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[Madman198237]

No, it got hilariously POLARIZED rolls. 10 for effectiveness, but also 10 for bugs. We'd have to try re-rolling *everything*, at great risk, to improve it. Basically, the only real "bug" (As in, thing you might not EXPECT from a grenade launcher) is that, um, actually nothing. I would EXPECT a grenade launcher to explode if the grenades are hit, I'd EXPECT it to be heavy, I'd EXPECT that the thing wouldn't leave much behind after you finish blowing said things to bits.

For an actual design, we might do something like this...

Ballistics-stopping, Acceleration-resisting, Tactical Manned Armor (New)
Based on Gothic self-supporting plate armor, the BATMAN suit is composed of steel plating, average thickness of 2 millimeters. Everything is covered by shaped metal plates. Shins have light plates, with good ol' spikey boots for kicking things. Thighs have heavier plating, with a scary-tough crotch piece (For comfort, you understand). The torso is protected by a piece backed with a slightly thinner version of our present interceptor vests, as padding in case of blunt trauma as well as a means to catch those pesky bullets. The head is protected by our standard Interceptor Suit helmets, but with steel projections from the cuirass which cover the back and sides of the neck. The arms get protection for the upper arms, with metal bracers that protect the inner forearms, and tough steel-and-Kevlar gauntlets to protect the hands.

It's a lot of words describing what is, in essence, a modern suit of medieval plate armor, backed by ballistics fiber. It'll stop bullets, teeth, claws, swords, arrows, and small missiles. And it's REALLY SIMPLE, mass-producible, and fairly cheap to boot. Or, at least, it can be very cheap depending on our rolls....

[Kashyyk]

It ain't no Next Gen Materials but sure, have a vote.

BATMAN : [1] Kashyyk

[RAM]

No, it got hilariously POLARIZED rolls. 10 for effectiveness, but also 10 for bugs. We'd have to try re-rolling *everything*, at great risk, to improve it.

We can just reroll one of the rolls as a revision, polarised rolls are the primary reason to revise...

[Stirk]

No, it got hilariously POLARIZED rolls. 10 for effectiveness, but also 10 for bugs. We'd have to try re-rolling *everything*, at great risk, to improve it. Basically, the only real "bug" (As in, thing you might not EXPECT from a grenade launcher) is that, um, actually nothing. I would EXPECT a grenade launcher to explode if the grenades are hit, I'd EXPECT it to be heavy, I'd EXPECT that the thing wouldn't leave much behind after you finish blowing said things to bits.

For an actual design, we might do something like this...

Ballistics-stopping, Acceleration-resisting, Tactical Manned Armor (New)
Based on Gothic self-supporting plate armor, the BATMAN suit is composed of steel plating, average thickness of 2 millimeters. Everything is covered by shaped metal plates. Shins have light plates, with good ol' spikey boots for kicking things. Thighs have heavier plating, with a scary-tough crotch piece (For comfort, you understand). The torso is protected by a piece backed with a slightly thinner version of our present interceptor vests, as padding in case of blunt trauma as well as a means to catch those pesky bullets. The head is protected by our standard Interceptor Suit helmets, but with steel projections from the cuirass which cover the back and sides of the neck. The arms get protection for the upper arms, with metal bracers that protect the inner forearms, and tough steel-and-Kevlar gauntlets to protect the hands.

It's a lot of words describing what is, in essence, a modern suit of medieval plate armor, backed by ballistics fiber. It'll stop bullets, teeth, claws, swords, arrows, and small missiles. And it's REALLY SIMPLE, mass-producible, and fairly cheap to boot. Or, at least, it can be very cheap depending on our rolls....

(2mm of steel wouldn't do much against modern firearms, though it might be able to perform against soft core 9mm bullets. The commies had a 2mm steel armor in WWII, which had to be made thicker when the Natzis moved to iron core boolets for their submachine guns. It would probably be around Class II/IIA armor, blocking some handgun rounds but becoming Swiss cheese to rifle rounds and stronger handguns. Steel plate inserts meant for rifle rounds are generally 3/8''+ thick, five times as thick as those plates. Which goes a long way to explaining why you don't see any soldiers in medieval style armor.

...Not that that has any bearing on this game.)

