Rob Thomas

Yes, but the PC's don't want to go there. The protection offered by a sharksuit has to be weighed against the loss of fine manipulation ability and the time needed to don and remove. I would not want to be wearing one while trying to place a limpet mine or conduct beach reconnaissance, much less over the beach operations.

Might have to stuff a shark repellent in and include a note for the game master to decide how effective, if at all, it is. Think the only people wh wear shark suits are people looking to get in close with sharks and no PC should want that. Still might be worth including, because some game master somewhere is itchin for it.

Nice idea. Dry bags are in Volume 1, shark cages look to be pretty custom so that might be a problem and I have my doubts about any "repellants". Should be able to find the other gear and some diving rules (depth, decompression and the like) could be useful. Thanks.

How about;

The humanitarian group that is always helping those in need and may or may not have a secret agenda.

The collectors out to get examples of all the flora, fauna and artifacts of every planet encountered - think of an intergalactic group of orchid collectors or birdwatchers.

The adventurer's club - like above but adventures usually involve trying to kill the most dangerous game on every planet with often archaic weapons.

The destabilizers - industrial backed organizations trying to prevent organized rule in the hopes of increased profit

The protesters - Always looking for the next cause, any cause, to work for and protest supposed exploitation.

The orbitals who believe we should be living in the heavens and not down in the dirt.

The NGO that duplicates government services, sometimes helping and some times interfering.

The freeholders who believe when you stake a claim to a rock you should be independent and free to do things as you choose.

And on and on and on... So many different ways to employ, help or hinder characters.

MEC Volume 2 is now under development. Currently the content stands at

Point and sticky things - knives, bows, crossbows and the like

Less-lethal - OC, shock, impact and flash-bang

Explosives - grenades, C4 and the demo rules to use them

Medical - full range of medical gear and rules

Firearms accessories - sights, lights, lasers, suppressors and bolt ons

More electronic goodies

Any other type of things you would like to see?

Firearms? That is another book or three.

More is better. I don't think you can have to much detail. Sure, some of it might never make it into the game, but if needed there it is.

The first thing needed to make BRP more popular is to get more people to pick up the book in the store. First step would be to up the eye candy value; better cover, better interior illustrations, etc.

Second is a good price point so the people who picked it up are less inclined to put it back down. Easiest way to accomplish that. especially since color is going to have raised the price, is to streamline what is in the basic book and that means pulling the gamemastering material. Separate gamemaster books work for other roleplaying games so why not BRP.

Once someone owns the book you need to convince them to play it. building flavor in a "universal system" book is challenging, but it can be done. The basic BRP book has none. Second is to get rid of the damn Spot Rules Chapter. right now there is an anemic Combat Chapter, and a whole lot of combat rules scattered about the Spot Rules Chapter. Total frustration.

Next big step is to help someone who has started playing find additional material easily and expose them to other possibilities. Best way to do that is with a good website. Interested in finding a setting, click a button and there is a list of all of the options. click on fantasy and here is all of the source books that have useful material. Right now there are a heck of a lot of good Monograms available and the only way to find out about them is to plod through the whole list.

End result would be more people buying BRP material and probably more people playing it.

Multi-rank stabbing as opposed to firing. A longer barrel also means another couple of feet of reach when fending off cavalry. From what I've been reading about rifled-muskets it is a reason why the rifled ones had such a long barrel.

what book are you reading? I just finished rereading the Ordnance Department and Springfield Armory documents on the development of the 1861 Rifle-Musket and there is not a single mention of an overall length requirement with fixed bayonet. On the other hand there is much discussion about how to improve on the performance of the 1855 Rifle-Musket and in the end lengthening the barrel from 33- to 40-inches was adopted despite objections of several officers who wanted to retain the shorter barrel of the 1855 even with the reduced performance. Because of the terrible performance of the 22-inch barreled 1855 Rifled-carbine there were no cavalry or artillery versions of the 1861/63. Nothing in these official documents support the notion that weapon use as a pike-like thrusting weapon were ever a factor in determining barrel length. I don't have detailed information on British rifle development but the limited production and issue of sub 30-inch barreled versions suggest a similar outlook.

Calvary and Naval forces were quick to adopt shorter length rifles.

Say what? Cavalry always used shorter weapons, the change from smoothbores to rifles and then smaller caliber rifles affected this not at all.

