Best resource for guns?

[Atgxtg]

On 10/23/2016 at 9:21 PM, SDLeary said:

Yes, but somewhat relevant to the OP, as they are looking for a Western/Steampunk game. In the late 1880's adoption in Europe began, and the new propellants were reportedly 2-3 times as powerful. 

 

Yeah, but I believe smokeless powder wasn't available in the older calibers. I think they all used new custom calibers for precisely that reason. So the chance of winding up with one of the advanced powders in a black power weapon were pretty slim. Someone would probably have to go out of their wave to get the more powerful powder, ignore the multitude of warnings that they would get while doing so, and then have a way of loading the powder into a weapon like an old muzzle loader- a really really bad idea. I suspect that the problem of too powerful a propellant is a more modern one, since modernn manufacturers have introduced more powerful propellants into older cartridges such as the 45 ACP and 9mm Parabellum, so there is more of a risk of somebody loading a hundred year old firearm (such as a Colt M1911) with a round it can't handle (like a .45 ACP +P+ cartridge), and blowing the gun up. 

 

Most of the pre-cartridge firearms weren't all that reliable either. And even some of the early cartridges weren't all that safe. Volcanics come to mind. Blowing your own gun up was more commonplace that today. I've read that during a firefight, it wasn't unknown for a soldier to accidentally double load a muzzle loader. 

 

 

[Toadmaster]

10 hours ago, Atgxtg said:

 

Yeah, but I believe smokeless powder wasn't available in the older calibers. I think they all used new custom calibers for precisely that reason. So the chance of winding up with one of the advanced powders in a black power weapon were pretty slim. Someone would probably have to go out of their wave to get the more powerful powder, ignore the multitude of warnings that they would get while doing so, and then have a way of loading the powder into a weapon like an old muzzle loader- a really really bad idea. I suspect that the problem of too powerful a propellant is a more modern one, since modernn manufacturers have introduced more powerful propellants into older cartridges such as the 45 ACP and 9mm Parabellum, so there is more of a risk of somebody loading a hundred year old firearm (such as a Colt M1911) with a round it can't handle (like a .45 ACP +P+ cartridge), and blowing the gun up. 

 

Most of the pre-cartridge firearms weren't all that reliable either. And even some of the early cartridges weren't all that safe. Volcanics come to mind. Blowing your own gun up was more commonplace that today. I've read that during a firefight, it wasn't unknown for a soldier to accidentally double load a muzzle loader. 

 

 

It was an issue once smokeless powders became common place, so the 1890s and early 20th century. There were still a lot of older black powder guns in service, alongside more modern guns which could handle the hotter smokeless loads. In a time of poor consumer safety you could potentially find black powder safe loads on the shelf with dangerous (in an older gun) smokeless loads. Some blackpowder cartridges that survived into the smokeless era include .303 British, .32 S&W Long, .32-20, .38 S&W, .38 Long Colt, .44 S&W "American" .44-40, .44 Russian, .45 S&W, .45 Colt, .45-70, and .455 Webley. Smokeless powder was in wide spread use by the 1890s but most of these could still be found in new guns into the 1940s, a few continue to be popular today.

[Atgxtg]

8 hours ago, Toadmaster said:

It was an issue once smokeless powders became common place, so the 1890s and early 20th century. There were still a lot of older black powder guns in service, alongside more modern guns which could handle the hotter smokeless loads. In a time of poor consumer safety you could potentially find black powder safe loads on the shelf with dangerous (in an older gun) smokeless loads. Some blackpowder cartridges that survived into the smokeless era include .303 British, .32 S&W Long, .32-20, .38 S&W, .38 Long Colt, .44 S&W "American" .44-40, .44 Russian, .45 S&W, .45 Colt, .45-70, and .455 Webley. Smokeless powder was in wide spread use by the 1890s but most of these could still be found in new guns into the 1940s, a few continue to be popular today.

Commercial ammo of that era, which used smokeless powder  typically reduced the amount of propellant in the cartridge so there shouldn't have been a problem. And the more powerful rounds were in new calibers. So again, there shouldn't have been much of a problem in the 1890s or early 20th century. The problem areas would be if someone was reloading their own ammo (too easy to overdo it), and/or adapting a pre-cartridge weapon to smokeless powder (smokless powder required a jacketed round to prevent damage to the barrel).

[Toadmaster]

10 hours ago, Atgxtg said:

Commercial ammo of that era, which used smokeless powder  typically reduced the amount of propellant in the cartridge so there shouldn't have been a problem. And the more powerful rounds were in new calibers. So again, there shouldn't have been much of a problem in the 1890s or early 20th century. The problem areas would be if someone was reloading their own ammo (too easy to overdo it), and/or adapting a pre-cartridge weapon to smokeless powder (smokless powder required a jacketed round to prevent damage to the barrel).

Often that was the case, but there were commercial hot loads out there. Winchester in particular offered ammunition for at least the .44-40 and .45-70 around the turn of the century that was marketed as "High Velocity". It was specifically for use in their later (stronger) 1886 (.45-70) and 1892 (.44-40) lever action rifles. Warning was provided that the HV cartridges were not for use in older weapons or handguns. This "hot ammunition was discontinued many years later due to product liability concerns (basically consumer protection laws became a thing).  

[Atgxtg]

Sounds a lot like the problems that exist today with older pistols chambered for .45 ACP and 9mm Parabellum rounds. 

