…fighting with two Accurate pistols? Would you add two Boost dice or just one? I was thinking two, but I wanted to get opinions as the "math" doesn't always translate
How would you handle…
Personally, if someone was using Duel blasters i would give them a setback die for the off hand blaster, and treat it as a linked weapon neading 2 advantage to hit with both. Only one boost die based on the accuracy rating of both
Fighting with two weapons increases the difficulty once, no setback die - or more if fighting with different types of weapons, i.e. a vibro-knife and a blaster pistol, the poorest skill rating and characteristic rating is used, and the highest difficulty +2 difficulty dice.
As to using two accurate blasters. I think 1 boost would suffice, although I can certainly see reasoning for 2. The thing is that you pick your primary weapon, which is basically "the weapon" you attack with. Since fighting with two blaster basically means same skill and characteristic, the difficulty would be the same, the boost from accuracy would be added, in my opinion, once.
Perhaps if firing the two weapons at different targets (which as far as I can read is not really supported by the rules) then perhaps I'd let the two boost be applied, but I'd increase (and/or upgrade) the difficulty another 2, so 3 increases in total, above and beyond the highest starting difficulty; i.e. if one target is short range and another is medium, pick medium and increase.
My reasoning for the two Boost dice are that the pistols would both be Accurate. Taking that quality away seems…silly? Unfair. You get the idea. I'd have to toy with it, but opinions are welcome.
Of course, you compile benefits and penalties of the same type, so maybe one's enough. For example, it's dark and rainy and windy. AFAIK, that's one Setback die, not three. Add in being shot at, it's now two and if you're injured enough, three. Also, you use the lower of the skills with two weapons, so it stands to reason you don't lose or gain a Boost, you just get one, even if only one weapon's Accurate. I'd love an official word on this.
Well wind, darkness and rain could impose more than 1 setback die penalty - depending on severity; I'd basically pick the worst as the guiding penaliser. Still, I get your point and I think that is a fair assessment. I mean, you can only, really (afaik) aim with one gun at the time - by which I mean that one would be the main-aim, whereas the other's accuracy might help, its still a secondary effect, that only hits if you are so lucky.
As for "fariness" - I'm not sure I buy that argument for getting 2 boost dice when dual-wielding two accurate blasters. That's me though. I can see players wanting it, I still think its outside my "reasonable zone".
My ruling would be "No, you apply the bonus boost die from the Accurate quality only once if perfrorming a two-weapon attack with two accurate weapons". Two (and a half?) rationales are provided below, you can choose which you prefer.
#1
In the final week beta patch notes, the revised rules state the following about Two Weapon Combat (p9, first column):
"To make the attack, he performs a combined check. First, the character denotes one weapon as the primary weapon. When making the combined check, he will be attacking with this weapon. He then determines what skills and characteristics he would use when making attacks with his primary weapon, and his secondary weapon (the other weapon he wields). Finally, he determines his target.
To assemble the dice pool for this check, the player compares the skills that would be used to make an attack with each weapon, and compares the characteristics that would be used to make an attack with each weapon. He then takes the skill that he has lower ranks in, and the characteristic that he as lower ranks in, and uses this skill and characteristic to assemble his dice pool. (It’s very possible that the ranks in either the skills or characteristics are equal, in which case he can use either. If both checks would use the same skill or characteristic, he simply uses that skill or characteristic.) [sic]"
Two things are very clear: (A) you choose one primary weapon, and (B) you use the least favorable attack modifiers between the two weapons to construct the dice pool. Therefore, it follows the that either (A) you apply the benefits of only your primary weapon to the attack, or (B) recieve only the smaller bonus available on the roll (In this case, its either +1 Boost OR +1 Boost).
Under either A or B, you get +1 Boost.
#2
Either separate from #1,or informing it, pg 188 of the beta text, under Rules Adjudication states:
"However, rules lawyering - using the minutiae of the rules to gain an unfair, unexpected, or unintended advantage in game- should be avoided by both players and GMs. [sic]"
This is rules lawyering. The rules say don't do that.
And finally, to be clear, this is my ruling based on my interpretation of the RAW. I am not telling anyone that their dissenting interpretation is wrong. If there is valid rule text that directly contradicts an interpretation, then it is wrong, regardless of what my interpretation is. If there is valid rule text that directly contradicts my interpretation, then my interpretation is wrong.
-WJL
LethalDose said:
My ruling would be "No, you apply the bonus boost die from the Accurate quality only once if perfrorming a two-weapon attack with two accurate weapons". Two (and a half?) rationales are provided below, you can choose which you prefer.
#1
In the final week beta patch notes, the revised rules state the following about Two Weapon Combat (p9, first column):
"To make the attack, he performs a combined check. First, the character denotes one weapon as the primary weapon. When making the combined check, he will be attacking with this weapon. He then determines what skills and characteristics he would use when making attacks with his primary weapon, and his secondary weapon (the other weapon he wields). Finally, he determines his target.