[Madman198237]

I know the history of plate armor. However, a 2 mm UNHARDENED IRON (Medieval armor. 2 mm of non-face-hardened iron is literally the recipe for late-medieval plate armor) plate will take hits, without deforming or even so much as showing noticeable marks, from swords, battleaxes, hammers, maces, 300lb draw-weighted crossbows, and pretty much every other means of destruction available to your average beasty, including teeth, claws, and spikes. The ballistic-fiber vest (Partial interceptor suit, basically) will keep out bullets from hitting vital areas. Plating will also reduce damage from bullets, especially using the most modern steels.

Best part is, this stuff should be inherently cheap. We can get the ballistic-fiber vests for free, and while steel was hard to work back in the early medieval period, it's very easy to shape, mold, what-have-you these days.

It won't make our soldiers immune to bullets, for sure, but it should almost entirely prevent casualties from things like zombies (Perhaps with the exception of the runners...not sure how well-sealed this might get), mongrels, hostiles swinging swords and stuff, the list goes on.

[Stirk]

Knowing what you are after does help stat it ^_^.

New Xcom DLC is coming out. Not sure if it will distract me or give me inspiration.

[Madman198237]

BATMAN : [2] Kashyyk, Madman

I spent so much mental effort on that dumb acronym...

[RAM]

Spoiler: Original Safety Margin (click to show/hide)

Complications: 10! Heavy, Collateral Damage, Volatile

Development of the Safety Margin was a mixed bag. There is no doubt to its effectiveness, targets where shred apart accurately and efficiently with all current ammunition. To what is perhaps an absurd degree-tests had been performed to insure that the prototype wasn't death incarnate (while they were performed as a joke, the researcher who suggested the tests was laughing nervously until they were complete). All current rounds, frag, HE, HEAT, and incendiary work as planned and are all masterpieces in their own right. But all that effectiveness came at a cost. Both the weapon and its ammunition are incredibly heavy-especially given that soldiers are expected to carry extra ammo on their person. While this extra weight means that its felt kick is significantly lower than it would otherwise be-in addition to allowing for the grenade's incredibly potency- it means that the soldier will have trouble managing to hold any moderately heavy gear while equipped with it. Second, the sheer power of the rounds means that there is often not much left of what it hits. While this tends to be a positive, it means that most creatures killed by this weapon will not have corpses or any other recoverable materiel unless they are absurdly tough. Finally, while there is no safety issues in firing the grenades, they do not take getting hit very well. They are certainly more robust than the Oversights-but if they are hit by a more lethal blow (such as a gunshot) they are liable to detonate-setting off a chain reaction that could take out its operator and anyone standing remotely near it (along with their equipment, thanks to the second Complication). The enemy is liable to try to make good use of this issue if the catch wind of it-and the ammunition takes up a large amount of space as it stand, making it fairly likely that a lethal blow would lead to this devastating effect.

Revise Safety Margin: Reduced Safety Margin

While we expected it to be heavy, the extent of that seems excessive. Going over the notes it seems that various hardening efforts were to be made to the ammunition to allow armour-piercing. This seems sensible when dealing with unknown threats, provided you are not using ammunition with a contact trigger... We hope to find and remove hardened tips from the ammunition, reducing its weight and thus the force required to propel them, for an overall reduction in weight.
While collateral damage is inevitable with explosive and incendiary rounds, we hope to apply more focus to the fragmentation and shaped-charge rounds to direct more of the force into the fragments or forward angles respectively. With luck this will cause the fragmentation rounds to produce more scattered-incidental damage and less broad-obliteration. The shaped-charge rounds likewise ought to project more of their force forward and into the target, and less around and across the general region of the target.
Finally we are tightening up the arming mechanism to make it less responsive to brief changes in velocity. It ought to have to travel for at least a metre at something vaguely within the realm of projectile velocities before arming. This has the issue of making point-blank deployment ineffective, so users should be advised that suicide ploys won't work...

BATMAN : [2] Kashyyk, Madman
Reduced Safety Margin : []

[Hibou]

BATMAN : [3] Kashyyk, Madman, Hibou
Reduced Safety Margin : []

While the saying, "The best defense is a better offense" sounds nice, in practice that's rarely true and I'd like to see that our soldiers get better equipped to resist incoming damage. Also I'd imagine the BATMAN would look badass.

My only main concern with the BATMAN is that we might encounter inhibitive costs because of the heavier and more technical nature of the armor.

