll. Prismatic Wasteland uses a hit location table (baked into the original d20 roll, it’s very sexy). If the hit location that comes up is obscured (by previously mentioned chest-high wall), the hit can still miss.
I think that could be a solution; various weapons inflict a set amount of damage, depending on the weapon’s power. This could be kept fiction-first/in natural language, such as ‘light’, ‘severe’, ‘mortal’ (as suggested in the Boot Hill article), or could be set as a default number (3 damage for a pistol round, 5 for a rifle round, 8 for more).
A second note is that this system incentivizes both sides running into cover and taking pot shots from there – which I’d consider a feature, not a bug. It would mean adding more reasons for mobility, however – grenades to flush out opponents. Flanking is also an option, and is already built-in through firing from cover at an opponent out in the open.
An optimal strategy would also be to just move around a lot to not get shot; perhaps cover should weigh a bit heavier, or maybe firing while moving should be made more difficult, but that would introduce asymmetry. Alternatively, “moving” could always require a concrete place to move to, or “moving” meaning “you’re focusing on dodging, diving, rolling, sprinting”, essentially prohibiting shooting altogether.