Armageddon???? (Part Fifty Up)

[JCady]

Unlike you, I’m not a proponent of rechambering and reissuing decades old rifles.

Then what do you proposing doing to arm and equip a 12-million man army from the resources available, which were intended to support a 1-million man army? You do realize that anything and everything will have to be used, right? As a matter of fact, we may be looking at more of a 25-million man army.

Well, first of all how many surplus Garands are there still in storage? Is it enough to equip a 12 million man army, let alone a 25 million man army? Assuming it isn't, you're still going to have to either manufacture more Garands or issue another (surplus) weapon as well. Seeing how you're going to have to inspect and then rechamber, rebarrel and maybe even rebed all those surplus rifles (if I'm not missing something) (not to mention slap on a collapsing stock and a rail for an optic at least) you might as well put those man-hours into manufacturing weapons based off of the M16 family, which are currently in production in various different facilities all over the US.

If your grand-daddy can hit human targets at over 500 metres plus with said Garand, you sure as hell can hit a great big demon at such ranges and beyond with said Garand.

[The Duchess of Zeon]

Unlike you, I’m not a proponent of rechambering and reissuing decades old rifles.

Then what do you proposing doing to arm and equip a 12-million man army from the resources available, which were intended to support a 1-million man army? You do realize that anything and everything will have to be used, right? As a matter of fact, we may be looking at more of a 25-million man army.

Well, first of all how many surplus Garands are there still in storage? Is it enough to equip a 12 million man army, let alone a 25 million man army? Assuming it isn't, you're still going to have to either manufacture more Garands or issue another (surplus) weapon as well. Seeing how you're going to have to inspect and then rechamber, rebarrel and maybe even rebed all those surplus rifles (if I'm not missing something) (not to mention slap on a collapsing stock and a rail for an optic at least) you might as well put those man-hours into manufacturing weapons based off of the M16 family, which are currently in production in various different facilities all over the US.

Why do you think we'd be slapping on collapsible stocks and a rail for an optic? We're probably going to be arming plenty of units with hunting rifles, let alone old battle-rifles. M3 Springfields are also a real possibility. The logistics of equipping an army of 25 millions are rather staggering.

And on a completely unrelated note, I had just had the mental image of special Russian Rocket Infantry units. They have so many RPG-7s--imagine a whole regiment of infantry armed entirely with RPG-7s, standing in an old musket-age one line kneeling, one standing interwoven formation, facing a charging horde of Baldricks.

"Fire!"

And twenty-five hundred RPG-7 rounds go crashing into the Baldrick formation.

"Reload!"

Utterly impractical and a bit silly, but it has me giggling madly at the moment.

[Beowulf]

An AR-15 based rifle has the additional advantage of the very large number of boutique manufacturers. Plus, the advantage of being able to tell all the draftees: "If you have an AR-15, bringing it with you to Basic." At which point the upper gets switched out, and you have a roughly standard rifle. And we don't have to manufacture the entire rifle that way, just a new upper receiver.

[Adrian Laguna]

And on a completely unrelated note, I had just had the mental image of special Russian Rocket Infantry units. They have so many RPG-7s--imagine a whole regiment of infantry armed entirely with RPG-7s, standing in an old musket-age one line kneeling, one standing interwoven formation, facing a charging horde of Baldricks.

While that specific idea is rather silly, something similar has been done already. IIRC the Chechens, as well as Hamas, employ fire teams built around the RPG-7. Basically two riflemen and a granedier, or one rifleman and two granediers. Since there's so dammed many RPG-7s lying around, and any idiot can use it, I could see the Russians making units like that out of cheap conscripts.

[R011]

I'd rather reverse engineer the A-10 myself. For that matter, early 1950's fighter jets had terrible safety records. If I wanted an old retread that was faster than a Warthog, I'd go for an A-4 or an F-20.

The problem with reintroducing old aircraft like those is that the paperwork to build them no longer exists. It would take at least a couple of years to reverse engineer one, and it would essentially be a new aircraft that happened to look like an F-84. Far better to start from blank paper while rushing designs still in production into service. SuperTucanos and Hawk's, for instance, are both in production and easily overmatch the Baldricks. If the Sukhoi Su-25 is still in production, and it seems to be, then that becomes an excellent candidate.

