In 3nd ed it's 10 shots, can't find cyber shotguns in any of the 1nd/2nd ed books, nor any other cyber guns for that matter(except cyber squirt).

Cyberguns appeared in the Street Samurai Catalog IIRC, but became "core" afterwards.

Hrm, ok, then i think i misread that somehow . .

I'd allow the blood thing in my game simply because it adds an interesting plot device.

The human body contains about 5.6 liters of blood. Raising blood temperature one degree C would take 23,430 joules of energy, which translates to a 23 kilowatt/second power use. Take some physical in exchange for lasing some guy on a last ditch effort? I'd allow it.

OK, seems like i will have to dig through my SR3 Books again.
Someone mentioned some obscure little rule that seemingly allowed to get any kind of equipment in a Form that can be built into cyberlimbs for 4x the original Price . .

Thanks i found it, 4 shots for shotgun in that.

THAT I can get behind: 1 in the tube and three in the tube, 9" will fit in a cyber-forearm. Thanks!

Not a drum magazine, a helical magazine.

Cartridges are arraigned in a spiral, allowing for extremely compact arrangement.

The Calico series is probably the best known real world example of a gun using helical mags.

Take a 12 ga shell, which is roughly .72" diameter. Even if we account for the internal spring winding mechanism, it's probably a cylinder no bigger than 10-11 inches in length, and a 2-3 inches in diameter.

Still bulky, but a little more manageable.

OK, I see what you're getting at now (thanks for the links). Based on the cutaway though, the magazine is almost six "diameters" in width, so call that 4.25" / 10.75cm in diameter... That looks like it would actually work, but it's still WAY too much for a lower arm, especially including feed, breech, bolt and barrel. In the upper arm (of a troll or really big orc) I can see it, but then you need to get the rounds through the elbow. OK, so not ENTIRELY undoable but still a nightmare. That's why I always think of the old 1st/2nd Ed magazine because it's simple enough to shoehorn in alongside the barrel.

In the street samurai catalog we have 12 shots for hold-outs, 10 for light pistols and machine-pistols, 8 for smg's, 6 for heavy pistols and 4 for shotguns (internal ammo for all).

In the 4th edition we have 2 shots for hold-outs, 12 for light pistols, machine-pistols and smg's, 10 for heavy pistols and 10 for shotguns.

Seems like technology really improved for the bigger weapons and unevolved for hold-outs, right?

THIS is why i would go with External-Weapon-Mounts for Legs ^^

Maybe make it a Trollarina with really beautifull cyber legs. Long or Mini-Skirts.
Working one of those Retro-Stuffer-Shacks serving customers in their cars.(get your mind out of the gutter)
With built in Roller-Skates or Hover-Discs under the feet.

(Thanks for the complete downloads, for those of us whose old books are in storage 4+ hours away)

My point exactly.

Might be caseless shells. Actually for an internal weapon I would bet that they all are designed for caseless ammo. That would make it a little easier since caseless is more compact.

Oh, and have a look at CP2020 and their Chrome Book series. You'll find all kinds of interesting cyber guns and weapons.

Boo! Half the fun of putting a stubber in your arm is watching shell casings coming out of your wrist. Bonus points for scorch marks around the spare orifice.

I was assuming caseless... caseless doesn't save so much space as some people seem to think. Shotgun shells are only a small amount (height wise) of powder/brass. Unless you were going to limit the thing to slugs only, you still have to come up with some kind of shround to keep the pellets together until they leave the barrel. That all takes space.

There are a couple major advantages to implanting a laser weapon, even if the base weapon is bulkier.

• A regular firearm has moving parts (heavy, high velocity moving parts), and so while you can dispense with the portions of the weapons that are there for ergonomics, the portions that are there to guide and restrain the moving parts must remain. A laser weapon doesn't have any moving parts, so it's parts can be attached directly to the structural members of the forearm.
• In a firearm, the shape of parts, and their relation to each other is fixed (or nearly). In a laser weapon they are not. Emitter placement is fixed, but everything else can be moved around for the best fit to the space. Parts can even be moved to the upper arm, which would be about impossible for a firearm. Even placing ammo there would be 'interesting' engineering, and conspicuous, and unreliable. Parts can also be replaced by ones with the same function, but a different shape (a long skinny circuit board instead of a fat one, 2 smaller capacitors replacing a larger one...).

