The Lowly SKS

[bobcat]

Psychologically speaking, the bayonet at close range is the superior weapon to a rifle. There's just something about sharp and pointy cold steel presented with purpose that puts the fear of god into an opponent above and beyond even sticking a 12 gauge barrel in their face.

the reason is while the rifle and shotgun say "im going to kill you" the Bayonet says "im going to come over there and kill you in the most gruesome manner you can think of"

[95th Rifleman]

The bayonet takes away the faceless aspect of war. You see the guy's face, see the determination and rage as he runs towards you and it leaves you in no doubt that this bloke is going to ram his bayonet into your body and keep stabbing untill you are dead.

I think this must be the real fear aspect of the bayonet charge, seeing the other guy's face. All the propoganda bullshit fed to a soldier/insurgent to stiffen their resolve and courage just disappears there and then.

[Brother in Arms]

Bringing it all back to the SKS thats another reason they are a great rifle they usaully have an onboard bayonet so you can conserve ammunition and horribly intimidate your enemies.

(also to the about about firearm and rifle production. Lets face it the AR-15 type rifle is the number one rifle produced in this country today. Even in real 2000 there were several companies in the US with massive assembly lines producing m16 ar-15 parts. One I would consider would be Bushmaster in windham Maine. Maine faired pretty well in the twilight war. Though they would probably be making all the arms for MILGOV)

Sorry to distract from the SKS portion of this thread.

[Webstral]

Although it hardly needs saying, I ought to preface my remarks with the acknowledgement that my ideas are not canon material. That much said, coastal Maine belongs to First District (USCG) in my material. The potential to produce M16-type rifles is most welcome among the Guardians--especially since the maritime environment is hard on the pre-war stock of rifles.

If one is inclined to go with the rudimentary material of Howling Wilderness, then rifles produced in Maine conceivably could be made available to cantonments along the Atlantic seaboard.

[ArmySGT.]

http://www.scribd.com/doc/61979947/A-Guide-to-the-Drilling-Reaming-And-Broaching-a-Bolt-Action-Receiver-at-Home-Raymond-Benwood

http://www.scribd.com/doc/61744767/How-to-Build-the-Antique-Rifling-Machine-using-hand-tools

[Webstral]

Gorgeous resources. Thanks for posting those.

Years ago, I saw a book in the Loompanics catalogue for making machine tools that required no electricity. I'm kicking myself now for not having bought it. Come to think of it, I'm kicking myself for not having bought many of the books in good ol' Loompanics.

The availability of knowledge underscores the point that many things are possible in Twilight: 2000. However, as with all possibilities, means and opportunity are prerequisites. Time, manpower, resources, and know-how are all needed for many of the intriguing possibilities. One reason New America emerges as such a threat is that they do their planning. Their libraries are probably very well-stocked by late 1997. They have the tools they need to make use of the available resources and manpower. Most likely, the critical skills have been identified.

I've have tried to play up the theme of preparedness with my work. Thunder Empire is really all about laying the foundation for success. Poseidon's Rifles, on the other hand, is more about exploiting existing opportunities. Silver Shogunate is more of an effort to show what happens when the good guys don't get it together. (Though admittedly, Nevada is in a tough spot in the event of a sudden collapse of civilization.) The Black Watch in southern Vermont only survives because a survivalist cell does its homework and organizing in advance. Even then, the survivors in southern Vermont hold on by their fingertips for quite some time. When cantonments have access to the right expertise and the ability to support the work, many possibilities that today would be considered cost-ineffective become boons.

[ArmySGT.]

Signup for an account at www.scribd.com

Hundreds of manuals and books there. People put up anything and it can usually be had as a .pdf.

Hundreds of Field Manuals and Technical manuals from the U.S, British, German, and Russians are up. Some 200 years or more old, through WW2 and today.

I have many, many amazing WW2 manuals that show in detail how stuff was done.

http://www.scribd.com/haraoi_conal probably responsible for a few hundred. Seems to have access to the library at the Command and General Staff College at Ft. Leavenworth, KS.

