During the Feng Shui 2 Kickstarter, I ran a series of blog posts oriented around weekly themes. Each week I had “Mook Monday”, “Weapon Wednesday” and “Feng Shui Site Friday.” The themes included things like “Hollywood” and “Water”. As I relaunch my blog, I’ve decided not to keep the original tiny posts. Instead, I’m grouping them together into three larger ones; “Weapons”, “Mooks”, and “Feng Shui Sites.” Today, we’re going to start with this collection of weapons for Feng Shui 2.
Light Machine Guns
Welcome to Weapon Wednesday, because alliteration is always awesome. No? Well how about because the Feng Shui 2 Kickstarter goes live today! I want to start my series of blog entries with something you can easily use in the introductory adventure, and these certainly fit the bill. Enjoy.
M-249 SAW 13*/6/0
This light machine gun is so good at cutting mooks down, they called it a SAW. I put this bad boy into the hands of the main boss when I ran the introductory Feng Shui 2 adventure. Be sure to describe the awesomeness of the ammo belt looping around over his shoulders. There’s plenty of hot lead to go around…
M-60 13**/7/0
While it doesn’t have a cool name, the M-60 has been a staple of American action movies since the early ’80s. They are rarer in Hong Kong movies, but you can see one in the weapon cache in Hard Boiled. Characters, good or bad, with European ties might use the HK 21, which has the same stats.
RPK 13**/7/1
The AK-47 of light machine guns. The RPK is cheap, functional, and relatively easy to get hold of. While the large magazine looks impressive, nothing compares to 200 rounds on a belt of bullets slung over your shoulder.
Compact Shotguns
Wrapping up our urban jungle week, we have 3 compact shotguns for mean streets and close quarters of an urban environment.
MAG-7 12/4/5
I don’t know why this little piece of awesome from South Africa doesn’t appear in all the movies. It looks like a fat UZI with a fore-grip that is actually the pump action. Special, shortened 12-gauge ammunition is loaded in a magazine through the handle. This means that the MAG-7 can be reloaded in only 3 shots.
Serbu Super Shorty 13/3/6
A concealable pump-action shotgun. So what if it only has 3 shots, when they are 3 12-gauge shots. The less well named Franci PA3 has the same stats. Because of their lower capacity, reloading these shotguns takes 3 shots.
Sawed-off Side-by-side Shotgun 13/3/7
The classic double-barreled shotgun with the stock removed and the barrel cut down to less than the legal 18”. Because it only holds 2 shells, this shotgun can be reloaded in 3 shots.
“Water Guns”
Wrapping up Ocean week, we have three “water guns”. Not the Super Soaker kind, but the kind that can shoot underwater, including a big one to take down aquatic demons.
Friday starts a new week, with an interesting new theme. Come back and check it out!
H&K P11 9/3/5
Designed by Heckler & Koch for special forces units. The P11 has 5 chambers which are sealed, allowing the gun to fire while submerged. Relatively rare in the movies, Angelina Jolie used one in the second Tomb Raider movie.
Speargun 10/4/6
The classic underwater weapon, a large rubber band, drives a barbed stick into the target. It is hard to find an underwater action sequence that doesn’t have some of these.
Harpoon 13/ — /6
This is not Queequeg’s whaling spear. That is a spear (10 damage). This is a large, deck-mounted launcher from a modern whaling ship. The launched harpoon has an explosive warhead and a rope connecting to the launcher. A successful hit on any target restrains it. The target must make its attack against a defense of 13 to get free. If the target is very large (can you say demon?) the explosive charge will go off inside of it. This deals an additional 20 points of damage which ignores all toughness.
The Weapons of Hollywood
This week’s theme is “Action!” We are exploring the fun that could be had by incorporating the movie industry into your campaign. Action! Week has brought fight scenes on a sound stage and movie industry NPC’s. So we will wrap up the week with the Guns of Hollywood. What does that mean? These are the crazy, impractical, but still awesome weapons that Hollywood dreams up for action movies.
M134 Minigun, Handheld (13**/7/3)
The M134 is a real thing. Its six barrels fire 7.62mm ammunition at up to 6,000 rounds per minute. The weight of the gun (85 pounds), batteries and ammunition mean that this weapon must be mounted on a vehicle. And the military mounts them on helicopters, boats and Hummers. The handheld model from Predator and Terminator 2 are pure Hollywood imagination.
