Space Combat - Weapons

X15 C 'Regulator'

This close to medium range weapon was designed by Interstellar Defense Corp (IDC) for use in boarding an enemy ship. It is designed with several uses in mind, and can be modified to suit many more. Instead of using messy and dangerous propellants this gun uses a simple Gauss coil, which also serves to minimize the recoil associated with its use. It's main use is a semi-automatic, combat shotgun using a 17 shot clip. Other uses include using it to launch grenades, and also to shoot the 'Can Opener' (A large cylinder with a really sharp needle tip used to rip a hole in a ship's hull for boarding.)

P8 Plasma Assault Rifle

Developed by the Israeli government during the initial phases of colonization as an effective replacement for gun powder, the plasma rifle has been a staple of many world governments due to its ease of production and relative stability. The current model, the P8, is no exception. Coming standard with a laser sight it is also capable of more accuracy than its predecessors due to recent improvement is computer assisted aiming. Also there is even less recoil, though it was negligible before, it is almost non-existent now; for ease of use during out of ship combat.

These babies work by using the plasma to propel a bullet out of the gun. When this was still in the planning stages a couple of bueacrats asked why they couldn't just shoot plain plasma, only to be meet with laughter. The relative impossibility of plasma being an effective weapon on any range longer than 20 or 30 meters would seem to limit that idea's application.

Inspiration: The Combine Overwatch Pulse Rifle.

Akratek's Self Healing Minefield AKA 'Caltrops'

Using roughly 35 ping-pong sized mines you can now effective close off a passage and keep it closed. Using a small radio network to pin-point the position of the rest of the mines, this minefield will close any gaps that appear due to disablization of any portion of itself. The mines in the field will then hop, skip, or float around to fill in the gaps using small onboard directional thrusters.

Inspiration: Self Healing Minefield - http://www.darpa.mil/ato/programs/SHM/htmldemo.html

N2 Flashbang

Yet another invention brought to you from the labs at IDC, this grenade combines the traditional flashbang with the newest advances in electro-neural interactions to completely disable anyone in the radius mind, body, and everything else. In addition to creating a lot of lights and sounds this also creates a decent sized neural overload pulse (NOP), effectively preventing any action for some time. The NOP creates a brain fart effect, where the subject will completely forget what they were just doing and why they were doing it. On some subject this effect can last for 30 seconds or more.

OSR-005 'Harmony'

A primary weapon of the Oraki defense forces, the Harmony is a heavy beam weapon, typically intended to be mounted on combat frames or carried by androids. This monstrous device works on principles similar to gravity manipulation, generating the superstring with the harmonic pattern that corresponds to the carrier particle of the combined eletroweak force. The effect has been well described as a 'nuclear thunderbolt', as the forces that hold together the very protons and neutrons of the afflicted are disturbed in an incredible discharge of heat, light, and atomic radiation.

RS-947 'Hitman' sniper rifle

Sniping can be a problem when the target is in an enclosed location with no point of entry. Not so with the RS-947 rifle. Rather than crudely firing a round through a barrel and the air, requiring the sniper to find a 'clean' shot, the RS-947 teleports the round as soon as it is fired. A sniper simply has to set the coordinates--easy with the attached X-ray scope--and pull the trigger. The round is teleported directly in front of the target, allowing the sniper to fire from any position in range. Note that the RS-947's teleportation device is made to transport only matter; energy ordinance is not compatible with this rifle.

Adapted from the Star Trek: Deep Space 9 episode Field of Fire.

http://www.startrek.com/startrek/view/series/DS9/episode/104571.html

Renjo Talons

These gauntlet weapons are a standard part of Republican Space Marine armor, and are perhaps some of the most feared weapons in space. Consisting of little more than small arc-welders installed into the first two fingers of each hand, these vicious weapons allow the Space Marines to perform hand to hand combat with deadly effeciency in the hard vacuum of space. All they must do is rend open the armor of their foes, and allow decompression to take care of the rest.

Inspiration: Battle Angel Alita: Last Order.

EGE-42 'The Answer'

The Answer is a ship-to-ship scale weapon, and functions on the same principle as the Hyperspace drives that propel men between the stars. However, rather than opening a portal for an entire ship, the portal opened is much smaller, and at a greater distance - Whilst barely larger than a man, the portal is enough to strang some of the ship within hyperspace when it closes... often quite important parts leaving.

Sigumund Arms M-17, 'Mjollnir'

Just barely on the edge of man-portable, the Mjollnir is a heavily destructive weapon, and considered well worth it in open battlefields, despite the small load of only three to four shots.

