|
|
Post by Insano-Man on Sept 21, 2018 14:00:03 GMT -5
GET LOADED
If there's any one tool people swear by on Set, it's the gun. Sword. Gravity cannon. One of those. Going outside just about anywhere is a brush with death. Going outside in some places is instant death. Making it to the next town over can be just as much a matter of ammunition as it can be fuel or food. One way or another, not many people are brave enough to leave home without some kind of protection. Even the bigger aliens are smart enough to to stay indoors unless they're packing heat.
At the same time, industry is anything but standard on Set. Not everyone knows what a gun is in the first place. Most folks make due with rusty rifles, hand-me-down handguns, and anything they can pull out of a ditch or a crab's stomach. People like to imitate proven weapon designs, but only the Loonies have anything resemblant of a knowledge base. When someone pulls a gun or a knife, it's potluck on what it'll be. The following is a list of all noteworthy weapons and ammunition on Set, blunt, blade, ballistic, or otherwise.
This is an open topic.
If you'd like to invent a new kind of weapon or ammunition, feel free to post it here! Since Erf is a big, wide-open place, just about anything's possible. Go nuts!
|
|
|
|
Post by Insano-Man on Sept 21, 2018 14:00:26 GMT -5
GARAGE GUNS
Type: Ranged, Firearm
Role: Provisional Weapon
Producer: Anyone
Service Life: N/A
Action: Unreliable
Rate of Fire: Jumpy
Velocity: Slow
Range: Bad
Ammunition: Anything
Magazine: Guesswork
Length: Awkward
Weight: Heavy
Deep in the mud of prehistory, someone decided they wanted to make a shotgun out of a lead pipe and a screwdriver. It probably didn't end well. Today, people are still doing it. It still doesn't end well. Garage guns are just what the name suggests; random garbage you'd find in a garage, slapped together into something that looks like a gun. They're just as liable to explode and kill the wrong person as they are to shoot, but they're better than nothing. On Set, it might still be a win - shooting yourself isn't as painful as being eaten alive by crabs.
Garage guns come in many different shapes and sizes. Just about anyone who's seen a gun before can build one. Some are just tiny, bolt-action zip guns, shooting even tinier nails. Some are hefty muskets that are just a few technological epochs out of style. Some are decent, reliable guns that were actually built by professionals - they were just made out of random scrap. One way or another, it's hard to tell what one's going to look like. Plenty of people have them and plenty of people make them, but there's never been a go-to style for Set's tinkerers.
Garage guns are about as reliable as a coin toss, but they're still the most popular weapons on the planet. It's not hard to figure out why. They're cheap. They're dirt cheap. Cavemen know how to make them. Diehard technophobes in the Cult of Meat are ready to give them a whirl. Down-on-their-luck Loonies won't scoff at having a gun instead of their fists. Finding ammunition is usually just a matter of applying a hammer to a rock until it fits into a casing. Odds are that they're going to stay in the top spot for a very long time. Out in Set's wilderness, people always need guns - and an empty hand's usually not picky.
|
|
|
|
Post by Insano-Man on Sept 21, 2018 14:00:55 GMT -5
IM28R "STUMPY" RAILRIFLE
Type: Ranged, Firearm
Role: General Service Rifle
Producer: Loonies
Service Life: -22 OSC - Present
Action: Magnetic Accelerator, Railgun
Rate of Fire: 200RPM - 1,800RPM
Velocity: 1km/s - 3km/s
Range: 500m - 2km
Ammunition: 2mm Railgun
Magazine: 60 + 150ml Coolant
Length: 450mm - 930mm
Weight: 1.5kg - 2.7kg
Equipment:
- Modular Power Controls
- Internal Heatsinks
- Emergency Heat Vents
Furniture:
- Pistol Grip
- Modular Stock
- Modular Foregrip
- Modular Carrying Handle
- Collapsible Ironsights
- GUPPY Equipment Rails (Top, Sides, Underslung, Grip, Stock)
If there's any one weapon on Set that's earned its place, it's the IM28R. Nothing's seen as much hard fighting as the venerable Stumpy. There have been so many produced that it's been guessed that there are at least ten railrifles for every one person on Set. It's killed more men, monsters, and machines than just about anything else on the planet. It's been a Looney's best friend for about 1,300 years and counting - and no one expects it'll ever go away.