This doesn't help with heat, but would help a great deal with bulk.

OK, from a purely structural engineering standpoint, you're completey correct that a laser system (with the exception of the terminal lasing and focusing components) can be completely dissociated with each other in terms of arangement.


OK, problem is - I touched this earlier - is that while a lot of the available space in a conventionl firearm is void or solid mass that serves secondary purposes, a laser weapon, in LARGE part due to your completely accurate observation above - is packed to the gills in every nook and cranny with something vital to the "core" operation: firing a weapon-grade laser. Changing the shape of a circuitboard isn't always a practical - or possible - option, depending on details of the engineering, unless you're willing/able to sacrifice some performance somewhere. Two smaller capacitors means you have to add MORE hardware to deal with load balancing. Everything's a tradeoff when you get into an operation like this.


Unless the Devs would be so kind as to toss up a scale picture of the laser "pistol" with something like a Manhunter for comparison, heat aside, I still believe that the total bulk of "core" components in a laser is going to functionally exceed the available capacity in a cyberlimb less than troll-scale, where even then I'd say it's a stretch. Now, there was a post a ways up now that talked about exactly how much heat you'd need to dump and the effects on the (meta)human body, but the total scale of heat buildup is going to be entirely based on the conversion efficiency of the lasing medium. Modern high-power lasers aren't actually that efficient, though that is changing. My problem is, despite twenty years of progress, Ares really hasn't progressed far enough to convince me they hit the Holy Grail.

My reasoning goes something like this: 2070's heavy ground warfare is probably going to be done by "heavy infantry" - troopers in powered compbat armor. Now, I'm not talking baby mecha or anything so rediculous, just advanced versions of what is described in Arsenal: Heavy military-grade full-body armor with powered assist to AGIlity and STRength. Those muscles take power. The sealed life-support system takes power. Sensors and on-board computers take power. Same for communications, jammers, and all the other things that would get shoehored into a suit of high-end military PCA. But in 2070, let's face it: power's easy. Sure, you may have a pretty short total duration in the field, say 24 hours in combat conditions, but you're going to run out of ammunition WAY faster than that. Ammunition is dangerous to transport, especially with a front-line resupply mission. But if you put the equivalent weight of ammunition as super-high-density peak-discharge capacitors in an armored box on the back where the chain gun's ammo canister was, you now have a tremendously large basic operating budget for power, and you could have a recoilless point-and-shoot light-speed weapon system whose only limit is how quickly you can resupply the troops with power. And power's easy, relatively speaking; think of a couple ammunition hauling grunts in special custom PCAs set up as giant copper-tops on legs. They're as mobile as the troops they're supporting, can reload with a single connection rather than havig to move containers both in the field and at the resupply point.

But with that being said, none of that has hit the field. That tells me Ares is still short of the point where a "laser rifle" is standard military issue. If ammunition based weapons are still the best possible choice, there's work to be done. Now, I WILL conceed that the technology has made some big strides since the 2050 Street Samurai Catalog, but they aren't there, yet. My bet is that the efficiency still isn't there yet on the primary lasing, and that heat remains a problem.

Anybody and everybody is free to disagree, of course, but that's my take on it. Should we see a new Redline Laser Pistol 2074! that will fit in a conventional holster, then I'll happily revisit the issue and sample a little rook with my hat... and take the MAGic hit and get a partial cyberlimb with one mounted inside.

Concerning heat, i got a little question:
How hot does a Heavy Pistol get when shot multiple times in fast succession?
How about an SMG? Or a Shotgun?