As for bombers, existing P-3's and similar aircraft should be fairly easily convertible to conventional bombers. We could also be making value engineered versions of aircraft like the F-15E and F/A-18E that are basically bomb-trucks with minimal electronics.

[[R_H]]

If your grand-daddy can hit human targets at over 500 metres plus with said Garand, you sure as hell can hit a great big demon at such ranges and beyond with said Garand.

Sorry, my grand-daddy was issued a Schmidt-Rubin K31, not a Garand

But yes, of course every Garand was able to hit human sized targets at >500 m. It's not like they wouldn't be able to do so today, after being in storage for a few decades. Must be why I've heard that some of them aren't terrible accurate. Oh and by the way, if I'm not mistaken the Marines have to be able to hit a torso sized target at 500m with their M16A2 or A4 and the iron sights. Being able to hit that demon at range is nice and all, but that shot needs to hit something vital (CNS or heart preferablely), otherwise it's just as good as wasted.

We're going to need so many stopgap rifles that you can't imagine. The problem with 7.62mm NATO is that, while better than 5.56mm for this task, and obviously with hollow-cavity we'll be able to get a much better ability to kill demons, it still clearly doesn't have the firepower to reliably take down a baldrick which requires two shots of .50 to kill in some cases (though one disables them, thankfully).

What if the two shots was a fluke. After all, people have survived large calibre gunshot wounds. Perhaps the same shot placement doesn't carry over from humans to demons, something for dissections to determine.

I'm actually thinking longer term, here, in terms of setting up an ideal new battle rifle for production. The answer is to base it on a Garand modified for a detachable box magazine, i.e., the M1A, except in an extremely heavy magnum catridge. The ideal of which is the .458 winchester mag for fitting that gun. The Garand is familiar to Americans, it's an excellent service rifle, we can certainly get tooled up to mass-produce them fairly easily.

The Garand isn't the ideal new BR. Ever heard of the Magpul ACR/Masada? It's a fairly revolutionary (hailed like the second coming of Jesus Lite on most firearm forums) because it mixes and matches advantageous design features of many different firearms (AR18 gas-system, modular mag-well etc), the kicker is that it was designed and prototyped in less than a year by a tiny company (compared to the likes of Bushmaster (who will be producing it) and Colt) that primarily specialises in plastic accesories for the M16 family.

[The Duchess of Zeon]

I'd rather reverse engineer the A-10 myself. For that matter, early 1950's fighter jets had terrible safety records. If I wanted an old retread that was faster than a Warthog, I'd go for an A-4 or an F-20.

The problem with reintroducing old aircraft like those is that the paperwork to build them no longer exists. It would take at least a couple of years to reverse engineer one, and it would essentially be a new aircraft that happened to look like an F-84. Far better to start from blank paper while rushing designs still in production into service. SuperTucanos and Hawk's, for instance, are both in production and easily overmatch the Baldricks. If the Sukhoi Su-25 is still in production, and it seems to be, then that becomes an excellent candidate.

As for bombers, existing P-3's and similar aircraft should be fairly easily convertible to conventional bombers. We could also be making value engineered versions of aircraft like the F-15E and F/A-18E that are basically bomb-trucks with minimal electronics.

You apparently didn't read the original comment that started this line of conversation, the fact that the whole original tooling set for the F-84 exists. (and by the way, we do keep our blueprints on top of that).

The other fighters are out of it because of a lack of production tools; the F-84 is being considered because have a full production line sitting around waiting to be set up and put back in use.

[The Duchess of Zeon]

The Garand isn't the ideal new BR. Ever heard of the Magpul ACR/Masada? It's a fairly revolutionary (hailed like the second coming of Jesus Lite on most firearm forums) because it mixes and matches advantageous design features of many different firearms (AR18 gas-system, modular mag-well etc), the kicker is that it was designed and prototyped in less than a year by a tiny company (compared to the likes of Bushmaster (who will be producing it) and Colt) that primarily specialises in plastic accesories for the M16 family.

