Possibly My Final Rant On Scifi Hand Held Directed Energy Weapons...

[Spacescifi]

 

I like seeing them in scifi, I grew up watching them. But once I understood the physics and the real risks that come with them, it kind of made them less cool and more like a looks cool but ultimately bad idea. Why?

Scenario: Let's say we have a scifi lightning beam pistol gun. It fires a straight beam of lightning (by ionizing a linear path through the air with a pull of the trigger, no laser involved and don't ask how it's scifi lol) up to 2 kilometers long. At the end of the beam it scatters by spreading out into normal crinkled lighting bolts, Much the same way lighting spreads out and diverges at it's end in the sky.

What can it do? Two things. It can stun someone via shock (star trek style), kill via electric shock, or cut through an inch of steel every half second at it's maximum setting,

Main Concerns: I am aware flash blindness is an issue when it comes to high intensity light, whether temporary blurred vision or even permanent damage.

Main Questions:

1. Would a linear lighting bolt fired from the scifi pistol that is powerful enough to stun a 180 pound man unconscious also be so bright that it would cause flash blindness to any onlookers without eye protection? If so, what would eye protection look like for the shooter? Goggles probably. Since shades have open spaces and unfiltered light can get through, what you want is full coverage protection to block flash blindness. At a distance this is less of a problem for onlookers, as many if not all of us have seen lightning without any harm to our vision whatsoever.

2. Would a linear lightning bolt powerful enough to actually kill a 180 pound man via electrical shock also cause flash blindness? My guess is that it would be nearly equal to the effect of a stun level beam, since there is not a huge difference in power between the level electrical power required to stun unconscious as opposed to the level required to kill.

3. Would the linear lightning beam's max setting which cuts through an inch ofsteel every half second be bright enough to cause flash blindness or even permanent eye damage to onlookers? I think so, most definitely. Because even real life lighning bolts do not concentrate enough energy to do that but the linear lightning beam pistol would. Again distance would factor in, but the shooter would either need to wear protective goggles or shoot with eyes closed lol.

Conclusion: The appeal of beam pistols in scifi is not only how awesome they look but also their utility. No need to carry a bunch of heavy ammo around and having the option to stun from far distance rather than only having killing as an option.

I still like scifi

I like seeing them in scifi, I grew up watching them. But once I understood the physics and the real risks that come with them, it kind of made them less cool and more like a looks cool but ultimately bad idea. Why?

Scenario: Let's say we have a scifi lightning beam pistol gun. It fires a straight beam of lightning (by ionizing a linear path through the air with a pull of the trigger, no laser involved and don't ask how it's scifi lol) up to 2 kilometers long. At the end of the beam it scatters by spreading out into normal crinkled lighting bolts, Much the same way lighting spreads out and diverges at it's end in the sky.

What can it do? Two things. It can stun someone via shock (star trek style), kill via electric shock, or cut through an inch of steel every half second at it's maximum setting,

Main Concerns: I am aware flash blindness is an issue when it comes to high intensity light, whether temporary blurred vision or even permanent damage.

Main Questions:

1. Would a linear lighting bolt fired from the scifi pistol that is powerful enough to stun a 180 pound man unconscious also be so bright that it would cause flash blindness to any onlookers without eye protection? If so, what would eye protection look like for the shooter? Goggles probably. Since shades have open spaces and unfiltered light can get through, what you want is full coverage protection to block flash blindness. At a distance this is less of a problem for onlookers, as many if not all of us have seen lightning without any harm to our vision whatsoever.

2. Would a linear lightning bolt powerful enough to actually kill a 180 pound man via electrical shock also cause flash blindness? My guess is that it would be nearly equal to the effect of a stun level beam, since there is not a huge difference in power between the level electrical power required to stun unconscious as opposed to the level required to kill.

3. Would the linear lightning beam's max setting which cuts through an inch ofsteel every half second be bright enough to cause flash blindness or even permanent eye damage to onlookers? I think so, most definitely. Because even real life lighning bolts do not concentrate enough energy to do that but the linear lightning beam pistol would. Again distance would factor in, but the shooter would either need to wear protective goggles or shoot with eyes closed lol.