The IM28R is, officially, the Infantry Model 28 Rifleman Modular Assault Weapon. Unofficially, people call it Stumpy; most are manufactured in a short, handy carbine format. Short length or not, there's never been much debate about terminal ballistics. The IM28R is an automatic railgun firing 2mm slugs up to 10mm in length. Most are stocked deep in 2x2mm pellets. The lowest recorded muzzle velocity on a railrifle is just shy of a kilometer per second. Penetration and energy on target are enough to punch through light vehicle armor or tear limbs off of meat monsters.
The Loonies aren't fond of high-maintenance weapons. For a railgun, the IM28R is anything but. It comes with very few computerized parts - and none of them are absolutely necessary. Everything from its rails to its power systems can be serviced by hand, in battlefield conditions, with minimal training. Most parts have a service lifetime roughly ten times that of their operator. Catastrophic breakdowns happen once every century - provided one's made it that long before retirement. Most Loonies are trained to smith ammunition from scratch. Most bunkers can stitch together a Stumpy out of nothing but nerve.
On top of that, the IM28R is versatile. It's covered in Looney-standard GUPPY rails to be kitted out with just about anything. Scopes, stocks, gadgets, or the Loonies' much-beloved grenade launchers - Stumpy's a rifle with a very deep wardrobe. On top of that, most rifles come with adjustable power settings. Set to its maximum, it'll serve as a marksman rifle or a truck hunter. Set to its minimum, a Stumpy can dump out hundreds of slugs without ever peaking out in heat. A deep magazine is all it needs to work as a machine gun.
Heat, on the other hand, has always been the big problem with railguns. Higher power, longer slugs, and shorter rails all come at cost to effective magazine capacity. Most IM28Rs - and railrifles in general - only have the tolerance to put out around 30 rounds at medium power. With magazine-mounted heatsinks or coolant packs, the number jumps up to 60. Most bunkers build their standard magazines to that number. Likewise, most magazines feature an emergency discharge latch over their heat dumps. Bigger magazines usually come with bigger heatsinks or bigger coolant reservoirs.
The Stumpy's unbelievable service history goes back to the earliest known Looney bunkers on the planet. It's been an inextricable element of the Loonies, just as much as bunkers and goofy names. One way or another, every bunker comes into being with some kind of idea on how to build one - even the bunkers climbing out of the Chambers of Myth. Railrifles pop up in the strangest places, everywhere from the graveyard orbit right down to the Underworld. They show up with the strangest people. Space Loonies following the "old reliable" philosophy, tribal savages worshiping dead bunkers - Stumpy's been a friend to many.
As backwards as it sounds, Stumpy's not as widespread as it'd seem. Showing off Looney hardware is a good way to get shot by the people who made it. Even as one of their most common fighting tools, the Loonies are always willing to chase down lost railrifles. They're always ready to torch their stockpiles before they let someone else get to them. If another bunker turns up dead, other Loonies are quick to make sure it's buried. It's hardly that much of a surprise; with that much firepower in a single weapon, nobody's looking forward to letting the wildlife get ahold of one.
|
|
|
|
Post by Insano-Man on Sept 21, 2018 14:01:14 GMT -5
SCBD FLESCHER IV SUBMACHINE GUNType: Ranged, Firearm Role: Personal Defense Weapon Producer: Izing-Flescher Tactical Arms Company (Defunct)Service Life: 1126 OSC - Present Action: Gas-Operated Rotating Bolt, Automatic Rate of Fire: 550RPM Velocity: 350m/s Range: 150m - 200m Ammunition: 9x15mm Flescher Magazine: 24 Length: 850mm Weight: 3.5kg - 3.7kg Furniture:- Pistol Grip - Collapsible Stock - Vertical Foregrip - Ironsights - Rachal Equipment Rails (Top)A pile of garbage by any other name would smell as sweet. The SBCD Flescher IV is one of the most common weapons on Set. It does not do the planet any favors. It's the summary of everything wrong with a firearm. It's heavy for its size, unreliable on a good day, and couldn't hit the broad side of a battlecruiser from five feet away. It's stuck with a lightweight caliber that hits like a boneless toddler. The only two things working in its favor are plentiful ammunition and easy maintenance. Both are mostly down to how easy it is to find one. Everywhere you look on Set, you'll find a Flescher; rusting out at the bottom of a river, bent sideways in a gravitational minefield, or turning to slag inside a crab's stomach. No matter where you get one, you can expect that, by about the fifth shot out, it'll jam. By the second magazine, it'll break down and start double-feeding. A hundred rounds in, it'll probably explode and kill everyone standing next to it. For every two people in front of it, the Flescher's killed one person behind it. People on the surface can't get enough of them. It's more than just a cheap spacer's joke. It's one of the most awful things to happen to gunsmiths on Set. Everything about the Flescher is cheap. Ammunition is easy to find and easy to manufacture. Parts seem to fall out of trees - even garbage haulers love to stockpile all the submachine guns left behind. The cheap materials quality on all its pieces means a blacksmith out in the middle of nowhere can fix one with their bare hands. Use a sewer pipe for a barrel, a shovel handle for a stock, and a paint gun for the receiver, it'll all work. For a little while, but it'll work. For a closer look at the Flescher IV's past and rise to fame, refer to its history article here.
