Best Sci-Fi gun

[SpaceMarine93]

Of all the varieties (such as slugthrowers, lasers, particle beam, coil, rail, pulse, etc.) and types (assault rifles, battle rifles, shotguns, machine guns, submachine guns, miniguns, pistols, etc.) of guns contrived in science fiction, considering the need to balance compactness, weight, versatility, accuracy, durability, ammo size, stopping power, rate of fire, production costs and speed, ease of repair and maintenance, etc. which one could be considered the best and most effective infantry/personnel weapon ever contrived in science fiction? The Kalashnikov / M4 Carbine of Space Operas, Cyberpunk and whatnot?

[Rabid]

Ork tele-fragger gun : teleport a gretchin into selected target. :v


Obviously, I don't know the whole of Sci-fi. What few stories I know are relatively gun free.

However, let's see from what I know...

The Kalashnikov / M4 Carbine of Space Operas, Cyberpunk and whatnot?

40K Imperial Guard Lasgun ?

Has been produced on millions of world for (more than ?) ten thousand years to equip an army of millions of billions of men and women. I think it can qualify, no ?

- Compactness : Generally, roughly of comparable size with a G3, if maybe a little bit longer, and stockier/of bigger build.
- Weight : I dunno, but very probably under 10Kg in most cases.
- Versatility, Rate-of-fire & Magazine size : Reportedly able of variable power output, impacting individual shot power, rate-of-fire and battery drain. At standard anti-personal power-output, I think it can be shot roughly a hundred time before having to change the battery.
- Accuracy & range : Maybe not that great, I dunno. Comparable to good modern rifles, I'd guess, as lasers have a tendency of having shitty ranges in atmosphere.
- Durability, ease of repair and maintenance : Can be built and maintained on very low tech world with native resources. Will very likely be used by a dozen guardsmen or more before being destroyed or used for spare parts. Can be used as a club in the heat of the action without negatively impacting the gun's performances (but don't go tell the tech-priests you did that, though...).

[Connor MacLeod]

"best" is going to be completely subjective, because you generally design things to fit certain requirements and balance various advantages and disadvantages (EG tradeoffs) whilst doing so. What is 'best' for one universe, or situation will not be the best in a different one.

[Bakustra]

The Seeking Hypersonic Automatic Kinetic Kill. Three modes of fire- single-shot, hexagonal burst, and full-auto. Fire rate of 400 rpm, 2000 round magazine. Synthesizes its own ammo from local materials- and tells you what to put in. Can bring down a bomber or break into a bank vault. Programmed to disarm individuals of more than 18 recognizable weapons types. Guaranteed lethality against human or humaniform targets - shoot someone in the hand, and the bullet tracks into their head. Comes with two remote sights to allow you to fire around corners. Easily maintainable, and with a power supply guaranteed for the service lifetime of the weapon. Yep, with this baby, the only dick pills you'll have to take will be ones to get the ol' wedding tackle to droop from the permanent erection you'll have with this phallic-as-hell substitute for your masculinity.

As for recognizability, ray guns of all sorts, phasers, blasters, "death rays", etc. are the single most recognizable weapon of sci-fi, but there's no point in narrowing things down further.

[Vendetta]

The Lazy Gun.

Absolutely guaranteed* to destroy anything you point it at, usually with a certain amount of whimsical irony.

* for a certain value of absoluteness. Unexpected results may occur.

[Black Admiral]

Ork tele-fragger gun : teleport a gretchin into selected target. :v

That would be the Shokk Attack Gun.

[Starglider]

The Lazy Gun.

Great MacGuffin but not really practical for mass infantry issue. Use of Weapons has various semi-plausible ultra-advanced infantry weapons but for stylish overkill you can't beat the Zorg ZF-1;

"It’s light, handle’s adjustable for easy carrying, good for righties and lefties. Breaks down into 4 parts, undetectable by x-ray; ideal for quick, discreet interventions. Titanium recharger, three thousand round clip with bursts of 3 to 300. With the replay button it’s even easier; one shot, and replay sends every following shot to the same location. And to finish the job, all the Zorg oldies but goldies. Rocket launcher, arrow launcher (with exploding and poisonous gas heads), our famous net launcher, the ALWAYS efficient flame-thrower, and for the grand finale, the all new Ice Cube System!

[Atlan]

Xeelee Starbreaker. It has setting that go from "cook an egg" to "Fuck that star over there."

In addition to that, someone who knows how to handle it (that would be a Xeelee, not a human) can use it to construct a star system, including planets, from interstellar hydrogen.

The Lazy Gun.

Absolutely guaranteed* to destroy anything you point it at, usually with a certain amount of whimsical irony.

* for a certain value of absoluteness. Unexpected results may occur.

Oh yeah, that guy who pointed it at a star...

[Vendetta]

The Lazy Gun.

Absolutely guaranteed* to destroy anything you point it at, usually with a certain amount of whimsical irony.

* for a certain value of absoluteness. Unexpected results may occur.

Oh yeah, that guy who pointed it at a star...

Technically he got something indistinguishable from what he wanted.

[Ahriman238]

I don't believe I've ever heard of this 'Lazy gun.' Care to enlighten?

For most of these attributes, ammo capacity, armor-piercing, rate of fire etc. The ever over-the-top Grav Gun from the Posleen War. It shoots antimatter rounds (high end figure in the books is 100 kg TNT equivalent) at insane rates of fire (30,000 rpm) though conflicting numbers are given in the books. In a sane world, the recoil from those things would break a strong tank, in a Ringo book, they can be carried and fired by unarmored infantry, and weigh about 20 kilos.

