Fallout 3

[Aram]

So why would a .223 pistol do more damage than a .223 rifle.

Huh? You really should know this.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muzzle_velocity

 

Barrel length can affect the kinetic energy transmitted to the bullet.

Thankyou for the wikipedia page. I never knew what muzzle velocity was until you linked a wiki page for me.

[Aram]

Well wouldn't a bullet shot from a rifled barrel have picked up more speed upon exit than one shot from a pistol.

Yes, which begs the question of why the pistol does more damage than the rifle in Fallout.

 

Similarly one wonders why in Fallout 3, the "Blackhawk" does roughly twice as much damage as the regular .44 Magnum revolver when they're outwardly identical and both shoot the same ammunition.

[Wrath of Dagon]

For the same reason clothes give you bonuses.

[Aram]

Well clothes make the man. That's just a fact.

[poolofpoo]

Similarly one wonders why in Fallout 3, the "Blackhawk" does roughly twice as much damage as the regular .44 Magnum revolver when they're outwardly identical and both shoot the same ammunition.

 

it says in the gun docs that the blackhawk fires hollow point for increased stopping power, everyone should know this by now

Edited November 21, 2008 by poolofpoo

[Wrath of Dagon]

I thought it was stated the ammo was the same. Isn't up to you which ammo you load?

[mkreku]

So why would a .223 pistol do more damage than a .223 rifle.

Huh? You really should know this.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muzzle_velocity

 

Barrel length can affect the kinetic energy transmitted to the bullet.

Thankyou for the wikipedia page. I never knew what muzzle velocity was until you linked a wiki page for me.

Ask a stupid question, get a stupid answer.

 

Love it when people try to act smart by being condescending.. Yeah, I'm sure you know much more than the people writing the articles on Wikipedia, you just don't want anyone to know that by asking questions even an idiot wouldn't. Clever move.

[Dark_Raven]

The rifles are dumbed down but what do you expect from a .308? They should have had a 458 Magnum. Knock back power there.

[alanschu]

So why would a .223 pistol do more damage than a .223 rifle.

Huh? You really should know this.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muzzle_velocity

 

Barrel length can affect the kinetic energy transmitted to the bullet.

Thankyou for the wikipedia page. I never knew what muzzle velocity was until you linked a wiki page for me.

Ask a stupid question, get a stupid answer.

 

Love it when people try to act smart by being condescending.. Yeah, I'm sure you know much more than the people writing the articles on Wikipedia, you just don't want anyone to know that by asking questions even an idiot wouldn't. Clever move.

 

 

What would do more damage, a faster bullet or a slower bullet?

 

Aram asked why a .223 pistol would do more damage than a .223 rifle, and you posted about muzzle_velocity. Which would make me think you feel that a slower bullet would do more damage, since the .223 pistol would undoubtedly have a slower muzzle velocity. Is this the case? If so, why?

 

My ignorant assumption would be that a faster bullet would do more damage as it'd have more velocity, and therefore more momentum (p=mv). So, my question is still the same as Aram's...why would a .2239 pistol do more damage than a .223 rifle?

 

Especially since the context of Aram's post was in response to poo-guy talking about how damage is related to mass and velocity (i.e. momentum). Personally I found your linking to muzzle velocity to be a pretty poor answer, as it wasn't particularly an answer, especially in context of Aram's post.

 

If damage is a function of mass and velocity, then damage is related to momentum. In what way? Simply stating that muzzle velocity explains a faster moving bullet doesn't answer Aram's question. Is it simply more momentum = more damage? Because I'd imagine a bullet that is 1g going 10,000 m/s would not necessarily do as much damage as a bullet that was 100g moving at 100 m/s (I picked extreme values for a reason).

Edited November 22, 2008 by alanschu

[Wrath of Dagon]

Actually damage is proportional to energy, which is proportional to velocity squared. So a pistol of the same caliber would never do more damage than a rifle, not in this universe. Not that pistols usually use the same caliber ammo anyway. Aah, this reminds me of the endless discussions on Mass Effect forum about the damage from rail gun micro ammo back in the day.

[alanschu]

Is damage really proportional to energy? I guess the energy must be transfered somewhere.

 

 

Take a musket round of equivalent mass with the same speed as a rifle bullet, and I guarantee you that musket round is going to mess you up a lot more because it's not going to have as clean of an entry or path through you.

