GameLits and Guns

[pyrak]

So while thinking about stuff, namely the gamelit genre and the fact that it's based around enhancing the body (and giving magical powers), I was thinking about speed and dodging stuff. namely dodging bullets. Dodging bullets after they've been fired is a super human feat that's literally impossible to pull off in practice. You're either in the bullet's path (or on an intercept) or your not (so really when trying to avoid getting shot your avoiding where you think the shooter is going to be aiming). The reasons for this are a few, the human mind can't react fast enough (you also would have to be able to see the bullet first, and the human body can't generate enough force to move move the extra foot or so needed in the amount of time it would take for the bullet to travel to you. Long story short, the human body doesn't have the mental speed, perception, or the physical instantaneous power needed to dodge a bullet (you can't even fall fast enough to dodge it. Now when you're dealing with a system, the limits of the human body are thrown out the window more often then not in one way or another, physics tends to be there still to a degree (but then subverted at the convenience of whatever needs physics to suddenly not be working properly). In essence you need to be able to see and react to the world in bullet time (Neo, the Flash, most speedster superhumans) in order to pull this off. (This is not going into the matter of toughness vs bullets at the moment but that can also be brought up)

So with all that in mind, how would a GameLit world work if there's firearms of modern or more advanced makings in it? I'm largely doing some brainstorming for an idea of a sci-fan gamelit type universe where you have more of the classic gamelit system stuff but at the same time advanced technologies and a more nuanced approach to the system where increased stats affect the person's capabilities and interaction with everything around them (although also working with smaller increments, something where the "average" is supposed to be 100 in a stat, and someone with 1000 in a stat would be legendary).

In the end, I'm basically asking, how do people think guns would interact with a system that's based around enhancing people's bodies? Especially if the system was orignally balanced for sword wielding barbarians who wouldn't understand how magnetic fields work, what the brain actually does, or that the sun is really a super massive nuclear fusion reactor that the world rotates around.

(wasn't sure if this would fit more in authors general or authors discussion and writing tips)

 

[Assurbanipal_II]

So while thinking about stuff, namely the gamelit genre and the fact that it's based around enhancing the body (and giving magical powers), I was thinking about speed and dodging stuff. namely dodging bullets. Dodging bullets after they've been fired is a super human feat that's literally impossible to pull off in practice. You're either in the bullet's path (or on an intercept) or your not (so really when trying to avoid getting shot your avoiding where you think the shooter is going to be aiming). The reasons for this are a few, the human mind can't react fast enough (you also would have to be able to see the bullet first, and the human body can't generate enough force to move move the extra foot or so needed in the amount of time it would take for the bullet to travel to you. Long story short, the human body doesn't have the mental speed, perception, or the physical instantaneous power needed to dodge a bullet (you can't even fall fast enough to dodge it. Now when you're dealing with a system, the limits of the human body are thrown out the window more often then not in one way or another, physics tends to be there still to a degree (but then subverted at the convenience of whatever needs physics to suddenly not be working properly). In essence you need to be able to see and react to the world in bullet time (Neo, the Flash, most speedster superhumans) in order to pull this off. (This is not going into the matter of toughness vs bullets at the moment but that can also be brought up)

So with all that in mind, how would a GameLit world work if there's firearms of modern or more advanced makings in it? I'm largely doing some brainstorming for an idea of a sci-fan gamelit type universe where you have more of the classic gamelit system stuff but at the same time advanced technologies and a more nuanced approach to the system where increased stats affect the person's capabilities and interaction with everything around them (although also working with smaller increments, something where the "average" is supposed to be 100 in a stat, and someone with 1000 in a stat would be legendary).

In the end, I'm basically asking, how do people think guns would interact with a system that's based around enhancing people's bodies? Especially if the system was orignally balanced for sword wielding barbarians who wouldn't understand how magnetic fields work, what the brain actually does, or that the sun is really a super massive nuclear fusion reactor that the world rotates around.

(wasn't sure if this would fit more in authors general or authors discussion and writing tips)

It depends. How potent is your body enhancement? What limits do exist?

In the worst case, you render all other weaponry obsolete and body enhancement will reign supreme. In the other case, not much will change. Basic principles of dispersion and command and control will remain the same just with more superhuman soldiers.

 

[pyrak]

It depends. How potent is your body enhancement? What limits do exist?

In the worst case, you render all other weaponry obsolete and body enhancement will reign supreme. In the other case, not much will change. Basic principles of dispersion and command and control will remain the same just with more superhuman soldiers.

