[Rift_0f_Bladz]

One thing to note is the farthest a metahuman can see (on earth) is only ~5km (or little over 3mi). This is do to the curvature of the earth, and under "flat" terrain, such as the open sea. Our actual eyes could precive object or light farther, but can't due to Mother Earth being a big ball.

Note: This is also taking into account person and object viewed are at the same elevation, such as sea level. If the person is at a higher elevation, the max distance is increased.

[Hobbes]

How do you figure that, Hobbes?
And yes, the clip size is something I thought about too; I was just going to load a multiple of 6 in my AK-97 extended clips which can hold a maximum of 76, so 2 APDS, 1 Tracer times 24.

Which means you're loading 48 APDS rounds @ 12 nuyen a piece, and 24 Tracer rounds @ 6 nuyen a piece, for a total of 72 rounds @ 720 nuyen per clip.

Remember, Tracer rounds specifically state that they are an exception to the rule about loading different types of rounds in a clip, and their price is not +60 but 60 nuyen per 10 rounds.

The main issue I've got is that they're saying "don't keep track of the order of each round in the mag, but keep track of the order of each round in the mag."  Example a 35 round Magazine, what do you load as the last 5 rounds if Tracers only work in Full Auto?  Tracer rules are a little head scratching as well.  Only works with Full Auto but the benifit kicks in when you fire more than 2 rounds.  Again I come around to the question of "But what if the Tracer round is the last round in a Burst"  Or what do you do with the last 5 rounds in a Magazine if it's not a multiple of 6.   They're trying to keep it abstract, but by saying it's every three rounds and charging as if it's every three rounds aren't you now tracking each round in the Magazine?

'tis why I prefer Tracers as a add on cost to the Ammo already in there, since mostly that is what it is in reality.  A dab of Phosphorus on the bullet.  The bullet itself is usually the same as the rest in the belt/magazine, at least for the man portable stuffs.

[Herr Brackhaus]

That's fair, Hobbes, but that's simply your preference. The tracer rules say that every third round you fit in a clip must be a tracer, and that this is an exception to the normal rules of multiple rounds in a clip. I personally think you're overcomplicating things a little, and unnecessarily so.

Allow me to demonstrate. Yes, you have to fire at least two rounds; I assumed that the rules talked about firing at least two tracers, not any two generic rounds. In other words, you have to fire at least six rounds (for example, two regular rounds, one tracer, two regular rounds, one tracer) to gain the benefits of the tracer rounds.

As for remaining rounds in a clip that isn't a multiple of six, it should be as simple as "you don't get the benefit of tracers". In my example I'm using an AK-97 with a Rating 2 extended clip; this means that I've got a clip capacity of 76, but the closest multiple of 6 is 72. So the last four rounds will be regular rounds x2, tracer, regular round x1. I don't gain the benefit of tracers when firing rounds 73 through 76, and I could even choose not to load the last four rounds in the clip; I was personally just going to skip them altogether to avoid confusion.

I'd say specific rule trumps general; if you'd like to house rule how tracers work then that's your prerogative, of course, but respectfully, that's not what's being discussed here. My final thoughts on your application is that real life tracers are a little more complicated than "a dab of phosphorous on the bullet", but that is neither here nor there given what the Shadowrun rules for tracer rounds are.

I am curious to see how previous editions handled this type of ammunition, so I'll go back and check that now just for my own sake.

[adzling]

I'd go with tracers add to cost of ammo in weapon.
Otherwise you'd have to determine weapon damage by multiplying Dv/AV change from standard ammo by 2/3 to arrive at final damage code.

And yeah I totally bet authors didn't factor in du, apds etc when inventing tracers.

and tracers should not work so well in broad daylight and they should also help enemy shoot /locate you.
And they should not help at short range.

[Herr Brackhaus]

*sighs*

Fair enough, but again, those are house rules, adzling. Given the comments in this thread I am getting a feeling that tracers have been overlooked, though, so that's something at least.

[Duellist_D]

Houserules or not, the current RAW on Tracers are Bonkers.
Why would anybody NOT ever use them, even in Firearms that are already Smartgun equipped?

Saving almost 30% on every "special" ammo shot alone is reason enough for everybody to use these in any given situation where a fulllauto CAPABLE Weapon is used, even when all you ever do is plinking SA shots.
Going by RAW you already get the Bonus for the second shot in an INI pass, even if the first one was a singleprojectile SA shot.

And that simply doesn't make any sense to me, from a mechanical point of view.
It's simply one of the cases where a smack with the rulebook is a good answer (at least for me) to anyone trying to pull this move with special ammo at my table.

"Tracer has to be the same type of ammo as the rest in the mag" is a very easy fix that eliminates all of this nonsense.

[Herr Brackhaus]

I can't agree with that logic, Duelist, and I'd smack you with the rulebook for being a rules lawyer if you tried that at my table.

Tracers work just fine unless you try to game the system with silly stuff like that. And since this thread has devolved from the intended purpose, I'll just go ahead and close it. Thanks to everyone for replying, I did get what I wanted out of this topic.