Where else can be creative, and more over the top than a Shroom parody? Oh yes, Orion's Arm. That universe gives us 'boom bullets' 12-gauge shotgun rounds with a gram of antimatter (not for close combat use.) 'Disassembler' bullets made entirely of grey goo nanites that eat you from the inside out. And a personal favorite, Blackmailer low-velocity bullets. Once the bullet breaks skin, it deploys braking hooks to hang around. The bullet contains a small bomb or potent poison that will be released if you try and tamper with or remove it, or if it's owner sends a detonate signal. Conclusion: once you shoot somebody, you own him.

Warp Gun from Mutineer's Moon, point and whatever matter is in the way goes on an immediate one-way trip into hyperspace, where they are promptly disintegrated due to not having any of the protections a starship does. No flash, no scream no beam. One moment your buddy is taking cover behind a wall, the next the wall and your buddy are gone.

On a similiar note, the D-Cannon the Eldar Wraithguard use, it rips a hole into the warp wherever you point it that sucks most nearby things inside. And the Eldar Deathspinner, which fires rapidly spreading nets of mono-wire.

[The Yosemite Bear]

Tasp: the most entertaining less than leathal weapon. Though I'm pretty sure that in 40k, it would beconsidered a foul pervesion of the Slannesshi.

[PREDATOR490]

Zorg ZF-1

Altenatively:

Force Lance

Only thing it really misses is a lightsaber function.

[The Yosemite Bear]

Tasp: the most entertaining less than leathal weapon. Though I'm pretty sure that in 40k, it would beconsidered a foul pervesion of the Slannesshi.

or as wikipedia would put it

Tasp - A device that can stimulate the pleasure center of the brain via electric induction at varying levels, even at a distance. Such a jolt of pleasure can be as totally disabling as a similar jolt of pain could be. More so, repeated use of the tasp at a low level can become addictive, allowing even greater control of the subject. Less malignantly, their use had become commonplace in parks on Earth, to give an unexpected shock to random passers-by, before their use was banned by the ARM. The act of randomly zapping people with a tasp was called "making their day".

or as wired put it, one of the top ten coolest guns in sci fi.

[Nephtys]

Not sure exactly how you can top the Zorg ZF-1. It's not just a spacegun. It's 7 spaceguns.

[The Yosemite Bear]

Huntsman 5000 from 2000ad comics, makes it's own ammo, fires nano tech rounds best suited to kill it's target, the guidance system built into those bullets never misses, genetically bonded to the wielder, and the lethality of the rounds is based on the wielder's psionic potential. In the right hands this "Mosin Nagant" can kill a giant mecha robot with a single shot.....

did I mention that this weapon gets extra cool points for being a MOSIN NAGANT upgraded with alien tech, that manufactures one gyrojet round based on the needs of the genetically bonded marksman, brain, to be exactly what is needed every time he/she pulls the trigger....

[Darth Tedious]

The Point of View gun from the HHGG film was pretty cool, though it was a one-off.

(for those not familiar...) Point, shoot. The target now sees the world from your point of view, and is able to understand your personal beliefs and feelings, and completely sympathise. It also appears have a wide-angle setting which can affect an entire group. Note: It has no effect on women, because they're already women.

If you could equip an entire army with them... provided your army believed in what they were fighting for...

[The Yosemite Bear]

Total Prospective Vortex was a punishment booth in the book.

[The Romulan Republic]

I"m pretty fond of phasers due to their versatility and non-lethal capabilities. They can stun, kill, vaporize, heat things, be set to overload to make an improvised explosive, and fire on standard or wide beam mode.

[fgalkin]

From Dan Simmons' Endymion

The FORCE weapon was ugly, an exception to the Consul's collecting scheme, but I saw why it had been useful. The thing was multipurpose-an 18-mm plasma rifle, a variable-beam coherent-energy weapon, grenade launcher, a bhee-keeper (beams of high energy electrons), flechette launcher, a wideband blinder, heat-seeking dart flinger-hell a FORCE assault rifle could do anything but cook the trooper's males. (And when in the field, the variable-beam, set to low, could usually do that as well).

The Bhee-beam was shown to go through 500m of solid rock, and the energy beam can turn sand into molten glass in an instant.

Have a very nice day.
-fgalkin

[Connor MacLeod]

Oh god Hyperion. Swiss army guns (Which show up in other novels like Old Mans war due to ADVANCED NANOTECH AMMO) which always give me a headache.

Isn't that the series where the PAX troops supposedly had supar powered armour that was able to take down spaceships too or something?

[Parallax]

The De-Mat gun, made by the Time Lords.
Apparently it didn't actually kill the target, it just erased them completely from time.

[folti78]

I don't believe I've ever heard of this 'Lazy gun.' Care to enlighten?

From here Ancient magitech weapons left behind by a posthuman entity(probably as nice little fuck you message). Not normal guns, because they don't shoot anything, but create some effect that will kill their target. Has a nasty case of nuking itself and it's surroundings when someone tries to open it.

[Eternal_Freedom]

The De-Mat gun, made by the Time Lords.
Apparently it didn't actually kill the target, it just erased them completely from time.

It's pretty damn effective. Body armour, shields, psychic crap, no effective defence. And it allows for two wrongs to really make a right. Bad guy kills a friend, you demat the bad guy, friend never died.

[The Romulan Republic]

I don't know if that much messing with the time line is a good idea. Pretty powerful effect though. It sounds like a technological equivalent to Bale Fire from Wheel of Time.

[Eternal_Freedom]

I don't know if that much messing with the time line is a good idea. Pretty powerful effect though. It sounds like a technological equivalent to Bale Fire from Wheel of Time.

This is why the Time Lords kept it as an Ultimate Weapon of Doom - Only To Be Used In Extreme Circumstances (TM). Like Galifrey getting invaded.