Marines (later Royal Marines) were originally issued with the sea service Musket, which was a couple inches shorter then the land pattern muskets, but with the switch to Rifle-Muskets they carried the same weapons as the infantry. The US Marines follow the same pattern. On neither side of the ocean are there naval versions of the rifle-muskets and no records of the US or British navies purchasing quantities of rifle-muskets. In 1867 the US Navy was the first customer for the Remington Rolling Block rifle, choosing the performance of the 33-inch barrel (with no fitting for bayonet) over handier carbine length versions. I am not a collector of French arms or books so I don't have any information on French naval use of the rifle-musket.

I think you missed my point., Apparently rifles didn't need as long a barrel as muskets. So the rifles with musket length barrels had some specifically advantage to armies of the day.

I did not miss your point, I am just not aware of any historical or ballistic information to support it. Barrel length of muskets was not designed around their use from the second or third rank, but from the needs of the slow burning powders to get the projectile to maximum velocity. Tactics came second, taking advantage of the longer barrel. Sub 30-inch barreled rifles do not become standard for primary issue until after WW2, long long after multi-rank firing has been abandoned.

While the long barrels did aid in multi-rank firing, the main reason for their use was the slow burning powders of the day required a long barrel to achieve maximum velocity. The short-barreled musketoons were a sacrifice of performance to accommodate the needs of cavalry and artillery personnel. the sergeant's rifle was of shorter design because it would often be slung while directing the soldiers, the barrel length being chosen so that a fixed bayonet would not reach touch the ground with the average height of personnel.

I own weapons of the period with both 39/40-inch and 33-inch barrels and have never noticed a significant performance difference between them. It should be noted that on the 33-inch Pattern 1858 Sergeant's rifle the sights out to 1250 yards and while I have never fired to that range, 500 yard accuracy is good.

On Chinese rifles I found this interesting gun Collector's Firearms, which utilizes a British musket action. At a guess I would say the production date is between 1825 and 1850. Would be an interesting gun to shoot.

A somewhat obscure source: An article about the Jewish Company of the

Shanghai Volunteer Force in 1863 mentions that this force was armed with

a "short version" of the "30-03 Enfield".

It seems they either mean the Musketoon version of the 1853 Pattern Enfield,

"Short version" need not imply musketoon. There were rifles with 39-inch barrels, sergeant's rifles with 33-inch barrels, artillery musketoons with 24-inch barrels and cavalry musketoons with 21-inch barrels. the first two were produced in very large quantities and exported extensively, while the latter two were produced in much smaller numbers and generally used only by the appropriate forces. As an examplem almost 1 million rifles and sergeant's rifles were imported into the US during the Civil War, but only about 7000 musketoons (all by by the Confederacy and called carbines).

That is not to say that there was not an entire force running around with musketoons, stranger things have happened, but it makes you wonder. I could certainly see an entire unit equipped with sergeant's rifles (P1856, P1858 most likely).

Go for the eye candy and leave your brain at home. Otherwise, you will be faced with a lackluster story that has not an original idea, plot holes of gargantuan proportion, forgettable characters and inane "high-tech" weapons. I did not pay for the ticket so I cannot demand a refund, but James Cameron should send me a Blu-Ray of Terminator as compensation for wasted time.

Not just bayonets, but sizable sword-bayonets. Even without the bayonet these are big beefy rifles (40-inch barrels and full length wooden stocks) and parry would be completely appropriate.

Jiangnan Arsenal questions.

Were they producing copies of Remington rifles, or Remington Revolvers (1858)? And is the 1861 rifle mentioned a copy of the "Springfield" 1861 or some Remington weapon that I am unaware of?

It would be the "Springfield" 1861 Rifle Musket and then the Remington Rolling Block rifle. None of my books mention 1861s with Chinese marks so I doubt there were many or at least of a quality to see them lasting. Remingtons with Chinese marks are not that common.

I got data for a few period weapons, but I'm not sure just which ones would have made it into the region. I'd assume that some of the US and British Military Rifles like the Springfields and Enfields would have been produced in enough numbers for export, but probably not too much else.

The arms trade was big business during the period and primary arms were produced in surprising numbers. With rapidly changing technology most guns were not in service long and sold off as surplus. the vast majority of 1861s were sold off immediately after the civil war ended (I count myself lucky to own one that never left the country). Something like the Remington Rolling Block was only used in small quantities by the US but became the primary rifle of a number of countries.