|
|
|
|
Post by Insano-Man on Sept 21, 2018 14:02:17 GMT -5
RAD5 "FALCON" BATTLE RIFLE
Type: Ranged, Firearm
Role: General Service Rifle
Producer: Razzer Assault & Defense Arms Corporation (Defunct)
Service Life: 900-930 OSC - Present
Action: Gas-Operated Rotating Bolt, Automatic
Rate of Fire: 650RPM
Velocity: 850m/s
Range: 250m - 500m
Ammunition: 8.2x46mm Magnum
Magazine: 18
Length: 1050mm
Weight: 4.4kg - 4.8kg
Furniture:
- Pistol Grip
- Folding Stock
- Detachable Handguard
- Ironsights
- Rachal Equipment Rails (Top)
There's not much to be said about the RAD5. It's as generic as a battle rifle comes. It looks like everything else, works like everything else, and has a name you'd forget in about as much time as it took you to read. About the only thing going for it is its legacy; it's the most common powder-driven automatic rifle on and off the planet. One way or another, the Falcon's set the trend for just about every other weapon of its class. Given how reliable, cheap, and easy-to-feed it is, most reckon it's got at least another century in it before it starts disappearing.
Falcons are made mostly up in orbit, usually by the dozens. They work the rounds all over, right alongside lasers and coilguns. Spacers mostly see them as bottom-tier last-resorts, but poverty has a way of keeping the cheap stuff in circulation. Trashy stations keep their guards stocked in Falcons and 8.2mm. Junky freighters have them hiding in the walls in case they're boarded. Rifle-savvy spacers usually chop their barrels, rig them up with bullpup conversion kits, or even trash the stock. Weight and form factor get more attention when you're going from airlock to airlock.
Gunsmiths down on Set usually know how to slap a Falcon together out of spare parts, but most make their way down through barter. Merchants and mercenaries buy them off spacers by the litter wherever they get the chance. They get sold, dropped, eaten, or just plain lost from there. All along the way, mechanics and tinkerers pick over their parts to see how they work. The highest concentration on Falcons and parts is usually around a regular landing zone, but it's not unusual for trade routes to send them out into the sticks.
The Falcon's history is about as vague as the gun itself. It started out way back in the aftermath of the Splinter Wars and Big Split, around 900 OSC, with Razzer Assault & Defense. That was all back when half the planet's population was dead and the other half needed guns. Fine details on everything else have been lost to time. All that's really accepted as fact is that Razzer made a decent gun, filled a need, and cashed out before anyone could start writing history again. The Falcon survived and earned a solid reputation, one that's held on longer than some Looney hardware.
Ever since, the Falcon's been seen in the hands of spacers, bandits, humans, sorassan, and everyone in between. It's been copied, imitated, and mutated a few thousand different ways by just about everyone. It's been built in Cloneston, Unity Station, and the middle of absolute nowhere by everyone and everything. Loonies print it for sale and Space Loonies shuttle it around as trade goods. In the few places they still make movies, it's the weapon of choice for scrappy heroes and egg-brained bandits. If the whole planet decides to move on to something better, the Falcon's left a mark people aren't going to forget - even if the rifle's about as forgettable as they come.
