Rapid-fire techniques

Double tapping

A double-tap (as explained by Rupert) is a technique in which the shooter "puts two rounds into nearly the same place very quickly in an attempt to get a cumulative effect that's greater than the normal effect of two bullet wounds".

Following the same idea, you can triple-tap too, but hardly more, as automatic pistols' rate of fire, along with recoil, makes it difficult.

In Game Model: Double (or triple) tapping can be achieved with the standard GURPS 4e rules for rapid-fire.

The Mozambique Drill

This technique was made famous by Gunsite founder Jeff Cooper As explained by Tom Shoene, "the drill is to fire a double-tap to the torso as fast as possible, and then, having observed the results of those shots, to shift to slow-fire and deliver a single aimed shot to the head. The theory is that if two torso shots don't stop your target, either they're wearing body armor or your caliber of choice is too puny to cause a torso stop. Either way, you need a central nervous system hit at that point to tuirn the target off. In the orignal case, the central nervous system hit was to the neck, but the head is a better target".

Tom Shoene also adds that "the idea is that it's much easier to get those tordo hits, and most of the time they will do the job. But if they aren't working, just repeating the same thing may not help (especially if it's armor that you're dealing with). Hopefully the torso hits have at least stunned your opponnent, and probably hurt him, even if they didn't penetrate armor. That should give you the time to adjust. If you're skilled at this, it's going to happen more or less automatically, not as a conscious thought. Sure it's risky, but so is just about all close-quarters handgun fighting".

Jeff Cooper mentions the history behind this technique on the following page: http://www.dvc.org.uk/~johnny/jeff/jeff1_1.html

In Game Model: the Mozambique Drill can be modeled with a 2-turns maneuver. During the first turn, use standard rapid-fire rules for the double-tapping. During the second turn, aim for the head, with the appropriate aiming modifiers (and possibly the Bunk modifier too, depending on the situation, the weapon used, the character's ST score, etc.).

Draw fire-walking

The following is explained by Digganob: "When I was in the police academy, they taught us how to "strafe" the target as you draw a pistol from the holster. As you bring the gun up from the holster position, you start firing when the barrel is about lined up with the target's kneecap. Instead of fighting the recoil, you go with it. Put the next two shots into the torso. Occasionally the third or fourth one will hit the head or neck, but you're not trying to bring it that high. Ideally you level out at center of mass after about the 3rd shot".

"The first shot often misses, but you're not really trying to hit with it. You're letting your opponent know that you have a weapon drawn, and are firing back. Since you're not waiting to get the gun up to eye level and draw a bead first, you start firing sooner which makes your opponent realize he's being shot at sooner. Even if you miss with all 3-4 shots, he's probably soiling his drawers and either running away, or dropping any weapons he may have, or both".

"But basically, you're using the recoil of the semi-auto pistol to "walk" your fire. That's why I mentioned that all the locations should be lined up, and not a in a circular pattern. I should have also mentioned that you must start at the lower location".

In Game Model: a way to model this in game is to simply use unaimed rapid-fire, and roll randomly for locations. Then, re-order those locations from lowest to highest, and apply damage.