It's a valid question. Thirty rounds out of my personal Glock 22 in as many seconds and the slide is still touchable. An SMG is even hotter, presumably. But one of the biggest determinants of heat in automatic weapons is the method of operation. Direct gas impingement recoil operation (AR-15 family as a common example) actually taps gas from the outbound shot to work the action, putting the hottest gas back where you started. That makes things hot in a hurry, as in 212F+ with a single clip on full auto. Switching to a piston system leaves the breech and barrel cool enough to handle after several clips. Presumably, for an internal weapon, you're going to go with the most reliable (jams are going to SUCK inside a cyberlimb) and coolest. Oh, incidentally, direct impingement also fouls the breech faster.

*empty look* uhu @.@

Don't look at me in that tone of voice, you silly troll!

Short version: some guns get really hot while others stay cool for a long time, depending on how they reload themselves.

Oh, and thank you for the pics of the lasers. Having seen the pics from SR3, I now FIRMLY stand behind my earlier statements on lasers. The image of the Redline Pistol shows a weapon with about the same bulk as a good sized SMG just in a side view, but certain details suggest it's actually wider as well... think Super Soaker with the tank. That's not going to fit well in a limb at all. And the power pack's even larger than a standard clip, though it's possibly shorter in height, it's a lot wider, almost short Assault Rifle size (think 20-round M-16 from 'Nam). Sorry, folks, until the next gen of lasers shows up, I have to say they're not usable in a limb... yet. But they're definitely getting a lot closer.

See? that's how you have to talk to me about this kind of thing. THAT i actually understood ^^
So, basically, an internal gun had better be Caseless and pass Gas out the Front of the barrel for a nice big muzzle flash?
I can live with that. Style is important after all ^^
Also, if the Ares Redline is about SMG Size and i can get an SMG implanted, then why NOT the Redline?
External clip port would not have to accomodate the complete flash pack, only a cable that can lead the power into the weapon from outside.
Granted, you lose the biggest advantage of built in guns, the concealability, with that, but you gain a bit more practicality.
further more, i'd say that the internal reservoir of a Laser-Gun does not have to fit as many loads as the usual Power Pack.
After the first shot, the disguise/shock/surprise moment is usually over anyway . . hmm, now i imagine a runner running around with a kind of adapter.
Put one end into the Arm, put one end into a wall power outlet and shoot people dead *snickers* Yes, i know, Wall-Socket-Current ain't gonna cut it.
But it's a funny thought ^^

Problem is, the external packs are as forbidden as the weapons themselves. And sure, you could go with a two or three shot internal capacitor to save room, but that was a condition I stipulated back when lasers first came up way up the thread. On the other hand, you COULD put a bigish pack in an upper arm to feed the lower... but keep in mind: when they say "implanted SMG" they're deleting all stock, all casing worth mentioning, everything but the barrel, breech, bolt and whatever's handling ammunition feed and storage. That means that a weapon the SIZE of an SMG that's packed solid with light-weight but bulky bits is going to take up FAR more room in a cyberlimb, even allowing for the distribution of parts all over creation.
Caseless has nothing to do with if the weapon heats up or not, actually. The advantages are basically two: you can get more ammunition into the same relative space in the magazine. How much more? That's an interesting question. If we're talking a bullet with lots of lead and not so much brass by comparison (Say, .45 ACP), then going caseless is going to have a LOT less impact than on an assault rifle round where most of the length/width is actually brass. The second advantage, and it's a big one from an engineering and reliability standpoint, is that you don't need to worry about dealing with a spent casing in ANY way and can afford to eliminate an ejection port AND could in theory make the breech backwards air/watertight. That helps tremendously with things like sand, mud and other environmental contaminants. You'd want to go with a recoil system that has NO additional breech fouling (Electronic Firing as described, whatever the actual methods used to achieve the effect comes to mind especially strongly). Make sense?

enough for me, thank you, again ^^

So, I was thinking, without turning yourself into a cyber-zombie, I believe that you could work out with your GM having a laser pistol in you cyber-arm if you also had a cyber-torso which would handle all the dissipating heat. (perhaps having a small built-in refrigerator like the ones used to coll beer).
Just a thought.