|
|
|
|
Post by Insano-Man on Sept 21, 2018 14:02:36 GMT -5
MK. 48 MAW-L LASER CARBINE
Type: Ranged, Energy Weapon
Role: General Service Rifle
Producer: Space Loonies
Service Life: April 18th, 1205 OSC - Present
Action: Laser, Pulsed/Beam
Rate of Fire: 280RPM (Effective)
Range: 270m (Sea Level), 400km (Vacuum)
Heat Capacity: 3 Seconds Sustained Output
Length: 380mm - 750mm
Weight: 2.8kg - 7kg
Equipment:
- Modular Power Controls
- Internal Heatsinks
- Emergency Heat Vents
- Detachable Coolant Packs
- Controlled Meltdown Failsafe System
- Emergency Self-Destruct System
Furniture:
- Pistol Grip
- Modular Stock
- Modular Ironsights
- Detachable Barrel
- Marathon Equipment Rails (Top, Sides, Underslung, Stock)
Mark 48 Modular Assault Weapon, Laser - the gun a spacer never wants to see. The weapon of choice for Space Looney marines and salvagers. Contraband so illegal just about everyone on and off the planet will kill you just for touching it. A laser so dangerous it's standard practice to rig it with a hair-trigger self-destruct module. If a MAWL shows up and you're not wearing the right colors, there's a one-in-three chance your skull's about to enter a gaseous state.
The MAWL is traditionally a carbine-length chemical laser firing pulses at or around ultraviolet. Different fleets usually have their own spin on the standard, but the result's usually the same; a deadly-accurate, deadly-powerful, and just-plain-deadly laser. Most variations include a fun switch like the fire selector on an assault rifle. Push it all the way, the MAWL turns into a sustained beam that'll cut through hull panels. Pull it back, it'll fire femtosecond pulses with enough strength to melt through powered armor like ice cream. Fiddle with the optics and power settings, things can get absurd; wide-angle cones of death, meat-cleaning line-lasers, or anti-tank jolts hot enough to knock out a shuttle.
If there's one thing the MAWL has in spades, it's heat. Just about every component on the weapon is dedicated, in one way or another, to the task of taking on excess thermal energy. Coolant packs like magazines, replaceable barrels like a machine gun, a stock full of heatsinks, and rails built like radiators. MAWLs stack on so much heat that most models are made to break down safely if the weapon's about to explode. Plenty of Space Loonies call it by the nickname "cheese grater" just for all the extra surface space and ventilation.
MAWLs come in all shapes and sizes - sometimes, just on the same ship alone. The truth of the weapon is that the barrels, handguards, and all its longer pieces are fluff; most are put there for heat absorption or extra rail slots. Occasionally, a fleet decides it wants to squeeze those few extra kilometers and adds on to the focusing array, but that's the most of it. A MAWL at its most basic isn't a whole lot bigger than a heavy pistol. It's not all that strange for a single marine to run around with three MAWLs in different configurations for different occasions.
The MAWL got its start back around 1193 OSC. Around that time, the Joint Orbital Defense Council wanted to add in a new standard weapon. The goal was to meet some demands from high orbit and the Scuttler Slice for a proper space gun; something that stop-gas and countermeasures couldn't get in the way of. Ideally, it'd fully replace the older, punchier MSA95 particle cannon - which had the less-than-intimidating title of "MAWPP". They started out by collecting common blueprints from willing fleets. A recurring theme picked up right away. Most fleets favored lasers over particle cannons, which lost a bit of their edge in boarding actions. Straight away, J-CON went for the spacer's classic.
The "Mark 48" in its name is about accurate to how things went. Forty-seven iterations went through as prototypes sent out to participating fleets. Most were sent out at about the same time to get as much feedback as possible. It took somewhere around twelve years for the prototype phase to reach its end, but no one asked twice about the results. Even on in-atmosphere trials, the MAWL blew the MAWPP out of the water in overall performance. When April 18th hit in 1205, just about every fleet involved cycled out their old MAWPPs out for the new model. Schematics hit the MASTER network before the month was out.
The MAWL's held on for around a century of solid performance. Spacers have learned to get nervous when they see one out in the open. Loonies have learned to get angry when they see one on the ground. Space Loonies have lost the new gun smell and recognize it about as well as the old MAWPP - which is still kicking around alongside its zappier cousin. Lately, the MAWL's met strong competition in planetary circles. The MAWPP's picked up a second wind in the XMWS70 particle gun. Alongside it, the slower, heftier MSA452 plasma coilgun is gaining in popularity, especially out in the Chopping Blocks.
