Realistic wanked out swords/close range weapons in sci-fi.

[Zixinus]

Swords are illogical in modern warfare, if not completely useless. A regular gun-powdered firearm is superior in almost any situation, not to mention lasers, particle cannons and the like.

But goddamn it, aren't they cool?

And because of that, we often see various works where close-range weapons find their way on the modern battlefield.

Lightsabers anyone?

But not just Lightsabers, but combat staffs, the knives of the Freman of Dune, space axes from good old Lensmen, force lances in Andromeda, etc.

It is of course unreasonable to assume that military soldiers will have these weapons in the future. But it is not only soldiers that fight, and there are situations where firearms are just not available.

Criminals that have to keep a low profile, for example, might have a surprise in their pocket for the unwary.

Also, surprisingly Space Marines may require a weapon when it comes to assault on a space station in an age where regular guns would cause more harm then good (well, more then usual).

So, I open this tread for everyone to omit their ideas regarding close-range weaponry. The uselessness of close-range weaponry in the age of guns is obvious, but lets keep this fun.

Advised criterion:
- Describe a weapon you think that imagine to actually work, not something you wanked out to oblivion.
- Reasonable level of scientific accuracy (no "made out of neutronium"). Although we can go unrealistic.
- No mystical forcefields.
- Has to have SOME practical value, even if its only ceremonial.
- The weapon does not necessarily have to be in far-future.

Here is a non-sci-fi example, one of my homeland's peasent culture.

It's called "fokos" (which essentially translates to "degree-er").
It is a long, straight stick, usually as long as a cane and its end ends in a small axe-like head with a blade on one side and the other ending either in a spike or hammer.
Simple but it can be an effective close-range weapon in skilled hands.
Here comes the trickery: the head could easily be removed and hidden.

The weapon was used since Hungarians were nomads to the 19th century, by both civilians and military.
Peasants often had walking sticks with a degree-er head hidden in their coat, and whenever trouble arise, they took it out and slapped it on the walking stick.

I'll post some on my own ideas tomorrow.

[NecronLord]

If I recall correctly, EE-Smith had some fairly workable explanation for boarding-axes.

[Zixinus]

Oh, and here is an entry on the degree-er. It's in Hungarian.
http://mek.oszk.hu/02100/02115/html/2-384.html

I've provided this as an example of a weapon that is creative in idea and could be somewhat-adopted to sci-fi.

[Drooling Iguana]

Well, if your regular, long-range weapon uses some sort of high-yield explosive round you might need a short-range backup weapon for if the enemy gets close enough that you'd get caught in the blast yourself if you used the long-range gun.

Of course, lightsabres make a reasonable amount of sense for someone who can see into the future to know where a projectile is going to hit before it's fired.

The whole shield/lasgun thing from Dune was idiotic from the start (even ignoring the mockery of physics involved in having a blast travel backwards along a beam of light, why not just use a projectile that fires a laser as it nears the target and use the shield effect to your advantage?) but it did fit in well with the general tone of the novel. (I shudder to think about how bad the BH/KJA books must be if they're considered to be even worse than the original.)

For the most part, though, there really aren't any good reasons to bring a sword to a gunfight.

[Teleros]

But the minions of the Law had one remaining weapon, carried expressly for this eventuality. The space-axe - a combination and sublimation of battle-axe, mace, bludgeon, and lumberman's picaroon, a massively needle-pointed implement of potentialities limited only by the physical strength and bodily agility of its wielder.
...
When the space-tempered apex of that thirty-pound monstrosity...

Basically it was developed because the personal shields of the time could resist the energy-based hand weapons for several minutes at full blast. Grenades & machine guns etc were also quite effective, as the shrapnel / bullets tended to be of too low velocity to set off the shields, but for boarding work they can be a bit messy .

[Ford Prefect]

- Has to have SOME practical value, even if its only ceremonial.

A knife for silence.

[PREDATOR490]

... force lances in Andromeda, etc.

The force lance in Andromeda was actually a practical weapon given it was turned into the equivelent of a do all weapon.

Force Lance

1) 'Smart Bullets'

Capable of intercepting incoming projectiles, morters and homing on targets. (Season 2)

2) Plasma bursts (Season 2)

3) Self Destruct ( Season 1 - 2)

4) Security feature that zapped anyone who touched it besides the owner. (Season 1 - 5)

5) Power transfer feature ( Season 5)

6) Could extend to become a staff with the gun features still enabled. (Season 1 - 2)

The power of a Force Lance was something like 30,000 volts IF I recall correctly. They got overrun by zombies and they only got taken out by 10,000 volts of energy. Each Force Lance could only shoot 3 times at a level equal to that amount.
Andromeda was fairly bad story wise but I found the Force Lance a rather interesting item and it allowed the introduction of a melee weapon that could serve as a gun. I wouldnt classify it as unreasonable in that universe.