Why the fuck are you still thinking in terms of "the ideal new BR"? We're talking about a weaponized big game rifle, not a battle rifle. The requirements for an ideal rifle that is firing cartridges powerful enough to stop a cape buffalo are utterly different from those of a modern battle rifle, okay? Drill that into your brain.

[JCady]

If your grand-daddy can hit human targets at over 500 metres plus with said Garand, you sure as hell can hit a great big demon at such ranges and beyond with said Garand.

Sorry, my grand-daddy was issued a Schmidt-Rubin K31, not a Garand

But yes, of course every Garand was able to hit human sized targets at >500 m. It's not like they wouldn't be able to do so today, after being in storage for a few decades. Must be why I've heard that some of them aren't terrible accurate. Oh and by the way, if I'm not mistaken the Marines have to be able to hit a torso sized target at 500m with their M16A2 or A4 and the iron sights. Being able to hit that demon at range is nice and all, but that shot needs to hit something vital (CNS or heart preferablely), otherwise it's just as good as wasted.

Total red herring. The point is that iron sights are perfectly adequate for the ranges in question; scopes are a luxury, and one that Earth can't afford at a time when it needs to be cranking out ginormous numbers of weapons.

The Garand isn't the ideal new BR. Ever heard of the Magpul ACR/Masada? It's a fairly revolutionary (hailed like the second coming of Jesus Lite on most firearm forums) because it mixes and matches advantageous design features of many different firearms (AR18 gas-system, modular mag-well etc), the kicker is that it was designed and prototyped in less than a year by a tiny company (compared to the likes of Bushmaster (who will be producing it) and Colt) that primarily specialises in plastic accesories for the M16 family.

The Masada is not revolutionary in any way, shape or form; it is an evolutionary design which combines the best aspects of various existing assault rifles. It is also not any sort of battle rifle, much less the sort of "heavy rifle" we need for demon-busting; it's an assault rifle chambered for the same puny 5.56mm as the M-16 series.

[[R_H]]

Why the fuck are you still thinking in terms of "the ideal new BR"? We're talking about a weaponized big game rifle, not a battle rifle. The requirements for an ideal rifle that is firing cartridges powerful enough to stop a cape buffalo are utterly different from those of a modern battle rifle, okay? Drill that into your brain.

You fucking mentionned it. "I'm actually thinking longer term, here, in terms of setting up an ideal new battle rifle for production." No where did I say that I didn't agree that a larger cartridge is necessary, I don't agree that you A) think manufacturing an out of date rifle and B) that it should be a "weaponised" (what ever that's supposed to mean, maybe you were thinking militarised?) big game rifle. It's not a fucking safari. Just because you can make rifles powerful enough to blow out that buffalo's brain through it's ass doesn't mean that the rifle is appropriate for military use, or even necessary. What requirements are different between your ideal rifle and those of a battle rifle?

[JCady]

Why the fuck are you still thinking in terms of "the ideal new BR"? We're talking about a weaponized big game rifle, not a battle rifle. The requirements for an ideal rifle that is firing cartridges powerful enough to stop a cape buffalo are utterly different from those of a modern battle rifle, okay? Drill that into your brain.

You fucking mentionned it. "I'm actually thinking longer term, here, in terms of setting up an ideal new battle rifle for production." No where did I say that I didn't agree that a larger cartridge is necessary, I don't agree that you A) think manufacturing an out of date rifle and B) that it should be a "weaponised" (what ever that's supposed to mean, maybe you were thinking militarised?) big game rifle. It's not a fucking safari. Just because you can make rifles powerful enough to blow out that buffalo's brain through it's ass doesn't mean that the rifle is appropriate for military use, or even necessary. What requirements are different between your ideal rifle and those of a battle rifle?

The sort of anti-demon rifle (ADR) needed for the War On Damnation is a battle rifle (BR) in terms of function and role, but it's not a job which any existing battle rifle is capable of performing.

