Armageddon???? (Part Fifty Up)

[The Duchess of Zeon]

I'm not particularly sure if you skipped physics, but one of the fundamental portions of Einstein's equations revolved around the relationship between matter and energy. It's fairly trivial to convert matter to energy, but it takes large amounts of energy to be able to do the opposite.

Fun fact: Energy is turned into matter pretty frequently inside of particle accelerators.

Or, to elaborate further, whatever energy the soul had was expended in being turned into another body, most likely, which is why the demons have to torture people instead of just killing them and doing energy capture. And, yes, energy must be conserved--in this case, it is conserved by being turned into matter.

This is why I'm pretty sure that people who die in Hell stay dead--the existence of the soul is impossible enough, why should we irrationally believe it must have the power for infinite cross-gradient trips and re-materializations? That would be ludicrous. Also, it would leave the demons with no reason to torture humans. The remnant soul probably dissipates as a puff of heated air, more or less, when a hell-denizen is killed there, or on Earth, or anywhere (and denizens of hell can certainly life on Earth if demons can).

One more disturbing possibility when it comes to demons is that they used to be people in some cases. Or there may be some demons who used to be people whose descendants form this demon population.

The big question is what happens to all of that energy when someone who is still alive gets killed in Hell. Do they materialize in the next plain up? If they don't, do they sort of linger there as ghosts, like in the Greek vision of Hades, their souls not having enough power against a higher gradient to generate bodies? Or does the energy just stay in hell? Because then you're going to have 50kg + M/AM detonations whenever a soldier dies. I sort of think that is quite unlikely, so one of the other alternatives is more plausible.

[Col. Crackpot]

She looked dazedly at the camera. “I need a bigger fucking gun.”

Best line of the chapter, IMVHO.

I laughed so hard it hurt.
If only Dalton still maintained the FUQ...

[The Duchess of Zeon]

I'd just like to add that most of the modifications that McCann makes to the Garand are unnecessary ones in this context--we can keep the same furniture and barrel length quite happily, for example. The fact that they use the same receiver is the key part--that means we can mass produce it cheaply and easily, once we dispense with the unnecessary changes for the luxury market.

[JCady]

If an F/A-18's eleven thousand watt AN/APG-79 radar in search mode gives demons a maddening itch, what would an AEGIS cruiser's four million watt AN/SPY-1 radar do on targeting mode? And how about one of those anti-riot microwave beam cannons they put on Humvees? Those don't have nearly as much raw power, obviously, but they're much more focused.

Note: The AN/APG-79 consists of 1100 transmit/recieve modules, with a power output on the order of 8 watts. The exact number is classified; out of sheer laziness I rounded up to 10 watts.

[Stuart]

The story is still good, but I've a couple of nitpicks to drop about the use of Spanish. "una ropas de prostituta" sounds very, very odd. I'm not 100% positive about the Latin-American usage, but in Spain we would say something like "ropa de puton". Puton being a colloquial, somewhat less offensive form of puta and prostituta. "Él era el hombre más valiente que he visto siempre.” Translates like "He was the bravest man I've always seen". Instead of siempre, it should be "nunca" and the phrase could be "Era el hombre mas valiente que nunca haya visto."

Thank you for the input - I've ammended the text accordingly. I don't speak Spanish so I had to rely on an on-line machine translation.

By the way the bit abouta group of teenage girls switching from language to language in the middle of sentances etc is quite true. I was in a restaurant in Northern New York State a couple of years back and the group (as described) were in the booth behind doing just that. Spanish, English and various slang types were all merged together into a single language. It didn't seem to matter where the individual words came from, they and their grammar were just used as convenient. I found it very impressive.

[Firethorn]

The problem with a .500 S&W is it is a hell of a kick and in a revolver you only have 6 rounds. With a high capacity .45 you can squeeze out a lot of rounds fairly quickly and then you pop in a fresh magazine and you are ready to go again.