[Sidewinder]

Most practical CQC weapon I can think of is a bayonet. Mount it on a rifle, hell, even a pistol, and it'll be practical as a last-resort weapon.

This also makes me wonder... what happens if a Force user decided to attach a lightsaber to a blaster, like a bayonet? Would such a combination be practical in 'Star Wars'?

[Teleros]

I'm not sure - a bayonet I'd've thought benefits from having the mass of the rifle / whatever behind it, but I can just see it making a lightsabre more awkward to use effectively.

That Force Lance thing sounds like some sort of sci-fi Swiss army knife however - now there's a way you could get some sort of melee weapon into a sci-fi setting .

[Peptuck]

Well, with Warhammer 40k, you've got reasons for thm to carry melee weapons; some enemies wear armor that can eat nearly anything a man-portable ranged weapon can put out and many of these enemies enjoy closing to hand-to-hand range. In other cases, there are effects that can only be generated by melee weapons - e.g. force weapons - that are particularly effective against those same enemies who like to get in close.

In other cases you often simply have opponents who, for whatever reason, prefer fighting at close range, and you need to carry a weapon suited for close-range combat when they do get in close, e.g. Orks or Khornate berserkers.

[Jaevric]

Most practical CQC weapon I can think of is a bayonet. Mount it on a rifle, hell, even a pistol, and it'll be practical as a last-resort weapon.

This also makes me wonder... what happens if a Force user decided to attach a lightsaber to a blaster, like a bayonet? Would such a combination be practical in 'Star Wars'?

I see two problems off the top of my head with a Jedi using a "lightsaber bayonet." Depending on the design of the "bayonet."

If we're talking a regular-length lightsaber hooked to the end of a blaster rifle, the issue becomes one of being extremely cumbersome, particularly in close quarters. Further, parrying blaster bolts will be more difficult because the energy blade will be further away from the centerline of the Jedi's body and will require the Jedi to manuever the extra length of the blaster rifle in order to parry.

A "bayonet length" lightsaber would also be awkward for parrying blaster bolts due to the much, much shorter length; though a weapon of that type would actually be quite effective as a bayonet for people who don't have precognition and can't parry blaster bolts anyway.

[Peptuck]

Most practical CQC weapon I can think of is a bayonet. Mount it on a rifle, hell, even a pistol, and it'll be practical as a last-resort weapon.

This also makes me wonder... what happens if a Force user decided to attach a lightsaber to a blaster, like a bayonet? Would such a combination be practical in 'Star Wars'?

I see two problems off the top of my head with a Jedi using a "lightsaber bayonet." Depending on the design of the "bayonet."

If we're talking a regular-length lightsaber hooked to the end of a blaster rifle, the issue becomes one of being extremely cumbersome, particularly in close quarters. Further, parrying blaster bolts will be more difficult because the energy blade will be further away from the centerline of the Jedi's body and will require the Jedi to manuever the extra length of the blaster rifle in order to parry.

A "bayonet length" lightsaber would also be awkward for parrying blaster bolts due to the much, much shorter length; though a weapon of that type would actually be quite effective as a bayonet for people who don't have precognition and can't parry blaster bolts anyway.

I'd assume that the lightsaber wouldn't be turned on when using it like a blaster.

If it was attached to something like the standard issue blaster rifles that stormtroopers carry, which are quite small for their size, it could be more effective....though it would probably be better to design a completely new weapon, from the ground up, to accomodate both a blaster and a mounted lightsaber bayonet.

Then again, there's not much use you could really get out of that combination of a weapon when it would be just as easy to carry a seperate blaster rifle and lightsaber - with the added benefit that the blaster rifle could have an underslung grenade launcher instead of a lightsaber attachment, making it even more useful.

[Peptuck]

Ghetto edit: If it was attached to something like the standard issue blaster rifles that stormtroopers carry, which are quite small for their power....

[Covenant]

Criterion:

- Describe a weapon you think that imagine to actually work, not something you wanked out to oblivion.

Forcefield Pike:

A long emitter set into a two-handed spear-like mount with a thumb control near the rear handhold. The weapon connects to a large powerpack like the Ghostbusters! Let's make it wanky and nostalgic.