[Madman198237]

Eh, like I said: The Europeans massed produced this stuff in 1400, we ought to be able to cheaply mass-produce this stuff now. Steel, iron, all of that is much more readily available to us now that it was to the Europeans.

By the way, is it clear that this thing is NOT a full suit of Gothic plate? It isn't quite all-encompassing. The arms are protected (For weight and mobility reasons) by only bracer-type rough cylinders strapped to the upper arms and forearms. The goal is to protect against most damage, not turn our guys into MJOLNIR-wearing Spartans.

[Blood_Librarian]

awe- biscuits, gonna ptw.

[Hibou]

Yeah you're probably right, the BATMAN technically is just a bigger, badder version of the currently free armor we have already.

Also, while we're throwing out blasts from the past, for your consideration:

R.O.B.I.N.
Rectangular Obfuscator and Ballistic Inhibitor (New)

The ROBIN was designed to work in tandem with the addition of the BATMAN, as well as functioning well alone. The device is essentially a ballistic shield, with thick steel plating along with kevlar backing and a ceramic outer layer to absorb higher caliber bullets. A thick piece of bulletproof plexiglass is set into the front of it so that the user may hide behind the shield but still maintain a visual on the attacker, as well as possible cover to move to. For the pièce de résistance, the exterior of the shield is covered in lab grade acid resistant plastic, making it largely impervious to bullets, as well as protecting against blunt force, slashing strikes, and chemical warfare to a lesser degree. This shield is designed to be about 4 feet tall and a little over 2 feet wide, obscuring the user completely from view as long as they maintain a low profile.

While the shield itself can be cumbersome, used in a squad it can provide immediate cover for not only the user but also their squadmates to utilize, enhancing survivability as well as creating a viable protective device for pointmen that is only enhanced by being in enclosed areas such as doors or hallways. The idea is that even if the extant armor is only a maybe on stopping higher caliber rifle rounds, this shield is a definitely.

[Madman198237]

Maybe? I can't imagine it being worthwhile in the sorts of high-mobility battles we find ourselves in, but if the enemy ever starts deploying more guns, it might find a use. Also, it should be a Kevlar-ceramic-steel backing sandwich.

But keep it on the table. The acronym is definite cool, and it should have some utility, even if we tend to clear ambushes with explosives rather than rushing.

[RAM]

The main worries I have with shields is bypassing the need for penetration, either by crushing people behind the shield, knocking it to the side, or using effects that travel around it, such as fire, gas, or curses... Although it certainly is very useful to have some mobile cover against small arms and equivalents.

Mostly though, at this point, I do not believe that we can afford to outfit our whole squad with armour. II suspect that the free equipment is free as an exception to ensure that we have equipment, and is not actually representative of how expensive something with the same materials and construction would be. I feel that "like the free stuff, but better" ought to be about 15, free with a bit of extra, but would actually turn out closer to 75 due to not being free at all, and could even go up to twice that if armour cops a cost malus from volume rather than a cost reduction from the need to have everyone looking suave in matching uniforms...

In short, I don't think that we are getting both armour and artillery. And we are probably getting the artillery, which rolled disaster on bugs. I would like to reroll those bugs. Sure, it might seem inherent that artillery be heavy, destroy stuff near the target, and have vulnerable munitions, but it could be lighter and easier to handle, it can be made more specialised in its destruction, there are multiple ammunition types afterall, no need for incendiary to destroy heat-resistant materials with concussive force, fragmentation should be all about making holes over a large area, no need to have a big blast-wave crushing things after it has sent the fragments around. H.E.A.T. is shaped-charge, it is meant to be directional, the more directional the better as far as making a hole in something very tough and it also means less destruction to the surroundings. High Explosives are meant to make a mess of the region, but even then, there is little value in starting fires... Se even the collateral damage can be improved. And modern explosive tend to be very stable when not specifically triggered. Safe storage is kind of one of the great design-goals of logistics, and military loves its logistics, especially for the sort of high-volume shooting that you tend to get with situations that call for big explosions.

So yes, the flaws are things that you tend to expect from artillery, but there is a lot of room for improvement there.

[Madman198237]

There is room for improvement, but as a last-ditch solution to those pesky "OH CRAP WE'RE ALL GOING TO DIE" situations, it'll work.

For now, we should try to avoid those situations by giving everyone PLATE ARMOR. It's FOOLPROOF!