[ArmySGT.]

ooops didn't work.

[WallShadow]

purchasing factors and a conclusion (and a further question)

AK47 (C/V) --$100
SKS (C/V) --$250
All else being equal, you might as well buy the AK47 if you're going to stock your militia's armory.
Which leads into another question: if you are buying weapons on the open market, say, in Krakow, how many would be available of a type, assuming average success in rolls I realize this is at the pleasure of the GM, but what should be the limiting factors in units when the item's availability is a given. One Five A dozen As many as they have cash for The last is highly unlikely considering the somewhat limited contents of the caches of the marauders in FCOK.
I guess a die roll here and there will help. Scrounging, Gunsmithing, and other skill levels could help the player sort out the wheat from the chaff--identifying weapons that would require major repair or are actually inoperable. And other givens are the rule-defined conditions (Rare, Scarce, Common, Very Common) and the locale (major city, city, town, village, open).
Sorry for thinking out loud, but I often try to anticipate problems before I am confronted with them.

[Brother in Arms]

I think they might have added an accidental 0 to the $25! Seriously...they SKS was made in the millions by the Russians, Chinese and Yugoslavians...Poland and Romanian also made thousands of them.

I can't imagine they wouldn't be being used by Reserves and Militias in Poland. Also Polish M44 Mosin Nagant and PPSH-41, PPS-43 and RPD machine gun. This would all be old stuff that was used by the polish military after WW2 but would not be frontline stuff.

BIA

[WallShadow]

I think they might have added an accidental 0 to the $25! Seriously...they SKS was made in the millions by the Russians, Chinese and Yugoslavians...Poland and Romanian also made thousands of them.

I can't imagine they wouldn't be being used by Reserves and Militias in Poland. Also Polish M44 Mosin Nagant and PPSH-41, PPS-43 and RPD machine gun. This would all be old stuff that was used by the polish military after WW2 but would not be frontline stuff.

BIA

Brother, Sorry to disillusion you, but the PPSh, the PPS, the Moisin-Nagant are all rather along the same prices as other SMGs and Bolt-action rifles. In the Post-KaBoom world, a firearm is a firearm and therefore valuable..
What would the modern equivalent of a WWI Chauchat be, I wonder Radom was listed or indicated on the map as one of the nuked cities: it was also a Pact armory city where weapons were manufactured (Brno in Czechoslovakia is in a similar situation). While the tools, machinery, and stocks of arms may have been slagged, what of the skilled technical personnel who may have escaped They may be worth hunting down and setting up in a small gunsmithing colony closely allied with an ammunition source (Wojo Or the town along the Wisla that makes reloads)

[raketenjagdpanzer]

One of Mark's Rules of Life:

There is no such thing as an obsolete tool or weapon, merely obsolete thinking used in their employ.

I was just leafing through my favorite image dump site (I'll tell anyone who's interested via PM because it is mostly very NSFW, but anyway) and one of the images that popped up was a group of tribeswomen in Africa, all carrying various guns - the woman closest to the cameraman was toting a very operational-looking StG44. Ralph Zumbro, in Tank Sergeant, mentioned them coming up occasionally (along with Mp44s) in the hands of the VC while he was in Vietnam.

So, yeah.

[Panther Al]

I was just leafing through my favorite image dump site (I'll tell anyone who's interested via PM because it is mostly very NSFW, but anyway) and one of the images that popped up was a group of tribeswomen in Africa, all carrying various guns - the woman closest to the cameraman was toting a very operational-looking StG44. Ralph Zumbro, in Tank Sergeant, mentioned them coming up occasionally (along with Mp44s) in the hands of the VC while he was in Vietnam.

So, yeah.

Hell, I toted one in Iraq for a while. The things just keep working.

[raketenjagdpanzer]

Hell, I toted one in Iraq for a while. The things just keep working.

SKS, MP44 or StG44

[Panther Al]

SKS, MP44 or StG44

MP44. Surprisingly, getting ammo wasn't impossible. Difficult mind, but I kept it fed for almost a month.