paladin2019
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Re: U.S. SMGs?

Sun 22 Aug 2021, 05:02

And if you need a grease gun, use a Carl Gustav (Chuck G) M/45 with "standard" +1 to Dam and Crit of the M1911 vs. the M9 to account for the .45 ACP ammo the grease gun shares with the former.You also wouldn't be wrong to reduce the reliability a step as the last repair parts would have been bought in the late 60's or early '70s and consumed by the mid '80s. By Desert Storm, shooters were cautioned to be prepared to fire the whole magazine with every trigger pull as excessive sear wear was common.
 
Lystra
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Re: U.S. SMGs?

Fri 27 Aug 2021, 23:54

How come there aren't any SMGs in the U.S. weapon list?
There is. The MP5.
Can't find the MP5 in the players guide. Is it in there?
 
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Fenhorn
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Re: U.S. SMGs?

Sat 28 Aug 2021, 00:14

How come there aren't any SMGs in the U.S. weapon list?
There is. The MP5.
Can't find the MP5 in the players guide. Is it in there?
There was in the alpha, but it was removed for unknown reasons.
“Thanks for noticin' me.” - Eeyore
 
paladin2019
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Re: U.S. SMGs?

Sat 28 Aug 2021, 05:08

There is. The MP5.
Can't find the MP5 in the players guide. Is it in there?
There was in the alpha, but it was removed for unknown reasons.
FWIW, it got replaced with the "Swedish K" in the Swedish weapons section. Why it didn't go to the Other Military Weapons section is probably due to the tyranny of formatting. What do you drop from that collection? There are at least 4 more guns that should be included. Is there an extra page that can be squeezed in? (Is the beta version even the extent of the expanded gear section?
 
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Ursus Maior
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Re: U.S. SMGs?

Sun 29 Aug 2021, 22:54

What I don't like about the gear section are the many redundancies between weapons, especially between Soviet and Polish weapons (plus a couple of US and Swedish ones). I like the drawings very well and I think it helps players to immerse, especially those that have no personal experience with weapons. But redundancies in the depictions eat up at least one full page. That could have gone into weapons like the MP5, the Milan ATGM (mentioned with the Marder IFV, but not given stats) or the PzF 44, which was actually a weapon produced in huge quantities, much more than the Armbrust.

Also, in the artillery section the 85 mm and 90 mm calibers are missing, despite being much more common than the 76.2 mm caliber. Additionally, the 73 mm - only used in the BMP-1 and related SPG-9 - misses the main ammo type: HEAT, while mentioning the unlikely AP type. I think, a line combining 85-95 mm would be desirable, allowing to stat the T-34, ASU-85 and similar casemate SPGs as well as older German, British and US tanks and tank destroyers, including the M26, M46, M47 and M48 line of tanks as well as the M36, which saw combat in the Balkans during the 1990s, much like some late model T-34s. And especially these T-34s would have been active in the Twilight War, since they were still on active duty in Bulgaria, Romania and Yugoslavia.
liber & infractus
 
SykesFive
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Re: U.S. SMGs?

Tue 07 Sep 2021, 22:05

Presumably there would be a huge number of M231 Firing Port Weapons available. Some background on this weapon, which is somewhat forgotten even though it's still in the Army's inventory. The initial version of the M2 Bradley Infantry Fighting Vehicle had six firing ports, two on each side and two to the rear. (The M2A2 Bradley that would have represented the majority of vehicles in use during WWIII mounted extra side armor and only had the two rear ports.) The M16 was too long for use inside the vehicle; instead, each Bradley was issued a set of M231s for the embarked infantrymen to fire out the ports.

The M231 is basically an M16 with a shorter barrel, no stock, no sights, and only full automatic fire. It was intended for use from the vehicle firing ports only. That said, it could be removed, and the Twilight: 2000 1st ed. rules suggested that it often was as Bradleys were damaged or broke down and soldiers scrounged for whatever weapons they could find. The M231 would probably be best described as a submachinegun and was so rated in 1st ed.

There are really no equivalents from other countries. Soldiers of other countries that used infantry fighting vehicles with firing ports (e.g., BMP and early Marders; no firing ports on the Warrior) simply expected infantry to use their standard-issue assault rifles for both mounted and dismounted combat, even though it was very awkward.
 
paladin2019
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Re: U.S. SMGs?

