does this remove or lessen the -30 penalty to hit stuff while firing an unbraced heavy weapon? or is ALL it does is let you spray fire wildly?

It doesn't say that it lessens the penalty, so I guess it doesn't.

However, FA already grants a +20, so you're at a net -10.

Doen't lesen the penalty, but let's you fire a heavy weapon without bracing it. Normally you aren't allowed to fire unbraced heavy weapons AT ALL. Prtty useful for when you get surprised by something and you really don't want to spend the first half action of your turn to brace the weapon and then have to wait until next turn before being able to fire it on full auto.

Varnias Tybalt said:

Yes you can, just not on semi- or full-auto, which is what Bulging Biceps allows.

Reportedly, however, the talent has changed in Rogue Trader to ignore the penalty for not bracing as well, though I'd like confirmation on that...

Hmm, that would make Heavy Weapons absurdly powerful, because it's not actually that rare to see Str/Toughness scores capible of toting them around. While a sensible GM might limit their use or impose penalties on dodge/acrobatics, etc when using them, the rules should really incorporate those penalties or you end up with a perfectly legitimate argument that a character can potentially run around with a MP Lascannon, dodging fire with a 80% success rate, and disengage from melee with an equally high success rate to fire the thing into the face of melee opponents.

Any world with at least some level of law keeping isn't going to let people run around with heavy weaponry. If the acolytes are trying to keep a low profile then heavy weapons are right out anyway. If they use their authority to justify such equipment then they'll be throwing subtlety out the window (not to say that isn't a viable MO). Finally, if they're operating in a lawless area then there's nothing to stop whatever pack of deviants they're up against from bringing their own heavy weapons out to play.

Snidesworth said:

I'd say they threw subtlety out the window the minute they decided to bring heavy weapons in the first place. Still, sometimes you need heavy firepower, that's just a fact of life.

Hodgepodge said:

That's the whole point of heavy weapons. They are supposed to be absurdly powerful. And even if you did remove the ability that bulging biceps confer you'd still have a big gun that is able to shred most enemies to pieces. Bulging biceps can be completely left alone. It's not breaking the game, especially since heavy weapons still have their inherent drawbacks to them, it won't matter if you can tot arond with them a bit more easily than the rest.

I was reffering to the prospect of the talent also removing the penalty for firing unbraced. Just being able to fire on Semi-or-Full-Auto is fine. Although I'd like to see some agility penalties for carrying a Heavy Weapon around as well.

Basically, I see them sort of like SA/FA Shotguns- almost brokenly powerful, but hard to actually use. And likewise, outright broken unless you read the rules very, very closely (IMO, for example, just disengaging is not enough to grant the +30 PBR bonus- but there is a reasonable argument that it does, which makes shotguns disgustingly powerful instead of just disgustingly awesome).

Hodgepodge said:

How would disengaging from melee help someone with a shotgun? You don't get very far by disengaging from melee, and if you spend your full action doing that, there's not much preventing the shotgunners aggressor from simply charging the shotgunner again, effectively making it impossible for the shotgunner to get a single shot off.

Shotguns are insanely specialized weapons in the rules. First you have to make sure to be at point blank range to gain any special benefit from the Scatter quality, second you have to make sure that you have the drop on your opponents and be able to fire first. Because all those opponents have to do is charge you (not that hard to do at PB range) and then you'll just stand there looking like an idiot since you can't fire basic weapons in melee.

Second, they are pretty much useless against targets wearing armour on ranges beyond point blank range. I'd say those drawbacks more than weigh up the "insanely powerful" benefits a shotgun has at point blank range.

Yes, shotguns are destructive as hell at really close range, but aside from that they're pretty useless, even if they can fire on semi-auto or full-auto. I mean how's a semi.-auto blast by a combat shotgun gonna help when targets on moderate range are wearing standard flak armour, but it counts as POWER ARMOUR against hits scored by the shotgun? That's 8 points of damage soaked up since shotguns don't have a Pen value, and then we haven't even started to count in the factors of toughness bonus, where a reasonably tough mook will probably have a TB of 4, meaning 12 points of damage will be completely soaked up by each shot. Meaning that for damage you have to roll either 9 or 10 to actually hurt the mook with a shotgun on a moderate combat range.

So I ask you, what exactly do you mean by shotguns being "disgustingly powerful"?