Requiring a backpack generator to functionally contain and fire its ammunition, the Mjollnir carrys three micropellets of unstable neutronium metal. Stored and launched under extreme gravity fields, the micropellets being their decay as soon as they are fired, unleashing a torrential blaze of heat and radiation in its path, until such time as it is stopped by impact, where upon it tends to finish its decay, at a some what more rapid rate once it is no longer relativistically dilated.

This weapon has been alternately nicknamed by the troops as 'Big Mojo Mama' and 'Enough'.

GH-13 'Moby Dick'

A preferred tool and incidental weapon of many rogue elements, the Moby Dick is simply the next in a line of 'weapons' that man has used for many thousands of years: A harpoon. Consisting of a carbide tipped, high alloy spear, the Moby Dick is fired much like a simple rail gun, except that the spike it fires at simple multiples of the speed of sound, rather than significant fractions of c trails out a carbon microfilament, along which the user can either draw himself to the target (and vice versa), or which he can use as an extremely sharp wire-trap, though this takes quite a bit of skill.

This may also be used as a gun vs weaker vacuum / environmental suits.

Avela'sh Su Forme - The Kiss of the Stars

A favored weapon of the troops of the Fornost, a warlike race on the edge of the inner bulge of the galaxy, the Kiss of the Stars launches gel-canisters of nano-compounded thermite. Sticky, painful, and capable of burning through most armors even in the vacuum of space, the Kiss of the Stars is the thirty-first century replacement for Napalm.

Chemical Agent µ-5793R, a.k.a. 'Demon's Blood'

The most corrosive substance known to humanity, Demon's Blood was first discovered in crystalized form. It was found in the burnt out hyperdrive core of a ghost ship, apparently formed when the core suffered a meltdown. The crystals melt at a mere 400°F, making a liquid corrosive which no known substance can stop. Researchers were able to recreate the conditions the crystals formed, and the military quickly found application. Demon's Blood crystals can be carried by troops into enemy territory. A crystal is attached to a thermal grenade and thrown. Upon detenation, the crystal melts and the chemical is splattered, burning through anything in its path. Demon's Blood is also useful for space combat, burning holes through an enemy hull and causing vacuum leaks. While no material substance known can stop Demon's Blood, a magnetic or energy shield repels it fairly easily.

Ion Bolt Cannon

Star Control II: The Ur-Quan Masters

The Ion bolt gun is considered one of the most basic and rudimentary of capital space weaponry. Capital weaponry being the proper name of ship sized weaponry as opposed to vehicle, or man sized weapons. The Ion bolt gun is a basic weapon that discharges packets of highly ionized and magnetically bonded gasses. These 'bolts' hit enemy ships and cause damage though heat/electromagnetic damage to the hull and electric damage to ship systems.

The weapon is considered a basic one since sufficient hull shielding, and hardened electronic components can reduce the destructive power of the cannon.

M1-22 with k2 pack Intership Subordanance

Common name: Pachinkos

This Marines weapon is used for inner ship and station combat. Tactics inside a ship or station are different than standard combat; as damage to the environment is often more dangerous to even a full suited marine than any ordiance thrown at them. Explosive decompression, removal of key systems, rupture of plasma conduits, are the least of the Marines worries, but all of them are dangerous to the point of lethalty.

The M1-22 is a forearm submounted armgun, round in configuration - thermos like. It is attached to the k2 styled pack with a simple hose that clips to the arm of the MI suit. The M1-22 rounds are small spheres (2cm pong standard) of polystand.

With the Standard load, the impact can be stunning to an unarmed/ uninsulated being. Once ruptured, the splatted pressured adhesive expands to an approximate volume of 16cms by 16cm by 7cm. The adhesive will stick to 97% of substances used in a ship or suit environment, including itself. Within 10 seconds the adhesive begins to harden. Within 100 seconds (half that in O2 mix) it hardens to the strength of a 'brick' (see attachment b62 for specs).

The M1-22 has a cyclic of 90 spheres per minute through its gravetic projector (neglectable recoil even in micro g), so a casual spray will immobilize most targets. A time on target spray (or a second 'tag') should immobilize a MI suit. The K2 pack can carry upto 500 spheres. M1-22 standard rounds can be used to make breach patches, temporary barriers (being flameproof and plasma resistant), insulation (electric and thermal), bridges, and if discharged out its k2 grab pouch, they can be left behind as contact traps.

The solvent for standard rounds is the blue roden spray. It begins to break down the strike in 300 seconds. Most solvents will work, but their time to release will be longer.