[Walsingham]

You're kind of looking at this the wrong way. You're thinking too much about the weapon and not about the target. Wound ballistics are called that for a reason.

[mkreku]

What would do more damage, a faster bullet or a slower bullet?

 

Aram asked why a .223 pistol would do more damage than a .223 rifle, and you posted about muzzle_velocity. Which would make me think you feel that a slower bullet would do more damage, since the .223 pistol would undoubtedly have a slower muzzle velocity. Is this the case? If so, why?

 

My ignorant assumption would be that a faster bullet would do more damage as it'd have more velocity, and therefore more momentum (p=mv). So, my question is still the same as Aram's...why would a .2239 pistol do more damage than a .223 rifle?

 

Especially since the context of Aram's post was in response to poo-guy talking about how damage is related to mass and velocity (i.e. momentum). Personally I found your linking to muzzle velocity to be a pretty poor answer, as it wasn't particularly an answer, especially in context of Aram's post.

 

If damage is a function of mass and velocity, then damage is related to momentum. In what way? Simply stating that muzzle velocity explains a faster moving bullet doesn't answer Aram's question. Is it simply more momentum = more damage? Because I'd imagine a bullet that is 1g going 10,000 m/s would not necessarily do as much damage as a bullet that was 100g moving at 100 m/s (I picked extreme values for a reason).

Actually, I saw now that the post I thought I was replying to was cut off. This part:

 

The thing about RPGs with guns that I never understood is how two weapons firing the same cartridge can have different damage ratings.

This is where the muzzle velocity reference belongs.

 

Anyhow, it's still a question of kinetic energy and how well the bullet manages to transfer that energy to the target. There are (of course) several factors determining how much damage a shot does, barrel length being one of them, what sort of jacket the bullet has another, and even the quality of the weapon a third. Even the amount of bore in the barrel can determine the amount of damage a bullet does. Too little and there's a risk the bullet starts to tumble in the air (thus losing huge amounts of energy and precision), too much.. and I don't know what happens :D

 

ANYHOW, even though the question is a bit complex, it's not surprising AT ALL that two different weapons firing the same cartridge can have different damage outputs.

[Aram]

If there were a difference in barrel lengths, I might buy it, but that's usually not the case or it's often the wrong way around. In any case, unless there is a very significant increase in barrel length, there would be only a marginal increase in velocity and even less in damage (depending on the caliber). The ability of the "named" weapons in Fallout 3 to do as much as twice the damage despite being outwardly identical to their nameless counterparts, and even having interchangeable parts, is what prompted my post. I don't know where poolofpoo got that hollow point bit, but I'd say that a gun magically converting the bullets into hollow points is even more reality-bending than magically making them go faster. I'll buy accuracy, I'll by reliability, I'll buy rate of fire, but firearms can't magically make a bullet go faster or do more damage.

 

The .223 pistol and rifle in Fallout are special cases in that the differences in barrel lengths could potentially change the damage as much as they do, but they did it completely backward. Most of the damage potential of the .223 round comes from the fact that its very high velocity causes the tiny bullet to fragment upon striking its target. There is a specific velocity at which the bullet can do this, but I can't remember it off the top of my head. I know however that the M4 loses about 200fps from the M16 for its six inches of barrel, and the reduction would be increasingly greater for every inch lost from that. They say the minimum length for an AR-15 to have the fragmentation aspect is 10.5 inches, which is a lot longer than the .223 pistol in Fallout appears to boast. The .223 pistol should do much less damage but does much more.

[Wrath of Dagon]

Is damage really proportional to energy? I guess the energy must be transfered somewhere.

 

 

Take a musket round of equivalent mass with the same speed as a rifle bullet, and I guarantee you that musket round is going to mess you up a lot more because it's not going to have as clean of an entry or path through you.

It's the energy that gets transferred that does the damage. So a bullet that tumbles inside the body will do a lot more damage than a bullet that passes clean through, other things being equal.

[Aristes]

Just finished my second run. I did everything I could think of, scoured to find all the bobbleheads. (I did have to cheat for some of them.) I found all sorts of cool unique weapons. (I didn't cheat for these. I just ran across them doing everything else.) And finally did the last of the final quest line. The ending seems better the second time. I think that's because I wasn't concentrating on what it didn't have. The voice over was good. The

way they illuminated the statue of Thomas Jefferson

was quite well done and I found the

way they integrated the photo the PC takes with his dad on his tenth birthday

was actually touching. Excellent game, but I'm taking a break for a while.