If you're the Gm of your group, here's a tip: If your players have armed themselves with shotguns mainly because they do awesome damage at point blank range, send some reasonably intelligent mooks their way. You don't have to have that high of an Intelligence Bonus to realize that straying near point blank range of an enemy brandishing a shotgun would be a bad idea. It's better trying to pick off the shotgunners from afar (or at least far enough not to get seriously injured by shotgun blasts).

If the human mooks in flak armour starts doing that, I promise you that your players will sweat.

As for the heavy weapons combined with bulging biceps. It's still not that powerful. Even if it let's you fire semi-auto or full-auto shots unbraced, the gunner will still have to deal with the penalties of being unbraced. That's a -30 to hit (a rather nasty penalty). Besides that, the gunner is still required to use both hands, meaning that if he (like the shotgunner) becomes assaulted in melee he'll have some serious problems.

Aside from that there's the fact that heavy weapons weigh A LOT, and you have to have more than decent Strength and Toughness bonuses to be able to carry them comfortably. Counting in the weight of the ammo (as a GM you really should consider the extra weight into the ammunition carried by a heavy weapon gunner. Absurd amounts of stub rounds or bolt rounds will be felt in the packing. It's a lot of brass and lead weights to be carried), it's pretty much impossible to carry additional back-up weapons and other important gear without straining effort.

Then there's the issues with subtlety. It's hard enough trying to smuggle high grade basic weapons and even some pistols through security checkpoints and weapon checks, doing the same with a heavy weapon is pretty much impossible. But then again, the acolytes might be in more criminal sectors of whatever world or ship they happen to be on, but still heavy weapons will give them a disadvantage. News will travel fast of heavily armed newcomers, instantly making any investigations a lot more deadly if the acolytes mess-up. A "harmless" seeming newcomer who gets into a fight with some gangers or hiding heretics might not have to face that deadly opposition. A newcomer belonging to a group of newcomers who are rumoured to be heavily armed, will make any ganger or heretic tense, and they'd probably play it safe when dealing with said newcomer, breaking out the most nasty pieces of firepower they can muster. (meaning that the acolytes might have to face the same kind of heavy stubbers or heavy bolters that they use themselves)

So you see, there's a lot of aspect which speaks against bringing shotguns and/or heavy weaposn from a tactical standpoint. That's why such weapons are called "Special weapons". They are only suited for use at "special" occasions, and can sometimes be outright harmful to the wielder at other occasions. This means you have to anticipate said occasions (which can be really tricky when you're undercover), as to make sure not to bring the "wrong kind of gun".

After all, what good is a heavy stubber going to do, when it causes the very heretics or traitors you hunt to arm themselves with the same kinds of weapons or possibly even worse?

...Although I'd like to see some agility penalties for carrying a Heavy Weapon around as well.

Well there kind of is. P215 (If encumbered) '.... You take -10 penalty to all movement related tests and reduce you agility bonus by 1 for determining movement rates...' Unless the heavy weapon and all their gear weighs less than their Carry limits they will be on penalties.

IMO, for example, just disengaging is not enough to grant the +30 PBR bonus

Well you could look at that way, but seeing as you need acrobatics (and then a test) to even gain an action after a disengage, unless your opponant is totally melee only (who would move back into combat, if you like as it is 1m it can be done for free) you have given them a point blank shot with a full action to use so who is worse off.

Disengaging helps because it's a half-action with a successful acrobatics check, which can be a pretty safe bet for midgame characters who like shotguns. Take a rank 5 Assassin who rolled 30 agility and bought himself up to 50 agility (which is not usual for an Assassin since it is a super-cheap stat for them and rules most of their skills). He has Acrobatics +10, so he has a 60% chance of disengaging without taking a hit. Even if he takes the hit, this is a chararacter with a high enough dodge not to sweat a standard attack from most enemies, and he still gets to disengage as per the IH. Now, if I were writing the rules, I would have made Disengage actions preclude any offensive action in that round, since you are running away. However, the rules themselves say nothing about this. In fact, you may perfectly legally choose not to move at all (although this would put you back into melee). A smart player will, meanwhile, move three meters so they are still PBR, but the enemy cannot charge (which requires a movement of at least four meters). The enemy now needs to move to make a melee attack, precluding anything more deadly than a Standard Attack, retreat, or get into a gun battle with an enemy with a semi-auto shotgun (ie, commit suicide). The Assassin is then has a half-action and is not in melee. Which is perfect chance to unload a Shotgun blast.

