Why are guns in Pathfinder so weak?

>Any thoughts?
If you want guns then don't play D&Dfinder, or to shorten and simplify that don't play D&Dfinder

...

>Get shots but survive.
>The wound becomes infected, gangrene an all.
>Amputate.
>Your character's career is over. Can still go around with an eye patch, wooden legs or something.

Guns in Pathfinder are fine, considering they treat armor as a ranged touch. Which is what Crossbows should be too.

But oh yeah, there'll always be some faggot that says Crossbows and Bows were less then useless in medieval warfare because arrows and bolts could be stopped by gambeson cloth.

> replying to a literal 'katanas are underpowered in d20' copypasta

I've thought better of Veeky Forums.

Why are greatswords in Pathfinder so weak?

Also, is this fix okay?
>whenhit with a greatsword you make save vs. instant death
>if you make a save, it's 4d20 damage, ignoring armor

I feel like this will make ggreatswords more realistic. Any thoughts?

Seriously though, this is a game where you can jam one of these fucking swords through someone and have them not give a shit. Why would tiny pieces of lead be different?

How's this for a fix?

Don't play Pathfinder.

>you can jam one of these fucking swords through someone and have them not give a shit

but abstract hit points

That's retarded.

IRL people get shot all the time and walk it off, and that's with smokeless powder for triple the velocity. Plus hollowpoints for handguns and soft points or fragmenting rounds for rifles.

80% of people shot with a handgun and 20% of people shot with a rifle survive, and that's realistic commoners with 1 or 2 hit dice. Medical care might be better IRL, but then again there's no healing magic either.

In game terms, the morale effect of firearms comes from a high crit multiplier and crit threat, not base damage dice.

Modern PC's like Roy Benavidez (a Vietnam War medal of honor winner) were shot, stabbed, and blown up dozens of times and still completed the mission.

Fantasy PCs and monsters with 10+ hit dice should be able to do the same thing.

Let's say a low level fighter is fighting a tank with god-tier HP, both are regular humans. And let's say the low level fighter, using an incredibly weak sword, says that he is specifically rolling to put his sword straight through the gut of the God tier tank. And, through the grace of God, rolls well enough to succeed. But, because the tank has God tier HP, this does fuckall. Now, a regular human has just had a sword shoved through his gut, but it ain't doing jack shit. Yet, were he to do the same to the low level fighter, assuming his higher level means better gear and strength, the fighter could easily be 1 hit killed.
HP altogether isn't a good thing for realism. AC works better with abstracts.

>4d20

I'd bet you would call yourself a clever man.

>triple the velocity
>Implying clean penetration increases the damage taken by a gunshot victim

Spend some more time on wikipedia before posting about something, maybe?

You are not understanding what Hit Points are. They are not meat points, they are plot armor. When a player gets hit and loses HP he usually isn't even touched. It is the last bullet (or near so) or sword strike that actually hits him solid and puts him down. Till then it is scratches and bruises and almost got me.

Think of it this way. You watch an action movie. The hero gets shot at, a lot. Several times you think 'he probably should have got hit and killed'. But instead he manages to dodge aside or pull some other hero trick.

That is HP at work.

Guns are fine, beside from the typical balance issues that pathfinder has of course.

>"clean penetration" aka overpenetration

No, you. Even shitty late 1890s era cartridges produce yaw. Everything over 2000 fps produces hydrostatic shock and fragmentation/controlled expansion is the norm over 2500 fps unless you're a safari dude shooting monoblocs or Eurofag soldier memed into using non-expanding rounds by the Red Cross.

None of these occur with 900 fps muskets.

>when people are shot with guns in real life they die instantly
wew

How does this "plot armor" save you from swimming through lava?

It likely shouldn't. I'm not as familiar with Pathfinder as I am with older D&D versions. But back then there was a clear concept of instant death. No matter how many HP you had, you would just die if 'X' happened. No save, nothing.

Head on a chopping block and the axe falls? Sorry, off with your head.

Likely the same thing here.

I suspect that newer editions have done away with that understanding, based on your question.

The rule I use is 'if I can't think of something, no matter how crazy, that could save you then you die'.

hah, what you did there... it made me laugh, and my ancestors laughed with me! To you I raise my goblet, stranger!

>currently paralyzed because of Hold Person
>a Giant with fighter levels swings a poisoned greataxe into me and hits, dealing 4d6+10 damage of the 'you were cut' slashing damage type
>as the poison is now coursing through my body, I have to make a DC15 constitution saving throw or take 2d10 damage of the poison type and be poisoned
>i fail my save, taking the poison damage and becoming poisoned
>because the Giant is a fighter, it used a special maneuver when it hit me that flung me 15ft away from it in addition to the damage
>this causes me to fall down a deep hole into a pit of spikes, taking another 4d10 damage of the piercing type as i am impaled on the bed of spikes, and another 2d6 damage from the fall that would normally be bludgeoning, but the GM ruled it was also piercing damage
>the next turn belongs to a few goblin enemies that are fighting alongside the giant, they begin hurling Alchemist's Fires at me, two of them hit dealing 2d4+2 bludgeoning damage and lighting me on fire
>my turn comes and i take 2d4 fire damage, and pass my will save versus Hold person, meaning i am now no longer paralysed
>my HP was high enough to survive all that, so i use my high movement abilities to quickly climb out of the hole and continue fighting the giant

This is a fairly reasonable mock high level encounter in 3.X and higher editions. You would be expected to survive this.

Guns aren't weak in PF. They're just another type of weapon, and the damage comes from the character using them, which means it is gunslingers that are weak.

If you haven't figured out the system by now, stop playing it.

Well, 3x got a little silly. IIRC the damage for being submerged in acid or lava was 20d6 per turn, which is about 70 damage per turn... which is survivable.

