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[Shadowclaw777]

Prototype Evrasium Precision Rifle:
OEIGR:
SIAERA: (1) SC777
Oculus Hardpoint-Mountable Chemical Laser: (1) SC777

[Happerry]

Prototype Evrasium Precision Rifle:
OEIGR:
SIAERA: (1) SC777
Oculus Hardpoint-Mountable Chemical Laser: (2) SC777, Happerry

[Doubloon-Seven]

Doubloon's Patented vOat Cereal! High in Sodium!

Prototype Evrasium Precision Rifle:
OEIGR:
SIAERA: (2) SC777, D7
Oculus Hardpoint-Mountable Chemical Laser: (3) SC777, Happerry, D7

[Jilladilla]

Remember Happerry, we have 2 designs, so 2 votes. Unless you were just ambivalent towards the other things?

Prototype Evrasium Precision Rifle:
OEIGR:
SIAERA: (3) SC777, D7, Jilladilla
Oculus Hardpoint-Mountable Chemical Laser: (4) SC777, Happerry, D7, Jilladilla

[Happerry]

Remember Happerry, we have 2 designs, so 2 votes. Unless you were just ambivalent towards the other things?

No, I'd just forgotten we had two designs.

Prototype Evrasium Precision Rifle:
OEIGR:
SIAERA: (4) SC777, D7, Jilladilla, Happerry
Oculus Hardpoint-Mountable Chemical Laser: (4) SC777, Happerry, D7, Jilladilla

[Madman198237]

The SIAERA (Pronounced "Sierra") is a weapons system intended for use in all environs, which mostly just means that you can shoot it in space without flying backwards due to reaction forces. This works due to a two-stage propellant system in the cartridges. Firstly, you've got a standard smokeless propellant charge that imparts some initial kick, and then a secondary stage where the "Gyro" part kicks in. A rocket charge ignites, further accelerating the round while in flight.

Of course, that isn't all. One looking at a SIAERA round would find it to be unusually large, and this is because the round, is in fact, "smart", capable of performing course corrections by gimballing its rocket motor, and raising or lowering control surfaces on the bullet itself. With a wireless communication chip, the bullet can communicate with an infrared scanner mounted on the weapon itself, and change course to hit a target. This can range from increasing the effective range of a marksman's shot, to turning a mindless spray of bullets into a deadly volley.

The SIAERA feeds 20mm rounds (packed with guidance control and tipped with lead-well, not actually lead but you get the idea) from a 9-round box magazine. Operators can choose between semi-automatic, 3-round burst, and fully automatic.

Squad-Integrated All-Environment Rocket Armaments
Difficulty: Hard
Roll: 3+3-1 = 5 = Average

The SIAERA is a criminally butchered backronym of sorts with an unwieldy name.

Oh wait, you wanted information about the gun. Right. So, about that.

SIAERA wasn't a super easy project because of the incredible needs of the guidance system. SIERA is basically a 20mm rocket launcher masquerading as a rifle. The large size of the box magazine and heavy rounds makes the weapon very unwieldy, and to combat this it is built in a bullpup style so some of the weight can be rested against the shoulder. The rocket motor runs the length of the projectile and is vectored through four fixed nozzles angled backwards and outwards. These nozzles have valves that control how much of the rocket motor's thrust is vectored in what direction, and thus alter the direction of travel of the projectile fairly accurately. However, the need for the projectile to build up speed means that the guidance system only goes really active at about Medium range, and can only make large corrections over Long range.

At Short range the guidance is functionally unnoticeable, inside buildings the rounds are basically a nonlethal round that will only sometimes kill the target, on account of their slow velocity. Sometimes the still-burning solid rocket fuel will do some more damage to poorly armored targets, though it'd be wise to not count on this too much.

At Medium range, vectoring can generally make a very near miss into a hit, or a pure miss into less of a miss, provided the operator can get the weapon pointed where they want it to guide to in time. The projectiles are lethal at this range, though armor can still defeat them.

At Long range is where the vectoring really shines. Managing to get the laser back on target can turn a round that was going to completely miss into a guaranteed headshot. Of note, though, is that the more vectoring that is done, the less velocity the round has. This isn't much of a problem since the round does build up to lethal velocity before enabling vectoring, but it must still be considered when firing at protected targets.