People who go hunting dangerous game such as bear with handguns don't go with .45s for a REASON.

The problem with even +P+ .45 ammo is that it lacks sufficient penetration capabilities to take down a Baldrick sufficiently quickly to be effective.

A baldrick barely notices .32 and .45. Most civilian carriers of .45 for self defense today are using +P already. 9 rounds of .45 COM only pissed the Baldrick off, though he might of bled to death eventually, but the wounds might still of clotted. Even 30 ROUNDS OF 5.56 is proving insufficient in battle situations. 8 rounds of .30-06 probably would of eventually proved fatal, but the Baldrick was STILL moving after taking it.

Six rounds of .357 Mag might do more for stopping a Baldrick than 12 rounds of .45. For a handgun, I wouldn't want anything below the .357, preferably

And a doublestack .45 is awfully thick. I'm slightly below average size for a male, and I find a double stack .45 handgun hard to grip comfortably. If you WANT a semi auto, I'd look into 10mm firing FMJ.

Though at least initially I see people carrying whatever they can get. I'm going along the lines that 200 rounds of hits in various places from 20 different people should work fairly well for mall attacks, at least until SOMEBODY with a magnum rifle finishes the job.

[JCady]

I'm not particularly sure if you skipped physics, but one of the fundamental portions of Einstein's equations revolved around the relationship between matter and energy. It's fairly trivial to convert matter to energy, but it takes large amounts of energy to be able to do the opposite.

Fun fact: Energy is turned into matter pretty frequently inside of particle accelerators.

Or, to elaborate further, whatever energy the soul had was expended in being turned into another body, most likely, which is why the demons have to torture people instead of just killing them and doing energy capture. And, yes, energy must be conserved--in this case, it is conserved by being turned into matter.

This is why I'm pretty sure that people who die in Hell stay dead--the existence of the soul is impossible enough, why should we irrationally believe it must have the power for infinite cross-gradient trips and re-materializations? That would be ludicrous. Also, it would leave the demons with no reason to torture humans. The remnant soul probably dissipates as a puff of heated air, more or less, when a hell-denizen is killed there, or on Earth, or anywhere (and denizens of hell can certainly life on Earth if demons can).

One more disturbing possibility when it comes to demons is that they used to be people in some cases. Or there may be some demons who used to be people whose descendants form this demon population.

The big question is what happens to all of that energy when someone who is still alive gets killed in Hell. Do they materialize in the next plain up? If they don't, do they sort of linger there as ghosts, like in the Greek vision of Hades, their souls not having enough power against a higher gradient to generate bodies? Or does the energy just stay in hell? Because then you're going to have 50kg + M/AM detonations whenever a soldier dies. I sort of think that is quite unlikely, so one of the other alternatives is more plausible.

"Normally" when someone on Earth dies, they gain enough energy to ascend from Earth to Heaven or Hell. Since the demons and angels have to harvest large numbers of souls to /try/ to boost up to the next level beyond, it is clear that the next dimension up requires a considerably greater energy investment. Therefore, it's very likely that anyone who dies in Heaven or Hell will die permanently rather than ascend.

It might be possible to "channel" one's second death energy to generate a second Hell body for oneself instead of failing to ascend, but this clearly doesn't happen automatically the way ascension upon death does. If that is the case, it might be the reason Heaven has a much lower energy need than Hell: Heaven is only collecting enough soul energy to provide its members with a "safety net" and reincarnate if they die, wheras Hell is trying to push on to the next dimension up.

Anyhow, if someone living travels from Earth to Heaven or Hell through a reverse portal, the power supply on Earth has to provide the necessary "ascension energy". As a result, a live Earth denizen in Heaven or Hell would presumably have a considerable energy surplus upon death; that person would not have to "spend" a portion of hir death energy boost on ascension into Heaven/Hell because sie is already there.