Wed 08 Sep 2021, 08:42

Depending on the reality we are using, the T:2k 1e timeframe still had Bradleys in the hypothetical and the M231 still had a stock and sights; they hadn't yet or had just been deleted. T:2k has also had a tendency to play fast and loose with military definitions of SMGs. The M231, for example, has a barrel an inch longer than an M4's, and thus over 30% too long for the US designation for an SMG. The Bradley prototype approved for further development and eventual production used grease guns (as the M231 wasn't yet available) and the M231 exists because the M16A1 could never meet the desired specs. The latter will never be an open bolt machine gun firing upwards of 1200 rounds per minute. This cyclic rate is why sights and stocks were deleted from the M231. As light as it is (on par with an M16 using a grease gun like stock), it is effectively uncontrollable outside of its firing port.

There should be plenty of the machine guns available, at a stupidly high RoF of 8+ (whatever MG3s get set to), but at the standard -2 to hit for a light machine gun. And unable to be aimed as they have no sights besides the tracers they are intended to be used with exclusively.
 
SykesFive
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Re: U.S. SMGs?

Wed 08 Sep 2021, 17:19

Depending on the reality we are using, the T:2k 1e timeframe still had Bradleys in the hypothetical and the M231 still had a stock and sights; they hadn't yet or had just been deleted.
To be fair, the M231 as rated in Twilight: 2000 1st ed. was a very bad SMG, especially its range (base range 20, most SMGs base range 30, M16 base range 50). I'm not sure whether it was assumed to have the stock or not. The description in the Equipment List simply doesn't say. The illustration in the Small Arms Guide 1st ed. is hard to interpret but it may be showing a wire stock, perhaps jury-rigged.

I'd argue that GDW classified these weapons as submachineguns in part because the category of carbine wasn't much used. In the early 1980s armies were still issuing full-length battle rifles and assault rifles. The interest in shorter, lighter assault rifles and the "carbine" terminology for these either wasn't used or wasn't well-known.

The Small Arms Guide includes the following US-made SMGs:

CAR-15 (presumably this represents all 5.56mm Colt Commandos including the XM177 and GAU-5A)
CAR-15A1 (same as above but chambered for 9mm)
MAC-10
M3A1 "Grease Gun"
M231
 
paladin2019
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Re: U.S. SMGs?

Wed 08 Sep 2021, 20:07

The Small Arms Guide includes the following US-made SMGs:

CAR-15 (presumably this represents all 5.56mm Colt Commandos including the XM177 and GAU-5A)
CAR-15A1 (same as above but chambered for 9mm)
MAC-10
M3A1 "Grease Gun"
M231
FWIW, CAR-15 was simply a trade name for Colt Armalite Rifle that Colt used when they bought the design from Armalite. But, Band-Aid and Xerox.... The DoD definition of an SMG is a full auto small arm with a barrel less than 11 inches. The XM-177 sort of qualifies (at a barrel length of 11.5 inches) but most iterations of what are commonly termed CAR-15s and the M231 (with its 15.6 inch barrel) absolutely do not. I'm not sure who wrote the particular The Small Arms Guide you reference or what standard they are using to categorize small arms but including, at least, the M231 means they are not using that designation's standard. When it comes to "CAR-15s", there are so many possible configurations that the particular example may or may not be classifiable as a submachine gun by its governing standards. <shrug>
 
SykesFive
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Re: U.S. SMGs?

Wed 08 Sep 2021, 20:43

I'm referring to the Small Arms Guide for Twilight: 2000 1st ed. (1988) and trying to make sense of the entry for a submachinegun (that is a term with significance for game mechanics) called "CAR-15." I know that is a general term for Colt-produced Armalites and there are a zillion different CAR-15s. But the evidence in the book suggests the authors (GDW staffers Frank Frey and Loren Wiseman) meant to specify the various shorter-barreled models that are sometimes collectively referred to as "Colt Commandos" including the XM177.

In Twilight: 2000 1st ed., all weapons were assigned to categories that dictated a few things including which skill to use and what penalties were incurred for firing while moving. (Rate of fire, magazine capacity, range, damage, and armor penetration were stats for individual weapons.) There was no carbine category. Shorter versions of assault rifles were classified as submachineguns, two examples in the 1st ed. basic box being the M231 and "AKR" which is described as a cut-down AK-74 (and probably corresponds to what is actually designated "AKS-74U"). Submachineguns had less penalty than assault rifles for shooting while moving.

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