Two Settings:

1) Shield Mode: Creates a large curved bubble-shield at the head of the pike, and perhaps a bit in front of it, with the emitter array 'vents' along the length of it tilted out to about 45 degrees off the angle of the pike. Someone with a pike can block a corridor with the forcefield, or stick the thing into the ground and bury the power supply next to it to create a small shielded canopy to fire from.

Shield Pike wearers could also advance in front of a friendly group to keep small arms fire from penetrating--and hell--let's let them augment nearby pikes so that several ranks of pikemen could make a hefty shield if they're all turned on. Basical personal shield emitter, except on a stick. Maybe they give off nasty radation. Give the Pikeman a gasmask looking thing for super badass effect.

It's two handed because there's a transfer of momentum between the sheild, pike, and soldier. So you need to be able to brace yourself when people start firing into your pike, or charge into it.

2) Stabby Mode: The thumb control on the pike controls the aperature of the shield emitters. The wider, the weaker the effect, so generally you quench the aperature down as far as you can, for example, to open it only wide enough to cover a corridor side-to-side or floor-to-ceiling.

However, you can quench it down completely and throttle up the power, creating a nearly directly forwards wedge of force. Stabbing into someone else's personal shield will penetrate it and possibly rip the generator right off (if they were charging into you, for example) and it would slash right through average matter as if it were a blade. It still needs a great deal of force to penetrate things, but a force wedge could concievably do a lot of thermal damage, like we saw a lightsaber do.

So you could charge a foe with your pike in shield mode, causing shit to plink off you, then quench it down (like putting your thumb over a hose) and then jam it into someone. I called this a Pike though, so in general you'd want to brace it and yourself and use the thing defensively to rip into oncoming attackers--and depending on how the shield physics works, it could be theoretically possible for a small point of 'high pressure' forcefielding to cut into an 'all over' shield bubble of a tank, letting you rip up the guts of a piece of machinery with your pike.

- Reasonable level of scientific accuracy (no "made out of neutronium"). Although we can go unrealistic.

You'd need to carry a heavy battery of some sort to give the thing enough life to do much with it, but I don't see why it would be improbable, even if it is impractical. A personal shield is not all that unprecedented in Sci-Fi settings--and sticking your personal sheild one-way on the end of a stick shouldn't be all that hard, and the one-way and variable coverage aspect of it should let you put more of the energy spent maintaining the sheild into the parts of the shield that matter the most.

- No mystical forcefields.

No mysticism here, we got good ol' electromagnetism to do this job. We can even demonstrate the idea of conservation of momentum in a shield, which is something we rarely see, but do talk about. If the forcefield is being pushed from the emitter, banging on the shield should also bang on the emitter. So it should be possibe--if the emitter isn't securely enough bolted into the ship/tank or onto an infantryman's belt, to knock it right off with a solid enough hit. The pike gives you an advantage.

If you nea no forcefields or shielding of any type then you've basically screwed a lot more of the sci-fi conventions than just wanked out melee weapons, so I'm assuming you just mean no unrealistic magic 'force emitters'.

[Lord of the Abyss]

The Paratwa in the Paratwa Trilogy used something called a Cohe wand, which was basically a lightsaber whip ( and they had guns as well ). They also had force fields that protected against most weapons front-and back, but were open to the sides. So for them, a weapon that could go around corners made sense; they could kill with the "whip" while keeping the near-impenetrable field between them and the target.

[Ender]

In Glasshouse they have Voporal swords that can cut anything. The society can generate wormholes of varying size pretty much on a whim, using them for travel - scan body (destroying you in the process), open wormhole, transmit scan information through, nanites build body on other side. Continuity of conciousness so you feel like you just stepped through a door to be there.

Thing is, the adapted it somewhat, and took metal bars, and lined them with microwormhole generators. So instead of a blade, you have a series of wormholes. So whatever you hit with it gets shunted off into deeps spae as the sword moves along that vector.

[Zixinus]

I have found an interesting site regarding lightsabers btw: http://web.archive.org/web/200008171924 ... abres4.htm

If you nea no forcefields or shielding of any type then you've basically screwed a lot more of the sci-fi conventions than just wanked out melee weapons, so I'm assuming you just mean no unrealistic magic 'force emitters'.

Pretty much yeah, specially I mean nothing like what would you have in Star Wars. Otherwise we will have lightflails and lightwips before you can sing your country's hymn.

Don't let my criterion stop you at discussing ideas, they are only advise.

For example, your idea regarding force-pikes is very, very cool. It is plausible, has pragmatical reasoning yet has great potential for great moments.