I starting to think that while there might be some local copies of modern Western firearms, there would probably be quite a few older muskets still in service.

Fowling pieces, matchlocks, you name it and it probably was used in numbers greater then modern western arms.

While I will use music for setting the mood of a game session or even encounter I rarely have it playing while we are playing for fear of one more distraction. What I do use extensively is sound effects. Rather then saying, "You here squeaking from the wood floor above" I simply play the track that I have preloaded on the MP3 player and away we go. Over the years I have acquired around thirty CDs (there are almost as many cassettes collecting dust somewhere in the basement) and with half hours work I can assemble the desired sounds for an evenings gaming.

So what we would likely see would be mostly smoothbores with some rifled muskets, and the odd percussion cap or breach loading weapon?

Percussion muskets and rifles would not be uncommon. Anything else would be a rarity. If 600 foreign techs did come over in 64-65 you could be looking at a small number of Henry, Sharps and Spencer rifles (and carbines) entering the country with them. roleplaying characters being unique individuals in their environment you could probably justify anything you wanted - Volcanic lever-action pistols and a heavy barreled Sharps anyone?

I think I have understood it now. The arsenal did indeed begin to produce

rifles in 1864 or 1865, with machines and technicians of an American firm

in Shanghai, Hunt and Company. However, these rifles were considered a

failure, and therefore from 1871 onwards the Remington model was produ-

ced. I wonder what the earlier rifles were like, but to find that out would

probably take more research time than I am prepared to spend.

None of my books list Hunt and Company as anything other then an import/export company so that does not help identify the rifle, but I did find this'

"Imperial General Tso Tsung T'ang had established a modern arsenal and a dockyard at Foochow on the coast in 1864 and Imperial General Tseng Kuo Feng had founded Kiangnan Arsenal at Shanghai in 1865. Rifled muskets, bayonets and swords were produced."

Based on the fact that the 1861 Rifle Musket was produced by at least 25 companies in addition to US arsenals I would be willing to bet that one or more sold off their machinery after completing their government contract, and it ended up in China. The 1861 is a nice design, but it is easy to imagine machinery that has already seen hard use not being up to snuff, especially having been shipped half way round the world. And cutting edge technology it was not by the time production commenced in 1864-65.

The Remington Rolling Block would have been a huge improvement, followed by Mausers in the late 1870s and then Remington-Lees in the early 1880s.

Now I am beginning to suspect that I have a language problem, because in

German a musket is defined as a muzzle loading smoothbore weapon ? :confused:

If only Americanized English was that simple. As Atgxtg said, we tend to use the term rifle rather freely for any ongarm that fires bullets, and most non-shooters would include shotguns. Musket would be used purely for smoothbores except the powers that be officially titled the Model 1861 and 1863 "Rifle Musket". Skimming through a few of my books on the period provided no enlightenment as to why. Rifle had been used for earlier rifled longarms. Musket suddenly becomes common usage for any flintlock or percussion longarm. It could be worse, we could be discussing Kentucky rifles or semi-automatic revolvers.

So at least the elite units of the Chinese army probably were armed with such

rifles after 1864.

I think there may be some translation issues involved here.

Edit.:

It obviously was a Chinese copy of a Remington rifle, produced at Jiangnan Ar-

senal in Shanghai with machines imported from the USA. However, I have not

found an information which Remington model it was.

Now I know it is not a true bolt action rifle. In 1864 Remington had just introduced there rolling block single shot rifle, which is most certainly not a bolt action. The Remington Rolling Block was widely adopted for military service and my books do show Chinese proof marks, though China was never a Remington customer, which suggests local production. 1864 does still seem early, the first country to officially adopt the Rolling Block was Denmark in 1867.

For comparison Remington's first bolt action rifle was the Remington-Keane Magazine Bolt Action Rifle, about 5000 of which were produced between 1880 and 1888 (and very high on my wish list). As far as I know the first official adoption of a bolt action rifle was the Mauser single shot in 1871.

[EDIT] Did some more checking and there is no existing records of a licensing agreement or machinery sales between Remington and China. Production in China is not believed to have started before the mid-1870s.

High praise indeed. Thank you. This is BRP not GURPS was a mantra we repeated as we wrote material and then stripped it down to the essential basics. Have to admit it was a new concept for me as I was (probably still am) a firm believer in the "more rules is better rules" camp. Of course, I write material far more then I play these days. Such is life.