What this player, who really hasn't made any usual skill choices yet, has done is simply observe that Disengage utterly breaks the normal mechanisms by which closing to melee range normally acts as a counter to non-pistol ranged weapons.

I don't really have a problem with that per-se, except that if they also get the +30 PBR bonus in this scenario, they will likely even kill flak-armored enemies. Keep in mind that Assassins get Mighty Shot very early, which gives them +2 damage on each ranged hit. So now we're looking at a minimum damage of 7 and a max of 16 per hit on most shotguns. God help the poor GM who follows the popular (although blanantly incorrect) reading of the RAW for Fire Selectors and lets this guy have one on a Meat Hammer, with its damage range of 10-18 in this scenario. But even a sane shotgun now has an average damage of 11.5, which means with 4 TB and 4 armor, the average hit is going to do 3-4 wounds of damage. That's no biggie, but assuming the +30 PBR bonus, 40 base BS (a humble 30 starting roll with two advances), and +10 from a red-dot, we're looking at 80 WS. So, on a reasonable roll of 40, he will have 4 degrees of success and 9-12 damage. Just for fun, there's no reason that he wouldn't be using Inferno shells, so that's three chances to set the enemy on fire. Instead of being countered by the high armor/toughness enemy, he stands a decent chance of having one-shotted it (unless it's high agility as well or something). If not, well, this isn't anything unusual, he can do it every turn. And, keep in mind, I'm actually using rather conservative assumptions here- strictly average base rolls, no min-maxing of home worlds, etc.

Also, scatter weapons only take the double armor penalty at long or extended range. Mid-range, they're decent enough weapons, although not powerhouses by any means.

If this is a later-game scenario, it becomes relevant to note that disengage also allows for a standard attack with a single-shot Heavy Weapon. At this point, your average assassin who started with 30 toughness and 30 strength is going to have a hard time taking advantage of this. Bulging Biceps is, for example, out of the question. However, over the course of his career, he may have understandable chosen to shell out the 2500 to max his toughness. This gives him a combined toughness and strength score of 8, enough to carry 56kg comfortably. He's not going to be carrying around the nice heavy weapons with ease or anything, but with Lindh Light Power Armor, an otherwise reasonable choice for an agile character entering heavy combat, he bumps up to 67kg. RAW, he can now fire a MP Lascannon every turn, in melee. If you go with the interpretation that he gets the PBR bonus after disengaging, this additionally negates the -20 penalty and actually gives a +10 bonus when he does so. This only starts to get scary when you enter the world of slightly-above-average Feral World Assasins who can carry 67-78kg without even wearing the power armor (rolled 35+ in toughness, strength, or both), but those aren't really so terribly unusual.

Also, the penalties for carrying between your carry weight and lifting weight aren't really so bad: -1 AB for determining movement, -10 on agility tests (offset at this point by Acrobatics +20), and a toughness test every TB hours to determine if you take 1 point of Fatigue. That's not much of a penalty for being able to reliably use Heavy Weapons in melee. And, just for added fun, a Plasma Cannon, not my first choice but still brutally powerful, only weighs 38kg.

Of course, Heavy Weapons are more a Guardsman's game. Luckily, they can't get Acrobatics. So they have several options. First, they can simply make an opposed WS to Manouver the opponent one space away. Because you are said to be engaged with an opponent if you end a move action adjacent to them (DH pg 192) and he just ended a move action without being adjacent to the enemy, RAW it seems that he is no longer in melee and can do as he pleases (this also applies to most Assasins incidentally). Likewise, he can simply walk away, since a mid-late game guardsman is likely to be able to shrug off a hit, especially if he picked up dodge+20. Now he's free to blast away with his MP Lascannon, which the average late-game Guardsman really shouldn't have much trouble holding, at +10. In both his and his Assassin buddy's case, it's actually +20 due to red-dot.

Now into the fun world of automatic fire. All this? All it takes is one character to keep the enemy away from his friend for one turn, and then disengage/manouver/whatever to get out of the way. Then his friend opens up with his Vanaheim/Multi-Laser/Multi-Melta at +50 from PBR and Full-Auto.

Yes, it's true, there are ways to counter this. But there's really not much in the game that can survive a decent roll with that sort of blast. Bracing normally balances this by adding another turn or so to set up and then limiting the arc of fire. But once you're in a situation where you can actually use a Heavy Weapon and can carry it, a single slip up by the GM and there is a smoking crater where the Slaught Overseer was. Likewise, even a semi-auto shotgun turns almost any challenge for a mid-game party into a challenge for the GM to make sure that player never gets the one turn out of melee he needs to end virtually any otherwise fair threat.

