CSC Weapons

[justacaveman]

I've noticed a few items in the CSC that seem to require some attention.

The Light Assault Gun (LAG) on page 107. Light? The thing weighs 30kg! In CT it only weighed 4kg, what's with that? At most, I would make it 8kg.

The 8mm Gauss Sniper Rifle on page 82. No stats are given for this weapon.
My own interpretation: Damage: 6d6+2, Shots: 10, Auto: No, Recoil: 0, Cost: 20,000, Mass: 10kg, Ammo cost: 60

Plasma Grenades on page 114. They seem rather weak at 5d6 (less than a High Explosive grenade). According to the description on page 122, they're supposed to be advanced versions of High Explosive grenades. I would make them 8d6/6d6/4d6, and raise the price to 250 in order to make them more in line with HE. They would only be available at TL 12+.

These are just the things I've worked out a solution for. There is also a decided lack in the hi-tech civilian weapon department, and a few gaps in the military weapons (I've done my own write-ups for these. Available as a PDF or other format if anyone wants it.).

Just my .02 credits.

 

[justacaveman]

The LAG is similar to a South African weapon called the Neopup 20mm PAW. The Neopup has a 6-round magazine and fires a 110 gram 20mm projectile at 310 m/s. It weighs 6kg unloaded, and about 7.5kg loaded, and is .845 meters long. It what the original CT LAG was supposed to be.

The weapon you're describing is a 20mm Anti-tank rifle. These weigh about 50kg, are about 1.8 meters long, and fire a 110 gram projectile at about 1000 m/s. Not a LAG.

 

[justacaveman]

The CT LAG had muzzle velocity between 400-500 m/s. The book stated that it fired a 20mm, 30 gram bullet. This weight would be incorrect, and either a typo or a misunderstanding of metric weights (written by an american before metric usage was common). A more realistic projectile weight would be 60-70 grams. Also the weapon itself was a bit light at 4.5kg loaded, again a more realistic weight would be about 8kg loaded. The projectile on the Neopup is 110 grams, and reducing this to 60-70 grams would get you the muzzle velocity of the LAG. Also the Neopup uses no new technology, it's just repackaged 1970's tech (about TL 7). The LAG is a TL 8 design, and would have some improvements over the Neopup. And a LAG WAS basically a high-velocity grenade launcher before anyone tried to make such a weapon for real. The Neopup is just an early version of a LAG with a bigger payload and 60% of the muzzle velocity.

The LAG was designed as assault weapon, which means firepower and mobility. The 20mm anti-tank rifles do not meet this criteria, they are too heavy, and designed for use in stationary positions. They are just really big sniper rifles designed to shoot at armoured vehicles.

 

[Stainless]

Must there be all this gun-porn on the net? There may be young people reading! :roll:

 

[rust]

Must there be all this gun-porn on the net? There may be young people reading! :roll:

Indeed, one could at least try to discuss something more family friendly,
like for example chainsaws or shock whips. 8)

 

[rust]

Medival repeating crossbows. Ever since seeing the "landing" scene in the new "Robin Hood" movie I am sure they have been used a lot in the 11th/12th century.

I really loved the landing craft the French used for their amphibious as-
sault ... :lol:

 

[Egil Skallagrimsson]

Frankly, there are so many typos and/or misunderstandings of "real" slug weapons in CSC that my copy is covered with corrections. When they move onto support weapons, or weapons which don't exist (ACR, gausss, energy) things just become bizarre (and don't get me going on artillery, missiles etc),

The best thing is to pull out the weapons you will use/want the players to have access to in YTU, correct the stats where neccessary, write them up as a table, and use that.

Egil

 

[justacaveman]

In the various Traveller rule sets until MGT the LAG weighed about 4.5kg. Suddenly in MGT it weighs 30kg when the ammo cost right next to the weight is 30?

The Denel Neopup PAW is not a grenade launcher, even if they call it that. A 110 gram projectile travelling at 310 m/s has a lot of kinetic energy. Enough that the PAW uses an APC-T round round that will penetrate 8mm of steel armour at 100 meters. APC-T stands for Armor Piercing Capped - Tracer. This is a hardened steel kinetic kill projectile (no explosives) that was developed in WW II and was used in anti-tank guns. The PAW is a LAG in everything but name. A slight change in the ammo design and you have a faster round with about the same kinetic energy. The differences are minor.