The M1-22 will shoot any standard K series 2cm Pong round. Payloads can very to include gas agents (see K series manual), contact chemicals (see K series manual), plasma charge, sensory flash rounds, chaff, paint gas (for tracking and negating holo and camo fields, and solids.

Warp Torpedo Mk IV

Of all the computers known to man, of all the powerful intelligences produced in the laboratories of Earth, only two have proven skilled enough to navigate the impossible twists and turns of Under-space. Mankind himself, and Dolphin.

The Mark IV Warp Torpedo exploits this by being based around the mind of a cloned cetacian, hooked to a simple life support system, trained by direct eletronic stimuli. This meat-machine is the pilot of a tremendous suicide bomb, typically an exceptionally powerful graviton wave generator, or occasionally bio-weapons. They are launched alone and in pairs from worlds far away from the battlefront, acting as devestating surprise weapons.

M1-65b Intership Anti-Personel Subordanance

Common Name: Baby Ripper

This Marines weapon is used for inner ship and station combat. Tactics inside a ship or station are different than standard combat; as damage to the environment is often more dangerous to even a full suited marine than any ordiance thrown at them. Explosive decompression, removal of key systems, rupture of plasma conduits, are the least of the Marines worries, but all of them are dangerous to the point of lethalty. This anti-personel weapon provides minimum danger to heavily armored mobile suited marines.

The M1-65b is a forearm submounted armgun for anti-suit and anti-personel uses. It uses a L2 cartridge pack. Each cartrige holds 15, 15 cm serrated biphase carbide steel disks. Your average trooper will carry two replacements and one in chamber.

These disks are spun up and projected via magnetic force generated by McArthur super conducting electromagnets. There is currently no compensator for the M1-65b, unlike the full sized two handed M1-65, thus personel must be in full G or mag booted down. While nominally damaging to bulkheads and panels, the ripping motion of the spinning disks is devistating to flesh and 'soft' suits (causing decompression and often cutting into the person underneath). In fact, since the disks will richochet off walls and bulkheads, they can be fired around corners (banking of near wall), clear rooms/ halls (fire in and close the door, they will bounce about until they strike a soft target to embed themselves in), cut safety teathers (though this tactic may be discontinued see adjenda for the New Genieva Military Conduct Convention), and set up as temporary traps (one flying about a closed hallway will be a danger for anyone passing through the hallway for 3 minutes.

The cyclic per the weapon is 15 per minute. Cartrige change time 12 seconds once practiced.

L1T Plasma Dirk

Not as clumsy or as random as a blaster, but an elegant weapon for a more civilized age. Obi-Wan Kenobi, Star Wars, 1977.

I don't know what that old man was supposed to have, but it sure as hell wasn't one of these! Corporal Schmidt, 667th Armored Infantry.

The Plasma Dirk is evocative of certain ancient fictional weapons, but not nearly so clean or effective as the Light Sabers of the mythical Jedi Knight. A favored tool of anti-tank infantry and Marine boarding troops, the plasma dirk is a close combat weapon roughly the size and shape of a large knife hilt when deactived. Once ignited, the dirk draws upon the ambient atmosphere to create a gout of plasma, more or less controlled by magnetic fields that project from the dirk's emission end - length will depend on the ambient atmosphere's composition, power use is constant.

A good hot oxygenated plasma can burn through several inches of durasteel in mere seconds, and both anti-tank crews and boarders put this to full effect, tearing holes where needed in the armor of their foes, so long as they haven't been spaced, anyway. However, in the Old Terran Standard Oxy-Nitrogen atmosphere, the burnoff from the plasma has been reported as having a sedative effect on unprotected humans, and some xeno-morphs, in confined spaces, as the nitrous oxide can overwhelm the respiratory system. Users must be cautious of this effect - It would hardly do to fall asleep in the midst of wielding such a knife!

VTT-666 'Hell Tank'

A ground vehicle designed for the various volcanic worlds in the Human Empire, the aptly-named Hell Tank can go where few other armored vehicles can. Half meter thick duranium armor protects the tank from lava, magma, even low-grade plasma. Like most tanks, the VTT-666 is propelled by hover treads, but these can be retracted and four duranium treads - two dorsal, two ventral - extend, allowing the tank to crawl over the harshest terrain. A plasma drill allows the tank to even burrow beneath molten rock if necessary.

The Hell Tank is powered by a Mk. IX 'Envy' fusion engine. Armaments vary by field usage, but the standard VTT-666 is equipped with an M-79 'Wrath' repeater turret, two forward-mounted TS-49 'Pride' plasma cannons, and an LR-987h 'Avarice' artillery system. The pressurized cabin houses up to two pilots and one gunner; all crew are required to wear heat-resistant pressure suits while operating in volcanic terrain.