The difference in requirement between a "normal" BR and an ADR is that the ADR needs to fire a round that is powerful enough to reliably blow out a demon's brains in one or two shots. Regular battle rifles achieve this sort of one-two hit lethality against humans, but it should be bloody frakking obvious that vastly more powerful rounds are required to achieve sufficient effect against demons. That's where big game rifles come in; they do deliver the necessary terminal performance.

In the interest of expedience the ADR is going to have to be a militarized big game rifle. A purpose-designed military rifle in the same calibres would be better still, but we don't have the time to develop that. What we need to do is take a solid and reliable big-game rifle design, strip it of all the fancy bells and whistles, ruggedize it to soldier-proof standards, and order every gun maker in every country to start immediate mass-production.

[The Duchess of Zeon]

You fucking mentionned it. "I'm actually thinking longer term, here, in terms of setting up an ideal new battle rifle for production." No where did I say that I didn't agree that a larger cartridge is necessary, I don't agree that you A) think manufacturing an out of date rifle and B) that it should be a "weaponised" (what ever that's supposed to mean, maybe you were thinking militarised?) big game rifle. It's not a fucking safari. Just because you can make rifles powerful enough to blow out that buffalo's brain through it's ass doesn't mean that the rifle is appropriate for military use, or even necessary. What requirements are different between your ideal rifle and those of a battle rifle?

Yes, I did mean militarized. Now, let's look at this:

1. Urban combat like in Hit will probably be extremely rare. Baldricks fight in formation, which means open-field fighting at extreme range. That means you want a very long rifle that can reach out and reliably kill someone at 400 to 500 meters.

2. You must be able to knock them out of the fight with one hit, reliably. That means a round which has comparable destructive effect to a .50cal military-issue round, with the proviso that the round may be hollow-point because the Hague no longer matters. Therefore, we must have a round capable of, with hollow-cavity ammunition, reliably equaling the destructive effect of the .50cal without it. That means we are looking at magnum rounds in the .338 - .460 range.

3. Hunting bullets with a polymer tip to give good long-range ballistics while still being of the expanding type will be what we're issuing standard.

4. You want the rifle to be HEAVY, not light, because the recoil is a bitch and because of the numbers of the enemy: YOU WILL BE FIRING 350 - 400 ROUNDS OF HIGH-CALIBER MAGNUM AMMUNITION IN ONE DAY. Heavy rifle = dissipates recoil. Are we clear on that? So modern lightweight rifles are simply going to rip the shoulders of soldiers to shreds with that kind of ROF with those immensely heavy rounds.

5. An automatic capability is not desired because the size of the ammunition required to kill Baldricks is much to large to provide in sufficient quantities for rapid fire, and because we do not need to engage in suppressive fire against, but rather in marksmanship.


These all speak toward a big, heavy, and long old-style battle rifle, albeit still semi-automatic, firing a heavy magnum hunting cartridge, polymer tip with a hollow cavity for maximum "mushroom" effect of the bullet on impact.

[[R_H]]

Total red herring. The point is that iron sights are perfectly adequate for the ranges in question; scopes are a luxury, and one that Earth can't afford at a time when it needs to be cranking out ginormous numbers of weapons.

They're adequate for killing humans, right? Which is why they're not issued to regular units, oh wait that isn't the case. Just because you can hit something at x range, doesn't mean that you've hit your target where it needs to be hit in order to be eliminated as a threat. Baldies seem tough enough to close the 500 meters between you and them and then tear you to shreds. Without a scope you (and most people) wouldn't be able to see what you're firing in enough detail to put that shot where it counts. I think crew-served weapons are a going to be a lot more important than they ever were, both in the direct and indirect roles (ex. the Norwegians had their MG3s on mil-adjustable tripods, with binoculars marked off in mils, they were able to lay down 10*10 meter beaten zones at 2000m).

The Garand isn't the ideal new BR. Ever heard of the Magpul ACR/Masada? It's a fairly revolutionary (hailed like the second coming of Jesus Lite on most firearm forums) because it mixes and matches advantageous design features of many different firearms (AR18 gas-system, modular mag-well etc), the kicker is that it was designed and prototyped in less than a year by a tiny company (compared to the likes of Bushmaster (who will be producing it) and Colt) that primarily specialises in plastic accesories for the M16 family.

