UCAS Armed Forces, What do they carry? Options

[Nath]

[otomik]

[TinkerGnome]

The cost on the Alpha is prohibitive, but it's a lot cheaper than any other assault rifle when you consider the costs of smartlinks. It'd probably be standard issue for any soldier with the 'ware to support it.

[otomik]

even though Colt today sucks really badly and should die it will not be sold to another company because through some bizarre turn of events they are partially owned by the state of Connecticut which doesn't allow them to be sold or moved or anything. all they are today is a name and once the M4 contracts are done with I don't think the US Military will ever deal with Colt again (Colt is notorious for labor despute problems and the military had to contract M16s to be made by Fabrique Nationale)

[FlakJacket]

[Nath]

[shadd4d]

Who is this significant other and where do you find out about him?

Don

[Nath]

[Siege]

[FlakJacket]

[TinkerGnome]

[Siege]

I have never believed the prices in the book were listed at "whole sale" value.

Never mind SI markup for buying illegal goods or buying goods illegally, but think about the daily mark up.

I worked (briefly) at a supermarket frozen food section. I had a chance to see what the retail markup actually was. Ouch. The advertised sale was usually just a little more than the sale price from the vendor.

Now, cutting out the middle-man markup and sell directly to your customer -- I'd imagine Ares could deal in bulk discounts. Dealing with simple numbers, instead of 50 nuyen raw profit from each weapon, cut it down to 25 nuyen for a guaranteed five year run.

That's a hell of an incentive for procurement officers. And the lucrative parts contracts that follow a guaranteed run are gravy for the supplying corp.

-Siege

[TinkerGnome]

Well, I understand about markups and the like, but within an industry they tend to be relatively similar. Supermarkets probably aren't the best example here since they literally work on a single digit percentage markup unlike most other industries. I know I worked in a game store for a while and our markup was in the 50% range on almost everything.

Someone who's worked in the gun industry or a gun shop could probably tell us the markup, but I'd say for a given kind of weapon it's pretty standard. ARs might be x% and pistols of z type might be y%.

In any case, the Alpha wouldn't likely be considered until the mid-late 60s if only because the military likes to test things over the long term before buying thousands of them.

[Blaze]

Your mileage may vary, but I equip UCAS military units with the M23 and M22A2 (both chambered in 6mm Caseless) in the same way that the M16A2 and M16/M203 (respectively) are used in modern times. The Alpha is finding a niche in special operations units, where it's more common for the troops to have a Smartlink fitted. The Cobra's the favourite for vehicle crews or as a CQB weapon, while the HK227 and MP5TX are more commonly seen in the hands of the FBI and Secret Service.
A nasty thought also occurs- special operations units, especially naval-based ones, facing the potential of combat against vehicles may consider reworking the Alpha to replace the grenade launcher with a gyrojet pistol. Equipped with Seeker-plus rockets and a top-mounted target designator, that'd give the trooper the ability to deal with light armoured vehicles without breaking out the LAWs. Unit price wouldn't be that much more expensive than the standard Alpha, and the gyrojet ammo is shot-for-shot cheaper than most variants of air-timed minigrenades.

-JH.