Just so we're clear... can Jury Rigged actually reduce the cost of activating extra hits with Auto-fire to just one Advantage result?

If so, this does not make sense. Chewbacca is a Wookiee, therefore you must acquit.

Thank you.

I could see a skilled weaponsmith improving a weapon's rate of fire. Sure.

In other games there'd be minor quirks to any modified weapon (overheat maybe?), but EotE seems happy to assume that's happening with no ill effects - game-mechanic-wise, anyway.

Seems kinda game-breaking to me. Perhaps only the FIRST Auto-fire hit has its cost reduced? I mean getting one whole hit's worth of damage for every advantage is stupid overpowered. Boost dice from aiming would so incredibly lethal it boggles the mind. (It also means the conversation about having four arms in the Destroyer Droid thread just got a bit more interesting.)

Yeah, that sounds a great fix.

By the rules, yes. It's pretty bad. Remember that opponents can get it too (and they don't have to wade through talent trees unless you want them to). Soon enough you'll see a move toward gun control and a ban on Auto-fire... Or, you'll see a lot of deaths.

Autofire hasn't come up much in my group. Only one character out of eight so far has owned a weapon capable of it (though, thinking about it, once he acquired it fights were over very quickly).

Anyone care to post their house-rule fix for Autofire?

I'm not sure how I'd approach the problem.

Something about ammuntion?

Base damage only for additional hits?

I've pondered it and was thinking that in an unsupported firing stance a player would be limited to a cap of three hits and beyond that the weapon is too wild off target. Fire from a prone position or mount and it would be game on.

New rule - " The Rambo Effect ": The number of hits with an auto-fire attack cannot exceed Brawn.

EDIT: intended to quote 2P51, here

Great rule Orange. Now I kind of want to stack my Wookie character with Ranged Heavy...

Yeah, this has been discussed since Beta. it is legit.

Autofire is a bit crazy but as long as you don't hand wave the other balancing factors in the game you should be okay. For example for a PC to be able to effectively Autofire a Heavy Blaster Rifle without any Setback dice they are going to have to have both a high Agility and a high Brawn to over come both the Cumbersome Quality and it's 6 ENC. You can Mod and Jury Rig the weapons and use some gear to overcome these Qualities but you'll be using up those Hard Points and the limit of your Jury Rigging on reducing ENC rather than other Qualities like reducing the Activation cost.

Yeah, this has been discussed since Beta. it is legit.

And auto-fire is too good at 3 advantage, it is stupid broken at 1. However the system doesn't seem to care one whit about combat balance as far as I've been able to tell. If your players do this you'll just have to start equipping all your random jawa minions with missile tubes and combat will be over in 1 round either way.

One of the few times I agree with HappyDaze, but the best way to avoid powergaming is to make it self regulating.

New (not) Rule for the GM: Anything you can do I can (and will) do better.

This means that if you try to break the combat system, I will do it better. Do you really want to be ambushed by a dozen Storm Commandos with the 'wont be seen by the players' talent and 4xaccurate double aimed, barrage autofiring light repeating blasters?

I'm not saying that I will do this if you jury rig your blaster, or even if you use it. I will only get nasty if you use it to break the combat system. If you are assaulting an Impy base and you use the blaster to mow down stormtroopers by the score, that is a good thing and just means I will add more stormtroopers. I can have stormies show up in white vans if I need to. All I mean is that if you insist on bringing your supergun to the dinner party, and using it to shoot anything, make that everything, that even looks at you funny, I will have bad things happen to you.

You play nice, and so will I.

The description for Jury Rigger states that you can reduce the cost of ONE quality, and one extra hit of Auto-fire is ONE quality in my book. The errata should be that if a quality can be activated more than once, Jury Rigger can only reduce the cost of the first activation. I'm perfectly fine with that, as it makes improving Auto-fire a neat option without making it ridiculous. (Which is to say nothing of the spoiled atmosphere at the notion that factory-built auto-fire weapons are half as effective as they could be with some rerouted power cuplinks held together chewing gum.)

Yeah, this has been discussed since Beta. it is legit.

And auto-fire is too good at 3 advantage, it is stupid broken at 1. However the system doesn't seem to care one whit about combat balance as far as I've been able to tell. If your players do this you'll just have to start equipping all your random jawa minions with missile tubes and combat will be over in 1 round either way.

I agree but as I pointed out getting Autofire activation down to one Advantage is at a cost of Jury Rigging and the Superior Quality, which are two Mods that aren't reducing ENC or the Cumbersome Quality. You can get those down by using other means but you are still going to have to have a high Brawn to carry this weapon plus any other armor and gear. Then you're going to need a high Agility to generate enough Advantages to activate.