Tele-staff

Description: A telescopic staff with weighted tips, usually made out of lightened steel or specially carbon-bases composites that can be modifiable to specific purpose on-hand, although it is usually used to ease or augment zero-g or low-g movement. Most tele-staffs have either mechanical or electromagnetic springs. There are many dimensions in regards of workmanship, like whether both ends or only one end is sprung, the material type, given accessories and so on. High-quality tele-staffs usually have sentimental value, sometimes passed on in hereditary form. It is usually about 20-30 centimetres long.

Use: Practically, the tele-staff is like a Swiss Army knife (of which Spacer variants are plentiful of) for bigger objects and objectives. Normally it is used to augment movement in zero-g or low-g environments, as well as to be able to poke things farther away. It's function as a weapon is not to be ignored, as it can be used both as a staff and a baton, not to mention that different heads can be attached, making it a good spear or axe or tazer-pod at choice. But things like saws and grasping claws can also be fitted on.
It should be noted that it is also used as a tool, especially in rural areas, due to its usefulness in the wilderness and low-tech environment and ability to fend off most types of animals. It is also the favoured weapon of many police forces, due to its light weight and adaptability, and great potential to at non-lethal neutralization.

History: The exact history of this weapon is unknown, although it definitely appeared out of Spacer circles. There are many legends of its origin, from crippled grandpa needing another leg, trough directors needing a fancy weapon to records of Karon himself experimenting with something that has been described as a tele-staff. It is reasonable to assume that someone initially experimented with the idea in some sort of fiction and it fancied many craftsman's imagination and free time.
None the less, it is a very widespread tool and weapon.

[Covenant]

The real issue with a melee weapon is that unless it does something besides just stab people, a gun is better, because a gun will be lighter and do the job from longer range without the degree of skill it takes to wield the weapon.

In that sense, a melee weapon for military use needs to be worth what it weighs to carry it (and worth more than it's weight in ammo, sidearm, etc) and a civilian/criminal melee weapon needs to fill some niche that a legal or illegal sidearm couldn't. You could, essentially, make a Space UK where guns are illegal but vibrodaggers are common for self defense, but that's basically a contrived setup. Totally plausible, but you could turn that same situation into "guns and knives are illegal, but everyone is required by law to carry Pokemon for self defense" or whatever else you want to write about.

Another problem is weight. Stronger materials generally weigh more, so some kind of carbon-fiber weave weapon becomes very hevy very fast, and basically ruins it's usefulness again. And a weak melee weapon is just gonna shatter.

If you pull the setting back some, to more of a Dystopian Future thing, you could come up with some clever riot-control weapons. Ever heard of an Impact Baton?

They work by having a flowing material inside of a hollow shaft, and when you swing the thing, the material flows via centripedal force to the end of the shaft--the head--and adds a lot of extra whump to your strike. If you made an Impact Axe or Impact Sword or Impact Hammer you could easily create a weapon that would allow you to cut right through a person (or flatten their skull) with much less force than you may expect.

Another way to justify this sort of thing is to go the cattle-prod route. If your melee weapon is carrying 500 amps of utterly deadly zap-force, then even nicking a target with it could cause some serious fireworks. At which point you may wonder why they just don't have one of those tazer weapons to do it at a range instead of hand-held, but that's more easily explained--reusability.

The last 'mundane' weapon example is a very old idea. In zero-G you could definately get a lot of use out a few extra tools--like an extendable hook to latch onto things and make spacewalks or regular travel safer, to help propel you around, to let you have a counter-weight in your hands to change direction mid-flight. A good man-height staff would be able to carry a lot of useful things and your Spacewalking Stick could be the sort of thing that every zero-G worker learns to use like he was born with it.

In such a circumstance, attempting to harass someone in a zero-G environment, who has a rapidly-telescoping staff with a hook on the end and possibly a few other gizmos becomes a lot more worrisome. One good whack from the thing could send someone spiralling off into space. It would be an extremely limited and 'non-military' weapon, but some variety of "Spacers" could learn to use their Spacewalking Sticks as potent defensive weapons. And if you say "They're in a mining penal colony! Life is cheap!" or something, you could say the sticks are also used to help lasso errant rocks from asteroid-breakup operations or something, and are immensely strong and capable of latching onto stuff. You basically get wire-fu staff/spear fights without the wires, because it's zero-G, and so long as you say there are no guns around you can justify the use of the staff as a weapon.

[Zixinus]

The last 'mundane' weapon example is a very old idea.

Where was it thought of before?