[Toadmaster]

I think it is just a natural state of marketing that gun / ammo makers want to up the ante in some way to make themselves stand out. Seems to have been kind of a back and forth between a standard of "hey, really don't use this in a gun it is not made for" and "we'll just take care of that problem for you by making sure it don't fit in the wrong guns".

The introduction of the .357 Magnum in 1935 seems to have started a trend towards making sure you can't stuff a hot cartridge into the wrong gun, a trend that lasted into the 80s. The late 80s or early 90s is when you start to see the introduction of +P and +P+ cartridges which are not safe in all the guns that can chamber them. Today there are quite a few high power loads available that require some discretion in their use. 

 

[Thot]

Hm, reading the above... is there a more-or-less direct conversion formula for impact energy in joules to BRP weapon damage? Or a table of some kind?

[Guest Vile Traveller]

Well, OP is asking for old guns, otherwise I'd have pointed at this:  

 

[Thot]

I just did a basic calculation based on a few known weapons from the BGB:

Name	Dmg	Rng	J	Avrg Dam	MinDmg	Max Dmg	J/AvrgDmg	J/MinDmg	J/MaxDmg
Pistol, Heavy	1D10+2	15	2000	7,5	3	12	267	667	167
Revolver, Light	1D6	15	1000	3,5	1	6	286	1000	167
Revolver, Medium	1D8	25	1500	4,5	1	8	333	1500	188
Rifle, Assault	2D6+2	90	1800	9	4	14	200	450	129
Rifle, Sniper	2D10+4	250	3600	15	6	24	240	600	150

 

From these results, it seems that about 150 Joules of muzzle energy are 1 point of maximum damage, with numbers being a lot less clear for average and minimum numbers.

[soltakss]

14 hours ago, Thot said:

I just did a basic calculation based on a few known weapons from the BGB:

Name	Dmg	Rng	J	Avrg Dam	MinDmg	Max Dmg	J/AvrgDmg	J/MinDmg	J/MaxDmg
Pistol, Heavy	1D10+2	15	2000	7,5	3	12	267	667	167
Revolver, Light	1D6	15	1000	3,5	1	6	286	1000	167
Revolver, Medium	1D8	25	1500	4,5	1	8	333	1500	188
Rifle, Assault	2D6+2	90	1800	9	4	14	200	450	129
Rifle, Sniper	2D10+4	250	3600	15	6	24	240	600	150

 

From these results, it seems that about 150 Joules of muzzle energy are 1 point of maximum damage, with numbers being a lot less clear for average and minimum numbers.

That is useful. Where did you get the value for Joules from?

[Thot]

2 hours ago, soltakss said:

That is useful. Where did you get the value for Joules from?

Wikipedia, actually. I took some standard calibres and looked the muzzle energy up. I had to make guesses for the calibre, of course: 5.56mm NATO for the assault rifle, 14mm for the sniper rifle, .44 for the Heavy pistol, etc.

(Some had just muzzle velocity and bullet mass, but that's then just (energy in joules)=1/2*(mass in kg)*(muzzle velocity in m/s)² )

With that and the above, one can, for example, conclude that the Soviet AK-47 with its 7.62×39mm cartridge and a muzzle energy of roughly 2100J (depending on cartridge  type) should have a single-shot max damage of around 16 and an average damage of around 10.5, so something like 2D6+4 should do it for that weapon/cartridge.

 

Edited November 5, 2016 by Thot

[Thot]

Just for the fun of it: The German WW2 standard rifle ammunition was 7,92 × 57 mm with a muzzle energy of 3600 to 4100 joules. Using the above assault rifle as a reference, that would give it a max damage of about 28 (!) and a damage of about 18, or in other words, something like 4D6+4. Obviously, at some point, the linear joules-to-damage equation breaks. Or the Germans won WW2. Your choice.

A tank gun (using the 120mm smooth bore cannon from Rheinmetall which is used in the German Leopard  MBT as a reference) has a muzzle energy of around 13,000,000 joules (13MJ).  As that equates to 15 dice of damage, and using the above weapons as a reference:

1,800 J -> 2D6+2 (average 9, max 14)

13,880 J -> 2D10+4 (average 15, max 24)

13,000,000 J -> 15D6 (average 52.5, max 90)

 

I am sure the designers just handwaved the numbers a bit to get approximately plausible values, but I wonder if we could find a progression that works...

[Atgxtg]

On 11/4/2016 at 2:51 PM, Thot said:

I just did a basic calculation based on a few known weapons from the BGB:

Name	Dmg	Rng	J	Avrg Dam	MinDmg	Max Dmg	J/AvrgDmg	J/MinDmg	J/MaxDmg
Pistol, Heavy	1D10+2	15	2000	7,5	3	12	267	667	167
Revolver, Light	1D6	15	1000	3,5	1	6	286	1000	167
Revolver, Medium	1D8	25	1500	4,5	1	8	333	1500	188
Rifle, Assault	2D6+2	90	1800	9	4	14	200	450	129
Rifle, Sniper	2D10+4	250	3600	15	6	24	240	600	150

 

From these results, it seems that about 150 Joules of muzzle energy are 1 point of maximum damage, with numbers being a lot less clear for average and minimum numbers.

What weapons did you use for the light and medium revolvers? 100) J of energy is better than a 9mm or .45 ACP. And most .44 Magnums come in at around 1500J rather than 2000J

[Thot]

After our other discussion, I would probably place the light revolver more in the .32 or .38 range, so definitely less than 1000, more like 250 J.

For the medium, I used one of the heavier .45 Colt rounds:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/.45_Colt

But of course, there's always a range here, so it is not so easy to assign which is which.