It's not that it's impossible to get this but it's much harder and much more expensive, both in credits and in EXP cost if you just follow all the RAW.

Yeah, this has been discussed since Beta. it is legit.

And auto-fire is too good at 3 advantage, it is stupid broken at 1. However the system doesn't seem to care one whit about combat balance as far as I've been able to tell. If your players do this you'll just have to start equipping all your random jawa minions with missile tubes and combat will be over in 1 round either way.

I agree but as I pointed out getting Autofire activation down to one Advantage is at a cost of Jury Rigging and the Superior Quality, which are two Mods that aren't reducing ENC or the Cumbersome Quality. You can get those down by using other means but you are still going to have to have a high Brawn to carry this weapon plus any other armor and gear. Then you're going to need a high Agility to generate enough Advantages to activate.

It's not that it's impossible to get this but it's much harder and much more expensive, both in credits and in EXP cost if you just follow all the RAW.

All you need is Jury Rigging to get the cost down to one Advantage, Superior at that point just gives you a free hit. And your whole argument about Brawn is null and void since a weapon sling uses only 1 Hard Point and costs a mere 100 credits with a rarity of 0. A weapon sling doesn't interfere with the Superior attachment and STILL leaves 2 Hard Points left on a heavy blaster rifle that can be used on an augmented spin barrel for +3 damage, +1 pierce, and +1 Accuracy ON TOP of the +1 damage and free hit from Superior.

All on a weapon that a Brawn 2 character can use, all without using Tinkerer to add an extra Hard Point, and all without a single talent outside of Jury Rigging.

Oh, and also check age 401 of the Core Rulebook. Both profiles you see there will describe riot guns, which are Auto-fire weapons with a stun setting and no Cumbersome rating.

All you need is Jury Rigging to get the cost down to one Advantage, Superior at that point just gives you a free hit. And your whole argument about Brawn is null and void since a weapon sling uses only 1 Hard Point and costs a mere 100 credits with a rarity of 0. A weapon sling doesn't interfere with the Superior attachment and STILL leaves 2 Hard Points left on a heavy blaster rifle that can be used on an augmented spin barrel for +3 damage, +1 pierce, and +1 Accuracy ON TOP of the +1 damage and free hit from Superior.

All on a weapon that a Brawn 2 character can use, all without using Tinkerer to add an extra Hard Point, and all without a single talent outside of Jury Rigging.

Oh, and also check age 401 of the Core Rulebook. Both profiles you see there will describe riot guns, which are Auto-fire weapons with a stun setting and no Cumbersome rating.

I think there is some confusion here regarding how Jury Rig works. I was under the impression that a weapon can only be Jury-Rigged once . Getting another Jury-Rig talent just lets you mod a second piece of equipment, not enhance an already-Rigged piece.

That doesn't completely change the argument, but it does mean that Auto-Fire with 1 Advantage is not really possible (or at least isn't easy). Even with the Superior modification, a Jury-Rigged weapon only gets a single extra Advantage, so the first Auto-Fire shot would cost 1 (rolled) Advantage, while all subsequent shots would require 2 each.

Jurry Rigged doesn't give you a free Advantage (that's Superior). It reduces the cost (in Advantages) to activate a particular Quality by 1. Autofire normally requires 2 Advantages, so Jurry Rigged can cut that to 1.

House Ruling that Jurry Rigged insteadnprovidesna freemAdvantagen(cumulative with Superior) would be a good fix to prevent such abuses.

I think Jonah hit the nail on the head. We refer to this as the "arms race" in my Pathfinder group. The truth is simply this: the GM controls all reality. If the players find something that makes them more powerful, the GM can easily respond by increasing the level of threat.

The trickier bit is keeping the game fun for everyone. So, in my Beta game of EotE back when, one player rolled up a bounty hunter droid, took the max allowed starting obligation to purchase a heavy blaster file and weapon sling, and then statted himself out as a Brawn/Agility guy and just owned everything in combat. Another character rolled up a Doctor who was very poor in combat. The challenge for me as the GM was to ensure that both of these characters could contribute and have fun in battles.

My players spotted this "exploit" in the game and pointed it out somewhat gleefully. I told them that yes, this was something they could do, but then so would I. I proposed a detente; if they would avoid jury-rigging autofire weapons on their PCs, I would refrain from doing the same on my NPCs. Everyone agreed that it was probably for the best. Fortunately I game with a group of mature players who are more interested in having fun that in "beating the system".

All you need is Jury Rigging to get the cost down to one Advantage, Superior at that point just gives you a free hit. And your whole argument about Brawn is null and void since a weapon sling uses only 1 Hard Point and costs a mere 100 credits with a rarity of 0. A weapon sling doesn't interfere with the Superior attachment and STILL leaves 2 Hard Points left on a heavy blaster rifle that can be used on an augmented spin barrel for +3 damage, +1 pierce, and +1 Accuracy ON TOP of the +1 damage and free hit from Superior.