In zero-G you could definately get a lot of use out a few extra tools--like an extendable hook to latch onto things and make spacewalks or regular travel safer, to help propel you around, to let you have a counter-weight in your hands to change direction mid-flight.

Spacers, as the name suggests, are space-faring people that are born, grown up in outer space, typically on spaceships or space stations, if not lunar colonies.

A good man-height staff would be able to carry a lot of useful things and your Spacewalking Stick could be the sort of thing that every zero-G worker learns to use like he was born with it

Which explains why it was a Spacer developed weapon.

Which is exactly why I thought of it. A great deal of typical Spacer weapons are modified tools or equipment.
For example, military-grade hyper-capacitators have an energy density so high, that they can explode under impact. When there is no grenade nearby, they can pull the "hypecap" out of their weapon, put it in a special case (if we are talking improvised on-board, sometimes the hypercaps have this function built-in), time it and throw.

Another example, is that the "modern" weapon-grade lasers did not came from military research, but when the laser in question was used for mobile lunar and asteroid mining and drilling, as normal drills often had to be braced to work at all. When Slet war-robots came and attacked an underground mining station, they met surprising resistance from the humans who realised that they their drilling equipment for which they spent weeks learning the appropriate safety protocols, can penetrate the war-robots armour about just as well as though lunar soil, as a laser penetrates by phasing, that is emitting light in waves. The miners merely had to dial the frequency of the waves (http://panoptesv.com/SciFi/Blaster.html). Since then, all lasers have this function, and can still be used as a drill. Useful on a boarding party when you left your lock-picks (or hacking tools) at home.

There are very few items that are specially meant to be a weapon alone, and these are typically possessed by Warriors, who (most often) function as military and police officers at the same time. For this reason, vacuum-grade weapons are often not available to civilians. This have variations depending on which clan/tribe/lineage/nation/whatever we are talking about, as some Spacers are harassed more then otherwise. In this case, they often wear weapons, which includes various tele-staff heads, like impact-axes.

Spacer engineering is typically this type: simple, modifiable, universal and highly reliable and durable, often improvised from scavenged equipment.
For this reason, trying to board a Spacer ship, even a civilian one, is a difficult task.

BTW, thanks for telling me about impact batons, the idea is very cool.

[Covenant]

I don't remember where the idea of the pole was from, but I remember that people used them to get around in some wicked-old sci-fi book. I added the idea of hooks and gizmos and was inspired by those long 'hook spears' from the logging industry--the ones they use to snag and drag logs as they come downstream--but the original idea is not mine. It may be mine enough for me, or you, to use in a story but I won't claim it.

[NetKnight]

I don't remember where the idea of the pole was from, but I remember that people used them to get around in some wicked-old sci-fi book.

Arthur C. Clarke's 2010? Actually, I recall the "broomstick', as he called it, being discribed in an earlier story, but either way, I think he originated the idea, albeit as a pure tool.

[Zixinus]

I recall that the broomstick was a miniaturized rocket.

[PREDATOR490]

That Force Lance thing sounds like some sort of sci-fi Swiss army knife however - now there's a way you could get some sort of melee weapon into a sci-fi setting .

Managed to find a piece of info on the Force Lance with an accompying pic for reference.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weapons_of_Andromeda


I forgot about the grappling hook feature which is yet another thing it can do. I'm not sure if it really is 2 meters long though. I always thought it was shorter but I guess that might have more to do with the fact its being used by a guy that used to play Hercules.

It does have a rather nice set of attributes and allows the introduction of a melee weapon into battles so it isnt that bad a design in universe. Although realistically I dont think a weapon like that is entirely feasible.
One thing that would make the Force Lance better would be to incorporate the Light Saber hehe.

[Connor MacLeod]

I don't quite understand why people would assume melee weapons would be useless under any and all circumstances. Against enemies in a long range battle the reasons are obvious, but not all battles will be from hundreds of meters away.


Force lances aren't really a whole lot better than phasers. Again, poor ergonomics, no sighting, and the "swiss army/melee" function isn't neccecsarily a good thing (it makes the devicee rather bloody complicated for one thing - specialization is NOT bad, remember.) Frankly some of the features they deliberately built into it (it can act as a bloody automated point defense weapon against incoming fire, which was about the itme I definittely deemed the weapon "insane")

[Thunderfire]

Melee weapon could be usefull in a realistic SF scenario. Beams and Bullets on a realistic starship mean death for everybody when vital equipment or the hull gets damaged/destroyed. A knife or stabbing sword would be really usefull for boarding actions.