From:	Blackadder <blkadder@****.NET>
Subject:	Re: A little of this and a little of that with a Tesla cannon
Date:	Mon, 8 Feb 1999 11:51:14 -0500

Dark Poet Asked:
|As far as the railguns go I dont really need any help sence I have
those
|pretty much planned out. But Im acctualy a littel stumpd as to how to
|work the maser and the lighting gun. As for the maser Im thinking of
|something with the range and spread of a shotgun the frys cyberware
and
|electronics but doesnt do much damage to stuff with armor etc.


Blackadder Added:
A maser beam doesn't diffuse that way like a shotgun, unless you
have a splitter on the projection end, and that gives you a different
type of spread. Essentially it's a laser; actually the very first type
of electromagnetic Amplification by Stimulated Emission Of Radiation
[First they discovered the Microwaves, later applied it to other
wavelentghts of the electromagnetic spectrum, calling that Lasers.]
And as anyone who's ever put a cat in the microwave can tell,
living flesh gettin hit by one will definitely notice, especially at
the igh power settings needed toi be feasible as a weapon. Think of it
as first exciting all the ambient water molecules in a living being,
from the cells out, raising it's temperature, boiling it's blood,
until the part being focused on by the maser explodes like a tv dinner
with the top left on in big bloody chunks, doing a lot more damage
than a visible frequency laser, which due to it's high penetration
capability, does only minimal damage in comparison to say a lead slug
[Assuming you don't have a barrel the size of your fist.]. Trouble is,
masers don't have the penetration of a visible light laser, or better
yet, and X~ray laser [these are really nasty], you can pop someone in
the next room doing minimal damage to the intervening obstruction.
Again, all this is predicated by how much power you pump into the
thing vs frequency [usually dictated by lasing medium] to achieve
desired penetration, but then it becomes a matter of energy
efficiency.
To be effective as a portable weapon, a laser must have high
penetration, maximum transfer of energy on impact and not blow thru
from overpenetration, easily carryable, minor malfunctions easily
repaired in the field [same level as being able to unjam a slug
thrower], and be energy efficient so you're not recharging the thing
every 12 shots. You don't have time something in a fight for a weapopn
you can only fire a several times, then have to chuck cause the
batteries have run out.
Lasers can also be adjusted in frequency, so that it can pass
thru certain colors unaffected, while striking the one behind it.
[There's an early experiment of this where two different colored
balloons were blown up, one inside the other, and a laser the same
color frequency as the outer one was fired at them. It passed thru the
outer ballon without popping it, and lanced the inner one, causing it
to pop.
[I may be slightly off on a minor detail or two. It's been awhile
since I studied them in college, and I just woke up.]
You're much better off going with particle beam weaponry, but
that hasn't been developed in the shadowrun Universe.....yet.
[EGMG as henchmen at ACME R&D Facility work feverishly on their new
toys ;-]


The BlackAdder!!!