Handheld energy weapons

[Avalancheon]

Laser Weapons
http://www.orionsarm.com/eg-article/48fddaf46dc97
Handheld laser weapons
http://www.orionsarm.com/eg-article/48fddc50c8880
Portable Laser weapons (should this be combined with the Handheld laser weapons article?)
http://www.orionsarm.com/eg-article/4c597ee31fac3
Particle beam weapons
http://www.orionsarm.com/eg-article/48fddeba8bc05

here's some of the EG particle beam and laser weapon articles to begin the discussion. We have a resident laser expert, Luke Campbell, who may or may not be around to answer any farther reaching questions, but there's quite a bit of material already written in the EG.

I'll also just put this article about OA military strategy, and the related articles at the bottom, if that's needed.
http://www.orionsarm.com/eg-article/4bad5ba9074ce

I've read alot of luke campbells work, its certainly interesting stuff but I don't know whether his designs (if they were ever implemented in the future) would pass the cost/benefit analysis of a military. If OA were a regular 'soft' science franchise, that caveat wouldn't even be a problem. But since the OA is all about hard sci fi, you do have to pause somewhat. Not to be contrarian, but I find it somewhat unlikely that even mature energy weapons would be competitive with regular small arms. I honestly can't see the average soldier (whether they be human or not) a century or two from now carrying a laser into battle. Their strengths aren't enough to overcome their weaknesses, IMHO.

While I agree that there are plenty of technologies in OA that could be apparently magical in OA to current people, i'm not so sure that lasers and particle weapons are a great example of that- and physics does still allow us to predict what will actually be impossible. The aiming systems will be pretty incredible though.

at least compared to most uses of lasers in Science fiction, I really like how OA mentions more peacetime uses for lasers and beams of light. Thinking about personal beam weapons is limiting when, at minimum, it's possible in OA to shoot someone with a laser from across the solar system, or use the same technology for a peaceful purpose like propulsion.

beamed energy propumsion
http://www.orionsarm.com/eg-article/460c36555a8d7

What I meant was that there are certain concepts that seem absurd at the time of their inception, but later turn out to become feasible. If you lived back in the 30s and thought up something like an optical disk, people of the time would say: 'Thats interesting and all, but how do you read information off the disk?' The idea would seem totally impractical because no one in the 30s had imagined lasers: They were an unknown unknown.

So when I read articles written by engineers and scientists (usually the type who don't read sci fi!) claiming that certain classes of futuristic technology can't work, I have to wonder whether there is something they aren't taking into account. Maybe there is an 'enabler' device that no one has even conceived of yet?

In OA, those limitations have been solved, at least for laser and plasma weapons. See the articles that Dfleymmes1134 has posted as well as the article on Hellbores (which do come in a handheld version if you're willing to augment the hands in question sufficiently.

What are you basing these assertions on? Please point to the specific EG articles that support your assertions here.

The truth of the matter is that energy weapons are common within the setting and can be made tremendously durable, reliable, self repairing, programmable, and various other useful things, when so desired. There are also various advanced projectile weapons, but it isn't clear that they consistently offer general advantages over energy weapons (although there are probably specific situations where one type of weapon or the other has an advantage).

No offense, but that kindof feels like handwaving. Okay, energy weapons in the OA have been stated to be as reliable as anything else out there. But that doesn't make alot of sense, because great engineering (at the hands of expert systems or super brights) can only take your gadgets so far. An automatic rifle can never be as reliable as a bolt action rifle, for instance. With certain exceptions, more advanced weapons require more moving parts, which have a higher chance of failure. The simple nature of a laser weapon makes it inherently more fragile and finicky than a projectile weapon. The lens can be cracked, obscured with dirt, etc, and these failure modes are more common than what a rifle would experience.

Then theres the issue of requisite technology. In order for my beloved plasma cannon to work, it requires 1) cyrogenically frozen hydrogen, which must be 2) superheated to a plasma, then 3) forced down a magnetically sealed barrel, and 4) follow a vortice tunnel created by a laser beam. How can something like that ever be as reliable as a simple projectile weapon? Its more of a portable laboratory than anything else! I just don't see how it can be soldier proofed, even with future infrastructure.

A more fundamental issue is your mention of a 'soldier'. In OA human (or biont, more generally speaking) soldiers are almost completely obsolete. I say 'almost' only because with sufficient and sufficiently advanced augmentation, a biont can operate in some specialized combat operations.

However, under general circumstances, bionts are utterly obsolete in combat. In Terragen civilization there is no task of any kind at which a machine cannot vastly outperform a biont in every way - and that includes warfare. Able to move faster than a human eye can follow and human reflexes can react, equipped with virtually perfect aim, superhuman strength, advanced camouflage, and a total lack of such concepts as fear, mercy, compassion, or guilt, OA combat automation can wipe the floor with any biont soldier, usually rendering them all dead or incapacitated before their nervous systems even have time to react to the notion that a fight has started.

For the most part, I agree. Human soldiers are already showing their limitations as fighters in the 21st century. In the mid term, though, I don't think they will be replaced by drones or robots en masse. That would be prohibitively expensive, militarily unwise, and change the nature of war in an undesirable way. What I do think will happen is that soldiers will be given minor genetic enhancements and cybernetic technology to make them more competitive. But as more and more time passes, and we head into the far future, the demands placed on a soldier will become so great that they will need to replaced by creatures that are either full cyborgs or bioborgs. They will not be cheap or disposable, either.

By definition, 'unpredictable' technologies are unpredictable, so it really doesn't logically follow that you can turn around and predict them. Such an exercise seems likely to rapidly degenerate into an exercise in handwavium - which really isn't what we are about here.

As the existing laser pages discuss, a laser can do a very credible imitation of a 'blaster' (and without the silly season bit of an energy bolt that moves so slowly that a human can dodge it). It can even, potentially, act as a 'stunner', using the laser to ionize the air in the beam and then act as a 'wireless taser' to run a disabling current into the target. We haven't really decided if we want that in the setting yet, but it has been discussed in the RL and here.

My 2c worth,

Todd

Yes, I touched on this with Dfleymmes. But what I'd like to know is, what classes of weapon can be safely ignored for the purposes of OA? We know that phasers won't ever become a reality, since they require particles that don't exist and can't exist (for they defy the laws of physics). But would this be true of stuff like ion cannons, liquid bullets, etc? They aren't impossible per say, but are currently impractical due to things like electrical charge, air density, etc.