What you say makes a lot more sense.

If I had to call it ingame, for a high-level, tanky Fighter falling into lava, I'd say their HP abstractly allows them to stay conscious, not panic, maybe have a handy potion of a little bit of fire resistance, land on rocks or something. Something that lets the story keep rolling.

That's it. I'm sick of all this "Masterwork Crossbow" bullshit that's going on in the d20 system right now. Guns deserve much better than that. Much, much better than that.

I should know what I'm talking about. I myself commissioned a genuine gun in America for $20,000 (that's about 2.4m yen) and have been practicing with it for almost 2 years now. I can even shoot slabs of solid steel with my gun.

American factories spend minutes working on a single gun and rifle the barrels up to a million times to produce the finest projectile weapons known to mankind.

Katanas have thrice the range as medieval bows and thrice the stopping power for that matter too. Anything a bow can shoot through, a gun can shoot through better. I'm pretty sure a gun could easily shoot through a knight wearing full plate with a single bullet.
Ever wonder why medieval Europe never bothered conquering the future? That's right, they were too scared to fight the disciplined soldiers and their guns of destruction. Even in World War II, American soldiers shot the men with katanas because guns are better than swords.
So what am I saying? Guns are simply the best weapon that the world has ever seen, and thus, require better stats in the d20 system. Here is the stat block I propose for Guns:
(One-Handed Exotic Weapon)
4d12 Damage
19-20 x4 Crit
+2 to hit and damage
Counts as Masterwork
(Two-Handed Exotic Weapon)
4d20 Damage
17-20 x4 Crit
+5 to hit and damage
Counts as Masterwork
Now that seems a lot more representative of the killing power of Guns in real life, don't you think?
tl;dr = Guns need to do more damage in d20, see my new stat block.

The thing is, in my opinion, you have to have a way of narrating the action such that the player survives and it sounds reasonable - if Hollywood. If you have to fall back on 'you take thirty damage so I guess you live...it is the rules' then I think there is an error here.

The damage is really just a measure of how much plot armor it takes to survive. A high level character gets to have very over the top last minute saves that really stretch credibility. Like he falls off a high building and happens to land in a wagon full of hay that just happens to be passing by. That sort of thing.

For your lava example I'd shoot for something like the armor saves him, as it is destroyed, for a split second. Or maybe there was a very hot, damaging, but not killing, rock that floated down the lava that he fell on.

But if I can't come up with something, the guy dies.

In my opinion it is all in how you describe it, which I think adds to the fun of the combat.

>>currently paralyzed because of Hold Person
OK
>>a Giant with fighter levels swings a poisoned greataxe into me and hits, dealing 4d6+10 damage of the 'you were cut' slashing damage type

Luckily it hits your armor, which takes the damage. But the bruise is going to be horrible to see the next day.

>>as the poison is now coursing through my body, I have to make a DC15 constitution saving throw or take 2d10 damage of the poison type and be poisoned
>>i fail my save, taking the poison damage and becoming poisoned

Describe how a small bit of axe bites through the armor, you can feel the poison etc etc

>>because the Giant is a fighter, it used a special maneuver when it hit me that flung me 15ft away from it in addition to the damage

You are flung back and roll a bit across the ground (in general people tend to accept that movie physics like this won't kill people who are special).

>>this causes me to fall down a deep hole into a pit of spikes, taking another 4d10 damage of the piercing type as i am impaled on the bed of spikes, and another 2d6 damage from the fall that would normally be bludgeoning, but the GM ruled it was also piercing damage

I'd describe it along the lines of hitting the back of the pit, sliding down, and just missing the spikes (so no actual impaling unless we are now talking near zero hp).

>>the next turn belongs to a few goblin enemies that are fighting alongside the giant, they begin hurling Alchemist's Fires at me, two of them hit dealing 2d4+2 bludgeoning damage and lighting me on fire

They land beside you and you can feel the flames, thank goodness they missed. You still take 7 hp damage of course.

Add some more fluff, describe how beaten you feel, etc etc

It works if you just don't say 'you take X damage'.

That sounds even less fun than user's ridiculous bullshit. You can let them get hit with things without making them lethal when you Hollywood it.

Fun fact: Simon was reacting to one of the sickest burns on television in that image.

That is the very point of Hit Points - you did not actually get hit with the lethal attack or for some other reason that you describe it did not have its intended effect. If you can't give a reason for the lethal attack to have not been lethal, then it was indeed lethal.

The bullet hits that small bible you carry in your breast pocket and is stopped by it, or by the badge, or you just happen to stumble back (or dodge) and the bullet only puts a hole in your jacket while giving you a nasty cut.

Something happened. And, yeah, if you can't come up with some description then that Giants Axe cuts the paralyzed character in half and he dies.

But like I said, that was older editions of D&D. Pathfinder may have a different philosophy that isn't as focused on having a story that makes sense. Which, if we are honest, a lot of people seem to be very comfortable with and enjoy. So, by all means, whatever you like.

I treat guns and crossbows as if they were bows and have the players fluff it as what ever they are shooting.

Why do people have such a hard time holding their disbelief with guns in RPGs compared to all pre-gun powder weapons? People seem to be mostly fine with the idea of being stabed fifty with a sword and being fine, but the same amount of gunshot wounds and people throw a fit.

Got a link?

Gun don't kill people
PCs kill people

And it will still be shit somehow.

>Resolves as touch attack within first range increment

Yeah, hella weak.

Fuck I'm laffin hard

That's not how it works from a mechanics standpoint. There are plenty of spells, abilities and maneuvers that are described as working by doing significant physical harm to the target.

Accept the absurdity of meat points, or use a different system.

...