The Masada is not revolutionary in any way, shape or form; it is an evolutionary design which combines the best aspects of various existing assault rifles. It is also not any sort of battle rifle, much less the sort of "heavy rifle" we need for demon-busting; it's an assault rifle chambered for the same puny 5.56mm as the M-16 series.

Evolutionary as it is, it's still decades ahead of turn of the century rifles. By the way, it's not just a 5.56mm weapon. It's also chambered in 6.8SPC, 7.62x39mm and 7.62 NATO - by definition also a battle rifle. I brought it up as an example of design work done by a small company in a relatively short time frame during peace-time (compared to total war with Heaven and Hell).

[Sea Skimmer]

As for aircraft armament, if M3s are back in production, I say we go with those. Most other armament fits would require some reengineering of the gun bays.

We have to reengineer the engine bay already, which is a much larger and more time consuming change. It’s not like we could just start churning these planes out in a month if we didn’t make any changes.

I wasn't thinking of actually mounting a gunpod, but rather was using it as a weight comparison. The problem with 30mm rounds is that the USAF doesn't have any preexisting guns that are appropriate for a fighter. They're either far too large, or don't have a sufficient rate of fire. This is also why I didn't suggest the M39.

.50cal guns have almost worthless firepower if the main threat is flying Baldricks, which aren’t even always killed 5in shell equivalent warheads on AMRAAM missiles! Rate of fire really does not make up for it, most rounds aren’t going to hit anyway and you’ve got no blast or fragmentation damage to inflict. .50cal exploding ammo exists, yes I know, but the HE load is just plain puny and because the bullets are lighter you then lose some of the prized ballistic performance of the round. We had the rounds in WW2 and ended up not using them because API worked better.

The same weight of 20mm HE ammo will just always been more effective. Hoards of MiG-15s escaped in Korea because of the deficiency in US fighter firepower, we kept .50cal way too long and the USAF can’t afford to make the same mistakes yet again. This thing should have cannon or else it’s not worth building at all. Course, it might not be worth building at all anyway, that’s really a matter of mobilization priorities and just how long it will realistically take to bring a production line into existence.

30mm now that I think about it more, is out of the question. You might be able to make a 30mm ADEN guns fit, but the muzzle blast would blind the pilot. Its real unfortunate this isn’t an F-86 we have to work with, because Canada actually did fit that plane with twin ADENs. Anyway two M39s with 200 rounds each should workout fine for the nose. It may actually be possible to put another pair in the wing roots, particularly since we can afford to make slight wing modifications. As an alternative fit, it would be possible to just convert M3 machine guns into 20mm cannon, though that means taking the risk of developing a sort of a new gun, that’s one thing I would not want to do.

[The Duchess of Zeon]

They're adequate for killing humans, right? Which is why they're not issued to regular units, oh wait that isn't the case. Just because you can hit something at x range, doesn't mean that you've hit your target where it needs to be hit in order to be eliminated as a threat. Baldies seem tough enough to close the 500 meters between you and them and then tear you to shreds. Without a scope you (and most people) wouldn't be able to see what you're firing in enough detail to put that shot where it counts. I think crew-served weapons are a going to be a lot more important than they ever were, both in the direct and indirect roles (ex. the Norwegians had their MG3s on mil-adjustable tripods, with binoculars marked off in mils, they were able to lay down 10*10 meter beaten zones at 2000m).

Put the shot where it counts? Why the hell are you fapping to sniper commentary? All we need to do is put a big hole in them somewhere at that range. Running across 500 meters with a channel through your body the size of a doubled fist pumping out blood, and you'll be dead by the time you reach the position of the person who shot you, so why does it matter where they're hit?

You really have no idea of the kind of combat this is, do you? We are not using cartridges adequate for killing humans here; we're going to be using cartridges, as I noted, adequate for killing cape buffalo. Try the Hornady loading for the .458 magnum--500 grains, 2,260 fps. Hollow cavity, polymer tipped big game bullets like that are what we need to reliably knock down Baldricks at any range.

