Iconic Small Arms
- Thread starter LeperColony
- Start date
Snub Pistol, even someone packing a plasma gun might be packing one as a backup.
My Personal favorite is a shotgun, autofire capable if possible
Lasers are nifty but nothing beats turning a pirate into Shredded Meat Product 23. And Barrel big enough to jam your thumb into is one heck of an intimidation factor.
My Personal favorite is a shotgun, autofire capable if possible
Lasers are nifty but nothing beats turning a pirate into Shredded Meat Product 23. And Barrel big enough to jam your thumb into is one heck of an intimidation factor.Shotguns and revolvers in space. An iconic trait shared between Traveller and Firefly. Generally speaking, sci-fi is not so keen on using revolvers, though shotguns do have their appeal (as in Aliens, Mass Effect, etc); but Traveller has them right in the core rules.
Rifle as the "standard military arm"! Non-automatic, that is...
Auto-rifle with full rifle cartridges rather than an assault rifle in the old core rules. You use an M-14, or for the bare minimum and old, full-scale AK-47 with its large cartridge (or better yet - the RPK light machinegun), or even a BAR, rather an M-16 or an AK-74.
The ACR which tends to look and feel like a "futuristic 1980's gun", ala the Pulse Rifle from Aliens. Caseless, of course! And bulpup in most renditions.
Laser weapons with backpacks. Lasers having limited utility as sharpshooter weapons on low-mid TLs due to their high damage and superior range, but becoming much less effective against well-prepared opponents once you have Reflex and aerosols. Energy weapons taking the back seat while everyone uses slugthrowers (except for heavy support weapons such as the PGMP/FGMP).
Rifle as the "standard military arm"! Non-automatic, that is...
Auto-rifle with full rifle cartridges rather than an assault rifle in the old core rules. You use an M-14, or for the bare minimum and old, full-scale AK-47 with its large cartridge (or better yet - the RPK light machinegun), or even a BAR, rather an M-16 or an AK-74.
The ACR which tends to look and feel like a "futuristic 1980's gun", ala the Pulse Rifle from Aliens. Caseless, of course! And bulpup in most renditions.
Laser weapons with backpacks. Lasers having limited utility as sharpshooter weapons on low-mid TLs due to their high damage and superior range, but becoming much less effective against well-prepared opponents once you have Reflex and aerosols. Energy weapons taking the back seat while everyone uses slugthrowers (except for heavy support weapons such as the PGMP/FGMP).
kilemall
SOC-14 5K
Which cannot be shared in polite company, I presume?
Who said we were polite?
The rules of the board do....
kilemall
SOC-14 5K
Cowboys in Space
I cast another vote for large bore revolvers and shotguns as Iconic Traveller small arms; laser carb. w/ back power pack when I could afford it. I loved that T20/CT weapon supplement from 10 plus years ago, it had tons of crunch and fluff. My favorite was the heavy revolver made specifically for Nobles and the 'lesser' quality cousins of said hand cannon.
I cast another vote for large bore revolvers and shotguns as Iconic Traveller small arms; laser carb. w/ back power pack when I could afford it. I loved that T20/CT weapon supplement from 10 plus years ago, it had tons of crunch and fluff. My favorite was the heavy revolver made specifically for Nobles and the 'lesser' quality cousins of said hand cannon.
I'd go as far as to say that revolvers and shotguns in space are far more iconic to Traveller than the PGMPs and FGMPs. This has some level of "The Old West in Space", ala Firefly. Traveller tech is clunky, from revolvers to bulky computers (with jump tapes, no less!) to ATVs. No sleek ultratech with blasters/phasers and teleportation beams. Much more Alien (or Firefly) than Star Trek.
The default Traveller campaign casts you as the crew of the Nostromo or the Serenity, not the Enterprise. You are a civilian or small-scale paramilitary, you use mostly-civilian weapons, a single killer xenomorph or a small band of Reavers is a major threat to you. You also lack a good supply of Redshirts to catch the bullets or beams aimed at you - they have all died during character generation.
In space, everyone can hear you pump the 12-gauge!
The default Traveller campaign casts you as the crew of the Nostromo or the Serenity, not the Enterprise. You are a civilian or small-scale paramilitary, you use mostly-civilian weapons, a single killer xenomorph or a small band of Reavers is a major threat to you. You also lack a good supply of Redshirts to catch the bullets or beams aimed at you - they have all died during character generation.
In space, everyone can hear you pump the 12-gauge!
I used to (still do in principle) have a rocket pistol IMTU. It was originally inspired by the Pyrrhan's guns in the Deathworld stories ('fires rocket propelled explosive slugs'). There's also a carbine or SMG firing the same ammunition.
These sort of took over the role of the snub pistol and accelerator rifle IMTU. Not terribly accurate at long range, but the explosive or HEAP shell payload makes them quite effective against body armour in a boarding or other close combat situation.
AnotherDilbert
SOC-14 1K
The iconic weapon of CT was the Auto Rifle. It was good at all ranges, against all armour, it solved all problems.