The worst case is that the person would die permanently just the same, because the increased energy level is still insufficient to reach the dimension above Heaven/Hell. An alternative would be Hell Ghosts as Her Grace suggested -- the soul is unable to generate a new body for itself when it dies in the "wrong" dimension, but it is able to use its increased energy to remain cohesive in some sort of incorporeal form. A less likely but more interesting case would be that the person would still "count" as Earth-dimension and would therefore reincarnate as a Heaven/Hell dimension being -- probably one which is considerably stronger/tougher than a "regular" death reincarnation due to the energy surplus.

An interesting twist on that would be if Heaven and/or Hell does have "reincarnation machines" powered by soul energy (as suggested above); such machines would probably work better for live humans than Heaven/Hell natives due to their energy surplus. Given that demons appear to be powered-up and messed-up humans, it's even (remotely) possible that such machines are already used to "promote" certain Hell humans into demons or Hell-beasts. Hell-beasts are more likely, simply because the demons are unlikely to want more "competition"...and it would be perversely amusing to them to "cut a deal" with a tortured soul that in fact leaves it even more tortured.

[[R_H]]

What kind of reorganisation will the presently serving infantry squads go through? Will the SAWs be replaced with close range weapons (.50 Beowulf ARs or auto-shotguns)? Will underslung grenade launchers still be used, or will there be grenadiers carrying standalone launchers (Milkor MGL-140 etc.)?

[The Duchess of Zeon]

People who go hunting dangerous game such as bear with handguns don't go with .45s for a REASON.

The problem with even +P+ .45 ammo is that it lacks sufficient penetration capabilities to take down a Baldrick sufficiently quickly to be effective.

A baldrick barely notices .32 and .45. Most civilian carriers of .45 for self defense today are using +P already. 9 rounds of .45 COM only pissed the Baldrick off, though he might of bled to death eventually, but the wounds might still of clotted. Even 30 ROUNDS OF 5.56 is proving insufficient in battle situations. 8 rounds of .30-06 probably would of eventually proved fatal, but the Baldrick was STILL moving after taking it.

Six rounds of .357 Mag might do more for stopping a Baldrick than 12 rounds of .45. For a handgun, I wouldn't want anything below the .357, preferably

And a doublestack .45 is awfully thick. I'm slightly below average size for a male, and I find a double stack .45 handgun hard to grip comfortably. If you WANT a semi auto, I'd look into 10mm firing FMJ.

Though at least initially I see people carrying whatever they can get. I'm going along the lines that 200 rounds of hits in various places from 20 different people should work fairly well for mall attacks, at least until SOMEBODY with a magnum rifle finishes the job.

I know in this world I'd be carrying a Desert Eagle in .44 magnum, just like General Supatra does. Except, I'm a much taller and physically imposing lady than our Thai friend, being at around 5'10" and northern European, after all, so, 10in barrel, and the 10-round extended magazine. (Unless she actually has the extended barrel and extended magazines for her's, Stu? If she does, I'm even more in awe of her. How is she doing, anyway?)

I think ten rounds of .44 magnum fired down a 10in barrel will suffice to kill a Baldrick. If not, well, I like big handbags for purses and four extra magazines wouldn't really be something I'd notice when it came to carrying around. Not like I wouldn't do that anyway.

.50 AE simply isn't an effective handgun round, it's mostly there for wanking; however, semi-autos in .44 magnum are effective, and will probably be snatched up like hotcakes on the civilian market. Especially with rifle production going all-out to the military, the handgun makers will find that the need to provide civilians with defensive weapons enmasse is their specialty, and that means weapons like the above.

[The Duchess of Zeon]

What kind of reorganisation will the presently serving infantry squads go through? Will the SAWs be replaced with close range weapons (.50 Beowulf ARs or auto-shotguns)? Will underslung grenade launchers still be used, or will there be grenadiers carrying standalone launchers (Milkor MGL-140 etc.)?