|
|
|
|
Post by Insano-Man on Sept 21, 2018 15:05:48 GMT -5
CLONESTON POLICE RIFLE
Type: Ranged, Firearm
Role: General Service Rifle
Producer: Cloneston
Service Life: 900-930 OSC - Present
Action: Gas-Operated Rotating Bolt, Automatic
Rate of Fire: 600 - 800RPM
Velocity: 800 - 1,120m/s
Range: 250m - 500m
Ammunition: 5.7x40mm, 6.5x50mm, 7.5x58mm
Magazine: 30 - 150
Length: 500mm - 1050mm
Weight: 8.9kg - 14.5kg
Furniture:
- Pistol Grip
- Collapsible Stock
- Forward Vertical Grip
- Ironsights
- CCPAMER M451 Equipment Rails (Top, Sides, Underslung)
If there's one thing that outnumbers clones in Cloneston, it's their hardware. Right near the top of the list is the standard rifle for every perp and cop in the city - and it is anything but standardized. Cloneston's cops source their equipment from a few hundred thousand manufacturers. Most come in parts kits that are switched and swapped around to fit the department's needs. Carbines, marksman rifles, machine guns - if there's something the clones think they need, it's usually built on the same platform. Between all the different configurations and suppliers, clone rifles are about as mixed up as garage guns.
The one thing that's consistent about clone hardware is that it's all heavy. An average clone carbine weighs about twice as much as a battle rifle made for human hands. Everything is chunky, reinforced, and overloaded with redundancy, whether it's a grip or a gadget. Even stock-standard magazines are built to survive falls right down to the city's bottom. For clones, it's no big deal; cybernetics and gene mods mean a heavy machine gun's just a feather in their hands. For everyone else, it's close to impossible to keep the gun on-target.
Given how many guns are flying around Cloneston at any given time, it's of no surprise to anyone that police rifles are popular. Most crooks and vigilantes find ways to shave down the weight to something manageable. Mutants and townies out in the wasteland put parts from clone rifles into just about everything. Spacers and wanderers have taken police guns as far out as Grusgau and as high up as the graveyard orbit. Templates and blueprints fly around everywhere, usually cut down to a reasonable weight.
The same applies to clone ammunition. The sheer volume of ammo pressed for Cloneston's police departments is enough to supply the whole planet twice over in just a single week's worth of production. About one of every ten towns out in the rest of Set uses the same casing and bullet design as the city's finest. About a quarter of all firearms up in orbit work with the same cartridge dimensions. Wasters and city-folk never touch anything else. As much as people down in Cloneston might be at odds with Pedro, no one's keen on shutting off the tap.
|
|
|
|
Post by Insano-Man on Nov 6, 2018 0:56:17 GMT -5
CVD-90/7 AUTOMATIC SHOTGUN
Type: Ranged, Firearm
Role: Combat Shotgun
Producer: Carolston Private Security Suppliers
Service Life: July 8th, 1231 OSC - Present
Action: Recoil Operated, Automatic
Rate of Fire: 350RPM
Velocity: 450m/s
Range: 100 - 150m
Ammunition: 15.6x72mmS Coldstone
Magazine: 7 - 16
Length: 520mm - 750mm
Weight: 3.8kg - 4.3kg
Furniture:
- Pistol Grip
- Folding Stock
- Detachable Handguard
- Ironsights
- Rachal Equipment Rails (Top, Side)
The CVD-90/7 is one of the handiest combat shotguns ever to hit high orbit - and one of the only spacer shotguns ever to exist. It's feared as much as a shoulder-destroying monster as it is a brutal terror in close quarters. It's scarce, expensive, and usually found only in well-to-do pirate operations or major mercenary outfits. It's got a reputation for reliability and a wealth of aftermarket potential. It's one of the only shotguns ever to see Space Looney service. It's one of the only shotguns never to go planetside.
The CVD in the shotgun's name stands for "Carolston Vehicle Defender". The shotgun was designed around the idea of being a shuttle guard's surprise wallop. In its standard configuration, it's puny. It's so short and small that it's usually mistaken for a submachine gun up until the 15.6mm bore finds a face to ruin. A minimalist underfolding stock and a handguard only just big enough for a redworlder to pinch help keep it even tinier. At point blank, in the cramped confines of a dock's airlock or a shuttle hangar, the loss in muzzle velocity from its stubby barrel doesn't mean much.
What the CVD has always been fighting against, on the other hand, is spacer nature. Most spacers are bundled up in pressure suits rated for micrometeor impacts. The result is that shotguns up in orbit are thrown against an endless supply of purpose-made soft armor. The CVD's engagement range means the concussive force of the shot is usually enough to incapacitate a target in a softsuit, but penetration is absolutely non-existent. Up against hardsuits, powered armor, or even unionite chassis, all a CVD shooter can do is yell at their pilot to pull out.
