iPoon.be wrote:
Its funny how little its used as a personnel carrier i think its because the passengers get shitty guns, while reall transport gets 2-shotkill sniping machineguns
(FYI in an APC the passengers cannot interact with the environment, e.g. BMP3, whereas in an Armoured Fighting Vehicle, or AFV, the passengers get gun ports and/or mounted weapons.)
Well, on the Bradley the standard weapons are short-barrel, stockless, high RoF, belt-fed variants of the M16 that mount into the gunports via a screw fitted cowling on the barrel sheath. I think BF2 got this right on the AFVs.
The weapons on the RIBs (Rigid-hulled Inflatable Boats) seem like over-powered SAWs... which I think is right for the typical weapon that a rapid-deployment assault-boat would get equipped with.
The M134 miniguns in the Blackhawk are terrible (v1.3). In reality they are 7.62mm NATO (so should be G3, M24 or L96A1 damage levels) and fire at over 10,000 rounds per minute. The reason they have 6 rotating barrels is to prevent rapid overheating. They are designed for long, sustained bursts. They are totally bogus in BF2, but at the same time infinite ammo would be ridiculous for those weapons' rate of fire.
The .50 cal chopper guns and jeep guns are terrible. They do nowhere near enough damage or spash-damage; they should totally shred unarmoured vehicles like FAVs, RIBs and transport choppers and be a threat to light armoured vehicles like APCs, AFVs and larger jeeps. Their RoF is totally nerfed (~300RPM vs ~550-600RPM) and they overheat too quickly even on short bursts. The M2HB Browning .50 calibre machinegun has been a defacto standard the world over since US involvement in WWII started. There is a reason for that and it is NOT because of how awful it is.
The Hind chin gun is totally nerfed too. Don't get me started on how badly it got screwed.
Another weapon that has been getting very popular among US forces is the GECAL50 minigun. It uses the standard .50 Calibre Browning MachineGun (.50BMG or 50BMG) as described above, and comes in either a rotating 3 or 6 barrel form. The 6 barrel version has a RoF twice as high as the 3 barrel. The RoF is not as high as the M134 but is still impressive. Given that the 50BMG round carries five times the energy of the 7.62mm NATO so this is an impressive suppression weapon. The GECAL50's are most often seen on Blackhawk and larger transport helicopters.
Yet another weapon that has been described as a "Technological Orphan" is the M214 minigun. It is very very similar to the M134 but scaled-down to fire 5.56mm NATO. It is a masterpiece of design and engineering; it is a 6 barrel rotary cannon firing 5000-6000RPM in a package light enough and portable enough to be carried by an individual footsoldier. First brought to prominence in the movie "Predator", the XM214 (as it was known then) got referred to as "The Amazing Rotary Machinegun As Used To Such Great Effect By Blaine In Predator" in cult gun-geeking circles. It was later used by Arnold Schwartzenegger in "Terminator 2". The disadvantage with the M214 as a squad support weapon is that the backpack of 2000 rounds of belted ammunition is used in about 25 seconds of continuous fire. Using the weapon as a vehicle-mounted system alleviates the ammo problems by using longer belts but nullifies its most attractive attribute, which is its portability. Additionally, the M214 lacks the effective range and power that is expected of a mounted weapon and the types of mounts that the M214 would be found on would hold larger, more attractive systems like the M60E, M134, Browning .50cal M2HB and GECAL50. Which is where the M214's reputation as an "orphan" comes from; a fine weapon looking for a home.
Sorry, got waffling.
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