[J.E. Sawyer]

The designers of F1/2/3/Tactics were not trying to model ballistics at all when they assigned damage properties to weapons, and the weapons do not maintain statistical continuity. They assigned weapons whatever damage value seemed to work and spread the ammo types out as seemed sensible. The AK-47 and FN-FAL in F:T had identical ranges, identical ammo type (7.62mm), but the former did 12-25 points of damage and the latter did 24-36.

[Aram]

It's an atrocity, I tells ya.

[Gorgon]

I got defeated on my second run during the escape from project purity.

Doctor Li and her companions decided to camp out near the first sewer entrance and would not budge even after I had cleared the entire sewer area, I had no saves to fall back on except autosave and quicksave and they were all after the Doctor Li script got broken.

 

Taking matters into my own hands I blew her companions to bits, then dragged one of their headless bodies with me, and Doctor Li followed me instead of staying where she was. Unfortunately even after we appeared at the citadel all she could say was "We have to get out of these tunnels, keep moving". Unfortunate, because all I needed her for were a couple of lines to let us in.

 

Edited November 24, 2008 by Gorgon

[Killian Kalthorne]

Bugs suck.

[Slowtrain]

The designers of F1/2/3/Tactics were not trying to model ballistics at all when they assigned damage properties to weapons, and the weapons do not maintain statistical continuity. They assigned weapons whatever damage value seemed to work and spread the ammo types out as seemed sensible. The AK-47 and FN-FAL in F:T had identical ranges, identical ammo type (7.62mm), but the former did 12-25 points of damage and the latter did 24-36.

 

 

I remember one of the devs from Microforte ripping on his own game (after the fact) for being completely and utterly lacking in tactics, despite the name.

 

I still enjoyed it though.

[~Di]

That's a shame. I always have 10 hard saves to fall back on so at most I'll lose maybe two hours or so of gameplay if my quicksave gets corrupted. I hate starting over because of a damned bug.

 

Edit: Did you check at the Bethesda forums? Sometimes those folks are genius at coming up with a cheat-code workaround for bugs like this. Maybe you can kill her, go back into the room where you entered the tunnel, then ressurrect her and see if she picks up her script correctly.

Edited November 25, 2008 by ~Di

[Gromnir]

The designers of F1/2/3/Tactics were not trying to model ballistics at all when they assigned damage properties to weapons, and the weapons do not maintain statistical continuity. They assigned weapons whatever damage value seemed to work and spread the ammo types out as seemed sensible. The AK-47 and FN-FAL in F:T had identical ranges, identical ammo type (7.62mm), but the former did 12-25 points of damage and the latter did 24-36.

 

 

I remember one of the devs from Microforte ripping on his own game (after the fact) for being completely and utterly lacking in tactics, despite the name.

 

I still enjoyed it though.

 

the first 2/3 of fo:t were pretty good. last 1/3 were... awful.

 

sadly, the complaints we seen most often regarding fo:t were the typical hardcore fo nonsense. fur on deathclaws? how DARE they!

 

HA! Good Fun!

[Slowtrain]

The designers of F1/2/3/Tactics were not trying to model ballistics at all when they assigned damage properties to weapons, and the weapons do not maintain statistical continuity. They assigned weapons whatever damage value seemed to work and spread the ammo types out as seemed sensible. The AK-47 and FN-FAL in F:T had identical ranges, identical ammo type (7.62mm), but the former did 12-25 points of damage and the latter did 24-36.

 

 

I remember one of the devs from Microforte ripping on his own game (after the fact) for being completely and utterly lacking in tactics, despite the name.

 

I still enjoyed it though.

 

the first 2/3 of fo:t were pretty good. last 1/3 were... awful.

 

sadly, the complaints we seen most often regarding fo:t were the typical hardcore fo nonsense. fur on deathclaws? how DARE they!

 

HA! Good Fun!

 

Now that you mention it I don't think I ever actually finished the game. I replayed it 4 or 5 times, but each time never made it past more than 1 or 2 of the final robot missions. The raider missions in the early part of the game were my favorite. Each set of missions (raiders, deathclaws, supermutants, reavers, robots) seemed to get a little less interesting though.

 

Tha absolute and utter outrage about hairy deathclaws remains one of my most lol Fallout fanbase moments.

[Dark_Raven]

Deathclaws were a bad idea for the series.