The SIAERA isn't free of problems: The guidance chip will sometimes miss the user's laser, or track another user's laser and run out of fuel trying to reach a target way out of its line of travel. Sometimes a valve will stick, or a rocket motor will explode halfway to the target, or any of a dozen other minor faults common to most firearms. However, we have successfully managed to develop a weapon that fires 20mm guided rockets, even if they carry no payload (and have no space to fit a payload).

Cost: 1 GPP
Weight: Infantryman's primary weapon, no weight.

Most of our notes on the Eyebite are now disintegrated to the molecular level, but we did manage to recall what some of the exotic chemicals we used were from a scientist who was out getting a snack on the evening the lab melted. With some trauma counselling, we've managed to draw up a design for a laser done properly.

The Oculus HMCL is mounted into a ball turret, capable of rotation in all directions and axes. Targeting is done by either ship sensors or an infrared sensor array mounted on a rotating boom beside the turret, which distinguishes ships by their radiating heat and exhaust. This data is run through a targeting computer, which aims the turret and tracks accordingly. Finally, images are delivered to a remote human operator, who can then give the order to fire. When this order is given, gas pipes supply the aforementioned exotic compounds to a reaction chamber, and as they begin to excite, a beam is created and focused through an array of mirrors and heat-tolerant lenses to temper it into a powerful, antiship red laser.

Oculus Hardpoint-Mountable Chemical Laser
Difficulty: Normal
Roll: 3+2-0 = 5 = Average

The Oculus HMCL is a competently-built laser gun. No mention has been made of any other laser weapon projects, of which there are none (it's one of the conditions of the traumatized engineer's ongoing therapy). It is linked to its mothership's fire control network, fires at a moderate rate, and does a moderate amount of damage for a chemical laser of its size, which is substantial. It is connected directly to the mothership's chemicals storage for laser weapons, which gives it the ability to fire continuously as long as the cooling system can keep up...which is not for long, as the cooling system is "radiate heat into the vacuum of space and hope that most of it is carried away when the spent chemicals are vented". The chemical nature of the weapon does aid cooling somewhat, as each time fresh chemicals are cycled into the lasing chamber some of the heat is absorbed by them, and when they're vented that heat leaves the weapon.

The user can comfortably sit far away from the turret and sip their tea, though it does require a little more hands-on use by the operator than we wanted. The target identification system isn't perfect and sometimes requires a little user input to ensure that the system is tracking the correct sensor contact, but other than that it is generally good at hitting roughly the same spot for an extended period of time, allowing it to deal quite a bit of damage to anything it comes in contact with.

(This design isn't very long for a reason---I'll be sort of retroactively balancing tech when we hit the first combat phase, so that we don't end up with one side firing lasers bigger than the other side's entire warship or whatever)

It is now the Turn 0 Revision Phase. You have two revisions.

Spoiler: Side Two Tech (click to show/hide)

Ships
ITC (Interplanetary Transport Craft): A less-than-stellar spacecraft, the ITC is a version of the ships landed on your planet when you first colonized it. It is prone to malfunction, slow, and generally unpleasant. The rocket shuttles used to get equipment from the ITC to the ground have a limited capacity, meaning that with the exception of troops and things that can be broken into much smaller parts, the ITC cannot carry any equipment of a size greater than 1TC. It has 4TC capacity in total and uses chemical engines for propulsion. It has no armor or armaments.
Cost: 2 SPP

Units
Basic Military Unit: (you may rename this if you so wish) A capable group of soldiers trained to operate any equipment you can give them. Field training allows them to keep up to date on the best way to operate the newest deathtraps and self-destructing gizmos you send them even after they’re deployed.
Cost: 2GPP

Ground Weapons
Printed Pistol: Issued to security guards on the colony ships, the only real weapon both colonies have. They are 3D-printed out of plastic, a process which is not entirely reliable, meaning the gun has a tendency to break after prolonged use... or any use, really.
Cost: Cheap

Squad-Integrated All-Environment Rocket Armaments: A 20mm guided rocket launcher. Guidance works OK, rockets work OK. Terrible in close quarters, low damage at Short range, lethal and lightly guided at Medium range, lightly armor piercing (if minimally guided) at Long range, otherwise moderately guided at Long range.
Cost: 1 GPP

