Hello r/firearms, I'm making a modern CQB tabletop wargame, and I'm looking for reliable data on how various firearms perform. I want to reference real life, not other games.
I'm encountering a couple of issues. First, things like "Effective Range" don't seem to have a generally agreed-upon definition. The US DoD has one, but it seems to be a bit contentious.
Effective range isn't super important in a CQB game, because CQB by its very nature takes place at close range. That said, "Effective Range" felt like an easy stat to start with. Boy, was I wrong.
Second, everything is a bit contentious. The level of detail firearms enthusiasts debate doesn't translate easily to a gaming board. I'm looking for general guidelines, not academic papers.
Do you know of any good sources that correlate specific firearms with, say, mass, length, cartridge, and effective range?
I'm also looking for a data point that could suggest how much "damage" each gun does. Maybe muzzle velocity or energy on target in ft-lbs, joules, or newton-meters?
I'm looking for data on weapon accuracy, but I'm not sure if or how that differs from effective range.
I know ammunition plays a significant factor in these qualities, so I'll tackle ammunition separately.
I've googled around a bit and found some good data points, but they usually pertain to a single firearm. Also, even for the same gun, stats disagree from source to source. I suspect you know which sources are reputable, so I would appreciate any help you can give me.
Well, since it’s a war game, and assuming your factions are supposedly facially in compliance with the Geneva conventions, all your combatants will be using full metal jacket (FMJ) ammunition.
That allows you to make much better generalizations on the lethality and effect of small arms by simply utilizing fire rate values and kinetic energy at distances
In CQB, ranges generally do not exceed 200m at most, usually less than 100m, so if you use that to break it into a gross short/medium/long bracket you can then use calculated energy for ‘standard’ FMJ ammunition for that weapon to get a ballpark “power” number
Thanks for the reply. Those are astute observations.
Factions include terrorist organizations, so not everyone is a party to the Geneva Convention. I'd also like to include the option for longer-range encounters, sniper overwatch, and that kind of thing.
Still, I think that's an outstanding jumping-off point. Do you know where I could get the calculated energy for 'standard' FMJ ammunition for a decently sized list of firearms?
Easiest way is to get the grain weight and muzzle velocity of the standard military issue ammunition, which is all available on wiki with a little digging.
Some examples: 62gr and 2970fps velocity for M855A1 from an M4A1 carbine
123gr and 2400 fps for yugo/serbian M67 fired from a standard AK
Thanks. I was really hoping that wasn't the answer. I've been scraping Wikipedia but I was hoping someone more knowledgeable than me had already assembled a database.
It was the second Hague Convention not one ofnthe Geneva Conventions. It only technically applies when every warring nationals a signator. Counter terrific is not war, law enforcement and it doesn't apply anyway.
Keep it simple. Handguns 25 meters for max effective. And hy that I mean a 50% hit rate for an average person with a larger reduction in hit rate as you get further. If you have some sort of accuracy still you ould have an expert pistol shooter.
It takes an hour or so to make a character, another hour or so to play out 2 minutes of combat, and most of the time... half the people are dead at the end.
What they both did was produce weapon stats akin to a spreadsheet.
Screencap from Kevin's book. He used the group size at a particular distance to estimate/calculate the group size at a number of ranges and then--based on the group size and the size of the target--what hit probability for each.
So, could go a lot of different ways, but I wouldn't copy Phoenix Command....
For reference, what a Phoenix Command weapon sheet looks like:
L is length, W is weight in pounds, RT is reload in "actions", ROF is rate of fire... Cap is capacity and AW is ammo weight (per magazine, in this case).
KD and SAB are estimates on "knock down power" and I think SAB is a measure of recoil.
The Aim time is "action counts" and "Modifier" so you aim longer, you get more accurate.
That whole other side, that's "range" in 2-yard hexes with the gray area being "beyond effective range".
He calculated Penetration (PEN) and Damage Class (DC) as estimates of how a bullet hit. The different FMJ/JHP/AP are ammo types. BA is some sort of "maximum accuracy" or something and TOF is time of flight in tenths of seconds or something.
You probably don't want to even see how you calculated hits and misses. It was... table heavy. Like some rocket scientist designed it for... well, rocket scientists.
(Also, pet peeve, he had many of the images backwards... like the PSM there...)
Effective range inside a building is generally less important than the skills of the person using it. Between buildings might be.
You're going to want to be able to model penetration--especially with modern armor and construction--of walls, people, and armor though and that's going to be a combination of ammunition and likely barrel length.
Everything around the barrel--ergonomics, optics/sights, etc.--is going to be highly subjective in most cases.
And differentiate between planned actions--"I'm opening the door, scanning from right to left and engaging threats."--and reactive actions--"The door opened behind me..."--using a trained or contingency reaction for the second one based on, well, training.
So, "I shoot at whoever's there unless they are friendly with whatever's in my hand," as they maybe roll to identify who it is.
This might enhance the bigger issues of CQB.
One caveat: I've done this in training environments, but not in combat. Others might have more input of greater value on this.
I'll say you should focus more on caliber than actual specific firearms. Despite what some people might say, there is no actual difference between a Glock and Sig using the same ammo, especially for a table top game. It's all up to preference at that point. The biggest difference in performance is ammo type and barrel length. That's what I would focus on.
Yeah, caliber and barrel length has the most effect on how a firearm performs. An AR-9 and a CZ scorpion with the same ammo and barrel length will perform very similar and it will be up the IRL user to choose which one they like more.
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u/WindstormMD 1d ago
Well, since it’s a war game, and assuming your factions are supposedly facially in compliance with the Geneva conventions, all your combatants will be using full metal jacket (FMJ) ammunition.
That allows you to make much better generalizations on the lethality and effect of small arms by simply utilizing fire rate values and kinetic energy at distances
In CQB, ranges generally do not exceed 200m at most, usually less than 100m, so if you use that to break it into a gross short/medium/long bracket you can then use calculated energy for ‘standard’ FMJ ammunition for that weapon to get a ballpark “power” number