Energy Weapons VS Ballistic Weapons

[Ralts Bloodthorne]

A common fallacy I see in many sci-fi games is the thought that beam weapons would eventually replace ballistic weapons completely. To me, this is completely ludicrious.

For one thing, right off the top of my head, you have atmospheric attenuation. That's not even counting such things as a high dust level, exotic atmospheres that may contain high refractory elements suspended in the gas, overabundance of oppositely charged materials in the ground or air, and many other factors that can affect beam weapons.

That's without even getting into the power pack. Sure, a fusion pack can supply nearly endless power, but look at the weight. Even if we say it's a cold fusion reactor or graviton reactor that only weights 5 lbs, you have interconnecting cables, aimed shots, etc.

Still, ballistic weapons also are affected by some of this, but let's continue.

Armor against energy weapons would not have to be overly weighty. A reflective suit can bounce light based weapons, superconductor material can be used to channel energy weapons into the suits power pack or onboard capicators (sure, you'd have to immediately discharge the energy, but there are plenty of ways to do this), not to mention energy shielding.

Hey, a laser could be bounced by a prism grenade.

Energy weapons would have little to know knockback, either, or impact shock.

Ballistic weapons, on the other hand, can also be configured for mission specific munitions, in addition to blowing through thin energy weapon configured armor. Weapon magazines could and probably would contain supercapacitors for emergency weapon operation (the ability to use scopes and other gadgets wouldn't work) as well as being quickly and easily handed back and forth between troops.

There are many other reasons that ballistic weapons will still be used, as even inertial dampeners won't have a full effect when you start adding in weapons that accellerate the projectiles to nearly C.

So, what do you think, should ballistic based weaponry still be included for PL 6 and higher, for vehicles, hand held weapons, and starships?

 

[Falkus]

But you're forgetting the potential versitality of hand weapons. Take phaser pistols on Star Trek. On the low settings, they can be used as highly effective non-lethal weapons, to create heat or cook food in emergancy situations, on the higher settings, they can easily disentegrate even an armored target, and be used as a cutting torch, and even overloaded and used as an impromptu hand grenade or explosive. That's a lot of utility out of a single device.

 

[C. Baize]

Absolutely.
Just because lasers exist doesn't negate the usefulness of explosives and chunks of various types of metals hurled at great velocity...

 

[Ralts Bloodthorne]

But you're forgetting the potential versitality of hand weapons. Take phaser pistols on Star Trek. On the low settings, they can be used as highly effective non-lethal weapons, to create heat or cook food in emergancy situations, on the higher settings, they can easily disentegrate even an armored target, and be used as a cutting torch, and even overloaded and used as an impromptu hand grenade or explosive. That's a lot of utility out of a single device.

And, according to the shows I remember, if I recall correctly, there were plenty of times they didn't work due to magnetic interference, and ion storm, or Spock's panties were in a wad.

Plus, IIRC, the phaser had a craptacular range (something like 50 feet) in the original show, was extremely limited in shots for the battlefield version.

I'm not saying that ballistic weapons are superior, they are radically different things, as different as knives are from clubs.

To say that the energy weapon would completely replace the projectile weapon is rediculous.

 

[Captain Tagon]

Energy weapons would have little to know knockback, either, or impact shock.

What modern ballistic weapons have any real knockback anyway?

 

[Captain Tagon]

And hey, just look at one of my favortie sci-fi settings, the Halo universe. Definately still using ballistic weapons there.

 

[Ralts Bloodthorne]

What modern ballistic weapons have any real knockback anyway?

Ummm, think for a second.

Fifty Caliber GPHMG will knock a target ass over teakettle for a ways.

An AK-47 or M-16 (series) will knock someone down.

Even a pistol round can throw someone down.

By knockback, I mean: Target gets hit, the kinetic energy knocks them backwards or down.

 

[Rhun]

So, what do you think, should ballistic based weaponry still be included for PL 6 and higher, for vehicles, hand held weapons, and starships?

Absolutely. Ballistic weapons are still heavily used in my PL 6+ games. They definitely have some advantages over energy weapons.

 

[Wolv0rine]

I think it depends on the usage instance. To take just one instance, ship-to-ship combat. To start off with, one has to establish whether or not the PL has established shields. If so, what is the nature of the shields? If we look again to Star Trek, for example, those shields are established to be pretty much inpenetrable to ballistic weapons, requiring energy weapons to punch through them (and even then, it often takes many shots).
I don't know, ballistic weapons will likely always have a place. Someone's likely to use them. Even if Planet A abandons them, they should keep in mind that Planet B may not have. In which case, when going to Planet B (or into it's territory) people from Planet A should have protection from such weapons.
So, even if You stop using them for some reason, I'd think you'd keep at least defenses against them in the event of meeting a lower PL race, or a race that never abandoned their use.

 

[Armistice]

See Battlestar Galactica (new series on SciFi) for an illustration of this point. Also, small note on ballistic impact, despite the common appearance of "knockback" in movies, no such thing actually occurs in RL. For proof debunking this common myth see Mythbusters:

Episode 25: Brown Note
Ever the chance-taker, Adam puts his body to the test for science. Will he be able to withstand subsonic frequencies, or will adult diapers be his only hope with the Brown Note? Next, he and Jamie put legendary Hollywood gunfights to the test. Finally, we'll see whether a constant drip of water falling on your (or in this case, Kari's) head really can be unbearable torture.

They pretty much conclusively debunk the "knockback" effect.