At the same time, the stunning power of a shotgun is a popular option for skilled skirmishers looking for live captives. A shot in the chest is enough to empty out the lungs and put a man on his back. A load of buckshot to a typical space helmet is one of the worst headaches a spacer can imagine - and one they'll usually survive. Slavers, pirates, mercenaries, and station guards alike all adore the less-than-lethal aspect of a good shotgun. The form factor, easy-going weight, and once-a-year maintenance schedule all make the CVD their first choice. The lack of dirt-sucking brains involved in its design and manufacture only sweetens the deal.
The CVD's disconnect from the planet below goes even further. For a shotgun, it has one of the strangest ranges on Set. Just like its stopping power, its owners end not far from where it was made. Being scarce and pricey means most spacers don't bring it planetside. Being short and stubby means that planet-dwellers don't want it either way. Up in space, with potluck pressurization and dice-roll gravity, accuracy and muzzle velocity don't suffer quite as much. In cramped corridors and claustrophobic hangars, they don't mean much either. Down on Set, with long sightlines, gravity, and all that air to get in the way, the CVD is nothing but a noisemaker.
In a funny kind of way, the same could be said of its reputation with the Space Loonies. The CVD-90/7 is one of the only combat shotguns ever to see general adoption by a Space Looney flotilla. The Space Loonies in question were the Kazil'Nazodam flotilla, who took on the shotgun around January of 1240 OSC. The CVD entered service as part of an emergency rearmament program, after a supply frigate disappeared in a radiation storm. Along with it went most of the flotilla's small arms and spare parts. They stopped into Lebedrovez, grabbed the first thing they could pick out of Carolston's catalogue, and prayed no one would notice the difference.
What most spacers don't know is that it was never actually used. Initially, the purchase was an accident. It'd been thought that the CVD was, in a mistake to set the tone for its life, a submachine gun. A few dozen arrived just as the flotilla realized the goof. Their first idea was to feed them into their smelters and use the metal to build something better. Somewhere in the middle of the plan, someone decided to change it up. Instead of breaking down the guns, they broke down their internal components instead.
The versatility of the design and a little bit of spacer ingenuity meant the Space Loonies could up the ante. They filled out the empty frames with coilgun parts, loaded their magazines down with pellets and coolant, and put them back to work. No one was the wiser when the flotilla hit up Lebedrovez on a Space Looney get-together in 1241. Around the airlocks leading up to their hangars were marines toting CVDs - so far as anyone knew. Prior, the CVD was a poor earner and a disappointment for Carolston Security. When word got around, fortunes flipped. People in orbit wanted to see what brought the Space Loonies in. The gold rush died off not long after, but demand has kept the CVD around to this day.
|
|
|
|
Post by Insano-Man on Mar 4, 2019 10:19:08 GMT -5
JACKERSUMB 8 MARKSMAN RIFLE
Type: Ranged, Firearm
Role: Marksman Rifle
Producer: Unknown
Service Life: 1264 OSC - Present
Action: Gas-Operated Rotating Bolt, Semiautomatic
Rate of Fire: 936 RPM
Velocity: 600 - 920m/s
Range: 400 - 1,500m
Ammunition: .53 Cambull
Magazine: 12
Length: 1,088mm
Weight: 5.1kg
Furniture:
- Rifle Grip
- Ironsights
- GUPPY Equipment Rails (Top, Underslung)
Every once in a while, an inbred cannibal gets a good idea. The Jackersumb 8 was one of those ideas. Just two hairs removed from being a standardized garage gun, the Jackersumb is one of the best examples of Set's cottage industry for firearms. It's long, it's heavy, and it's just as deadly as a club as it is as a rifle, but all of that plays to its dead-simple design. Slapped together by a junksmith in the sticks, it's a hole-punching powerhouse of a battle rifle. Sculpted by a professional, it's the finger of God inside a kilometer.
What sets the Jackersumb apart from most scrap shooters is the fact that it's been repeated, imitated, and iterated for around half a century. It's earned a solid reputation around the Knobbled Cutters for being a bear stopper and a man slayer. Part of that comes with what the Jackersumb stole itself. Looney-pattern equipment rails are part of the standard schematic for most rifles. The short and ugly .53 Cambull round means ammunition is easy to find and easier to load. The dirt-cheap parts and stupid-simple layout means just about any two-bit gunsmith can stitch one together. The fat furniture and chubby barrel all mean that its lifetime and upkeep are long and smooth.