Like lots of big guns in action movies, the M134 isn’t more effective than other machine guns, it just looks awesome. If you want to make it special, it requires the schticks Strong or Very Strong to wield, and gives the wielder a level in Carnival of Carnage. Level IV is still the highest, though.
Codpiece Revolver 9/1/5
Originally made as a gag prop for Desperado, Robert Rodriguez thought it was funny enough to use in at least two other films.
EM-1 Rail Gun 13/5/3
Firing “aluminum rounds at close to the speed of light,” the EM-1, from Eraser (if you haven’t seen it, don’t bother) is complete BS. Its X-Ray scope is BS. The movie is total BS, so maybe that is to be expected. However, the EM-1 makes a good skin for a “futuristic sniper rifle” that might be in the hands of the Jammers, NSA or Buro remnants.
Sorcerous Weapons
Magic weapons should be rare. They should also be awesome. The sorcerous weapons below make good McGuffins for an adventure. However, if a hero is going to use it long term, it should probably cost them a schtick — either one gained through advancement, or replacing one they already have.
Sword of Biting 10
This Dao, a curved Chinese broadsword, is enchanted by the spirit or its original owner. It lusts to avenge those who critically injure or kill its wielder. While the sword is being used in combat, each time the wielder takes damage, he can pay a Fortune (or derivative attribute) point to make an immediate counter attack. If the character is forced to keel over while using the Sword of Biting, the sword makes one final attack. This attack uses all the character’s remaining Fortune points and gets a +1 to the attack role for every point used in this manner.
Flying Guillotine 10
A basket with a series of vaguely explained blades around the rim. When thrown over an opponent’s head, it decapitates them and allows the attacks to retrieve the head in the basket. In Feng Shui it works as described against mooks. Against named foes, it is a damage 10 melee weapon, and the decapitation effect is a cinematic description of a killing blow. This weapon should not require a schtick to use.
If you want to see one of these in action, check out Season 11, Episode 7 of Mythbusters. I found the results surprising.
Sword of the Dragon King 10
This ancient sword combines an intricately carved jade dragon hilt with a blade forged in a dragon’s fire. A character attacking with the sword can choose to use their Sorcery skill, instead of Marital Arts, for the attack roll.
Taking Down Big Game
Sometimes in Feng Shui 2 you go up against something really big and tough: a big bruiser, dinosaur, a giant worm, Tanbi Garau. When dealing with such big game, you need a whole new class of weapon.
Weapons this powerful really don’t do extra damage against normal creatures. I believe the technical term is blow through. Bigger targets are another story. These weapons are capped at 13 damage, like other rifles in Feng Shui 2. While some of those rifles have a bonus to hit mooks, these rifles do extra damage against targets with toughness schticks: like the Big Bruiser’s Very Big schtick, or extra wound points. As always, the GM is the final arbiter of what applies.
Double-barrel Big Game Hunting Rifle 13/5/6
The weapon of choice for Victorian aristocrats on safari, and Michael Gross in Tremors. It looks like a double-barrel shotgun, but the barrel is rifled and it fires a variety of very large rounds — .600 and .700 Nitro Express being the two largest. These weapons were the expensive toys of the elites, and they remain costly to this day. A rifle like this does +2 damage to tough opponents.
.700 WTF 13/4/6
For all of you who thought the Full Metal Nutball’s homemade weapons were a crazy idea, I present the .700 WTF. A home made gun, firing homemade bullets out of home modified brass. Actually, it’s still a crazy idea — just in a different way. The .700 WTF is a single-shot weapon. Its bullpup design has two advantages. First, the weapon is short so you can pretend it is concealable. Second, the bolt is right next to your head, so if anything goes wrong with this homemade monster, you are unlikely to suffer for long. It also does +2 damage against tough opponents.
Marlin Model 1895SBL 13/5/4
This is the gun carried by Chris Pratt in Jurassic World, and it is pretty much ideal for demon hunting. It compensates for its small round (compared to the other two) by having a magazine capacity of 6. Its stainless steel barrel is weather resistant, and it has a military spec picaninny rail on top for mounting a wide variety of optics and other accessories. The 1895SBL will do an extra point of damage against tough opponents.
I would also allow the Maverick Cop’s Winchester Model 70 to get a similar +1 damage against tough creatures. .458 magnum is plenty big enough.