True, and also with most any gamelit system there's magic which brings in the question of how magic folds into everything (like is it better to have strength and endurance bolstered or, to use mana to fuel powered armor). What sort of spells would be better for modern combat, are shield spells even effetive enough to be usable, and what about using attack spells, or is it better to have physical barriers and weapons, and use misdirection, utility and support spells.

Since you do need weapons to be effective the enhancements wouldn't be so pronounced that things simple as spear would be rendered pointless at low levels, high levels naturally they would but basically I imagine it would be something where as the more advanced weapons get the more impact their able to do at higher levels (and the development of weapons and defenses would also shape the development of stat builds, aka the combat meta). Cavemen would likely want high endurance, strength and awareness, but later on fighters in more orginised armies might be needing to have a certain level of intelligence / wisdom, officers would also need high mental stats and particularly charisma (however that would work, if it's a thing). Right up to having full musket formations in your armies, most armies would empoisisise to a certain degree on strength, but once the muskets are good enough, strength only needs to be so much and other stats would take priority. Jump to modern combat and you need a good dash strength, a larger amount of speed and endurance, but even more importantly you need to have quick wits to react to situations faster and and relay accurate information. (But that all gets thrown out the window if it's possible to go to absurd levels of power where you straight up ignore physics).

Fun fact, it takes about 13 time the speed of an avarage adult for a human to be able to get enough force to run on water (I'd round up to 15 for the "point of 'practicality'").

 

[LostLibrarian]

The thing I picked while planning my SciFi-LitRPG was the classic "concentrate on the shooter".

A bullet might be too fast for low-levels, but the finger pulling the trigger isn't. With enouhg reaction/concentration and your system stuff, you can easily go the way of "knowing the flightpath of the bullet" and avoiding it beforehand. I like this approach, because especially on early levels it keeps guns as a threat during an ambush/snipe.

Another way would be concentrate on the HP and make your higher level characters bullet sponges. With that the weapon itself is still a problem, but the body will survive X bullets before it's game over...

 

[Sabruness]

The thing I picked while planning my SciFi-LitRPG was the classic "concentrate on the shooter".

A bullet might be too fast for low-levels, but the finger pulling the trigger isn't. With enouhg reaction/concentration and your system stuff, you can easily go the way of "knowing the flightpath of the bullet" and avoiding it beforehand. I like this approach, because especially on early levels it keeps guns as a threat during an ambush/snipe.

Another way would be concentrate on the HP and make your higher level characters bullet sponges. With that the weapon itself is still a problem, but the body will survive X bullets before it's game over...

yeah, this. unless you're making projectile weapons obsolete, the issue becomes that of reacting to the user of the projectile weapons and not the projectiles themselves. Even if the brain is advanced enough to keep up with the speed of projectiles, it doesnt mean much if the body cant match or beat those speeds and vice versa. That's why if you want to have a reasonable equality where guns are neither super OP or completely useless, you would have to work out how the power users would react (ie to unconscious physical cues from the shooter(s)) as well as how the power users would train to be able to react that way.

it would also work for the opposite side. If a power user was also a shooter, perhaps they could train to react to similar cues from the opponent. Then you have the question of projectile weapons that arent directly operated by people in the same way guns are (like tank guns, artillery, etc) which due to their inherently higher power and velocity could do immense damage if they hit.

TL;DR: if you really want projectile weapons to fit in without either being OP or useless then you'd have to tread a fine, deep line of balancing carefully.

 

[LostLibrarian]

Then you have the question of projectile weapons that arent directly operated by people in the same way guns are

You can also up that with mind/system-controlled triggers. So you would never know when the bullet comes. With that a battle between high-ranking shooters becomes your classical Iaido battle where both try to avoid the others line of fire while keeping the upper hand, before one bullet will end the fight.


But you give a good point in that the standing of the gun itself has to be decided first. With such easy to use technology, the usual power creep doesn't work as much. Anybody can pull a trigger, no need for a secret technique from the ancestors.

So unless the enemy is too poor to afford good weapons, any mid-level boss and above would need to be able to (insta)kill the MC with weaponry. Hence it'll come back to a battle between users, where the mid-level enemies can fall behind the main opponents...

 

[NotaNuffian]

I thought the thread is about how gamelit affects the guns as a weapon in whole, soley because guns and the bullets they fire has a finite growth in damage unless changing the bullet and powder properties to further increase the damage. I thought the talk would be about BS gamelit skills that somehow allows the "increase" in damage of a normal bullet fired.
Also, to react to a speeding bullet is OP as 1. It is very smol. 2. It is very fast (>mach1). Making a character capable of precog or even just see the bullet fly is OP itself.