Inspired by a FlashChat, I believe between Scrasamax and myself.

The Voice of God

Sub-Space Detonator

The Sub-space detonator is a canister roughly the size of a medium sized automobile. It is composed of a neutron detonator tied into a phased array Distorter and a sub-space field generator. While the effectiveness of the neutron bomb is low in space, since most ships have adequate shielding against radiation, its effect in subspace is impressive. The blast wave is effectivly shunted into sub-space by the Distorter and generator, which creates a wave harmonic. This 'wave' ripples through the immediate vicinity of the bomb at the a fraction of the speed of light, creating a vivid blue ring, or sphere from the point of detonation.

A few technical guides mislabel this weapon as a sonic or a seismic weapon since it has a shattering effect on objects in its area of effect and survivors of the weapon universally report a throbbing chord like sound associated with the wave detonation/impact. Physics says this is impossible since there is no medium in space to conduct sound. A solution has been presented that the sound is really the vibration of the ship itself being rung by a sub-space distortion wave.

The use of sub-space detonators has been officially banned by Article 19 of the Tycho Treaty.

Fake Ghost Weapons

A Fake Ghost weapon must be attuned to a certain species. By creating weak electromagnetic fields of chaotic nature, the neural system of any target of this species will generate feelings of 'the sensed presence', fear, and other experiences bordering on hallucinations. In theory, a sufficiently subtle and prolonged exposure can drive someone insane; more probable is panic and disorientation.

The technology, strictly banned for civil use, is used in mass warfare to freak out the other side, creating disorder in their ranks. There has been at least one major terrorist attack with a stolen prototype, used on a large crowd... in the stampede that followed, thousands have died.

Protection is possible by shielding as against any electromagnetic effect; the problem is to know when it is employed. Also, studies exist that hint at the possibility of destabilising a hostile ship's shields, creating exactly this effect in it, until the shields are lowered or changed to cancel the effect. Medical solution is still in development.

(Inspired by this study: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/3046179.stm, discussed in this thread: http://www.strolen.com/guild/index.php?topic=625.0)

The Snot Rocket

Actually developed in pre-space warfare ages the Snot Rocket is a propelled, gel based, acid bomb. Cheap but effective, the powerful acid (developed from commercial cleaning agents), though a disgusting neon green blob, eats holes right through enemy armor. It is widely assumed that the use of gas-state propellants to launch the canisters was originally some sick army technician's idea of a joke, as it makes a very audible sneezing sound. The weapon was abandoned due to the lack of explosions, quick kills, and the tendency of the stuff to glow and eat through canisters.

HLR-1

One of the first man-portable energy type weapons to be deployed in defense of the Solar System against the Scranja, the Heavy LASER Repeater-1 used technology vastly similar to the Kalashnikov AK-217. Designed to deal with the dual issues of quickly depleted power capacity and massive energy inefficiencies and cooling in the designs of the day, the ammunition of the HLR-1 is more complex than the gun itself.

Resembling nothing quite so much as a scaled down, sawed off Vulcan cannon, the laser is belt-fed a series of cylinders, which contain the electro-chemical light-pulse generator and gain medium, a small ultra-capacitor to jump and enhance the light-pulse generation, and a small amount of neon held at the triple point. After the beam is generated and released, batteries within the cannon rotate the barrel to the next point in the firing cycle, and release the neon as a cooling element, which is vented to the local area.

Originally hailed as a 'the ray gun we'll finally kill the scalies with' by politicians and common troop alike, the troopers soon learned to despise the cantankerous weapon. With insufficient punch to fully penetrate the enemy armor, the gun generated many 'fighting wounded' enemy, many of whom punched their adrenal-equivalent dump system, the pain-numbing chemical fogging their brains and causing them to fight harder, though perhaps with less cohesion. So too, the gun was prone to misfire in atmosphere, the neon discharge freezing atmospheric elements to the working parts of the gun, causing jamming, and often breakage of the cold-embrittled parts. As well, the gun was often lethal in close quarters unless breathers were issued to the troops - neon build up caused the loss of several emplacements, the fighters passing out from anoxia.

Soon, many elements issued the weapon refused to use it, stealing the AK-217 from the armory or other squads if it was the only way to obtain one. Held on to for a short time due to political considerations, the program was dropped when the asteroid belt factories were obliterated, and there were thus no longer any constituents to send the money to.