Evolutionary as it is, it's still decades ahead of turn of the century rifles. By the way, it's not just a 5.56mm weapon. It's also chambered in 6.8SPC, 7.62x39mm and 7.62 NATO - by definition also a battle rifle. I brought it up as an example of design work done by a small company in a relatively short time frame during peace-time (compared to total war with Heaven and Hell).

Dumbass, "Decades ahead" in the WRONG REQUIREMENTS.

[Admiral Valdemar]

I take it giving out M82s to everyone is a bad idea then. Something smaller like the AI chambered for the .338 Lapua Magnum?

[The Duchess of Zeon]

I take it giving out M82s to everyone is a bad idea then. Something smaller like the AI chambered for the .338 Lapua Magnum?

That would definitely work from the standpoint of the British Army, yes.

You could probably get the FN-FAL to work with .338 Lapua Magnum, for that matter.

[Firethorn]

Well, first of all how many surplus Garands are there still in storage? Is it enough to equip a 12 million man army, let alone a 25 million man army? Assuming it isn't, you're still going to have to either manufacture more Garands or issue another (surplus) weapon as well.

I have to agree. I'd see mostly issuing garands for use in training or rearward units, preferably modified as little as possible.

After all, .30-06 & .308 are substantially more powerful rounds than .223 or 7.62x39.

As for who gets them, in a call up this massive you'd be surprised as to how many Garands and Springfields and other military rifles come out of the woodwork, often maintained lovingly by their collectors. You'd come out with tens of thousands of them by simply raiding gun stores. Along with magnum hunting rifles that would work well for activating militias for homeland defense. In which case I'd have the activation be 'be prepared to show up with a gun at least as powerful as .308/7.62x54 and 200 rounds'. For those who DON'T have 200 rounds of ammo(such as me and my .300 wby), raid sporting stores and such.

In the longer run, run the reworked large caliber AR-15/M-16 lines full out, to include the various small private AR15 producers like rock river arms. The only reason I'd turn out M1 Garands would be for the (soon to be) human armies of hell, as they have a larger number of people trained on them, and their simpler nature allows operation in much more severe conditions. It's far easier to detail strip and clean a M1 than a M16.

I wouldn't bother much with shotguns, as a large caliber rifle can be just as useful at short range as a shotgun using slugs. That and part of the point is to keep the Baldricks from reaching shotgun range.

R_H - the M16 platform, by default, only has an official range of 300 meters against point(IE human) targets. 500 meters for large targets such as formations and vehicles. As for accuracy, not all Garands were created equal, much less treated that way. There are dead on shooters, and there are ones with shot out barrels and such. People capable of taking on targets at 500 meters, scope or iron, are fairly rare. But demons are bigger, and I'm not looking for a one shot one kill at that range. Against Baldricks, a 50% hit rate at 500 meters would be more than enough.

Duchess - Given definitions, 'Battle Rifle' is the best description for what we're looking for - A rifle designed for use in combat that uses a full size rifle cartridge, while an 'assault rifle' is select fire and uses an intermediate cartridge.

At the size and power we're looking at going to for effectiveness, select fire loses much of it's usefulness, as recoil would have you missing on subsequent shots.

Heck, I might be producing 1908 springfields for hell. The US forces, of course. Other countries should feel free to get in on it as well.

[[R_H]]

The sort of anti-demon rifle (ADR) needed for the War On Damnation is a battle rifle (BR) in terms of function and role, but it's not a job which any existing battle rifle is capable of performing.

Thanks for pointing out the obvious. Nor are most surplus military rifles capable of doing so.

The difference in requirement between a "normal" BR and an ADR is that the ADR needs to fire a round that is powerful enough to reliably blow out a demon's brains in one or two shots. Regular battle rifles achieve this sort of one-two hit lethality against humans, but it should be bloody frakking obvious that vastly more powerful rounds are required to achieve sufficient effect against demons. That's where big game rifles come in; they do deliver the necessary terminal performance.