Conclusion: The appeal of beam pistols in scifi is not only how awesome they look but also their utility. No need to carry a bunch of heavy ammo around and having the option to stun from far distance rather than only having killing as an option.

I still like scifi beam pistols, but if I were to use them in scifi, they would be restricted to professionals. The public would be taught not to look directly at linear lightning beams as well as be allowed to buy protective goggles at an affordable price.

So instead of everybody and their mom packing heat via scifi DEW pistols, everybody and their mom would be sporting DEW eye protective goggles lol. Likely ones with straps that could easily be strapped to the top of the head when there is no immediate need to use them.

So ultimately you can still use them in a setting, but to respect the real dangers they pose the user and onlookers have to live and act in a way that shows they know them.

Because if scifi taught me anything it is that the future is bright.

Too darn bright in fact.

 

 

Edited January 18 by Spacescifi

[Spacescifi]

Sorry I tried to edit this and ended up recopying most of it more than once.

[Nuke]

if i have to choose between an assault rifle and a lighting gun, im picking the assault rifle. weapons should be more dangerous to the enemy than you. i got a black eye the first time i used a scoped rifle, but i also got 80 pounds of venison so it kind of worked out. still beats electrocuting yourself because there was a ground path you didnt see. there are better ways, like take a 40mm grenade launcher, and have a grenade with some electrodes and the tazer bits inside. you could probibly also fit that into a 12 gauge shell with a reduced powder charge.

with how small/powerful laser tools have become, usually for rust removal or metal cutting, they would go through human flesh quite readily, probibly body armor too. the practicality of laser weaponry on the battlefield leaves something to be desired. if you can some how get rid of things like the geneva convention you still have to deal with the issue of potentially blinding everyone on the battlefield. the enemy, your own soldiers, civilians, the operator, etc. you could presumably see those with combat engineers as non-combat equipment and under some dire situations see them use it as a weapon (probibly be the last thing you see).

i think the coolest scifi sidearm is probibly the ppg from babylon5. used explicitly because it can wound, kill and not penetrate the hull. i assume its a plasma weapon. the firearm equivalent is frangible ammo. but if you cannot penetrate hull, you will have little luck with body armor. so once again i am preferring slug throwers.

now comes the problem with eye protection. lasers come in different wavelengths. this is usually fixed by the lasing medium, but its no quite that simple. when you use diode pumped solid state lasers, you get a bunch of ir that is converted to another color (in the case of yag, thats green), but not all the ir gets used up, some comes out the end, so you get a mix of ir and green. so you need glasses that can block both wavelengths. but presumably you would end up with a mix of common wavelengths and a few uncommon ones, and so you might as well just used blacked out goggles and feel your away around. you might be able to use some automatic filtering using augmented reality displays. lasers can also disable cameras, you might have a number of hot spares that you replace after the mission or use non-optical sensors, eg accoustic or radar. if you have the tech you could just replace all your soldier's eyes with laser hardened artificial eyes, good if you want a cyborg army.

[Spacescifi]

38 minutes ago, Nuke said:

if i have to choose between an assault rifle and a lighting gun, im picking the assault rifle. weapons should be more dangerous to the enemy than you. i got a black eye the first time i used a scoped rifle, but i also got 80 pounds of venison so it kind of worked out. still beats electrocuting yourself because there was a ground path you didnt see. there are better ways, like take a 40mm grenade launcher, and have a grenade with some electrodes and the tazer bits inside. you could probibly also fit that into a 12 gauge shell with a reduced powder charge.

with how small/powerful laser tools have become, usually for rust removal or metal cutting, they would go through human flesh quite readily, probibly body armor too. the practicality of laser weaponry on the battlefield leaves something to be desired. if you can some how get rid of things like the geneva convention you still have to deal with the issue of potentially blinding everyone on the battlefield. the enemy, your own soldiers, civilians, the operator, etc. you could presumably see those with combat engineers as non-combat equipment and under some dire situations see them use it as a weapon (probibly be the last thing you see).