AR72 Banshee Mag-Rail Assault Weapon

Note: this is set within the book series Orphanage, by Robert Buettner.

The AR72 Banshee assault rifle was the first man-portable weapon, invented by the UN Space Force, to use Mag-Rail technology. The technology was taken from the Pseudocephalopod, or 'Slug's' premier anti-personnel assault weapon, which primarily made use of electromagnetic energy to create a frictionless area around the porjectile, thus propelling large shells at catastrophic speeds.

The Banshee was a bastard child of the older chemically-propelled rounds and the newer Mag-Rail technology. The operating system was simple: to activate the Mag-Rail component of the weapon, the user was required to simply rack the slide of the weapon. This only works when a rounds is chambered or is about to be chambered, both to conserve energy and also to decrease any chances of a weapons failure. This creates a completely frictionless environment within the chamber, meaning that upon the firing of the round, there would be no forces pulling upon the round itself. The firing system, when the Mag-system was active involved a mixture of both magnets lining the barrel pulling the bullet forward and the chemical reaction of the gunpowder pushing from behind. In layman's terms? Magnetic acceleration plus classic gunpowder propulsion simply means a world of hurt for whoever's on the business end of this weapon.

Reliability is at an amazing level with this weapon. Every single part of the weapon, from the main action to the individual magnets lining the barrel, is completely detachable, and the whole weapon can be taken apart within about two minutes and reassaembled within the same time. The gun actually weighs almost twice as much as the standard-issue rifles of the earlier days, such as the M20 rifle deployed by 1st Division during the Battle of Ganymede, and is also larger, but is still made of light enough plastic to allow each soldier to carry multiple spare parts. The mechanisms are well spaced-out, and none of the parts are completely attached, meaning that if one system fails, the rifle can still function as a whole. If the magazine feed fails, rounds can still be loaded in one-by-one from the breech. If the Mag-system fails, then the gun can be deployed as a normal rifle, etc.

Accuracy, due to the speed of the round, is outstanding. There have been multiple cases of grunts barely out of bootcamp managing to successfuly engage Slug targets at ranges upwards of a kilometre. In addition, standard ammunition has devloped in order to increase the damage each round can do. Upon entering a target's body cavity, a small charge within the bullet is set off by an electric pulse, causing horrible internal damage to the target. Similar rounds can be fired at a target and then detonated en masse- these rounds are designed to 'burrow' into any hard objects they hit, alowing for grunts to use the rifle to blow out entire chunks of a wall in seconds, doing a combat engineer's job with a rifleman's kit.

Over three dozen different configurations exist for this weapon, including (but not limited to): a CQC carbine, a higher-caliber Designated Marksman's Rifle, a flechette-specific Crowd Control rifle, and the 'Brain Gun': a specialized variation, only used by Special Forces and infantry commanders, which houses a laser designator, a panel that monitors and triangulates radio signals, an ambient noise generator, and a specialized 'puter device which designates targets for Smart Round ammunition and then guides each round into the target.

Distribution of the Banshee to Allied forces began roughly twenty yars after the opening shots of the Slug Wars (as in the destruction of the first cities) and has remained popular with the soldiers ever since. Grunts seem to enjoy using the weapon to outsmart the Slugs and to increase their already-considerable combat options.

Semi-permanent oscillatory subfield a.k.a 'Frickin' Handshake'

The first military contacts with the Volians seemed fairly easy, their ships seemed to have comparable arms, but were few in numbers. Then their fleets arrived and showed the humans how war is waged in space.

One of the surprises was the 'Handshake'. The Volians are able to generate some kind of a stable subspace field between their ships. But what is normally not observed in our space, has here size and duration, most probably a few inches wide and upheld as long as necessary. Any matter passing through this field is disintegrated or sent elsewhere, who cares? And while the beam is by itself not likely to cause much damage, moving it - and the ships generating it will move - can cut apart the biggest ships, cause decompression and destroy anything in their path. No shields seem to be able stop them for now.

Worse, the Volians know their craft. They like to fight in large groups, spreading out, then initiate their beams as opportunity strikes. More than a few commanders have lost their nerve and retreated, once the beams started taking out everything left and right.

Luckily, they are not perfect. Only medium sized-ships have been seen to generate the beams, and not every time, there are conflicting reports on recharge times. They cannot seem to be able to create them on a distance of more than one or two miles, so the battle has to be compact. The powering up takes a few seconds and our scientists think it can be detected. With the known data, computers are able to calculate dangerous constellations of ships, and when they can be avoided. Lastly, taking out one of the ships will take out the beam as well. Good luck.