Timeline for How is warfare affected when armor has (temporarily) outpaced guns? How can guns compete?
Current License: CC BY-SA 4.0
11 events
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| Oct 23, 2019 at 15:44 | comment | added | Dragongeek | Training military forces in hand-to-hand would also not be cost-effective. In wartime, any Joe/Jane can be pushed through basic and have the capability to be a member of an effective fighting force in only 8-9 weeks. Training someone to be an effective melee combatant? No way. Learning to fight with a sword/axe takes way longer than it does to learn to shoot. Anyone can pick up a gun and kill someone with only a minimum of training. Hell, you don't even need to be particularly fit to shoot a gun while without conditioning an axe-wielder wouldn't be able to fight for more than a minute. | |
| Oct 23, 2019 at 15:37 | comment | added | Dragongeek | You also need to understand one of the military's primary goals: spend as little money possible on each solider without compromising combat effectiveness. Why aren't all soldiers kitted out high-powered rifles? Because it would be a waste of money. If suddenly high powered rifles were required to defeat their foes, then the military would use them. It's not as if there's a lack of big guns, hardly anything new would need to be invented. Once you've got your soldier equipped with an elephant gun, their opponents will die of blunt force trauma before they get into pole-arm range. | |
| Oct 23, 2019 at 15:32 | comment | added | Dragongeek | Ok, first of all even if the armor is light weight and able to stop common military rounds, that doesn't mean they have no effect. A rifle round hitting your chest can still crack or break ribs even if it doesn't penetrate. Also while your axe or warhammer may pack an equal punch energy-wise, any idiot with a gun can pump out hammer-blow equivalent shots all day as long as they have the ammo. It's not as if guns get less effective in short ranges, as long as you're not in physical contact ranges. In fact, all guns have significantly higher energy at close distances. | |
| Oct 23, 2019 at 15:20 | comment | added | wolfsshield | @Dragongeek IF the armor were impervious to all man carried firearms, then your standard melee would be useless. But Soldiers would start carrying around blow-torchs or some thing that can cut the armor off or weld it stiff so the encased Soldier loses mobility. Ranged weapons would start including epoxies that would glue joints stiff or seal off escape hatches in the armor. The result would be an instant memorial to the poor sap still inside unless his allies could crack him back out. | |
| Oct 23, 2019 at 12:24 | comment | added | joeytwiddle | The slow blade penetrates the shield | |
| Oct 22, 2019 at 14:02 | comment | added | ksbes | I just do not understand you people! Have you ever read the question you answering? Where have you found bullet immunity? ."..can easily stop most bullets like 9mm and 5.56mm..." - that is all! This armor doesn't even stop all lowcaliber bullets. And axe (and, ironicaly, warhammer) strike has more energy and in some cases more penetrating ability than 9mm or even 7.62mm bullet. And of case knife strike to weakpoint is always the option. So yes, hand-to hand is not preferable way of fighting, but it just would be more probable. | |
| Oct 22, 2019 at 13:31 | comment | added | Dragongeek | I don't think that there would be a resurgence in hand-to-hand combat if armor were suddenly amazing. If armor is suddenly good enough to make you immune to bullets (and their physical effects), then no hand-to-hand weapon is going to be able to harm you. People could wail on each other with swords, bats, knives all day long without suffering any damage. Hell, you probably wouldn't be able to choke someone who's wearing completely bulletproof armor. I think ranged weapons would still be used. If a strong enough bullet hits you in the throat, you can still die even if the bullet bounces off | |
| Oct 21, 2019 at 16:50 | vote | accept | Seraphim | ||
| Oct 21, 2019 at 16:50 | |||||
| Oct 21, 2019 at 12:48 | comment | added | Borgh | The WH40K bolters are perfectly sensible if you regularly encounter 10-foot sentient fungoids or Beings From Hell. | |
| Oct 21, 2019 at 12:11 | history | edited | ksbes | CC BY-SA 4.0 |
added 4 characters in body
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| Oct 21, 2019 at 6:48 | history | answered | ksbes | CC BY-SA 4.0 |