There was a comment that hitting a man at 200 paces with a musket is about as hard as hitting a man on the moon-that is impossible.

The comments that come from people with inadequate knowledge about firearms make me smile.

Since BRP lets people shoot at 2x and 4x the base range by halving the skill, I'd probably drop the ranges to something like 25 and 50.

Under battlefield conditions those are perfectly reasonable numbers, but not good representations of the true capabilities of the longarms of the period.

Something like a 1863 Spencer Carbine might just pop up by the end of the era in question with a range of around 85, and be quite popular, if rare.

As long as you had an ammo source the Spencer would be hugely popular. Colt revolvers were quite popular in London as early as 1850 and could have made their way to China. By 1860 a character could be carrying a Henry or Sharps. Still, i suspect the total number in country for any American model was probably in the single digits.

The range of the Rifle, Musket is rather optimistic for a Brown Bess or any smoothbore of the period. I would use 40 for the musket and 70 or so for the rifles. Maybe decrease Attk for the rifled versions to 1/5.

So basically you are talking 1840-1865; Opium wars being 1839-42 and 1856-60, and Taiping rebellion 1850-64.

For the British that means issue long arms will be purely muzzle loaders. The various versions of the Brown Bess would have been the most common issue, especially the Sea Service Pattern with the Marines. Rifled muzzle loaders would have also been pretty common both with the Brunswick and later the 1853 Rifle-Musket. Pistols would have been flintlock on and percussion muzzle loaders. Nothing else would have been issued during this period. The Snyder breach loading conversion of the Enfields would not appear for few years later and bolt actions are decades away.

Officers and non-military gentlemen would have also carried a wider range of privately purchased weapons, but they would have been mostly of similar type, to include some single and double barrel sporting guns (rifles and shotguns). A few revolving and pepperbox pistols might have also been present in non-military hands.

Sadly, I know of know good sources for the Chinese arms of the period. Despite the huge numbers involved my guess is that it was a motley collection of small arms - China certainly had no capacity to produce a standardized arm in such quantities. One thing is pretty much a given, the muzzle loading percussion musket would have been the high tech rarity. Flintlocks muskets would have dominated.

All in all nowhere near the variety of arms as in North America during the same period.

Honestly, I'm not sure a weapons book for a single system really makes sense. Despite my wish for more BRP supplements, this really only makes sense if its multi-system, like the old Firebird Ltd. The Armory: Vol. 1, or R.Tal's Compendium of Modern Firearms, both by Kevin Dockery. They had stats for MSPE (or was it Top Secret?), CoC, Morrow Project, and a couple of others.

Two of my favorite books. Guns, Guns, Guns also had stats for several systems. Haven't seen anything like that in years and not sure the environment of cooperation exists in the gaming industry to even make it possible now days. What other systems would you be interested in seeing stats for? Cannot hurt to investigate.

Now, if its going to be revised/optional rules for firearms use, as well as weapons lists, I say go for it!

That almost goes without saying. If I am going to add noise suppressors to a game I want rules for them. Same goes for optical sights and all the other little bits that make firearms so much fun (I am a pretty serious collector and shooter). Challenge is adding new rules without over complicating a rather simple system - we tried to maintain that balance with MEC.

Rob

This book is chock full of equipment and the BRP information to use them in game. All it needs is an equivalent book on weapons to be complete. If either Domenic De Bechi or Rob Thomas are reading this, come out of hiding and talk to us, you did good.

Thank you.

For those hoping for cyber goodies I apologize. This is not the book for you as it deals with only real items available today. Dom and I worked very hard to be true to real item data and worked with all of the relevant companies to insure we had accurate pictures. Sorry to say that future projects we are considering do not include cyber.

Weapons are certainly on the wish list. We had hoped to include a chapter on melee weapons (lethal and less then) in MODERN EQUIPMENT CATALOG, but all of the companies we contacted refused permission and without pictures they were out. We have not given up on that front and hope to include them in a future book.

I would love to do a firearms book (or several) for BRP. Just a question of finding time and figuring out what to include. Don't think anyone (except maybe me) wants twenty pages of high-cap 9mm pistols that all have exactly the same game stats. By the same token, who would be happy with an M4 that is not loaded with optics, lights, IR pointers and the like. So much to include. So much to consider.

After the holidays we plan to dive into the next project and have no intention of it taking three years like MODERN EQUIPMENT CATALOG.

Rob