If the weight is not a mistake then you are saying that the TL 8 LAG is somehow a poorly designed copy of a TL 5 Antitank Rifle, since it weighs almost twice as much, costs twice as much, has more than twice the recoil (another error I believe), and is 50% more expensive to fire, with no increase in lethality or effectiveness.

The Antitank rifle stats are on page 106, and the LAG's stats are on page 107 of the CSC.

Why some people insist on defending obvious errors while denying facts that are pointed out to them (repeatedly) just continues to both astound and annoy me. You are entitled to your own opinion, not your own facts.

 

[justacaveman]

Stainless said:

Must there be all this gun-porn on the net? There may be young people reading!

I'd have to say that you're playing the wrong types of games, since ALL RPGs have their roots in 1970's wargames. The roleplaying element came about when the players wanted a more personlized command experience, and developed rules to do this.

Most games are designed to simulate conflict and violence of one sort or another. To call an interest in accurately simulating the weapons involved "Gun Porn", is no more accurate than calling an interest in Olympic equipment technology "Sports Porn".

 

[justacaveman]

It's on their own webpage.

http://www.neopup.co.za/neopupinformation.html

Click on ammunition.

 

[justacaveman]

The Neopup is never called a grenade launcher by its manufacturer. They call it a Personal Area Weapon. Other people have called it a grenade launcher, because it it doesn't fit into their preconceived categories.

It is not a grenade launcher, it is a man-portable 20mm cannon firing a shortened 20mm cartridge at 310 m/s, but using the same 110 gram projectile (the part that comes out of the front of the barrel) as a 20mm Vulcan cannon. In contrast, a 40mm grenade launcher fires a 170 gram projectile at 76 m/s (25% of the muzzle velocity of the Neopup, with much less kinetic energy.).

As far as 8mm of steel armour being a JOKE, get real. This was the average armour thickness of a WW I tank (Which is what an antitank rifle was designed to kill. It was also the average thickness of most Armored Personnel Carriers up until the 1960's. This weapon isn't supposed to be killing tanks for goodness sake, it is supposed to take out LIGHT armoured vehicles and penetrate barriers that the enemy is using for cover.

And yes the TL 5 Antitank Rifle should weigh twice as much as it does in CSC. But the LAG should weigh 1/3 of what it does in the CSC, and have no more recoil than a shotgun (Watch the Neopup video).

 

[justacaveman]

You seem to have forgotten that we were discussing the LAG.

The reference to the Neopup was to determine whether or not it met the specifications for a LAG. And it does.

A LAG in Traveller was a shoulder-fired weapon that used a 20mm cartridge with a MAXIMUM muzzle velocity of 500 m/s. The specififications in the various Traveller books listed the weight of the projectile as 30 grams (This is an obvious error since a .50 BMG bullet (12.7mm) is 40 grams.), but realistically it should be about 70 grams. It had 5 shots, and was semi-automatic. The weight in the Traveller books varied from 4.5 kg-8kg loaded.

A Neopup (Not Neopub) uses a 20mm projectile at 310 m/s, has a 110 gram projectile, holds 6 shots, and weighs about 7.5 kg loaded. If you do NOTHING but reduce the projectile weight to 70 grams, you will kick the muzzle velocity up to 500 m/s easily (this will not affect the kinetic energy at all). So a Neopup is a LAG in all but name. The APCT rounds that the Neopup has made for it would be equivalent to Full AP Anti-Armour ammo, and you could make DSAP ammo for it if you so desired. I REPEAT a Neopup is a LAG (LAG stands for Light Assault Gun, and is a general term like SMG etc..).

And while you continue to disparage 8mm of armor as a JOKE, the following Vehicles all had/have armour that was no better protection than that: Soviet BTR series, French VAB, M113 series, Uparmored Humvees (There are plenty more.). 8mm of steel armour is sufficient to completely protect against 7.62mm ball ammunition. Only the newest and heaviest APC's have better armour protection than this. The LAG is not a design to kill tanks, just LIGHT vehicles etc. (And is just barely capable of that.).

 

[locarno24]

The Light Assault Gun (LAG) on page 107. Light? The thing weighs 30kg! In CT it only weighed 4kg, what's with that? At most, I would make it 8kg.

A direct read-across of weights and names is at best questionable in quite a bit of Traveller. It just shows up more in small arms because we think we know how big they should be...

A Mercenary LMG at 20 Kg is the same - at 3D6 damage it's firing rifle rounds, but at 20 Kg it's not exactly 'Light' either - being twice the weight of the 10 Kg M60 General Purpose machine gun, and half-way to the 40 Kg M2 Heavy Machine gun.

