General > Discussion
Machine gun / Autocannon Discussion
DanielOR:
Doc J - or move them off a sniping position... I was thinking, if you can't kill a sniper, at least shove them off the roof, giving troups time to close in...
Sirg - alien without a brain was a joke, really. But they may very well have no single vulunrable brain. Place it in the chest cavity and it becomes much more resiliant. if Ortnoks are bread for war, that is not an unexpected solution.
* WARNING! Science stuff according to Dan *
Effects of impact...
Projectile (say, .50 cal bullet): It can either go thourgh a target, making a hole (think NATO .223 round on belly) but retaining a lot of it's energy or be stopped, not make a hole, but then you have an inelastic collision, i.e. almost all momentum and energy is transfered to the target (think .357 magnum or a .45 - stopping power, baby!). If alien armor protects the alien, we are in case B, no hole, momentum absorbed. Now, if alien was a solid chunk of diamond, straight conservation of momentum: m_bullet * v_bullet = M_target * V_target. If target is 10 times heavier than the bullet, it will acquire the velocity 1/10th that of a bullet, in same direction.
If the armor does not absorb the bullet but only behaves like a super-hard shell, that is what we are dealing with. Alien flies back. Now, soft alien tissue must be in contact with the armor. Which means that a shockwave will propagate from point of impat on in. This is what happens these days with a human wearing armor - huge bruises, broken ribs, in extreme cases - ruptured organs, even if there is no hole. The armor destributes the imact. Instead of a piercing needle, the hit is like with a sledgehammer or a cement bag. The alien armor may try to do a few things at once - "eat" some of the transfered energy by having a plate the shatters - thus taking some of the energy. May also have a gel-like layer, which absorbs momentum and the shockwave gets redirected throughout the armor itself, not the tissue. So, the "hard shell - shatter plate - soft absorbing lining - hard shell" design might help to reduce both the point impact and tissue damage. but still - momentum is conserved. Even if the organs are not liquified, significant enough momentum will shove the alien back.
Explotion: the flying pieces, for the most part, behave as bullets and we need not look at them. The shockwave, however, is a different story. In a nuke, btw, it is the shockwave, not the heat nor radiation that do the most immediate damage. It is the good old compressed air. The shockwave, in short, is the area of very high pressure traveling fast away from the center. The farther from center, the weaker the wave (falls as 1 / distance^3). This one need not be destributed by the armor - it affects every surface that the wavefront touches. It just transfers momentum, a solid wall of air. That feels like a cocrete wall. Again, the super-duper armor may keep the organs from liquifying, but being tosseed about is prety much mandatory.
TrashMan:
--- Quote from: Sophisanmus on July 01, 2008, 08:11:18 pm ---So durable enemies that take teamwork to dispatch are arcade-y. And running around blowing everyone else up with a rocket launcher isn't.
--- End quote ---
No, it isn't. Because a rocket launcher isn't a anti-personal weapon in the first place. It's a anti-armor weapon.
Basicely, like using a tank cannon to hunt deers.
Anything human-sized and organic, regardless of the armor, should be killed or GRUESOMELY injured if it gets a direct hit with a rocket launcher. Alien veichles, now, for them it would make sense to be able to withstand far more punishment.
Sophisanmus:
I think the crux of this is the "regardless of the armor" argument. Their armor is their protection, and one of the key reasons they are nearly unmatched by human forces. Light alien armor is, well, light, but their heavy suits likely approach the modern tank in durability value. This durability extends to the wearer, if it did not, then the aliens would not pose the threat they do. Hell, the fact that PHALANX has to research the armor to even figure out how it works belies that the armor is extremely advanced and effective. Their armor is exactly why an 5-alien landing party is a threat to national security. Well, that and weapons that outclass human heavy weapons. Though considering that their armor is designed to protect from those far-advanced weapons, a basic concussive explosion is not going to rend their heavy gunners in two.
Surrealistik:
Completely agree that the rocket launcher should do substantially more damage. I've set the damage value to 300 in my game personally.
Further, an instantly (or close to it) lethal rocket launcher would not defeat the fundamental concept of arms advancement and alien superiority, because it hosts a number of very serious disadvantages; the launcher requires both hands to hold and fire, it's a sizable weapon with huge units of ammunition that yield one shot each, and it requires reloading after each use.
Glaucus:
--- Quote from: Winter on February 04, 2008, 12:13:13 am ---Because the laws of physics say there is no possible way an autocannon/minigun will ever be an effective infantry weapon, unlike a good reliable machine gun.
Regards,
Winter
--- End quote ---
This is a silly argument given the number of things already in the game or that will be implemented in the game that defy the laws of physics... Faster than light travel and psychic powers to name 2.
In my opinion the decision to include or exclude something, like weapon ideas, should not be based on real world physics. The decision should be based on game play, such as "does the idea add something interesting to game play?". In this case, I don't think that the autocannon adds anything new or interesting to game play. In fact, I think that there are already too many weapon choices.
Why not tweak the machine gun stats instead of replacing it with the autocannon?
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