Fria Ligans forum

Digging into the cinematic kit now! A few questions, one is about the stats of the M41 variants. There is one scoped and one heavy variant, but the stats of the doesn't really align with the description.

M41A Pulse Rifle: Bonus +1, Damage 2, Range Long, Weight 1, AP and full auto
M42A Scope Rifle: Bonus +1, Damage 3, Range Extreme, Weight 1, AP
M41AE2 Heavy Pulse Rifle: Bonus +1, Damage 2, Range Extreme, Weight 2, AP and full auto

Balance-wise and thematically, the stats seem a bit off. My suggestion would be to make the sniper rifle heavier with the same damage as the pulse rifle, but higher bonus and potentially a "Scoped" special attribute and increase the damage but decrease the range of the Heavy Pulse Rifle, like this:

M41A Pulse Rifle: Bonus +1, Damage 2, Range Long, Weight 1, AP and full auto
M42A Scope Rifle: Bonus +2, Damage 2, Range Extreme, Weight 2, AP and Scoped
M41AE2 Heavy Pulse Rifle: Bonus +1, Damage 3, Range Long, Weight 2, AP and full auto

Scoped: Gain an extra +1 when aiming at Medium range or longer

I will probably house rule this, but any comments are of course welcome, including from Fria Ligan on why they are given the stats they are, Thomas

Edit: forgot to up the bonus of the sniper rifle, fixed

The sniper variant in the Colonial Marines Tech Manual uses the same round; it should not do less damage. It also has SLAP and ball ammo.

Real world sniper rifles typically use the same or heavier rounds than the battle rifles & assault rifles of their fielding nations.  The US sniper weapons include 7.62mmN and 12.7mm options; the battle rifles (M16A3, M16A4, M4, CAR15) use 5.56mmN.  The AK74 is 5.45x39mm, while the Dragonov does double duty as squad support and sniper, and is chambered in 7.62x54mm.

Yes, it's true but I think the problem is the pulse rifle - heavy pulse rifle comparison.

The pulse rifle has: +1, 2 damage, Long range, weight 1, a cost of 800 $ and a grenade launcher.
The heavy pulse rifle has: +1, 2 damage, Extreme range, weight 2, a cost of 1.200 $ and no grenade launcher.

Why should you want the heavy pulse rifle? Because you only win an "Extreme range" (and in ships I think that's not important), lose in weight and the grenade launcher and in the other fields are the same as the pulse rifle.

I agree with Ulmus about heavy pulse rifle. I would add any bonus: maybe damage (decreasing damage in the sniper and decreasing range in the heavy rifle), maybe a bonus to attack (+2 instead of +1), maybe another rule for reloads with the heavy rifle (so it's more difficult to run out of ammo) or... I don't know... but how it is, I would always take the pulse rifle instead of the heavy version.

Edit: I have been investigating, the heavy pulse rifle differs from the pulse rifle in terms of supression and ammo, that's the reason it has another cannon instead of a grenade launcher. Maybe the more thematic is to give a +2 to shoot, more ammo or a special action (some kind of barrage).

Given that we can expect colonial marine games to be an option (won't know for sure until the beta drops), the extra range is likely to be worth it in such context.

Given the second barrel, the heavy probably should have an extra die, but only in autofire...

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Edit: I have been investigating, the heavy pulse rifle differs from the pulse rifle in terms of supression and ammo, that's the reason it has another cannon instead of a grenade launcher. Maybe the more thematic is to give a +2 to shoot, more ammo or a special action (some kind of barrage).

I agree, some kind of "heavy auto fire" feature is probably better than just added bonus or damage

Given that we can expect colonial marine games to be an option (won't know for sure until the beta drops), the extra range is likely to be worth it in such context.

Given the second barrel, the heavy probably should have an extra die, but only in autofire...

The extra range might be meaningful, though I doubt that much of the claustrophobic action of Alien will take place beyond long range. I just don't see how you get that by adding an extra barrel.

Given that we can expect colonial marine games to be an option (won't know for sure until the beta drops), the extra range is likely to be worth it in such context.

Given the second barrel, the heavy probably should have an extra die, but only in autofire...

The extra range might be meaningful, though I doubt that much of the claustrophobic action of Alien will take place beyond long range. I just don't see how you get that by adding an extra barrel.

real world physics applies: heavier charge needs heavier recoil compensation; heavier bolt cycles a little slower.
the second barrel may or may not be fireable; it may just be a replacement for overheat. Assuming it's not just a replacement, it's increased autofire bullets downrange. 2 at a time makes for higher overall ROF.