Infantry Equipment
Basic Space Suit: A civilian space suit, totally unarmored and cumbersome to walk in. At least it works well enough, and has a self-sealing lining meaning a single shot isn't an immediate death sentence... most of the time. Necessary for deployment to worlds without breathable atmospheres.
Cost: Cheap

Combat EVA Suit: A ballistics-resistant well protected and maneuverable and relatively light EVA suit.
Cost: 1 GPP

Spacecraft Components
Eyebite MCLC: A self-destroying tank of fluoride compounds. Warning: DO NOT USE, DEATH OR SERIOUS INJURY MAY OCCUR.
Cost: You have got to be kidding me, right? COMPLETELY OBSOLETE

Oculus Hardpoint-Mountable Chemical Laser: A reasonable red-wavelength laser ball turret with an attached extra sensor component, a direct connection to the ship's laser chemical reservoir, and a generally decent capabilities list. Requires a spacecraft to mount.

Kinetic Storage Drive: Remarkably effective at occasionally self-destructing. Use not recommended, requires a ship (which you don't have).

Other
Command Radio: Essentially just a very big radio set, capable of reliable communication between planets, ships, and/or other planets. Currently only useful for taunting your enemy. The transmitter dish comes in a single piece and cannot fit in an ITC shuttle.
Cost: 2GPP
Weight: 1TC (requires 2 shuttle TC)

Infrastructure
Colony Defense Grid The reason you can't instantly invade the enemy homeworld. A series of surface-to-orbit missile launchers, the only real concession to defense the planners of the colony made. How they work is a mystery now, and no one wants to risk taking them apart to find out.

Aggravated Evrasium Reactor: Using the remarkable properties of Evrasium, this device extracts kinetic energy by shining laser light on a crystal matrix, which then punches the hell out of a set of turbines, generating power.
Provides: 2 SPP

Spoiler: Side Two Logistics (click to show/hide)

Ship Production Points: 18
  16 points: Unassigned.

Ground Production Points: 20
  20 points: Unassigned
 
Units
Nope, nothing to see here.

Ships
Your shipbuilders have been really lazy lately, haven’t they?

[Jilladilla]

While it may bear slight resemblance to the earlier plastic pistols, the Plastic Universal Machine Pistol hopes to not only exceed the capabilities of its predecessors, but to correct its flaws. Slightly misnamed, the 'PUMP' is only partially plastic, with the stock, casing, and generally anything that isn't put under intense working conditions being made of plastic. Those bits are made of 'traditional' metal. This should prevent weapon explosions from being commonplace, or even unusual, and send the occurrence straight into 'weird and rare' territory.

The PUMP has a 30 round box magazine, and has a grip attached underneath the end of the barrel allowing a superior two handed grip be used for weapon stability while unleashing rapid-fire death. All in all, a sidearm that should compliment our long range SIAERA Rifles.

[TricMagic]

Poly-Universal Machining Printer

Due to materiel constraints, we've needed to use plastics for a long time. With infrastructure, however, comes the ability to gather the materials, and print using other substances.

The Poly-Universal Machining Printer is a marvel, mostly due to being able to switch the nozzle for different materials. In addition, the non-stick tubes allow them to be cleaned easily, and being made of of a Metal/Plastic Polymer, isn't likely to melt at the temperatures some materials need to be at.

This is a lot of talk for something that can be put simply. We can print using metal. Therefore, we can make guns out of metal and polymers. The Metal cools quickly on contact, allowing rubber/plastic polymer to form the handle. In this way, it will stay cool even if the rest of it gets to hot. Beyond that, we can now print metal or any other material we can theoretically use. And it will be put to use to print Guns for our forces.


And yes, used PUMP here too, cause why not. It really is simple to be able to print metals rather than plastic.
Also, having the metal parts be made separately means they will need to be made separately. At that point, it would really be better to just make the gun in parts.

[TricMagic]

AER-Kinetic Storage Drive (AER-KSD)
Difficulty: Normal
Roll: 1+2-0 = 3 = Buggy Mess

Well, we made it. To the end of the testing cycle, that is. And boy, has it been so amazingly unfun. Half the interns quit, right after the other half were killed by angry rock induced brain punches. But we have an AER-KSD, and it looks just like you'd expect!