i think the coolest scifi sidearm is probibly the ppg from babylon5. used explicitly because it can wound, kill and not penetrate the hull. i assume its a plasma weapon. the firearm equivalent is frangible ammo. but if you cannot penetrate hull, you will have little luck with body armor. so once again i am preferring slug throwers.

now comes the problem with eye protection. lasers come in different wavelengths. this is usually fixed by the lasing medium, but its no quite that simple. when you use diode pumped solid state lasers, you get a bunch of ir that is converted to another color (in the case of yag, thats green), but not all the ir gets used up, some comes out the end, so you get a mix of ir and green. so you need glasses that can block both wavelengths. but presumably you would end up with a mix of common wavelengths and a few uncommon ones, and so you might as well just used blacked out goggles and feel your away around. you might be able to use some automatic filtering using augmented reality displays. lasers can also disable cameras, you might have a number of hot spares that you replace after the mission or use non-optical sensors, eg accoustic or radar. if you have the tech you could just replace all your soldier's eyes with laser hardened artificial eyes, good if you want a cyborg army.

 

Thanks for the reply. My long repeat post may have obcured it, but the scifi gun is a linear plasma beam (called lightning because it's the same effect until you go max power and start cutting through an inch of steel every half second).

I see the linear atmospheric plasma (LAP) gun being useful when starship crew are low on or lack ammo.

I know you prefer a gun that won't endanger you, but would you still prefer a normal gun if the LAP pistol provides you with 100 seconds of shooting non-stop before the powerbank drains? Also the LAP pistol would have no kickback since it merely ionizes a linear beam path of plasma 2 kilometers out in the air or less if the target is closer. Meaning aiming us simpler.

Air fighters or shuttles would likely love the LAP gun. But I agree on the ground it is more problematic.

 

I guess the crew of the enterprise would be brought up on war crimes for blinding so many aliens from their phasers lol.

Edited January 19 by Spacescifi

[Nuke]

i wouldn't completely write off plasma weapons at this point. there was some research into those in the 90s, which was successful enough to immediately classify. i believe it was featured in an episode of the robocop tv series from the '90s.

the situation changes when you do combined arms warfare, as lasers are valid anti-missile systems (some already in use). electric guns are a near future possibility, in naval rail/coil guns. i think even as small arms it has potential for use in a stealth rifle that makes little noise, even less than a suppressed firearm (the cia may have used such weapons for espionage during the cold war). other electric rifle concepts include ceaseless laser initiated rounds, using a propellant that can flash sublimate given a moderate powered laser. if ammo is the concern, the reloading gear and supplies are small enough to pack, at least smaller that the battery pack or generator you would need to power electric weapons. dune goes the other way with a lot of spring powered weapons firing poison darts and slow pellet weapons that can pierce shields. things that pass as nerf darts now becoming leathal is a stretch. the nerf bow i had would be formidable if you stick a gom jabbar in the end, we only had nails unfortunately.

i have doubts that electric arc weapons would hit their targets at all. if the ground is closer than the target, its finding ground. electric arcs like to follow the path of least resistance. unless of course you use a plasma bolt as the conductor for a high charge. you may be able to use some kind of beam to strip electrons from the air, and then you have a column of highly conductive plasma in which to move the current. but then again if these are common, then you could develop grounded armor that gives the arc a fast path to ground. i still think these would be finicky, dangerous to use, and easy to defeat.

[darthgently]

39 minutes ago, Nuke said:

the nerf bow i had would be formidable if you stick a gom jabbar in the end, we only had nails unfortunately

A sentence that was not on my bingo card to read on the internet this year and here it is in January!

[Nuke]

27 minutes ago, darthgently said:

A sentence that was not on my bingo card to read on the internet this year and here it is in January!

nerf can be dangerous if given to the correct grade schoolers.

 

there was also the supersoaker shotgun, which i made out of my sister's broken super soaker. it would dump its entire tank in one shot. we postulated how cool it would be to fill up with gasoline, but being from a carless family i had little access.