 

[LotsChrono]

So while thinking about stuff, namely the gamelit genre and the fact that it's based around enhancing the body (and giving magical powers), I was thinking about speed and dodging stuff. namely dodging bullets. Dodging bullets after they've been fired is a super human feat that's literally impossible to pull off in practice. You're either in the bullet's path (or on an intercept) or your not (so really when trying to avoid getting shot your avoiding where you think the shooter is going to be aiming). The reasons for this are a few, the human mind can't react fast enough (you also would have to be able to see the bullet first, and the human body can't generate enough force to move move the extra foot or so needed in the amount of time it would take for the bullet to travel to you. Long story short, the human body doesn't have the mental speed, perception, or the physical instantaneous power needed to dodge a bullet (you can't even fall fast enough to dodge it. Now when you're dealing with a system, the limits of the human body are thrown out the window more often then not in one way or another, physics tends to be there still to a degree (but then subverted at the convenience of whatever needs physics to suddenly not be working properly). In essence you need to be able to see and react to the world in bullet time (Neo, the Flash, most speedster superhumans) in order to pull this off. (This is not going into the matter of toughness vs bullets at the moment but that can also be brought up)

So with all that in mind, how would a GameLit world work if there's firearms of modern or more advanced makings in it? I'm largely doing some brainstorming for an idea of a sci-fan gamelit type universe where you have more of the classic gamelit system stuff but at the same time advanced technologies and a more nuanced approach to the system where increased stats affect the person's capabilities and interaction with everything around them (although also working with smaller increments, something where the "average" is supposed to be 100 in a stat, and someone with 1000 in a stat would be legendary).

In the end, I'm basically asking, how do people think guns would interact with a system that's based around enhancing people's bodies? Especially if the system was orignally balanced for sword wielding barbarians who wouldn't understand how magnetic fields work, what the brain actually does, or that the sun is really a super massive nuclear fusion reactor that the world rotates around.

(wasn't sure if this would fit more in authors general or authors discussion and writing tips)

My story ‘R. A. T. H’ actually may be able to answer this.

In my world, it’s a fantasy where technology advances through mana, so of course guns exist. However, there are different grades and types to guns—which primarily fire condensed mana—and people have different ways they can power themselves or an attribute of theirs up. So, in the end, it becomes possible to dodge bullets if you’re strong enough, enhanced enough, own the right armament, own the right Gear, or if the gun is simply of lesser quality.

 

[DreamOfRen]

So with all that in mind, how would a GameLit world work if there's firearms of modern or more advanced makings in it? I'm largely doing some brainstorming for an idea of a sci-fan gamelit type universe where you have more of the classic gamelit system stuff but at the same time advanced technologies and a more nuanced approach to the system where increased stats affect the person's capabilities and interaction with everything around them (although also working with smaller increments, something where the "average" is supposed to be 100 in a stat, and someone with 1000 in a stat would be legendary).

Fantasy allows for anything you want. You could create enhanced reflexes that slow the perception to a crawl, allowing them to dodge bullets as long as their focus isn't broken.

Or shields that will negate death.

 

[K5Rakitan]

This is making me nostalgic for my high school physics class.

 

[Shard]

My personal answer to this would be to have a combination of systems working together.

Dodging bullets is possible, but only if you have incredibly high reflexes (ability to move), intelligence (mental processing speed), perception (spot the threat), and good enough constitution/dexterity/strength to pull off the movement. Very few would be capable of this, as it requires extremely high abilities in two normally opposed fields of stats at the same time, as well as prior awareness of the threat.

On the other hand, you can also put in that most weapons draw power from the user, and that requires time spent with the projectile before firing it, and a capacity based on projectile size and material. This would allow you to have guns do less damage for the same quality material than a bow or crossbow, without special consideration, but also far more likely to hit the target due to faster projectile speed. Add in rare skills/classes/spells/whatnot to 'preload' projectiles with power, and you can then have rare elite groups that act as snipers, but overall the world will find the complexity of guns to not be worth it when you could turn out hundreds of bows or crossbows instead, which would have higher power for untrained individuals.

Similarly, perhaps power transfer between user and tool is based on complexity, and it is more difficult to transfer power to a automatic rifle than a bolt-action, which is more difficult than a flintlock, which is more difficult than a bow, which is more difficult than a spear. This also leads towards specialized purposes for different types of weapons, where you could have gattling guns mounted on castle walls beside groups of archers, allowing easy removal of masses of weak targets, and targeted attacks against powerful elites.

