Science Fiction Companion - Shotgun Damage

[jjThornton]

Hi,

I just had a player select a shotgun for his character and we noticed that it does 1-3d6 damage, which leads to a negative damage amount (the same applies to Shotgun, Full-Auto). After joking about it firing bandages and medi-gels, I realised that this could be an issue. Is there a way that I can change the item's damage in the companion book that will save for future use?

Many thanks for your time,
jj

[dragonheels]

At least, you'll have had a good laugh :)

[mac40k]

Either I don't understand the question, or you aren't clear on what the rule is. Assuming it is the latter, the rule for shotguns is:

Shotguns fire a spread of metal balls (also called “shot”),
and so do more damage at close range where the spread is
less and more of the shot hits the target. Farther away, the
shot spreads more and causes less damage. Because of
the increased chance of hitting someone due to the spread,
shotguns add +2 to their user’s Shooting rolls. They cause
1d6 damage at Long range, 2d6 at Medium, and 3d6 at Short
range.

So, 1-3d6 damage is read as, the shotgun does from 1 to 3d6 damage, not 1 minus 3d6. Any shotgun that hits will do from 1 - 3 points of damage minimum (not allowing for raise bonus) and there is no way for it to cause negative damage.

[JohnD]

What really needs to be done for the shotgun is that it have 3 damage spreads; short, medium and long range. This would account for the different damage rates based on range.

[Trenloe]

Either I don't understand the question, or you aren't clear on what the rule is. Assuming it is the latter, the rule for shotguns is:
...
We're talking about the implementation in FG. 1-3d6 damage results in FG calculating 1 <minus> 3d6 damage which is always negative.

[Ikael]

You must cope this manually in the sheet. You can create subattacks for the Shotgun weapon and set different damages for each (ie. 1d6, 2d6 and 3d6). Other source books are updated to represent the default damage as "up to 3d6" which FG interprets as 3d6.

[dstuffle]

Unless you use slugs, then the damage is 2d10 no matter the range, but you don't get the +2 to hit from shot spread. :)

[Doswelk]

What really needs to be done for the shotgun is that it have 3 damage spreads; short, medium and long range. This would account for the different damage rates based on range.
You can do that, I personally tend to add just 1d6 to the damage field on my shotguns and use the right mouse button to add the extra 1 or 2 dice when rolling damage.

My player's however NEVER, EVER use the shotgun at anything less that short range (gotta keep that +2 to hit!), for some reason :P