All this is less of a problem if a) it were made clear that when the rules say that one does not get the +30 from PBR in "close combat," they mean that once you've actually started shooting or slashing someone within say, pistol range, you are in "close combat" (rather than "melee") with them until combat ends or you move outside of pistol range, and b) that disengage signals a clear intent to flee the melee and requires you to move as far as possible within the bounds of a half-move action as is possible under the circumstances and/or disallows any further attacks within that round of combat as you flee (which would allow the fleeing character to make either a standard attack before disengaging, or make a half-move action afterwords to gain more distance).

The former is a clafification of and elaboration on my own reading of the RAW. The later represents my reading of the intent behind the Disengage action.

I have less problem with Manouver being used to break melee for attacks, because it requires a successful opposed WS check, which not only requires diversification across both range and melee combat specializations, but is far less likely to succeed against a powerful opponent than Disengage. Just walking away, likewise, is at least somewhat risky against a powerful foe.

I likewise don't have a problem with teamwork resulting in a great Heavy Weapon or Shotgun blast. It's just that giving the +30 under any circumstances but having freshly entered close combat range makes a very powerful attack into one which would subsequently require the GM's entire attention simply to prevent from occuring. Likewise, taking the -20 penalty away when using Bulging Biceps, which is what provoked my original comment, would have a similar result.

As for when heavy weapons and shotguns can be used, I agree, but I think that the above problems potentially complicate any use of heavy weapons at all. In the case of shotguns, I don't think that carrying them is that unusual. Any situation permitting an autogun would permit a shotgun as well. Also, they are technically concealable. Certainly, you can't bring them into a noble's court the way you can high status weapons like Power Swords, Inferno Pistols, dueling pistols, and "status symbol" type Bolters. Also, all the arguments I have made should make it clear that, if interpreted this way, shotguns and heavy weapons would be simply unfair to deploy against players, even in retaliation for their own use of them.

Would a good GM let players get away with this? No. But everything I have written reflects a reasonable interpretation of the RAW, and GMs shouldn't have to choose between two reasonable interpretations and then learn from experience or extensive background knowledge which of the two happens to break the game. Rather, the non-game-breaking interpretation should be clarified as the correct one ASAP.

Hodgepodge said:

AFAIK because reactions can only be taken when it is not your turn, you cannot attempt to dodge the free attack from breaking out of melee combat.

It seems you are correct about that, although that seems odd considering how many abilities let you use your reaction for other purposes on your own Turn.

Also, I caculated the unbraced penalty as -20 incorrectly. The proper penalty is -30.

I will let readers decide how much damage this does to my argument.

Hodgepodge said:

How so? Players have fate points to burn, your average mook don't.

Also consider this: would heretics and criminals care much for which weapons are "fair" to use when the Inquisition is after them? Not really.

I see no unfairness at all in deplying heavy weapons or shotguns against acolytes who take advantage of the same weapons themselves. The GM shouldn't think too much about what's "fair" for a heretic/traitor/mutant/criminal to use, rather they should think about what would be LIKELY for one such person to use when they know that they are either guarding an important location or know that the Inquisition is after them.

If you were a criminal, hunted by the Emperors thought-police who will surely execute you for the crimes you've commited, you're not gonna think. "Well, I could break out the heavy stubber and obliterate the agents chasing me from the face of the planet and be rid of them forever... But that wouldn't be fair, so I'll stick with my puny las carbine and primitive melee weapon instead."

Like I said. Player Characters have fate points to burn, NPC's don't. That's unfair to begin with, so there's no reason for the GM making the NPC's "pulling their punches". Especially not when the Players will use/abuse the same weapons themselves (yes, trying to fit fire selectors to Meat Hammer Shotguns is a blatant power gaming abuse of the rules. And if the players are inclined to go that way, then so should the NPC's)...

The problem there is that, really, using a fairly standard form of weapon according to the rules shouldn't require a situation where one routine shot on either side results in the death of either the player or the enemy. It's not as if shotguns are an unusual form of weapon, and all this is just a straightforward extention of the rules for using them in close combat. Heavy Weapons? Maybe, but what if you want to challenge your party with something that doesn't use them?

Hodgepodge said:

Now im going to have to invoke the argument of realism here. In real life, fairly standard weapons kill people. It doesn't matter if you're shot by a .50 Barret rifle, an artillery grenade or a 9 mm slug from a pistol. You will get injured or killed by it. That just life (... or death, depending on how you look at it).