All on a weapon that a Brawn 2 character can use, all without using Tinkerer to add an extra Hard Point, and all without a single talent outside of Jury Rigging.

Oh, and also check age 401 of the Core Rulebook. Both profiles you see there will describe riot guns, which are Auto-fire weapons with a stun setting and no Cumbersome rating.

I think there is some confusion here regarding how Jury Rig works. I was under the impression that a weapon can only be Jury-Rigged once . Getting another Jury-Rig talent just lets you mod a second piece of equipment, not enhance an already-Rigged piece.

That doesn't completely change the argument, but it does mean that Auto-Fire with 1 Advantage is not really possible (or at least isn't easy). Even with the Superior modification, a Jury-Rigged weapon only gets a single extra Advantage, so the first Auto-Fire shot would cost 1 (rolled) Advantage, while all subsequent shots would require 2 each.

You're right that an item can only be Jury Rigged once. However, Jury Rigged as written DOES allow for Auto-fire's cost to be cut down to one Advantage. My personal house rule for this is that it can only cut down on the cost for the first extra hit. (Thus the first hit costs one Advantage, but the second and all other subsequent hits cost two Advantages.) I feel this puts it in line with other options for Jury Rigged, including improved damage and a reduced critical rating.

In either case, adding Superior on top of an Auto-fire weapon with Jury Rigged could potentially mean a free hit, so long as the attack hit without any Threats.

My players spotted this "exploit" in the game and pointed it out somewhat gleefully. I told them that yes, this was something they could do, but then so would I. I proposed a detente; if they would avoid jury-rigging autofire weapons on their PCs, I would refrain from doing the same on my NPCs. Everyone agreed that it was probably for the best. Fortunately I game with a group of mature players who are more interested in having fun that in "beating the system".

Well said!

My personal house rule for this is that it can only cut down on the cost for the first extra hit. (Thus the first hit costs one Advantage, but the second and all other subsequent hits cost two Advantages.) I feel this puts it in line with other options for Jury Rigged, including improved damage and a reduced critical rating.

In either case, adding Superior on top of an Auto-fire weapon with Jury Rigged could potentially mean a free hit, so long as the attack hit without any Threats.

Hi,

Devil's advocate here.

Do you limit the other options for the Jury Rigged Talent in the same way?

If they were to increase the Damage of the Weapon by one with the Talent, do the only get plus one on the first hit and not on any subsequent hits?

If they take a weapon with a crit rating of 2 and reduce it to 1, does the first crit cost 1 and each subsequent crit cost 2?

If they reduce the activation cost for the stun effect on a pair of shock gloves from 2 to 1, does the first activation cost 1 and each subsequent activation cost 2?

If you answered no to any one of these questions, then your house rule is probably not really fairly applied.

Personally, I don't think that I would allow anyone in my group to get one of the big guns with autofire, and if they did get one, they certainly would harassed by Law Enforcement to give it up.

Now the Riot Gun or one of the 2 pistol autofire weapons are a lot more manageable, they are more likely to run out of ammo, they have shorter ranges, and they do less damage, each hit from auto fire has the target's soak deducted from it, the more advantages they roll for activating autofire, the fewer successes they have adding to the damage, after soak they might only do 1 or 2 points per hit.

I believe that it balances itself. Sometimes you get a lot of little hits, sometimes you get a really damaging shot with no autofire whatsoever (1 automatic advantage can still be canceled by an outstanding threat), Sometimes you get a little something in the middle.

Use Imperials with Tibanna sniffing Canids to remove super damaging repeating weapons from the group forcing them to use the smaller lighter damaging ones.

My advice, don't change the rules, work within the narrative.

Multiple strikes (easily generated when every Advantage is an extra hit) with basic+success damage is far more deadly than a single hit at basic+success+jury rigged damage. If you're in a game where you're the team from Predator, that may be fine. If you're in a less combat dependent game then it can be an OP pain in the arse.

I've played characters with both setups.

Oskara's currently got a compact little carbine, jury rigged for a little extra damage. She makes an impression, sure, taking down another enemy pretty much every round.

Cal had an unmodified heavy blaster rifle and was just tearing everything up. The challenge was gone and combat got dull, quick . Within two sessions I ditched it and switched to a vibroknife as his primary weapon. Much cooler, much more risky, much more fun.

We haven't tested the ideas yet but I am thinking next session. I agree also, if something isn't implemented to rein in autofire it is just ridiculous damage output and takes all challenge from the game, which makes it all somewhat pointless imo.

Some of the ideas we are kicking around.