That actually leads to the interesting question of what kind of support weapon you'd want for close-in work. It made me start to think about the idea of a weapon for close-range work mounted on light vehicles: A fully automatic, pintle-mounted shotgun firing 10 gauge magnum slugs which would guarantee pretty much a one-hit, one-kill on Baldricks in confined spaces. Possibly also a "machine gun" in the same style? They're like as not not suitable for mass production, but it's interesting to consider if such a weapon would be feasable.

[[R_H]]

That actually leads to the interesting question of what kind of support weapon you'd want for close-in work. It made me start to think about the idea of a weapon for close-range work mounted on light vehicles: A fully automatic, pintle-mounted shotgun firing 10 gauge magnum slugs which would guarantee pretty much a one-hit, one-kill on Baldricks in confined spaces. Possibly also a "machine gun" in the same style? They're like as not not suitable for mass production, but it's interesting to consider if such a weapon would be feasable.

Future Weapons (bleach please) had a segement about a remote operated set of dual AA-12 shotguns from Blackwater, which was mounted to their Grizzly APC. I might not be remembering this properly, but I'll try to find the episode it was in.

[JCady]

I haven't heard of any actual belt-fed shotguns existing, but they are at least possible enough for the gun control nuts in Congress to pass a ban on them -- SB 1339 specifically bans belt-fed shotguns, among other things.

[[R_H]]

I haven't heard of any actual belt-fed shotguns existing, but they are at least possible enough for the gun control nuts in Congress to pass a ban on them -- SB 1339 specifically bans belt-fed shotguns, among other things.

I don't remember enough of the episode to say if they were belt fed or magazine fed, I'm getting the episode in question right now (episode 10 of season 3).

[JCady]

I haven't heard of any actual belt-fed shotguns existing, but they are at least possible enough for the gun control nuts in Congress to pass a ban on them -- SB 1339 specifically bans belt-fed shotguns, among other things.

I don't remember enough of the episode to say if they were belt fed or magazine fed, I'm getting the episode in question right now (episode 10 of season 3).

If they're stock AA-12s, they're mag-fed.

[Stuart]

[ I know in this world I'd be carrying a Desert Eagle in .44 magnum, just like General Supatra does.

Suphi gave up carrying her Desert Eagle (it was a Mark VIII by the way with the standard length 6 inch barrel and in .44 magnum) when she got to be a General. The truth is that it's primary purpose was public relations; to get ahead an officer has to be noticed and the gun got her attention. I can only think of one occasion when she actually used it in field conditions and that was an accident. Normally she carried an M16.

These days she carries a SIG 220 in .45 ACP with eight-round magazines.

She'd doing reasonably well, she's out of the South now, these days she's doing administration for the Thai miliitary hospital system. She doesn't post any more, her rank means anything she says has consequences and she's too outspoken to take the chance. She's retiring in 2009, her present post is her last. So she might come back once she's retired.

I think ten rounds of .44 magnum fired down a 10in barrel will suffice to kill a Baldrick. If not, well, I like big handbags for purses and four extra magazines wouldn't really be something I'd notice when it came to carrying around. Not like I wouldn't do that anyway.

The DE's a swine for concealed carry but if people start carrying them openly it would be different. It's a much-maligned weapon by the way, it works fine as long as its kept clean, the shooter uses good ammunition and doesn't limp-wrist it. It's very accurate due to the fixed barrel and the long sight base.

.50 AE simply isn't an effective handgun round, it's mostly there for wanking

I agree, its a water-melon. A military-load .44 magnum actually has more poke than the .50AE.

]quote]however, semi-autos in .44 magnum are effective, and will probably be snatched up like hotcakes on the civilian market. Especially with rifle production going all-out to the military, the handgun makers will find that the need to provide civilians with defensive weapons enmasse is their specialty, and that means weapons like the above.[/quote]

I agree; also revolvers in .44 magum will go like hot cakes. .44 magnum is actually a great round, most people can shoot it once they've got over the Hollywood-induced hype, its accurate and powerful. Once we get much bigger than it though, the guns become unwieldy and hard to shoot accurately.