Why should it be any different in an RPG? If your players just expect to survive dangerous firefights in-game simply because they know what the rules look like, then how will you ever raise the feeling of suspense?

Firefights and violence in general should be deadly. The victor should most often (meaning "not always, bot mostly") be the one who approach the situation in the smartest way and the most tactical way. Sometimes that will be enough, but even stray shots can kill.

This isn't Deathwatch where bullets just plink harmlessly off armour like it was rainwater. Acolytes are normal people not Space Marines. Sure they might have skills and talents, but there's no reason why they should be superhuman, shrugging off damage from firearms like they where being hit by nerf-rockets.

The players already have a narrative game mechanic to prevent such deaths, and it's called fate point burning. I'd say that's enough of a reason to leave the deadly nature of firearms be as they are.

If you want to challenge your players withoput heavy weapons being involved there's tons of avenues to explore. Some doesn't even involve combat at all or are simply impossible to solve with violence.

Fair enough. Still, I do think that the weapons in question are quite deadly enough without giving them the +30 PBR bonus just for managing to break out of direct melee combat with an enemy, especially since the rules do say that the bonus does not apply in "close combat," which is rather vauge and implies that they intended the bonus to be unapplicable in "close combat" situations other than straightforward melee.

Hodgepodge said:

Well I do believe the terms "close combat" and "melee" are pretty much interchangeable in this situation.

Regarding point blank range, it pretty much says that a target within three meters is considered to be within point blank range, and should confer a bonus of +30. So the real issue here is to be able to determine which range puts a character outside of melee/close combat but still within point blank range.

I personally houserule the range that if you are roughly one metre away from your opponent you are locked in melee/close combat. This might seem like a pretty short range (I mean, some close combat weapons are longer than a metre), but my basis on this is what type of feasible range you would get a, let's call it "attack of opporutunity" (I know, wrong game but it's an appropriate term). If someone stands one metre away from me and decides to flee with disregard for what I do, I'd probably be able to strike that person in time. If that person is further away from me (like 1.5 metres or 2 metres) I'd have considerable trouble landing a proper blow if that person decides to flee. Hence a range between over 1 metre and 3 metres isn't really close combat, but rather point blank range. And within this range, you can use basic weapons and heavy weapons, and you will get the PBR bonus.

(this "one metre CC-range" does not apply if one of the fighters are in prone position, as you could easily point a basic weapon at someone lying down rather than someone standing and being up in your face at one metre's range)

Also I don't really think the aspects you point out present much of an issue. Like I said, breaking off from melee without getting hit usually require a Disengage action. This is a full action and it only let's you move your half move away from your opponent (that's not very far unless you have Unnatural Agility or something like that). There's little stopping your opponent from charging you in order to prevent you from being able to fire. Yes, I know some of your other acolytes could help you keeping melee aggressors away, but what's to say that the acolytes' enemies are alone? Who's to say that there is an acolyte available to prevent melee aggressors from getting stuck in with the heavy weapons acolyte?

It all depends too much on circumstance, and it really bottles down to tactics. If an NPC is fighting a heavy weapons gunner, and said gunner breaks off and the NPC decides NOT to close the distance or roll for cover, then that NPC deserves to get shredded by heavy weapons fire. That being said a heavy weapons gunner who doesn't keep someone around to defend him/her while they get their weapon to bear, deserves to have a hard time even getting shots off, due to melee aggressors constantly harassing him/her by charging.

Bear in mind though that no one carrying a heavy weapon should really be involved in these types of ranges. If a machinegunner finds himself in melee, some serious tactical error has been made (or a real nasty ambush must have been sprung). Heavy weapons are most effective at longer ranges, and both the acolytes and the NPC's should know that instead of charging headlong towards eachother with heavy stubbers and missile launchers in hand.

Rereading the rules, I think you may be right. As quoted before, it is stated quite clearly that the definition of being "engaged" with someone is ending a movement adjacent to them (DH, 192, under Move (Full or Half Action). So either a successful Disengage or a Manouver, both of which are move actions, will allow you to move without taking a free attack. However, it gets tricky much beyond that. The combat abstractions panel on the page before mentions that when one is engaged, all attacks are Challenging (+0) because one is actively ducking, dodging, exchanging whatever attacks are possible (which resolve themselves into the effects of a standard attack), and generally "attempting to defend themselves to some degree."