I guess my perception of weapons is formed in an environment of pervasive National Service:
Weapon:
Small weapon for personal protection:
7,62 mm Assault Rifle
I guess my perception of weapons is formed in an environment of pervasive National Service:
Weapon:
Small weapon for personal protection:
7,62 mm Assault Rifle
kilemall
SOC-14 5K
Traveller does succinctly summarize what armed forces lost going to the assault rifle model- and gained.
Doing a continuing deep dive into the Striker rules, it struck me this past week that the ACR 9mm DS round has the same penetration (and therefore damage probabilities) as the .50 cal M-60. That's a LOT of punch in a 20-round personal rifle.
Doing a continuing deep dive into the Striker rules, it struck me this past week that the ACR 9mm DS round has the same penetration (and therefore damage probabilities) as the .50 cal M-60. That's a LOT of punch in a 20-round personal rifle.
Timerover51
SOC-14 5K
A .50 M60? The M60 I fired while in the military was 7.62mm, aka .308 NATO, and slightly less powerful than the .30-06. Now, the .50 caliber that I fired was the M2 Heavy Barrel, which could be fired semi-auto as well, while the tank gun I fired was the M85, no semi-auto option. I did not have a chance to fire the .50 caliber spotting rifle on the 106mm Recoilless Rifle. That did use a totally different cartridge than the machine guns.
Have fun trying to fire a slightly over 12 pound rifle, using a 154 grain 7mm projectile at 2,953 feet per second, in full automatic fire. I understand that a discarding sabot round is going to be lighter, probably on the order of the .30 caliber Accelerator Round for firing a .223 projectile from a .30 caliber weapon. However, discarding sabot rounds tend to be very hard on the rifling of the gun barrel, and you do have the discarded fragments of the sabot flying around in front of the barrel. These fragments are not going to be appreciated by any near neighbors slightly in front of the firer.
I figure the BAR, Browning Automatic Rifle, at 23.5 pounds loaded with magazine, the loaded magazine weighing 1.43 pounds, or the British BREN gun, are the lightest full-automatic weapons capable of accurate fire. Note, the BAR did have a semi-auto option, as well as 2 rates of fire. The M14 Modified for full-automatic use was lighter, but not at all liked as controlling it was extremely difficult.
Condottiere
SOC-14 5K
I believe using Striker discounts, you pay fifty credits for an automatic rifle, making it the ideal general issue weapon.
It's about 15mm of RHA according to the armour table, which is not unreasonable given that the .30-06 M2 armour piercing round is normally described as capable of penetrating around 1/2" of RHA at short ranges.
A .50 cal SLAP round is normally described as being able to penetrate about 30mm or of RHA at short ranges (500m IIRC but my google-fu fails me), which would roughly equate to a penetration of 12 at effective range.
When I did some rules for HMG AP round (back in the late jurassic period) I did stats for KEAPER rounds (think something roughly analagous to the Raufoss mk 211 I assumed it to have a penetration around 10, with a full-fat AP round (equivalent to the SLAP) having a penetration of 12.
A penetration of 6 is reasonable for ball rounds.
Back to the ACR, the stock Integration with Traveller rules make some weapons quite overpowered - 24D or more from a single attack with a gauss rifle is not unknown, even against targets wearing mid-range armour like combat environment suits. I used a couple of house rules to nerf some of the excesses:
- Positive bonus from an armour piercing round (gauss rifle, DS rounds, HEAP rounds from a snub pistol etc.) is capped at half the round's penetration. Therefore, a gauss rifle is +2 in total (+7/-5) against cloth, but +3 against an unarmoured target (half of +7 - you can round up or down as desired).
- Certain weapons don't get the 'exploding round' rule, in particular laser carbines/rifles and HEAP rounds from snub pistols or equivalent.
I also did some more detailed rules for generations of KEAP and HEAP rounds, to get penetrations of autocannons and CPR guns in line with modern (TL7-8) capabilities, and accommodating a few more incremental advances in the tech. This let one build a medium or high-velocity autocannon with a capability that's roughly in line with actual kit like 20x102mm AP rounds (approximately 50mm penetration at 500m) and so forth.
kilemall
SOC-14 5K
Hmm good points- I was looking at the TL6 HMG defintion.
Indeed. I have serious Striker nerdery going on in my thread in the CT subforum if you care to take it there.
kilemall
SOC-14 5K
If the Striker currency exchange rules are used universally, some horrible things can occur in general. It's probably best to just use them for merc operations costs.
kilemall
SOC-14 5K
I think we can presume more advanced recoil control mechanisms, gyroscopically controlled firing is explicitly mentioned in Mercenary, and TL10 is another round of materials and CPR tech improvement.
mike wightman
SOC-14 10K
I think what Timerover is pointing out is that there is no such thing as a .5 calibre M-60.
The M-60 is a 7.62mmNATO GPMG/LMG
The M-60 is a 7.62mmNATO GPMG/LMG
