GM's how would you handle a classic western 1 vs. many scene without using any special talents? (Last man standing)

Here's a classic example. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TbvMgLDVUd4#t=129

Using RAW this would take a few turns after having failed his coercion check.

We were running beyond the rim and got ambushed by a gang and I wanted to do something like this but couldn't think of a good way to sell my GM on it, especially when a talent exists to do this very thing.

Also how would you handle this?: (First 15 seconds) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ks7-A-7Zvak

Is that just a perception or vigilance check? Or would you just call it out because you know player X has a high perception or whatever? On a side note so far all perception checks in my game have been three or more difficulty, is that normal? How hard should it be for my bounty hunter to notice clues or size up a threat?

Thanks

Last Man Standing works. It could be a really hard hit with a crit on a minion group also, enough points to kill two and the crit for the third. It's all how you narrate it. Every tough guy speech doesn't have to be Coercion, it could just be @#$% talkin. Maybe your GM will like it and hand out a Boost die on the roll.

I would say either Perception or Vigilance is fine for spotting the knife.

I agree, a lot of times if you make a speech that is cool or seems appropriately intimidating, the GM will add a Boost just because it's awesome

example #1: lets look at the hero. probably a high xp merc (with a bit of assassin). very good agility (4?) + great ranged (light) (5?). applicable talents: point blank x2, true aim, deadly accuracy - ranged (light), quick draw, quick strike; lets just give him a basic slugthrower pistol. it will be enough.

the opponents: 3 street toughs (minions), soak 4, wounds 5;

ini rolls: player wins.

player draws gun as an incidental (quick draw). then true aim + aim as an extra maneuver. combat check: 5y, 3b vs. 1p (4y, 1g basic, upgraded once by true aim, the blues added by quick strike and aiming)

he hits!

damage would be 4 +5 (deadly accuraccy) +2 (point blank) +whatever successes he rolled. discounting crits we would need 8 successes. possible, if unlikely. the way i read the scene he got 2 crits, taking out the first two, and the rest of the shots went into the last one.

you have to consider the guy is a badass. if your character has good enough skills, such a scene would be easily doable. i think the rules work very well for this kind of situation.

example #2:

a) "movie perception" should be avoided.

b) the shots are just a coercion check made with his shooting skills (at least i would houserule it like that ). a single triumph + narration was enough to convince the guy to back off.

once again, the rules work well to simulate this.

Using RAW this would take a few turns after having failed his coercion check.

In this case, Clint made his coercion check since he was trying to force the bad guys to draw thier guns first.

As a player, I'm not so sure situation 1 is do-able without the GM being on board. It implies multiple attacks per round, so you would need quick draw and auto-fire. As the GM, if I think this is a good idea, and I'm approached with the concept before hand, I would set it up with a few weak minions to "crunch wise" make it work. It would be a one-off, and not something to come a second time, but it would make for a great entrance (meet my toon) kinda thing.

If I don't know it's coming and a player surprises me with it. it is less likely to be an ideal situation, for it to take place- even as a one-off. It probably wouldn't work, even if I wanted it to. The bad guys would likely have some type of armor, and one shot kills with a pistol aren't that easy, even on a group of minions.

As the game already allows for this type of deal, granted it is on a much grander scale, as the "big" reward for a specific class, it is a difficult situation, unless you are that class with said talent. It would step on that guys toes and possibly erk the player who has invested so much xp into getting that talent on their character.

Number 2) Spend a force point to place a chrome mug on the railing in front of them or saying they can see the reflection in the store front windows across the street. Pretty situational, but very plausible in this regard. This would be results possible for a high perception of vigilance roll (or a triumph). Otherwise, unless the character had some type of rear facing vision, or was a force sensitive, the amount of information they would have about what was behind them would be more of a broad knowledge then a specific. They could potentially hear a "strain in the person's voice" behind them, or get a creepy feeling (hair on the back of the neck stands up, uncomfortable feeling of being closely watched), but they wouldn't know what exactly what the problem was, they would just know there was a threat behind them (not that the dude had a knife or anything).

example #2:

a) "movie perception" should be avoided.

b) the shots are just a coercion check made with his shooting skills (at least i would houserule it like that ). a single triumph + narration was enough to convince the guy to back off.

once again, the rules work well to simulate this.

I got the impression that OP was talking about knowing the guy was behind him and had a knife. This example works well if you're referring to the coercion of getting the threat off you.

GM's how would you handle a classic western 1 vs. many scene without using any special talents? (Last man standing)

The shooter in one of our games did something similar with a rule twist: she ended up with enough damage to kill one minion, and 9 advantages (there were a couple of passed-on boost dice from previous player's actions, plus her base pool is YYYG, plus all the negative dice came up empty). No extra Talents were used. I let the players have 3 crits to take out three more minions rather than upping the critical (which is pointless because a crit is an auto-kill anyway).

Also how would you handle this?: (First 15 seconds) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ks7-A-7Zvak

Is that just a perception or vigilance check? Or would you just call it out because you know player X has a high perception or whatever? On a side note so far all perception checks in my game have been three or more difficulty, is that normal? How hard should it be for my bounty hunter to notice clues or size up a threat?

That's Vigilance for sure. Clint's first action after the initiative was set was a Coercion roll (I'd have given a boost die for the line), but had a couple threat that meant the guy backed down but didn't run off right away. A second Coercion roll and the guy took off.

Using RAW this would take a few turns after having failed his coercion check.

In this case, Clint made his coercion check since he was trying to force the bad guys to draw thier guns first.

Clint is a meta-gamer. He knew the bad guys were bad at Cool and good at Vigilance. He did a coercion check to make sure they knew a fight was coming and make it Cool checks for inititive.

As said above, they are nameless thugs, or as we call them in EotE, Minions. I'd think he got a crit to kill a minion (there are debates on how many minions you can kill with crits) and did enough damage to wipe out the minion group. The narrative would be that he shot several times, even though player Clint only rolled Ranged Light once.

As for the second one, standard stealth rules for the knife guy sneaking up. As for difficulty, have the player roll Vigilance vs the Stealth. Clint passed his vigilance so he chose to go to Coercion instead of starting combat. (Coercion with Agility for the stat because he backed up his words with shooting, perhaps?) If Clint would've failed, I would've either giving the bad guy a free attack before rolling initivate or I would've called for an initivate roll and played it from there, depending on how mean I'm feeling. I would give the bad guy Boost Dice to initivate in relation to how many threat were rolled on the Vigilance vs Stealth roll. Also, if Clint won inititave order, the player doesn't know exactly what's going on with knife guy and would have to act acordingly.