[Robo Jesus]

Your numbers are an order of magnitude out here.

Mainly because it's an estimate that popped up a while back (I think it popped up on livescience and yahoo news a couple years back) of how many people were conceived and possibly survived to be born; which is not the number of how many people actually survived to adulthood to reproduce. Not to mention it's an estimate of one hundred thousand years (mainly due to the data of how long the human male Y chromosome has been around), not the fifty thousand years estimate people like to commonly use. Slightly different contexts. :shrugs:

[JCady]

I agree; also revolvers in .44 magum will go like hot cakes. .44 magnum is actually a great round, most people can shoot it once they've got over the Hollywood-induced hype, its accurate and powerful. Once we get much bigger than it though, the guns become unwieldy and hard to shoot accurately.

Yeah, .44 Mag DE is not as bad as people think. It's a much bigger sidearm than I prefer, being a skinny 'lil Asian chick, but the DE action and frame soaks up .44 Mag recoil much better than a revolver does.

[[R_H]]

If they're stock AA-12s, they're mag-fed.

Ok.


Going back to squad (re)organisation, I'm thinking a 12 or 13 man squad like the Marines have would be more effective than an 8 or 9 man squad like the Army. Splitting it into 3 fireteams of 4, 'A' and 'B' consisting each of 2 riflemen (or 3 riflemen and 1 ARer) and 2 shotgunners/.50 ARers (one or both of which is also carrying a standalone grenade launcher like the M320 (the M203's replacement), the M32 or even the XRGL40 (would need 40x51mm grenades, but they have an 800m area target effective range compared to the 40x46mm 400m area target effective range). Each of the 8 members of 'A' and 'B' would of course be hauling along ammuntion for 'C's support weapon. Fireteam C would be in charge of a support weapon, either a light mortar, an automatic grenade launcher (along the lines of the Chinese QLZ-87B or the Czech SAG-30) or a lightened HMG (the Russian Kord and Utes 12.7mm HMGs weigh in at 41kg with the 6T7 tripod and ammo (the later massing a combined 16kg) distributed among the 4 members of Fireteam 'C', along with their personal weapons, perhaps the FN P90 (bad joke) or a standalone M26 12' shotgun (1.9kg) and the assistant gunners carrying .50 ARs (3.4kg) or even rifles.

[The Duchess of Zeon]

Your numbers are an order of magnitude out here.

Mainly because it's an estimate that popped up a while back (I think it popped up on livescience and yahoo news a couple years back) of how many people were conceived and possibly survived to be born; which is not the number of how many people actually survived to adulthood to reproduce. Not to mention it's an estimate of one hundred thousand years (mainly due to the data of how long the human male Y chromosome has been around), not the fifty thousand years estimate people like to commonly use. Slightly different contexts. :shrugs:

You're simply wrong. As Stuart said, the total number of humans who have ever lived is only around 125 billions; this includes all of those going back to the very beginning of humanity, because back then there were only tens of thousands (and potentially at one point as few as 3,000) humans in existence, and this was the case for a long time. If we factor in Neanderthals and other such sentients, perhaps 130 billions at the very most.

[[R_H]]

What about the Russian 9*39mm rounds? Would they be a suitable candidate for a short range round?

Those are subsonic rounds that only have around 700J at the muzzle, and have a range of between 300 and 400m.

[CaptainChewbacca]

I think that, if faced with a baldrick, I would very much like to have a Pfeifer-Zeliska .600 nitro express revolver.

As long as your first shot hits, you should do just fine. I imagine if it were to go into mass production, the size would go down considerably.

[[R_H]]

The dual remote operated AA-12 shotguns were drum fed (20 shell drums), mounted upside-down.

The system is called the "Hammer Turret System", which mounts the shotguns to the HX-240 turret.