However you look at it through, you get significant problems arising all over if you try to mix standard fantasy with modern weaponry. You should keep in mind the process of creation of guns and that process will lead to across the world, as it will require significant scientific understanding, manufacturing ability, high precision engineering, etc, which will all lead to quite considerable divergence from the typical fantasy setting. Going with sci-fi is a bit better, but still you get questions going in the opposite direction - if you have advanced technology, why would anyone use anything except guns, what sort of advancements would be put into those things, etc. Perhaps you go into the realm of laser/particle guns powered by the individual, while melee style weaponry is too weak to withstand being used as weaponry against other powerful individuals without breaking, but this leads to issues with armor and significant differences between the weak and the powerful.

Personally I prefer to avoid gamelit/litrpg type settings due to issues such as these, likewise mixing modern and fantasy.

In a mixed setting, I would have a reclusive self-sustained group in hiding with higher technology that is considered a myth cross the world, and they are the only ones capable of producing the modern weaponry, while occasionally relics of theirs turn up in ruins or the like, or perhaps they have agents that interact with the rest of the world who are allowed access to their equipment. Then you can justify the production as being limited, difficult to manage, and secret, while certain lucky adventurers can find them in rare cases. Combine with weapons that are magically enhanced to produce their own ammo (or enchanted micro-factories for ammo that you can just stuff material into to get a handful of rounds) and you can bypass the issue of limited ammo per located firearm. The main balancing factor in this case would be that other powerful individuals and groups would target anyone known to possess such things, meaning either you would have to be very careful no one lives to report you have such a thing, or be strong enough to take on the threats that are always waiting for you.

 

[pyrak]

My personal answer to this would be to have a combination of systems working together.

Dodging bullets is possible, but only if you have incredibly high reflexes (ability to move), intelligence (mental processing speed), perception (spot the threat), and good enough constitution/dexterity/strength to pull off the movement. Very few would be capable of this, as it requires extremely high abilities in two normally opposed fields of stats at the same time, as well as prior awareness of the threat.

On the other hand, you can also put in that most weapons draw power from the user, and that requires time spent with the projectile before firing it, and a capacity based on projectile size and material. This would allow you to have guns do less damage for the same quality material than a bow or crossbow, without special consideration, but also far more likely to hit the target due to faster projectile speed. Add in rare skills/classes/spells/whatnot to 'preload' projectiles with power, and you can then have rare elite groups that act as snipers, but overall the world will find the complexity of guns to not be worth it when you could turn out hundreds of bows or crossbows instead, which would have higher power for untrained individuals.

Similarly, perhaps power transfer between user and tool is based on complexity, and it is more difficult to transfer power to a automatic rifle than a bolt-action, which is more difficult than a flintlock, which is more difficult than a bow, which is more difficult than a spear. This also leads towards specialized purposes for different types of weapons, where you could have gattling guns mounted on castle walls beside groups of archers, allowing easy removal of masses of weak targets, and targeted attacks against powerful elites.

However you look at it through, you get significant problems arising all over if you try to mix standard fantasy with modern weaponry. You should keep in mind the process of creation of guns and that process will lead to across the world, as it will require significant scientific understanding, manufacturing ability, high precision engineering, etc, which will all lead to quite considerable divergence from the typical fantasy setting. Going with sci-fi is a bit better, but still you get questions going in the opposite direction - if you have advanced technology, why would anyone use anything except guns, what sort of advancements would be put into those things, etc. Perhaps you go into the realm of laser/particle guns powered by the individual, while melee style weaponry is too weak to withstand being used as weaponry against other powerful individuals without breaking, but this leads to issues with armor and significant differences between the weak and the powerful.

Personally I prefer to avoid gamelit/litrpg type settings due to issues such as these, likewise mixing modern and fantasy.

In a mixed setting, I would have a reclusive self-sustained group in hiding with higher technology that is considered a myth cross the world, and they are the only ones capable of producing the modern weaponry, while occasionally relics of theirs turn up in ruins or the like, or perhaps they have agents that interact with the rest of the world who are allowed access to their equipment. Then you can justify the production as being limited, difficult to manage, and secret, while certain lucky adventurers can find them in rare cases. Combine with weapons that are magically enhanced to produce their own ammo (or enchanted micro-factories for ammo that you can just stuff material into to get a handful of rounds) and you can bypass the issue of limited ammo per located firearm. The main balancing factor in this case would be that other powerful individuals and groups would target anyone known to possess such things, meaning either you would have to be very careful no one lives to report you have such a thing, or be strong enough to take on the threats that are always waiting for you.

Frankly the only reason for doing a sci-fi / gamelit thing was because the name "System Wars" makes me think 'Well what if there was multiple conflicting game lit systems strewn across multiple worlds from different planetary systems.'

As for dodging the bullet, it would take quite a lot of physics ignoring... Actually that could be interesting... Now has another idea to ad to this little experiment.