To assemble the dice pool for this check, the player compares the skills that would be used to make an attack with each weapon, and compares the characteristics that would be used to make an attack with each weapon. He then takes the skill that he has lower ranks in, and the characteristic that he as lower ranks in, and uses this skill and characteristic to assemble his dice pool. (It’s very possible that the ranks in either the skills or characteristics are equal, in which case he can use either. If both checks would use the same skill or characteristic, he simply uses that skill or characteristic.) [sic]"
Two things are very clear: (A) you choose one primary weapon, and (B) you use the least favorable attack modifiers between the two weapons to construct the dice pool. Therefore, it follows the that either (A) you apply the benefits of only your primary weapon to the attack, or (B) recieve only the smaller bonus available on the roll (In this case, its either +1 Boost OR +1 Boost).
Under either A or B, you get +1 Boost.
#2
Either separate from #1,or informing it, pg 188 of the beta text, under Rules Adjudication states:
"However, rules lawyering - using the minutiae of the rules to gain an unfair, unexpected, or unintended advantage in game- should be avoided by both players and GMs. [sic]"
This is rules lawyering. The rules say don't do that.
And finally, to be clear, this is my ruling based on my interpretation of the RAW. I am not telling anyone that their dissenting interpretation is wrong. If there is valid rule text that directly contradicts an interpretation, then it is wrong, regardless of what my interpretation is. If there is valid rule text that directly contradicts my interpretation, then my interpretation is wrong.
-WJL
+1
LethalDose said:
Two things are very clear: (A) you choose one primary weapon, and (B) you use the least favorable attack modifiers between the two weapons to construct the dice pool. Therefore, it follows the that either (A) you apply the benefits of only your primary weapon to the attack, or (B) recieve only the smaller bonus available on the roll (In this case, its either +1 Boost OR +1 Boost).
Just to clarify though…if you hit, do you just hope the boost die helped a lot, do you hit twice, or do you need to spend an advantage (ala auto-fire or linked weapons) to hit a second time?
2 advantages (or a Triupmh) results in a second hit - a la autofire indeed. But there can only be 1 additional hit, not multiple.
Jegergryte said:
2 advantages (or a Triupmh) results in a second hit - a la autofire indeed. But there can only be 1 additional hit, not multiple.
Everything Jeger said, and the second hit deals damage from the secondary weapon, which may be different than linked/autofire since those weapons deal the same amount of damage/hit.
Also, in a successful two weapon attack, the uncanceled successes are only added to the damage once, and distributed between the two hits as the character sees fit, where as the uncanceled successes from an Autofire or Linked attack are added to the damage of every hit.
On a successful hit, you can spend adv/triumph regularly to activate weapon qualities of the primary weapon. However, after adv/triumph has been spent to activate the second hit on a two-weapon attack, you may spend adv/triumph to activate the qualites of either weapon.
This is laid out on page p9 of the final week beta notes.
-WJL
Now, I know this is not covered in the rules, because there is no need for it to be covered in the rules. But let's say someone has a blaster pistol with autofire capabilities? Like, for instance, the subrepeating blaster in the Free-traders and freebooters catalogue 
Basically, the idea is, dual wielding two autofire capable pistols, autofiring and making a mess - how would you handle that?
My first idea was to just increase first for dual wielding (+1 difficulty), then for auto-fire - which then is either +1 or +2 (+1 if only one weapon is on auto-fire, +2 if both - unless the logic in this thread of only adding the one boost die applies, and therefore we would only add the one difficulty increase ?). I mean, its pointless unless you've got very high skill rating and characteristic rating - but its fun and would create a fear effect at least. Anyway, this basically means that you add 2 or 3 difficulty dice into the pool - perhaps slap on an upgrade for good measure too?
Any other ideas?
Jegergryte said:
Now, I know this is not covered in the rules, because there is no need for it to be covered in the rules. But let's say someone has a blaster pistol with autofire capabilities? Like, for instance, the subrepeating blaster in the Free-traders and freebooters catalogue
Basically, the idea is, dual wielding two autofire capable pistols, autofiring and making a mess - how would you handle that?
My first idea was to just increase first for dual wielding (+1 difficulty), then for auto-fire - which then is either +1 or +2 (+1 if only one weapon is on auto-fire, +2 if both - unless the logic in this thread of only adding the one boost die applies, and therefore we would only add the one difficulty increase ?). I mean, its pointless unless you've got very high skill rating and characteristic rating - but its fun and would create a fear effect at least. Anyway, this basically means that you add 2 or 3 difficulty dice into the pool - perhaps slap on an upgrade for good measure too?
Any other ideas?
So, first off, I'm tired as f*** right now, but i saw this and my mind is engaged and WON'T SHUT UP.
yeah, this isn't covered in the rules because it's not gonna happen for a couple of reasons, like:
- Its a mess
- There's no light weapons with autofire
- There's no mechanical benefit to this
- Seriously, it's a big f***ing mess
I think you're right, you'd increase difficulty one step for Autofire, and an additional step for two-weapon fighting, so +PP. Then go through all the typical shenanigans to figure you our dice pool in a two weapon attack.