An addon to the AER power system, the KSD is composed, ideally, of a set of plates capable of being "punched" by the ship to propel the ship in any direction, including turning if the reactor providing power is offset from the centerline. However, we've had some...issues.

Turns out, the original batch of interns decided to use some super-stiff springs in their design, and then overcorrected by oversizing the reactor and overcharging the Evrasium. The overcorrections resulted in a loss of control of where the punches were happening, reactors were breached, interns were punched, and we generally do not advise using the AER-KSD at all, though technically it will sometimes do what you want it to.

AER Spiral Drive: Prototype for Large Spacecraft

The AER Kinetic Storage Drive was... It was. Very Dangerous, good at exploding, hard to control. A bunch of things.

The main issue was actually controlling it, and the stiff springs. And the overcharging. And the Evrasium being a bit random. So we've scrapped the straight force of plates for the rotational force. You know, the energy that can replicate gravity.

The Spiral Drive uses Evrasium. Specificly, it uses Evrasium that has been ground to Dust, which is then ejected into a light at speed. This creates a small but powerful force, which rotates the connected gears to start spinning the drive at high speed. This spin creates centrifugal force, which then applies to the entire spacecraft. Through specific gears, this force can then be tuned to apply to a single direction, which accelerates the Spacecraft in that direction.

Due to the system, it can only apply force in a single direction, pushing the spacecraft forward. This can be adjusted to allow for turns in space, allowing for a smooth flight path. It can also make sudden turns. Though this mostly applies to it's use in smaller fighters.

The Prototype can't make such sudden turns, but it's size will be useful in spaceships. Simply inject the Evrasium Dust, and it will create that force. As a bonus, the force created is enough to escape the gravity of a planet, when the Spiral Drive is at full power.

It should be noted that a Spiral Drive acts as both generator and engine for a spacecraft. The excess rotational energy is used to power turbines to generate electricity. As such, this is a Revision of the AER itself, using what we have learned. The Dust should be a far more stable medium, and how much is injected at once will control how much force is created.


Put more simply. The Dust reacts with the light as it goes in, punching the entire assembly. This turns the gears, which turn the turbines. The force goes into that, and becomes negated. Meanwhile, the rest of the force is funneled, moving it(the ship) forward.


Dust goes into > Light Chamber from the back: Dust Reacts to Light, punching in all directions. Gears are turned, and the turbines spin. The rest of the force gets funneled forward, pushing the ship as it hits the back of the chamber.

The nature of funneling the Dust means we can apply continual force, or punches, as it were. Likewise, control in direction can be achieved though remote panels to funnel some of the forward force to push us at an angle.

[Wozzy]

General Tri-burst Firing Ordnance (GTFO)
While the SIAERA is considered a resounding success, it left our soldier wanting in close quarter combat. Keeping the same casing of our plastic pistol in an attempt to stay under budget, we completely replaced the insides and barrel with alloy forged components, which also allow our soldiers to utilyze a three-round burst firing mode.
Not including the metal alloy upgrades, the GTFO stays true to its plastic predecessor by keeping the same body and only adding a few peripherals. It now comes with a foldable foregrip for more accurate firing and the new magazine holds 18 rounds. Even at 600 RPM, the kick is managable enough to allow the soldier to maintain control, even without the foregrip.

If you want metal printing, this is how you do it:

Metal Pistol for Tric
Our pistol is trash. Not only does it break due to crappy plastic parts, but it also wouldn't function properly even if was made of metal. To fix that, we first upgrade our 3D printers to work with metal. Certain parts, such as the barrel, will need to withstand more pressure, so these will be alloy forged in a remote corner of our factories, but the rest of the parts can be printed, making production much faster, and the parts more reliable.
Next, we upgrade the actual components, because simply stating they are now made of metal doesn't fix anything. The barrel and other components have been improved in order to allow us to use a higher calibre round with more gunpowder, adding more stopping power. To compensate, we included a grip on the handle and redesigning the magazing to hold 15 bullets.

[TricMagic]

Cutting the Evrasium: EVA Gauntlet
Evrasium Vector Assault Gauntlet

The angry rock has a habit of punching wherever it wants. But we can make it punch forward every time. Difficult, sure, but doable.