A headshot, how will that feat of marksmanship ever be done at 500 m without any optics by conscripts, you know the optics which are a luxury items and all those millons of conscripts that have to be able to head-shot moving targets? Assault rifles can also achieve one or two hit lethalities, it’s called hitting either the central nervous system or the heart. Thanks again for pointing out the obvious, that more powerful rounds are required. Not only big game rifles are capable of firing powerful rounds (look at any anti-materiel rifle or the .338 Lapua).

In the interest of expedience the ADR is going to have to be a militarized big game rifle. A purpose-designed military rifle in the same calibres would be better still, but we don't have the time to develop that. What we need to do is take a solid and reliable big-game rifle design, strip it of all the fancy bells and whistles, ruggedize it to soldier-proof standards, and order every gun maker in every country to start immediate mass-production.

We don’t have time to develop the rifle better suited to the role? If losing a thousands equipped with those shitty ass M16s, better run for the hills once that big-game rifle doesn’t perform all too well in the role it was jammed into. If a small company design and prototype an evolutionary (your words, not mine) military rifle in less than a year during peacetime, don’t you expect that it would take less time to do so in a total war situation?

Yes, I did mean militarized. Now, let's look at this:

1. Urban combat like in Hit will probably be extremely rare. Baldricks fight in formation, which means open-field fighting at extreme range. That means you want a very long rifle that can reach out and reliably kill someone at 400 to 500 meters.

Sounds like more machine guns, light mortars and grenade launchers are needed, not big game rifles. Since you’re fighting in the open, why not use all the indirect fire weapons I just mentioned in my first sentence and primarily use those to kill the baldricks. Extreme range for the rifles you’re fapping to isn’t 500 meters.

2. You must be able to knock them out of the fight with one hit, reliably. That means a round which has comparable destructive effect to a .50cal military-issue round, with the proviso that the round may be hollow-point because the Hague no longer matters. Therefore, we must have a round capable of, with hollow-cavity ammunition, reliably equaling the destructive effect of the .50cal without it. That means we are looking at magnum rounds in the .338 - .460 range.

Why only one round? If it’s one round, wouldn’t it have to be more destructive that a .50 cal round, seeing how it took two .50 cal rounds to take down that baldrick?

3. Hunting bullets with a polymer tip to give good long-range ballistics while still being of the expanding type will be what we're issuing standard.

Except that not all polymer tip bullets in x caliber provide optimal ballistics and incapacitation effects.

4. You want the rifle to be HEAVY, not light, because the recoil is a bitch and because of the numbers of the enemy: YOU WILL BE FIRING 350 - 400 ROUNDS OF HIGH-CALIBER MAGNUM AMMUNITION IN ONE DAY. Heavy rifle = dissipates recoil. Are we clear on that? So modern lightweight rifles are simply going to rip the shoulders of soldiers to shreds with that kind of ROF with those immensely heavy rounds.

Mass isn’t the only way to mitigate recoil, not to mention it’s a rifle that has to be carried around by a soldier. L. James Sullivan made (involved in developing the M16, the Stoner 63 and the Ultimax 100) a name for himself with the Ultimax 100, one of the lightest LMGs

5. An automatic capability is not desired because the size of the ammunition required to kill Baldricks is much to large to provide in sufficient quantities for rapid fire, and because we do not need to engage in suppressive fire against, but rather in marksmanship. These all speak toward a big, heavy, and long old-style battle rifle, albeit still semi-automatic, firing a heavy magnum hunting cartridge, polymer tip with a hollow cavity for maximum "mushroom" effect of the bullet on impact.

I agree that full auto is unnecessary.

[CaptainChewbacca]

I don't know if we can conclude that urban fighting will be rare. There's no reason, once the demons know a thing or two about geography, that they can't open up a portal as big as the Iraqi one in, say, Central Park, or Red Square, or under the Arc de Triomphe. If that ever happens, the city in question is going to be a total loss.

[The Duchess of Zeon]

I don't know if we can conclude that urban fighting will be rare. There's no reason, once the demons know a thing or two about geography, that they can't open up a portal as big as the Iraqi one in, say, Central Park, or Red Square, or under the Arc de Triomphe. If that ever happens, the city in question is going to be a total loss.