Here's why no-one would do it: When you get your result, you can either spend 2 adv (or triumph) to activate autofire on your primary weapon, OR spend 2 adv to activate the two weapon attack, and THEN you can spend 2 more adv to activate AF on the secondary weapon (AF is a weapon quality, so normal two weapon attack rules, and so on). There NO reason to take the extra difficulty die firing two AF weapons because you could just fire one AF weapon and score more hits on the same roll because you don't have to activate the secondary weapon and its easier (lower diff).
BED NOW! SHUT UP BRAIN!
But it would prolly look cool.
SHUT! UP!!
-WJL
Now, all your reasons for not doing are correct - the main one being, it can't happen due to no ranged (light) weapon with autofire capabilities - even if I made one for my game 
As for mechanical benefits. Well. I can only see one, sort of benefit (which can be solved a number of different ways, like "Get a new weapon!"). But let's say your subrepeating home-brewed blaster pistol with autofire does exist, has a damage of 7. and your heavy blaster pistol is modded to kingdom come and has damage 11, even with Pierce perhaps. Now pick your main weapon - whichever, but I pick the heavy blaster - and roll. Now considering the drawbacks (+PP), the benefit is pointless (or hard to come by) - but lets say the heavy blaster is your main, you hit and score 5 successes and 6 advantages (solid hit). Normally the succcesses would be distributed as you see fit and you gain one additional hit. In this instance though, you could hit with the heavy blaster, slap the successes onto the secondary weapon, and use 2 advtanges to cause a hit from it, and the remaining 4 to cause 2 additional hits with the autofiring pistol.
I see why they havent included a ranged (light) weapon, and with this issue comes the net successes incompatability between autofire and two weapon fighting. In the former - as far as I remember - all successes are added to all hits (I know that at one point this was not so, but I believe they changed it back as LD say), whereas as LD also points out, in TWC it needs to be distributed. Now if I slap 4 of those 5 successes on to the blaster uzi hit(s), the damage goes from 7 to 11. Good hit, good damage. But then, when activating the autofire quality, does this damage (11) apply to all the autofire hits?
I don't think this system is meant for this.
For unbalanced play I'd think that when wielding two autofire weapons and firing increase difficulty by 2, activate secondary weapon 2 advantages, and autofire activation is reduced to 1 advantage. Still not much of a benefit. What a pointless gesture. I apologise.
LethalDose said:
Two things are very clear: (A) you choose one primary weapon, and (B) you use the least favorable attack modifiers between the two weapons to construct the dice pool. Therefore, it follows the that either (A) you apply the benefits of only your primary weapon to the attack, or (B) recieve only the smaller bonus available on the roll (In this case, its either +1 Boost OR +1 Boost).
While I agree with A), I don't agree that B) can be inferred from the rules. The rules only talk about determining the characteristic and skill being used for the check (i.e.: the base pool), and make no mention of any boost and or setback die that may apply. I'd ask you another question: If each weapon would contribute a setback die to the pool, would you only apply the setback die from the primary weapon, or from both?
I'd argue that RAW, you would add two setback/boost dice to the pool.
That being said, if you think that the player was just doing it for rules cheese, then by all means invoke the "don't be a ****" rule and only let him apply one boost die to the roll (or even none - it's not terribly against the spirit of the narrative to argue that you can't get any benefit from the accurate property of a weapon when wielding one in each hand - look at Jango's attempts to hit Obi Wan and Mace when doing so in AotC). Personally I don't see that adding a second boost die to the roll would be terribly abusive or against the spirit of the rules, if the character has access to two accurate pistols.
TalkingMuffin said:
…fighting with two Accurate pistols? Would you add two Boost dice or just one? I was thinking two, but I wanted to get opinions as the "math" doesn't always translate
I would only allow one boost dice, and I would require two Accurate pistols in order to obtain it.
Everything about dual wielding boils down to "taking the lowest available value and using that". By that logic, I would allow a boost dice for Accurate but just like you can't get a "double accurate" rifle, I wouldn't allow double boost dice for dual wield and I woudl require that the player fulfill the minimum requirement to get the dice (IE both weapons have Accurate).
That said, I don't think getting two boost dice would be game breaking, its just not logical when compared to the rest of the dual wield mechanics.
Bladehate said:
TalkingMuffin said:
…fighting with two Accurate pistols? Would you add two Boost dice or just one? I was thinking two, but I wanted to get opinions as the "math" doesn't always translate
I would only allow one boost dice, and I would require two Accurate pistols in order to obtain it.
Everything about dual wielding boils down to "taking the lowest available value and using that". By that logic, I would allow a boost dice for Accurate but just like you can't get a "double accurate" rifle, I wouldn't allow double boost dice for dual wield and I woudl require that the player fulfill the minimum requirement to get the dice (IE both weapons have Accurate).
That said, I don't think getting two boost dice would be game breaking, its just not logical when compared to the rest of the dual wield mechanics.
That's what I was thinking.
As far as autofire pistols, I'd probably give a Setback die as pistols are not well-suited for such. It stands to reason that only two-handed weapons would be viable with autofire.
Now, what about two lightsabers…(joke!)