What system does gun magic well? Can you do it well?

What system does gun magic well? Can you do it well?

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Fantasy Craft does a decent job of it, with the Rune Knight class. Use your gun as a spellcasting focus, with extra benefits for doing so, inscribe runes on it to channel magical effects into your shots, and use Unseen Servant to help reload faster.

Pathfinder has some magic gun related archetypes, but might be a better choice? I've never looked at fantasy craft though so I don't know.

Iron Kingdoms, but I'm a warmachine fan so bias.

Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.

Make a sufficiently advanced gun.

Personally, I would recommend FC over PF in general. It's from the same general family of games (being derived from D&D 3.0), but it's much better designed overall.

Kind of a bitch to get into though, since the core book is really poorly organized (so while the system as a whole is pretty sleek and elegant once you understand it, actually wrapping your head around it on first readthrough is way harder than it should be), and being a relatively unknown game with little active support it's hard to find other players.

Yeah, sure, there's that. But that's not as cool as channeling arcane power into your bullets.

Pic related.

If you are stuck with pathfinder, you could do worse than play a caster with a gun in it. Especially if you are a shameless powergamer like me, and you theorycraft builds with potential burst damage in the 120d6 range.

The only one I know of is Iron Kingdoms.

Lol, PF is fucking trash and you literally cannot do worse than it, except MAYBE actual 3.5, and that's only in certain respects. Oh, and guns ARE awful weapons within the awful system.

Seriously, why not just learn to use ANY other existing system? Sorry that they're too indie for you and your friends so you can never find a group, but you objectively have more fun with any game system that is not Pathfinder, followups being DnD3.5 then 4.0 respectively.

I will truly never understand why someone would play PF over at the very least 5.0. Sure, character creation options yadda yadda.

Absolutely no d20-based system does firearms well. It literally cannot happen based on the limitations of the system.


Seriously, just go sit your ass down and learn a different system. ANY different system. Some people have suggested Iron Kingdoms RPG. That's a good start. It's a very robust multi-class-based system that only uses between 2 and 6 d6 (You'll rarely need more than 3).

What's inherently bad about a 20 sided die?

A lot of people dislike a d20 because of how wildly it can vary. You're just as likely to decapitate the boss villain in one swing with a natural 20 as you are to trip and fall on your sword with a natural 1. With guns it's exaggerated in that most systems using early firearms include some kind of misfire or broken condition upon your guns if you roll a natural 1, which happens more frequently than should be reasonable in a d20 system.

Or something like that.

Oh I see, thank you for explaining user.

The over-arching label of 'd20 system' includes all games based on the work of Wizards of the Coast (a wholly-owned subsidiary of Hasbro), and often produced under the Open Game License (or 'OGL' for short). Aside from its unusual dependence on having a variety of dice but prioritizing one type over all others, the d20 only allows a flat probability curve. Each result on the die has a 5% chance of happening. d20-based systems (DnD 3, 3.5, 4, 5 [to a lesser extent], d20 modern, d20 future, d20 Spycraft, Pathfinder, Star Wars Revised edition, Star Wars Saga edition, and all derivatives thereof) tend to try to 'adjust' this probability with flat modifiers, always in increments of 5% but with very few limitations. This leads to competitive 'arms races' of stacking bonuses. Mixed with the other flaws endemic (though not inherent) to the systems (rules bloat, complex and counter-intuitive rules for relatively common actions, quadratic and exponentially-scaling special rules for certain classes while others remain on a linear power scale, uncapped injury-resistance mechanics, etc), the overall value of the systems as both roleplaying aids and tactical simulators drops.

That's not to say the games are worthless. But certain functions or concepts are beyond their ability to satisfy demand.

Ah, I think I understand some of the scope of problem.

So other games use stuff like multiple dice and stuff to have different probability curves they build around?

In GURPS Ritual Path Magic allows you to craft charms, which are basically pre-cast spells stored in small objects. Bullets can work as charms and will discharge their spell upon impact.

Alternatively you can just put a modifier on whatever form of magic you have so you can only use it through a gun, I'd recommend sorcery for this.

You can also just enchant guns so they'll cast magic for you. Optionally having them only work for you or only for certain people.

Yes. For instance, the Iron Kingdom rpg has players roll 2d6+stat+relevant skill versus target numbers set by the GM. This means many more rolls will fall into an 'average' range but investing resources (skill points, better gear) has a more pronounced effect. In certain circumstances characters can add a third die to their roll to improve their odds. Maybe that'll help hit the invisible elven sniper. Maybe you'll roll straight 1's. But with magic and special rules thoroughly integrated you wind up with a probability distribution less prone towards extremes.


Some systems use percentage dice. Some use dice pools. Some use decks of cards. Branch out a little, see what clicks with you.

>Oh, and guns ARE awful weapons within the awful system.

Guns are meh, but entirely servicable if you know how to build for it.

Gun wizards? Oh boy. They are bullshit.

The flat distribution curve of a d20 is not the problem with the system. A problem with the OGL/d20 shitbox is the use of a flat distribution curve to generate pass/fail results.

There are game system (old editions of Rolemaster) that produce the same effect using a flat distribution curve with weighted success and failure results as the effect you are avocation with a weighted distribution curve.

You just had to make me listen to it again...

youtube.com/watch?v=xrjUj-FRorY

Rifts

>Gun wizards? Oh boy. They are bullshit.
broken things amuse me, do explain.

Same.

I too would like to hear how gun wizards are bullshit

Alright.

The cornerstone of the gunwizard builds is dipping 1 level in the spellslinger wizard archetype. This gives you the ability to make a gun your bound item, and furthermore, use the gun's enhancement bonus as a bonus for your ranged touch/cone/line spells. Also, your ranged touch spells now have a 3x crit modifier.

This alone is already ridiculously good, and you could just dip 1 wizard then go with a fullcaster that doesn't have a gimped progression that the archetype enforces. A popular option is Oracle with a Heavens mistery, who gets to shoot level 1 color sprays even into his teens easily disabling groups.

What you are actually going to do, however, is take levels in a magus archetype that lets you use ranged weapon for spellstrike (either Myrmidarch or Eldritch Archer). Ranged Spellstrike allows you to deliver a spell as a ranged attack. This means you can cast, say, Disintegrate (40d6 at level 20), deliver it as a weapon attack, and because of Spellslinger, add your weapon enhancement bonus to the save DC.

Finally, you grab Named Bullet, which makes a ranged attack auto crit on hit.

So, a disintegrate with a named bullet (that is basically guaranteed to hit) is going to crit for 40d6x3. Plus the non-negliable gun damage, but considering the target is probably dust anyway...