What no one really knows is where the Jackersumb came from. No one knows who gave it its name, or why most are marked with an 8 as their model number. The rifle's history is all hearsay. Most sources claim it came out of the Forby Munti mountains, inside its home territory in the Knobbled Cutters. Its rise to fame was all just a matter of mercantile inevitability. Enough worked the trade routes in the Cutters around the time of 1264 OSC that demand started going to the region's gunsmiths. By around 1270, production had peaked high enough that just about every stone-shouldered watchman and bandit on the north side had one. Popularity tapered down to present-day levels in 1282, but never once has the Jackersumb gone out of style.
|
|
|
|
Post by Insano-Man on Apr 4, 2019 1:56:51 GMT -5
LAZTORAV A6C MACHINE PISTOL
Type: Ranged, Firearm
Role: Machine Pistol
Producer: Azkanah Ballistics Research Institute (Defunct)
Service Life: 1171 OSC - Present
Action: Simple Blowback, Automatic
Rate of Fire: 1,400 RPM
Velocity: 280m/s
Range: 80m (Sea Level), 400m (Vacuum)
Ammunition: 8.56x15mm Zurav
Magazine: 14
Length: 170mm
Weight: 0.8kg
Equipment:
- Muzzle Brake
Furniture:
- Pistol Grip
- Ironsights
- Qazr Equipment Rails (Underslung)
The definition of cheap; the definition of quality. The Laztorav A6C is one of the most common tools of the trade of hoodlums and muggers up in orbit. It's everywhere from the busted corners of Unity Station to the janitor's half of Lebedrovez. It's tiny, weak, and hard to hang onto if your palm was made to fit a pinky finger. Its ammunition is everywhere - and it's usually more expensive than the gun itself. It's the chief representative of budget guns all over orbit - and it's one of the finest machine pistols ever produced.
Looking at a Laztorav, it's not much. It's a grubby thing full of angles, with a grip made for a redworlder's hand. Inside, it's even less. The slide, the bolt, even the microscopic fire selector - it all has the look of a precision-engineered paperclip. What it all works out to in the end is the exact same thing. The A6C is dead simple, so foolproof it's been fired with every part caked in rust and blood. The cheap parts all come together to make it as easy on the wallet as it is on maintenance. Its tiny 8.56mm round practically shakes out of space trees in the civilized sides of orbit.
That's about where the niceties for the Laztorav end. The pistol will work, and it'll never stop working, but that doesn't mean you're going to like it. Without a revamp on its frame, an A6C is nigh impossible to hold straight in a human hand. Its magazine is short, its rate of fire is obscene, and the recoil from such a tiny thing going full auto means you're more likely to shoot yourself than your target. Even switched to semiautomatic, the 8.56mm round is ready to remind you of its price tag. Ballistic performance is non-existent. Down in the tug of gravity on Set's surface, with the atmosphere in the way, its effective range is about on par with spit.
What not many people will cop to these days is that the Laztorav, as dinky as it is, is still one of the best pocket pistols ever produced. It came into conceptuality around 1159 OSC, the brainchild of Sarut'Laztorav nes'ara Erebus Sprint. Only twenty-seven years prior, the Garbage Crisis had thrown the local markets around the high-orbiting Erebus Sprint into chaos. Hauler-spurred turmoil was still ongoing. Arms suppliers were cutting their losses, thugs and pirates were running wild, and harvester drones were making a mess of everything else. It was a prime opening for something simple - a crew defense weapon. Something cheap, easy, and quick to manufacture. Something spacers could trust and operate with a minimum of fuss.
What didn't go quite so right was the fact that Sarut was employed with the Azkanah Ballistics Research Institute. The ABRI had a paradoxical flair for overengineering and oversimplification, so something as small as a submachine gun couldn't just happen. Instead, it took no less than ten years for the design to clear its prototype phase. It went through every test and debate imaginable. What was worst about it all was that it was something like a discussion platform for the ABRI. It was the design people went to when they wanted to argue for an experimental feature - or even about nothing at all. It was as much a point of gunsmithing philosophy as it was a commercial project.
That didn't stop it from going through Hell on the printing table. It went through so many changes that at least ten of its test builds spun off into entirely new designs - and each finished before the Laztorav. It went from submachine gun to handgun halfway through. It had its caliber changed sixteen different times in one week alone. It was switched to a machine pistol at some point as an experiment to see if the insane recoil would actually keep crooks in check when it went to markets.