The same thing happens in a lot of sci-fi army/fleet settings where a military phrase which has a specific meaning (currently) is co-opted for something else. The endless wranglings over the use of the term "destroyer"* for example, or variations between machine gun & cannon (cannon is usually used for something able to lob an explosive round).



That said:

Light Assault Gun (LAG): Essentially a superheavy rifle, the LAG fires a single solid slug at extreme distances with armour piercing capability. A magazine containing five rounds is inserted into the underside of the weapon, ahead of the trigger guard, and locked into place before firing. The weapon comes standard with both a manually set tripod and an over-the-back sling to assist in carrying from place to place.

That's from Mercenary, and as such can be considered the definition of a Light Assault Gun in Mongoose Traveller (since it predated the Central Supply Catalogue). A 'single solid slug' does not resemble the Neopup. That description more accurately, to me, sounds like a Mechem NTW-20 - which the stats also resemble in terms of mass (26-29 Kg depending on incorporated bits).
http://world.guns.ru/sniper/sn55-e.htm

Of course, as noted, if you prefer the CT version of the Neopup or Barrett Payload Rifle (XM-109, I think?), then stick with it.

* See the endless rantings in the ex-A Call To Arms forum about the 'Escort Destroyer'.

 

[rust]

Anzio Ironworks in Florida also produces a 20 mm rifle that comes very
close to the Traveller LAG.

 

[justacaveman]

The Anzio mag-fed 20mm is an anti-material rifle (just another name for an antitank rifle). It's 2 meters long, 50kg, and couldn't possibly be carried and fired by a human.

The description in MGT Mercenary is so different from the classical version of a LAG (including TNE ) that it seems that someone mixed up LAGs and 20mm antitank rifles.

I don't accept obvious errors as anything but errors. Whether this was an error in judgement, or just bad editing I can't say, but it is certainly an error.

 

[rust]

The Anzio mag-fed 20mm is an anti-material rifle (just another name for an antitank rifle). It's 2 meters long, 50kg, and couldn't possibly be carried and fired by a human.

Actually, according to Anzio Ironworks it weighs 39 pounds, and it is in-
deed carried and fired by one person.

http://www.anzioironworks.com/20MM-TAKE-DOWN-RIFLE.htm

 

[DFW]

The Anzio mag-fed 20mm is an anti-material rifle (just another name for an antitank rifle). It's 2 meters long, 50kg, and couldn't possibly be carried and fired by a human.

Actually, according to Anzio Ironworks it weighs 39 pounds, and it is in-
deed carried and fired by one person.

http://www.anzioironworks.com/20MM-TAKE-DOWN-RIFLE.htm

Nice weapon. If I had the spare change I'd get one.

 

[rust]

+ Reduce damage of the MGT AT rifle
+ Keep the MGT version of the LAG

The same here, although I would also make the TL 5 AT Rifle a little less
expensive (2,000 Credits ?) in order to bring it more in line with the TL 5
Big Game Rifle (CSC p. 76) with its 1,200 Credits - but this is a "setting
thing".

 

[rust]

And finally what did the Normans call their landing operation? Something with Lion in it?

Judging from those landing craft, it could have been "Omaha Beach".

 

[justacaveman]

Rust wrote:

Actually, according to Anzio Ironworks it weighs 39 pounds, and it is in-
deed carried and fired by one person.

Wrong rifle, the Takedown 20mm is a single shot weapon without a magazine, can only be fired while prone or when the weapon is mounted, and to reload the weapon you have to remove the butt of the weapon (there is no actual bolt). The 20mm mag-fed rifle on the other hand starts at 69 lbs, and get up to over 150 lbs depending on chosen barrel length etc.. This weapon can also only be fired while prone or mounted.

I would double the weight of the TL 5 Antitank Rifle, but I wouldn't change anything else. This weapon would fire 15-25mm ammo.

New weapon: Light Antitank Rifle (TL 5) Damage: 5d6, Magazine: 5, Auto: No, Recoil: 2, Cost: 1500, Mass: 25kg, Ammo Cost: 10

I would change the LAG's weight to 8kg, change the name of MGT Mercenary's TL 8 LAG to a 20mm Anti-Material Rifle because that is the actual name of current weapons that fit that description, increase the weight of the TL 5 LAG to 36kg, and rename it to what it actually is (an Antitank Rifle). The Mercenary LAG is neither light, nor an assault weapon, and does not deserve the name. The CSC description does not need to be changed, and since it was put out after Mercenary, should be considered the more correct definition.