No it isn't. Direct-fire a 155mm with a nuclear shell straight down the iron sights into the portal.

[Sea Skimmer]

That would definitely work from the standpoint of the British Army, yes.

You could probably get the FN-FAL to work with .338 Lapua Magnum, for that matter.

You could, but you’d need some major work and testing to do it, since it’s using a necked down .416 Rugby cartridge case, making for a rather fat piece of ammo. As it is .338 Lapua Mangum has never been used in any kind of self loading rifle.

Once some Baldricks are captured it will also be most useful to test and see which, if any, of our current array of manmade poisons and war gases are effective against them. Chemical weapons could vastly reduce the need for high powered infantry weapons.

[CaptainChewbacca]

I don't know if we can conclude that urban fighting will be rare. There's no reason, once the demons know a thing or two about geography, that they can't open up a portal as big as the Iraqi one in, say, Central Park, or Red Square, or under the Arc de Triomphe. If that ever happens, the city in question is going to be a total loss.

No it isn't. Direct-fire a 155mm with a nuclear shell straight down the iron sights into the portal.

How quickly do you think we can get a nuclear artillery shell to Central Park? The portal in Iraq wasn't open that long, and I imagine any further 'portal invasions' will be more rapid in their execution.

[[R_H]]

Put the shot where it counts? Why the hell are you fapping to sniper commentary? All we need to do is put a big hole in them somewhere at that range. Running across 500 meters with a channel through your body the size of a doubled fist pumping out blood, and you'll be dead by the time you reach the position of the person who shot you, so why does it matter where they're hit?

How am I fapping to sniping when I saw it matters where you shot someone, whether human or baldrick. It matters if your bullet grazes/slightly wounds, hits the gut, hits the chest or hits the head. The last three will end up killing a balrick, but will it die quick enough that it can’t still rip Pvt. Smith apart before collapsing? Doesn’t really matter at range, you have enough time to shot him more that once (which isn’t what you’re looking for) but that’s because optics are a fucking luxury. You were the one babbling about baldricks having to be shot more that once with a .50 cal, doubled fist size wound channel or not. What if said not yet lethal wound occurs at a closer range, like what happened in hit, where there isn’t enough time to kill the baldrick because of blood loss.

You really have no idea of the kind of combat this is, do you? We are not using cartridges adequate for killing humans here; we're going to be using cartridges, as I noted, adequate for killing cape buffalo. Try the Hornady loading for the .458 magnum--500 grains, 2,260 fps. Hollow cavity, polymer tipped big game bullets like that are what we need to reliably knock down Baldricks at any range.


Dumbass, "Decades ahead" in the WRONG REQUIREMENTS.

Yeah, it’s combat akin to that of WW1, machine guns and artillery doing most of the killing, and WW2 ,riflemen supporting the machine guns and artillery. Why do you keep babbling about Cape Buffalo? Question, can you even polymer tip hollow points (seeing how they have a hole in the jacket at the tip of the bullet) and how would polymer tipped hollow points compare to just hollow points or just polymer tipped (honest question, not just for the sake of debate). Reliably at any range, what about at 10 km (I’m guessing you meant at rifle range)?

How about you list your requirements and I’ll list mine, so we can make this easier instead of you just replying “Dumbass, wrong requirements”.

[Singular Quartet]

[R_H], what the Duchess is saying is this:

The way to down a baldrick is by punching a large hole in him, and then laugh at range as he bleeds to death from said hole.

Big Game Rifles punch large holes in large creatures.

Modern Assault Rifles are designed to punch very small holes in semi-armored humans.

You keep suggesting using Modern Assault/Battle Rifles to kill baldricks, except those weapons aren't going to be effective due to the differences I outlined above. Your complaints about headshots are only necessary with the MBRs you refer to, not with the Long Rifles that Duchess keeps talking about.

As to your statements about recoil: True, mass isn't the only way to mitigate recoil, but it's the easiest/cheapest way to mitigate recoil.

Oh, and Chewie: Urban fighting would likely be faught with sawed-off/short combat shotguns rather than long rifles.