Through a deep study of the Evrasium, and many tests with cutting it, we've figured out exactly how it's structure applies to it's punching-ness. This means we can cut it down into crystals that do exactly what we want them to, punch things in a single direction with great force.

Cutting them into the desired shape let's us improve their power, and know where to shine to punch forward. And our Prototype accompaniment for this proof of concept is the EVA Gauntlet.

The Evrasium Vector Assault Gauntlet make use of specially cut Evrasium, and a powerful chemical battery to power the light inside them. The user activates them by pressing their fingers into the pressure switches while making a fist. The result is a bit obvious. Anything in front of the Gauntlet is hit with a powerful punch of energy. And it's range is pretty good too. Being a fist, aiming is easy, and there is no real recoil from it. In testing, we've found that the force seems to shatter bones and break apart objects. In atmosphere though, it is accompanied with a wave of force as it interacts with air, which actually reduces it's range some as compared to space. It's still good enough to serve as a Short Range weapon, and when storming a ship or structure, it's actually very good. Bullets certainly don't like the force breaking them apart, and at that range, there isn't much one can do against them.

All these things are very good, and somewhat simple with us being capable of cutting the Evrasium into crystal. However, it is a Complex process to us right now, as we need to cut quite carefully. Use is also somewhat limited, as the Cut Evrasium crystals, while far better at holding up than their uncut counterpart in operation, still can be expected to have broken down to the point of uselessness in 5 minutes of continuous use. Do to it being a new thing, refilling them can't be done in the field, and it usually makes more sense to just keep multiple EVA Gauntlets on you. This will likely be fixed later, but for now, they work well when Short Range Combat is needed.

[Wozzy]

Overhauled Kinetic Storage Power Drive OKSPD
Damn interns. This is what we get for trying to improve their quality of life by giving them unpaid experience. Anyways, this new batch seems much more competent, so lets try this again:
The OKSPD is basically the same thing as before, only this time we know better. With a spring that isn't as stiff, we don't have to overburden our reactor, so that should solve issues of hull breaches and fatalities. While our funders would like us to push the envelope, we really just want to make something that works, something with okay speed. Hey, that's good, write that down, we could use it for the name.

GTFO: (1) Wozzy
OKSPD: (1) Wozzy

[TricMagic]

GTFO: (1) Wozzy
OKSPD: (2) Wozzy, TricMagic
Cutting the Evrasium: EVA Gauntlet: (1) TricMagic

I'll just note the EVA Gauntlets are the proof of concept for the Evrasium Structure Study. If they are average, we can expect to have less trouble working with Evrasium in the future. Missiles that release a lot of force in a controlled way perhaps.

Well, that, and it gives us a decent short range weapon too.

[Jilladilla]

GTFO: (1) Wozzy
OKSPD: (3) Wozzy, TricMagic, Jilladilla
Cutting the Evrasium: EVA Gauntlet: (1) TricMagic
PUMP (Plastic Universal Machine Pistol): (1) Jilladilla

[TricMagic]

Study of Structure, Determining the Mechanics of Evrasium

The angry rock has a habit of punching wherever it wants. But we can make it punch forward every time. Difficult, sure, but doable.

Through a deep study of the Evrasium, and many tests with cutting it, we've figured out exactly how it's structure applies to it's punching-ness. This means we can cut it down into crystals that do exactly what we want them to, punch things in a single direction with great force.

This is usually done with a deep scan, and then using specialized tools to cut it so that the Evrasium will have points we can shine a concentrated light on. This will in turn produce force in a direction. With effort, we can determine what structures act in which way. There are, for example, cases where shining a light on the side instead creates force not toward the light, but elsewere on the Evrasium. With effort, we can find the common factors in these structures, and with the cut Evrasium, the light shining on it will have a clear point on which force can be triggered reliably. This will remove the issue of it being seemingly random at times, and allow us to use Evrasium in many ways in the future.


Someone wanted it alone, so here it is.

GTFO: (1) Wozzy
OKSPD: (3) Wozzy, TricMagic, Jilladilla
Cutting the Evrasium: EVA Gauntlet: (1) TricMagic
PUMP (Plastic Universal Machine Pistol): (1) Jilladilla
Study of Structure, Determining the Mechanics of Evrasium: (1) TricMagic

I'm fine with either, really. Actually not running into the issue of it punching us in the face would be nice.