Manufacturor's product page

Brochure

DefenseReview article about the system w/videos

[JCady]

The dual remote operated AA-12 shotguns were drum fed (20 shell drums), mounted upside-down.

Yep, those would be the regular magazines for the AA-12. A smaller 8-round box mag and a larger high capacity drum in the 30-40 round range are reportedly under development.

[Brovane]

The problem with a .500 S&W is it is a hell of a kick and in a revolver you only have 6 rounds. With a high capacity .45 you can squeeze out a lot of rounds fairly quickly and then you pop in a fresh magazine and you are ready to go again.

People who go hunting dangerous game such as bear with handguns don't go with .45s for a REASON.

The problem with even +P+ .45 ammo is that it lacks sufficient penetration capabilities to take down a Baldrick sufficiently quickly to be effective.

A baldrick barely notices .32 and .45. Most civilian carriers of .45 for self defense today are using +P already. 9 rounds of .45 COM only pissed the Baldrick off, though he might of bled to death eventually, but the wounds might still of clotted. Even 30 ROUNDS OF 5.56 is proving insufficient in battle situations. 8 rounds of .30-06 probably would of eventually proved fatal, but the Baldrick was STILL moving after taking it.

Six rounds of .357 Mag might do more for stopping a Baldrick than 12 rounds of .45. For a handgun, I wouldn't want anything below the .357, preferably

And a doublestack .45 is awfully thick. I'm slightly below average size for a male, and I find a double stack .45 handgun hard to grip comfortably. If you WANT a semi auto, I'd look into 10mm firing FMJ.

Though at least initially I see people carrying whatever they can get. I'm going along the lines that 200 rounds of hits in various places from 20 different people should work fairly well for mall attacks, at least until SOMEBODY with a magnum rifle finishes the job.

I have a PA P-14 .45 ACP which is a double stack .45 ACP and it fits just fine in my hand the same as a Glock 21 and H&K USP which I have also fired fits just fine in my hand. There might be a revival in 10mm also there might also be more Auto-Guns getting released in .44 Magnum also.

I had also mispoke on the Ammo. I was looking over the .45 ACP ammo that I bought for home defense that I have for my P-14 and it is .45 ACP +P 200GR with a velocity of 1050 FPS. Maybe .357 SIG will also become more popular.

The problem that I have with is basically unless you are getting a Desert Eagle you are stuck with revolvers for .357 Magnum or .44 Magnum. I have a Desert Eagle and while fun range gun it isn't something that I would want to carry into a potential hostile situation. Maybe somebody like H&K or Glock will make a Auto-Pistol in these calibers. The problem with a revolver is that you got six rounds are and you are done. With a P-14 in .45 ACP I got 14+1 rounds of .45 ACP and within seconds I can have 14 more rounds in the gun.

[Sea Skimmer]

Possibly also a "machine gun" in the same style? They're like as not not suitable for mass production, but it's interesting to consider if such a weapon would be feasable.

I don’t see why you couldn’t do that, but developing a new machine gun is going to take time. I’d prefer to make the ASP-30 the standard light vehicle weapon, alongside water cooled .50cals.

The thing is about as big and heavy as an M2 Browning, but it fires the same ammo as the M230 cannon on an Apache. With an 800m/s MV the HEDP shell has about 75,000 joules of energy, but AP rounds also exist with a bit lower velocity but more mass, increasing energy to some 85,000 joules. I’m pretty sure a 30mm hole straight through a Baldrick will put it down with one hit. And if the Bladrick isn’t at point blank range, you can loft the HEDP rounds to about 4,000 meters and still have fairly good accuracy.

I suggest it over the Mk.19 grenade launcher, which will none the less be produced on a very large scale, because Mk.19 velocity is only about 275m/s making it not that deadly at close range with an inerit slug (humans have survived hits by duds). Because it uses the high pressure-low pressure system we aren't really increase its MV, discarding sabot rounds aren't an option, nor are much higher chamber pressures.