Heterodox: Damage

OK. Firearms in the game are a bit overly damaging the way they are now. Three shots and you drop. A medium pistol at average damage will drop most people in just two hits. So do I make guns less deadly or people more resilient?

So here's what I'm thinking about for hit points: Toughness times three for HP. So average people will have about 15-18 HP. Mad tough people will have about 27-30.

Now if I want to aim for medium pistols on average kill average people in 3 hits, then the damage needs to average 5-6 points per hit. Light pistols should take twice as long say 2-3 per hit. Heavy pistols then would be 10-12 damage on average.

Light Pistol/SMG: 1d6 (3)
Pistols in this category are more designed to annoy an attacker and slightly deter than actually kill. Granted a critical hit will do 12 points of damage. If you were lucky enough to make that a called shot to a vital area then yeah you'd have killed them. SMGs are a little more popular in this class because while you would have to hit someone with about 6 to 10 rounds to kill them. Easy enough on the full auto setting.

Medium Pistol/SMG: 2d6 (7)
Medium firearms fall in the 9mm and 10mm range for ammunition. They are considered the standard for most criminals and anyone with a serious mind for self defense. Submachine guns in this class are of course incredibly deadly and are often employed by most security forces.

Heavy Pistol/SMG: 3d6 (11)
Employed by most street hitmen and as a sidearm for military & security forces. The SMG is used by black-ops teams and special forces units, or mounted onto powered armor.

Assault Rifle: 4d6 (14)
Employed by military forces as the main weapon for troops. It is designed to severely wound with one hit, and kill easily.

Battle Rifle: 4d6+6 (20)
Formerly used by most militaries, it has been replaced largely by the assault rifle in combat due to its excessive fatality rate. The assault rifle provides a larger drain on resources and morale.

Anti-Material Rifle: 4d6+12 (26)
Designed to aid in the destruction of vehicles and buildings it is generally considered a war-crime to use a weapon in this class against anyone in less than medium armor.

Mastery System: Skills and Mastery

Starting to work on Heterodox again, and tried to think of away for people (like me) who roll so badly that their characters fail their rolls - constantly. Came up with a Mastery die system and was about to write one set of rules until I looked back at my older notes. The two systems at first seemed to conflict but then I had an epiphany.

Stats range from 1-10.
Skills range from 1-15.
Die roll for skill checks are 3d6.

Thus a nearly impossible skill check would be something with a difficulty of 43.

Mastery Level
By default you are a novice at all skills - even ones you have 15 ranks in! However for every four points in a skill you may purchase a Mastery level in the skill for 10 character points multiplied by the mastery level, up to three mastery levels. Mastery levels add extra dice to your rolls during your skill checks for each level. You simply choose the best three dice to count as your 3d6.

Example: GSS#27 has Pistols 8 with mastery 2. When making attacks he rolls 5d6 with the following results: 6, 5, 3, 1, and 1. GSS#27's "official" roll would then be 6, 5, and 3.

Automatic Hit, Automatic Miss, and Criticals
When making a check and you roll two ones you automatically fail regardless of your skill level but ones ignored due to Mastery dice are ignored. Three ones are critical failures something devastating happens - up to the GM's discretion. For combat, it is typically a gun jamming or slipping and falling. On the upside two sixes are automatic successes. Three sixes are critical successes: maximum damage in an attack or some other beneficial event.