Cierre

Car bombs meant to kill indiscriminately are used main- ly by extremist policlubs and militants looking to send a message. Although these jobs are available, most runners find them distasteful and too risky to be worth

taking. Instead, runners most often use car bombs to inflict property damage.

Vehicle-borne explosives are not the preferred choice of weapon to blow up buildings. Due to decades of violent encounters with neo-anarchists and other militant groups, buildings have been designed to prevent someone from driving a vehicle too close to a building or into a building to destroy it. Perimeter fences and concrete barricades discourage the use of vehicle bombs against buildings. Most secure buildings will keep vehicles away by at least ten meters if not more, which means a device producing a circular blast suffers an immediate 20P reduction to its Damage Value even before the shockwave hits the building. Improvements in structural designs can also absorb some of the shockwave produced by an explosion, reducing the damage value of the explosive by another 20P. Even if the vehicle makes it into the building and detonates, the force of the blast is unevenly distributed, and the damage done to the building itself can be unpredictable. This is the primary reason most runners use a car bomb

simply as a distraction for a job, drawing attention to one side of the building while they break in on the opposite side, where they hope security personnel will be less numerous and more confused.

For a car bomb to be effective, it needs to be able to destroy the body of the vehicle in which it is hidden (typically the trunk, on/near the engine block, or planted on the undercarriage) and still have enough power to cause damage to the surrounding area. Review the Vehicle Damage Threshold table for the type of vehicle being used. The Damage Value given is the average DV necessary to destroy a standard vehicle using an explosive device. Remember, the vehicle resists the explosion using its Body + Armor Rating, minus half of its Armor Rating. Riggers planning to use a vehicle in a car bombing will sometimes weaken the chassis (reduce the Armor Rating of the vehicle) to allow more explosive force to escape the vehicle and do more damage to the surrounding area. A rigger needs to make an Automotive Mechanic + Logic [Mental] Test, with each hit reducing the Armor Rating of the vehicle by 1. A vehicle’s Armor Rating may only be reduced to 1 in this manner (the chassis itself still acts as 1 point of armor). Most standard vehicles do not have much armor where this procedure would make a big difference, as the explosion based in the car will have an Armor Penetration Rating of half the Armor rating anyway. However, for vehicles that have been customized with heavier armor, this step of reducing a vehicle’s Armor rating is essential for the explosive device to have any effect on the outside environment. Once a vehicle is prepared, the demolitions expert chooses the weight of explosives that will be used in the explosion and crafts the device. If the Armor Rating of the vehicle is reduced, decrease the threshold for destroying the vehicle by the number of Armor Rating points reduced in this manner.

A vehicle explosive device is always considered one device instead of a series of individual charges, so this kind of explosive is always calculated as a single charge. If the character is using 10 kilos of Rating 15 plastic explosives, consult the Base Effectiveness Ratings table (p. 176) for the Damage Value given for that amount of explosives. This is the base Damage Value for this device.

When a vehicle explosion goes off, the gamemaster rolls the vehicle’s Body + Armor Rating to see how many hits the vehicle gets to absorb damage from the explosion. Subtract the vehicle’s Body, its current Armor Rating, and the number of hits the vehicle got from the base value of the explosion. If the vehicle has a fuel-based engine rather than an electric engine and the vehicle is successfully destroyed, add 20P to the Damage Value of the explosion, as it sets off the fuel within the car and thus increases the explosion’s power. This final value will be the starting DV for anything taking damage from outside the vehicle. Because the explosion is considered a circular blast, the blast is reduced by 2 DV per meter. When a character resists damage from

Smasher’s team needs to infiltrate a high-security Renraku facil- ity. Due to the nature of security measures in place, Smasher’s team needs a distraction to draw a significant number of corp security out of position so they can sneak into the facility from the opposite side and abscond with the new cyberware design specs their Johnson wants. The team decides to set off a car bomb so that it destroys a part of the perimeter fence at the research facility. Smasher’s team acquires a Chrysler-Nissan Jackrabbit for this distraction. Their rigger reduces the Armor on the vehicle from 4 to 1 by creating weak points in the chassis frame, weakening hinges, and so on. The rigger also paints neo-anarchist slogans all over the vehicle’s exterior to make investi- gators believe it was a neo-anarchist attack. The rigger also installs a rigger interface so she can remotely pilot the vehicle into position.

For the car bomb, Smasher has 10 kilos of Rating 10 plastic explo- sives. The base damage of the car bomb would be 32P. Recon intelli- gence on the Renraku facility informs Smasher that the perimeter fence is an electrified wrought-iron fence that is three meters tall. Wrought iron is considered reinforced material (Structure 8, Armor 12). To blow a 3-meter hole in the 3-meter tall fence and hopefully disrupt the elec- trical current running through it, Smasher knows he needs to be able to deliver at least 24 boxes of damage to the barrier (see Destroying

Barriers, p. 197, SR5) to create a 3-meter hole in the fence. Smasher

decides to work with the explosives to increase their effective rating. Making a Demolitions + Logic [Mental] Test, Smasher gets four hits, which increases the effective rating to 14. The device’s Damage Value becomes 45P. He then makes an Extended Test to determine how long it takes him to make the bomb. The gamemaster rules that it is a bomb of average complexity, so Smasher has a threshold of 12 for his tests. Smasher gets 12 hits on three rolls, so he makes his bomb in 3 hours. The bomb is set up using a radio detonator. Smasher places the bomb in the trunk of the vehicle.

The rigger drives the vehicle to the target, jumps the curb, and parks it right next to the fence. Smasher then detonates the 10-kilo bomb. The gamemaster rolls the Body and Armor of the Jackrabbit (which only has 1 point of Armor now) to determine how many hits the vehicle knocks off the explosion (there is no question 45P destroys the car) and gets 4 hits on 9 dice.

The power of the blast is reduced by the Body and current Armor rating of the vehicle (8 + 1 = 9) and the number of hits the gamemas- ter got on the vehicle’s Damage Resistance Test (4). This particular Jackrabbit model has a fuel-based engine, so the gamemaster adds an additional 20P to the Damage Value of the explosion. The explosive blast damage becomes 52P (45 – 13 + 20), which is the base value for everything around the vehicle that needs to resist damage. The vehi- cle bomb is considered a circular blast, with a blast reduction of –2 per meter. Since the vehicle is parked next to the wrought-iron fence, the fence takes all 52P damage. The gamemaster rolls the fence’s Struc- ture and Armor Rating (with a –2 AP) and gets 5 hits. Based on that result, the explosion actually blows a 5-meter hole in the fence and disables the electrical current running through it (47 boxes of damage surpasses the 40-box requirement for a 5-meter hole). The runners then wait for security to react before scaling the fence and sneaking in on the other side of the building.

In addition to the fence, there are two nearby cars: one parked 3 meters away, one 4 meters away. If the gamemaster so desired, he could have those vehicles resist 46P and 44P damage as well, with both likely also ending up destroyed. This would make the scene much more cinematic and give the Renraku security three burning cars to deal with instead of just one.

to Stun, even if it does not exceed the modified Armor Rating. All damage caused by an explosive device is Physical in nature.

CAR BOMBS AS TOOLS