The end result was a weapon that had seen so many trials, so many attempts at perfection, that it was hard to find something wrong with it. It was hard to find what was left of it, but what was still there worked flawlessly. It hit shelves and dealers in 1171 - too long for it to make an impact on the post-Garbage Crisis chaos, but close enough that people still needed firepower. It took a couple of years before spacers could get over the stubby caliber, but, when it found its place, it held onto it. It was cheap, it was plenty, and it had the stamp of a trusted name right on its slide. With its reputation for reliability, it's managed to stick around ever since.
|
|
|
|
Post by Insano-Man on Jun 11, 2022 4:49:16 GMT -5
TUNDRA SUPLEXType: Ranged, Firearm Role: UnclearProducer: UnknownService Life: Unknown - Present Action: Gas-Operated Rotating Bolt, Automatic Rate of Fire: 483 - 630 RPM Velocity: 400 - 620m/s Range: 200 - 600m Ammunition: .301 Perning Blister Magazine: 50 Length: 1,232mm Weight: 9kg Furniture:- Underfolder Stock - Pistol Grip - Forward Grip - Ironsights - Detachable Air-Cooling Jacket The Tundra Suplex was one of those stupid ideas that nobody can figure out. It's one of those bad jokes like the Flescher IV - even if it's not nearly as wretched or beloved. Built somewhere, by somebody, for some reason, the Tundra Suplex has a long history of being silly and wrong. Of course, with stiff competition like spears, sharp rocks, and grenades disguised as submachine guns, it's not so terrible as to be a sensation. Once you've figured out how to get past the name, the Tundra Suplex invites you to figure out just what the Hell its inventor was thinking. Starting off, it looks like a rustic machine gun; it's got a big, boxy receiver that's about two thirds of the rifle's total length - and about ten pounds overweight. It's got a perforated jacket around the barrel for air cooling, that can be unscrewed and replaced - which would be real handy, if the barrel came out with it. Its default configuration includes a goofy, overengineered steel magazine that cuts an angle left for no apparent reason. Its ejection port is too long. Its ironsights are too tall. Its floating forward grip looks like it's about to snap off at the slightest provocation. When you've finally figured out just how the thing is meant to be held, you're still in for a ride. Most are made automatic - without even a safety lever to pump the brakes - but only with a certain quirk. Whatever technical documentation on the Tundra Suplex that must get around includes a specific manufacturing defect; its rate of fire jumps wildly by nearly 150 RPM depending on how hot it is. The higher the sun is and the longer you've been firing it, the more it'll jump around. The gun soaks up its own heat about as good as the machine gun it wants to be, but that doesn't count for much on a sunny summer day. What's worse is that it couldn't be a real machine gun even if it tried. Its standard chambering of .301 Perning Blister means it's only a few blinks away from being a morbidly-obese submachine gun. The total barrel length of the weapon is good enough for the round, but the round isn't good enough to measure up to the needs of anything further out than urban warfare or jungle fighting. Between the bone-crunching weight, the light cartridge, and the forward grip, the recoil is about non-existent, but that's all playing catch-up with the fact that its accuracy is about the same. No one's exactly sure when the Tundra Suplex came around. No one's exactly sure why. It started getting popular in 1060 OSC around the eastern seaboard of Ventannen, but big bricks bearing its likeness had been spotted for nearly two centuries before then. In 1060, it was loosely known as the Tundra Duplex, or sometimes the Pattersonn Model 120 - but nobody knows if Pattersonn invented the weapon, or only iterated on it. It took about a century for the Duplex to evolve into the Suplex - even if why was a detail conveniently lost to time - but, by 1171, the gun was here to stay. It'd spread across Ventannen, into the Knobbled Cutters, and even took a trip up to Scuttler pirates in orbit. There was a time in the mid-1200s where it'd gone sparse, and nearly even extinct, but, by 1291, it'd come back in force. Nowadays, it's mostly back to its old homeland in eastern Ventannen, and occasionally seen around the Chopping Blocks. As a small mercy to sanity, most owners of the Tundra Suplex know exactly what it is. They might be the same breed who worship the Flescher, but most townies and travellers clamp it to trucks and wagons as a convoy defense weapon. People improvise extended magazines to work it out as something like an economy machine gun. They call up gunsmiths to up the chambering to a real rifle round, and fix the sloppy action. It's that kind of realist that's kept the Suplex alive. As goofy as it is, it found a niche. Nobody's sure if it's the one its designer intended - and most reckon it isn't - but the Tundra Suplex has been keeping caravaners alive ever since it bumbled onto the scene.
|
|
