What's the standard issue a soldier in the army gets? Also, what's the general professionalism rating/skill levels/stats of a grunt?

Oh lord.

Numerous threads have been devoted to the topic without any particular result.

There are no canon indications of UCAS Army ratings. The general conensus involves the Colt M22A2 and the Colt little brother, primarily because they resemble the M-16 and variants in favor with the current US military.

Did you have a specific branch of the service in mind?

-Siege

Great. Another board faux pas. I suppose that's what the search button is for, huh. Feh.

I only have typical grunts, pathfinder/scout/sniper types and armour crews in mind. That's it.

On a side note, if you're not going to kill yourself with too much thought, just grab the soldiers in a particular module and use them as a basis.

Speaking of which, does anybody besides me think the XM8 looks rather futuristic? Slap a few blue glowing lines on that frame and we've got a nanotech gun of the future.

Okay, maybe I've just been playing too much red faction 2.

I also wonder why it isn't a bullpup rifle, given the current trend. Anyone care to enlighten me?

Its combination of retro style and a sleak, new age streamlined frame make this weapon a "must have" accesory for the coming season. Mmmkay?

It looks good on paper but I haven't heard anything about the practical application.

-Siege

Bullpups look cool but have their drawbacks: Try exchanging the magazine while you are lying prone...

BTW, I think the XM-8 is a good weapon. It's basically a G36 (current assault rifle of e.g. the German and Spanish armies) with a new outer shell.

The closest you get to cannonical source is that the old Street Samurai Catalog the Colt M-22 and HK G12 were both listed as in the trials for the "squad rifle trials"
I suspect Colt would get the contract to supprot home industries. The CAS uses the AUG system. The UCAS does use the Ares-Stoner HMG, and freaquently small arms contracts go to the same dealer.

One thing I might expect to see in the future is more fragmented gear aquisition contracts in the military. With the megacorps constantly fighting for them, they might change yearly, and it's probably not in the government's best budgetary interests to grant long term contracts (since the need to renegotiate every few years would drive prices way down and keep quality up).

They mention in SotA:63 that Tir's arms producer had a deal with the UCAS government that was dropped and handed to Ares due to product delays. Therefore, I'd tend to agree with Tinker Gnome that contracts are much more tenuous than current dealings. That also agrees with Desert Wars as an annual showcase of miltary hardware.

The soldiers in Brainscan are armed with M22A2s (note that there's an error in CC and the underbarrel GL goes with the M22A2 and not the M23) and one has a Browning Max Power.

If Ares keeps the contracts for a long time, I'd expect the Alpha to be adopted in 5-10 years. Note that the M22A2 has been around since '48

Don't have Field of Fire within reach now, but I believe there is an entry under the Colt Cobra SMG stating it was considered as standard weaponry for UCAS army... with an underbarrel grenade launcher, if I recall correctly...


Every stat in a module/adventure seems to use mainly the ColtM22a2 (w/HE defensive and concussion mini-grenades in Brainscan, and they gave the mage a Browning Max-Power).

FoF mentions a blurb that mentions, quote, "I hear the UCAS is gonna pick these up any day."

It's not mentioned as canon, but given the tendency to give Colt products to the UCAS military, it's highly likely the Cobra was adopted a PDW.

-Siege

Tzeench used to have info on this topic on his webpage, but the SR section has been down a long time. I saved some of the html pages and looked for them on my hard drive. Paraphrased here without permission.

The UCAS will use armor equivalent to armored vests with gel pack inserts over vital areas. He doesn't seem to think much of the military-grade armor suits.

Weapons will be loaded with caseless armor piercing rounds. The rifles will be limited to bursts, but SAWs and support weapons will be fully automatic. All weapons will have a flash hider.

All weapons will have iron sights and many will have reflex sights, most will have clip-on smartgun links (he doesn't believe many will be built in). Thermo, low light, electronic magnification, and range finding system will be on the weapons as well, but the display will be on smart goggles instead of the weapon.

Two members of every fireteam will have under-rifle grenade launchers (URGL) and carry both anti-personnel and anti-armor grenades, as well as projectiles for illumination, smoke, and incendiary. The grenades will be air-timed, tied to the sensors on the rifle and can be set to impact with a button or switch.

Grunts will carry "at least one or two rifle launched grenades for indirect fire" and some a supply of minigrenades for their URGL. He thinks the OCSW (a semi and full automatic grenade launcher) will replace the .50 as a support weapon. Each squad will have an OCSW broken down, it will replace the "M-249/M-60 class of weapon."

Every fireteam will have a SAW and the assistant gunner will carry extra ammunition and no extra grenades.

He thinks several grunts will carry LAWs with dual purpose anti-armor and anti-air missiles capable of homing in on painted targets.

Everyone will have smartgoggles with glare protection. The goggles will have their own low light, thermo, and magnification, for redundency. Helmets will have internal wiring to plug datajacks, smartgoggles, and comm gear. It will also act as an antenna. There will also be some kind of noise filtration/protection.
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He didn't specify any SR weapons. The M-23 probably works find as a base rifle to add things to. Either the Ingram Valiant or Ares MP-LMG work for SAWs, although they'd have to do the same damage as assault rifles (or very close) because SAWs use the same ammunition as whatever rifle is issued. No existing SR weapon matches the description of an OCSW to my knowledge. The LAW launcher exists in SR (CC pg 28), although it'd need a better missile to fit his idea.

Here's a UCAS military thread from a while ago. People had different opinions that what I just put up.

I'd second the Ares argument, since the VP of the UCAS is on the board of Ares and all. Ares Predator (II for those soldiers with smartlinks/smartgoggles) as sidearm, probably an Ares assault rifle. I'd say the Ares Alpha would go to one or two people in a platoon, similar to how the M60 (I think...M16 with a grenade launcher in the USA military) is distributed, with a stripped down just plain assault rifle for the grunts, possibly smartgun equipped for users with smartlinks or for use with smart goggles.

The Abstruse One

Colt is a wholly owned subsidiary of Ares Arms, a division of Ares Corp. No need for the chosen arms of the UCAS armed forces to necessarily be an Ares gun; even if you feel that the contract should go to Ares Corp, there are other brandnames to work with.

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.

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)

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

Don

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

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.

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.