Edited January 19 by Nuke

[Spacescifi]

3 hours ago, Nuke said:

i wouldn't completely write off plasma weapons at this point. there was some research into those in the 90s, which was successful enough to immediately classify. i believe it was featured in an episode of the robocop tv series from the '90s.

the situation changes when you do combined arms warfare, as lasers are valid anti-missile systems (some already in use). electric guns are a near future possibility, in naval rail/coil guns. i think even as small arms it has potential for use in a stealth rifle that makes little noise, even less than a suppressed firearm (the cia may have used such weapons for espionage during the cold war). other electric rifle concepts include ceaseless laser initiated rounds, using a propellant that can flash sublimate given a moderate powered laser. if ammo is the concern, the reloading gear and supplies are small enough to pack, at least smaller that the battery pack or generator you would need to power electric weapons. dune goes the other way with a lot of spring powered weapons firing poison darts and slow pellet weapons that can pierce shields. things that pass as nerf darts now becoming leathal is a stretch. the nerf bow i had would be formidable if you stick a gom jabbar in the end, we only had nails unfortunately.

i have doubts that electric arc weapons would hit their targets at all. if the ground is closer than the target, its finding ground. electric arcs like to follow the path of least resistance. unless of course you use a plasma bolt as the conductor for a high charge. you may be able to use some kind of beam to strip electrons from the air, and then you have a column of highly conductive plasma in which to move the current. but then again if these are common, then you could develop grounded armor that gives the arc a fast path to ground. i still think these would be finicky, dangerous to use, and easy to defeat.

 

Yep... conductive linear plasma beam is how the electric shock would transfer. So grounding from the beam itself is not an issue... you point where you want it to shoot and it like magic does... just like Trek phasers.

As for grounded armor... that could be beaten by ratcheting up the gun to max power. The burn through an inch of steel every half second setting.

And given that it can be fired 100 seconds before the gun's powerbank's drain, armor won't save anyone wearing it.

You could destroy a tank with relative ease with it... only problem would be dodging return fire as a bright beam coming from you tells everyone where to focus their fire.

And yes they would be common enough weapons used by professionals. So civilians would not have access generally.

The real area the gun gives advantages is against less scifi advanced civilizations... like us.

All you would have to do is sweep your beam at the max setting accross the battlefield and you could literally cut down entire modern army squads at once.

Granted... armor could mitigate this some, but the damage alone would mission kill a lot of military equipment in the process, to say nothing of all the casualties regardless if they survived.

Edited January 19 by Spacescifi

[magnemoe]

On 1/19/2025 at 2:23 AM, Nuke said:

i wouldn't completely write off plasma weapons at this point. there was some research into those in the 90s, which was successful enough to immediately classify. i believe it was featured in an episode of the robocop tv series from the '90s.

the situation changes when you do combined arms warfare, as lasers are valid anti-missile systems (some already in use). electric guns are a near future possibility, in naval rail/coil guns. i think even as small arms it has potential for use in a stealth rifle that makes little noise, even less than a suppressed firearm (the cia may have used such weapons for espionage during the cold war). other electric rifle concepts include ceaseless laser initiated rounds, using a propellant that can flash sublimate given a moderate powered laser. if ammo is the concern, the reloading gear and supplies are small enough to pack, at least smaller that the battery pack or generator you would need to power electric weapons. dune goes the other way with a lot of spring powered weapons firing poison darts and slow pellet weapons that can pierce shields. things that pass as nerf darts now becoming leathal is a stretch. the nerf bow i had would be formidable if you stick a gom jabbar in the end, we only had nails unfortunately.

i have doubts that electric arc weapons would hit their targets at all. if the ground is closer than the target, its finding ground. electric arcs like to follow the path of least resistance. unless of course you use a plasma bolt as the conductor for a high charge. you may be able to use some kind of beam to strip electrons from the air, and then you have a column of highly conductive plasma in which to move the current. but then again if these are common, then you could develop grounded armor that gives the arc a fast path to ground. i still think these would be finicky, dangerous to use, and easy to defeat.

Lasers makes sense as an anti air gun more so for soft targets like drones. But it not an handheld weapon in any way. 
For an stealth gun I probably use compressed air, way simpler and its not like you will shoot a lot, you want the bullet to be subsonic for stealth. 

One idea was to use two lasers or to ionize the air and then you send an taser charge trough it.