However, all this applies to the term "engagement," rather than "melee." Furthermore, if you have used a Disengage or Manouver Action successfully and choose to resolve it in a manner which leaves you 2 meters away from the enemy, you have ended a move action and are not adjacent to them. Therefore, you are not said to be engaged with them, as per the above definition. Also, on closer inspection, while the term "Close Combat is used in the definition of the PBR bonus, in the definition of Ganging Up on that page and the previous, including the sidebar, that term and melee are used interchangably (198-199).

So, as far as I can see, you are right. And there isn't any strong argument that you aren't.

Charge is not the best counter against a player using this, since they can move 2-3 meters, under change range.

Stun, Takedown, and Grapple are all great options, as is a melee compex enough that they find themselves engaged in close combat with another enemy in the course of their move action. Also, they have a half action to use their weapon. The enemy, if they survive, has a full round with them at PBR. Maybe you're right about turning the tables...

I think the fact that no one with heavy weapons should find themselves in melee is part of my problem with this. Bulging Biceps and this makes being in melee with a heavy weapon not that much riskier than being in melee with a pistol. Still, clever use of these rules by PCs invites equally clever counter-use of the rules by the GM, so I hope my Hypothetical Assassin enjoys being grappled every turn and having to spend a full action to test Contorotionist to escape it.

Hodgepodge said:

You're catching on!

Also remember that "clever rule use" doesn't always reflect "cheesy" in-game behaviour. I mean, if you're in really close proximity to someone brandishing a really big and unwieldy gun, you can either do two things:

Run for cover

OR

You make sure that the opponent can't aim and fire that big gun at you. which means you'll likely try to grapple, tackle, twist, turn dodge etc. Anything at all to stay away from the busniess-end of that heavy gun in his or her hands, preferably by staying right in his or her face making it impossible to shoot you.

It's this course of action that the clever rule usage will reflect, so I hope no GM will shy away from it. Just put yourself in the poor and desperate NPc's shoes and think: what would you do?

Oh and by the way, hypothetical assassins certainly do deserve to be grappled every turn and having to spend full action contortionist tests to escape from it. Assassins are by far the cheesiest class to play in Dark Heresy, and it has always been my opinion that something should be done about them (especially those goddamned Moritat Reapers!). It's very rare for the assassin player to actually have to think during combat.

While the Guardsman, The Arbitrator, The Scum and even the Sororitas have to employ some tactics and strategies during tough fights, the assassins can most of the time rely on ridiculous amounts of parries, dodges, high WS and BS and if you as a GM EVER make the mistake of letting said assassin get a hold of high grade weaponry (power swords anyone?) you're pretty much forced to sit back and watch the assassin player kill some of the most vicious and nasty NPC-creatures you've thought up without even breaking a sweat. Which of course will turn all those climactic battles you had in mind into anti-climactic mush.

I try to weigh this up myself by making some rather interesting personalities for the assassins I play, but seriously, something should be done about this utterly cheesy class.

I mean, yes assassins are cool, but do they ALWAYS have to have ninja-über-skills, ALL the time?

As far as I can tell, their weak spot is that even though they have high toughness, they lack access to the rather nice Toughness-based talents that really would let them take advantage of the stat. They seem particularily vulnerable to stunning, which is just vicious. Also, I don't think they have any particular efficacy against Pinning, so you could use that to force them to work together with other players.

Although I imagine a Templar Psyker is prettymuch the same thing but with magic powers. Although the harsh agility curve helps offset that a lot.

Edit: Hmm, come to think of it, since dodge negates damage from automatic fire and scatter per degree of success, you probably could just shoot Hypothetical Assassin in the face with a shotgun and not feel too badly about it. Also, he is only Hypothetical, so he's not a real person.

Hodgepodge said:

Yeah, well the thing is you have to actually get to touch them first in order to stun them. They are often impossible to surprise (since they always take Rapid Reflexes when they can), and once they know they are in combat (which they ALWAYS do) it's impossible to hit them since they always dodge or parry away like it was the easiest thing in the world.

Hmm. Well, if you give enemies weapon skill on par with theirs, they could feint (half action) and then takedown (half action) for a potential round of stunning.

Feint only works with the Standard Attack action, unfortunately. Also, it you must take a Move to close with the Hypothetical Assassin after he made a Disengage, you only have a Half Action left.

The question becomes, can a Knock-down or Takedown Action be Dodged? Parried?