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Old 09-22-2015, 03:11 PM   #21
Koningkrush
 
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Default Re: Actual Impaling Question

I can see the problem here with bullets that realistically make people explode. The solution would be to house rule that certain bullets or rounds cause internal explosion damage not from an actual "explosion" but from a compressed shock wave of air.

Of course, I'm no expert on fire arms so I would have no idea how to implement this idea or at what range this would come into play.

Maybe have small piercing do 1d of explosive damage for every 4d of normal damage dealt, 3d for piercing, 2d for large piercing, and for every 1d for huge piercing? That would make a .50 caliber large piercing rifle that deals something like 12d basic piercing damage deal 6d internal explosive damage.
Now you have big ass rifles blowing heads, limbs, and entire torsos apart. Maybe even near misses could deal half of what the explosive damage would have been just from the force of the bullet passing by.
Even better, you could have the explosive damage factor into knock-back for some cinematic effect. And, for some realism the explosive damage could deal blunt trauma damage if the bullet is stopped by armor. That way Iron Man can't walk away from a tank round to the face.

Small Pierce, Pierce, Large Pierce, Huge Pierce

4d, 3d, 2d, 1d

Last edited by Koningkrush; 09-22-2015 at 03:14 PM.
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Old 09-22-2015, 04:35 PM   #22
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Default Re: Actual Impaling Question

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Originally Posted by Koningkrush View Post
I can see the problem here with bullets that realistically make people explode. The solution would be to house rule that certain bullets or rounds cause internal explosion damage not from an actual "explosion" but from a compressed shock wave of air.

Of course, I'm no expert on fire arms so I would have no idea how to implement this idea or at what range this would come into play.

Maybe have small piercing do 1d of explosive damage for every 4d of normal damage dealt, 3d for piercing, 2d for large piercing, and for every 1d for huge piercing? That would make a .50 caliber large piercing rifle that deals something like 12d basic piercing damage deal 6d internal explosive damage.
Now you have big ass rifles blowing heads, limbs, and entire torsos apart. Maybe even near misses could deal half of what the explosive damage would have been just from the force of the bullet passing by.
Even better, you could have the explosive damage factor into knock-back for some cinematic effect. And, for some realism the explosive damage could deal blunt trauma damage if the bullet is stopped by armor. That way Iron Man can't walk away from a tank round to the face.

Small Pierce, Pierce, Large Pierce, Huge Pierce

4d, 3d, 2d, 1d
The problem is that it isn't an explosion. It's a splash. The temporary cavity is that air bubble created from the equivalent of a rock being thrown into water really fast. Only the rock is a very fast bullet, and the body of water is a person. It usually closes up after itself.

A near miss would only have, at most, a light breeze going past.
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Old 09-22-2015, 05:06 PM   #23
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12.7 x 99mm torso hit within effective range is instant death !
The temporary wound cavity expands so far beyond the bodies' recoverable elastic limit it bursts apart like a balloon .
S.O.P. when hit by .50 BMG is to spread yourself out over 10 square meters in several pieces then discover if there is an afterlife only in reverse order .
Yeah, pretty sure you're wrong there. Do you have some kind of citation for a single 12.7mm hit actually tearing a human apart? I've got at least one primary source on it not doing so to a deer.
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Old 09-22-2015, 07:53 PM   #24
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Yeah, pretty sure you're wrong there. Do you have some kind of citation for a single 12.7mm hit actually tearing a human apart? I've got at least one primary source on it not doing so to a deer.
I'm with Ulzgoroth here, I need to see something concrete before I believe this myth. A quick google search will bring up all sorts of images of deer and other game who have been hit. And while they are dead, and the exit wounds are gnarly, they didn't "explode".

I am also very hesitant about anything that relies too much on the temporary cavity rupturing the body. I am a disciple of Martin Fackler, however.
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Old 09-22-2015, 08:14 PM   #25
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I am also very hesitant about anything that relies too much on the temporary cavity rupturing the body. I am a disciple of Martin Fackler, however.
Fackler actually discusses this in one of his papers, and notes that if the temporary cavity is large enough to exceed the elasticity of the internal or containging tissue, terrible things can result. But only in that case (or in the case of fragments lowering elasticity artificially), and otherwise the temporary cavity can only disrupt by pushing up against nerve clusters.

The most famous cases of the "exploding body" observation tend to be prairie dogs hit by rounds like the .220 swift (4,000 fps). The body can't contain the cavity, and splorch.
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Old 09-22-2015, 11:59 PM   #26
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Fackler actually discusses this in one of his papers, and notes that if the temporary cavity is large enough to exceed the elasticity of the internal or containging tissue, terrible things can result. But only in that case (or in the case of fragments lowering elasticity artificially), and otherwise the temporary cavity can only disrupt by pushing up against nerve clusters.

The most famous cases of the "exploding body" observation tend to be prairie dogs hit by rounds like the .220 swift (4,000 fps). The body can't contain the cavity, and splorch.
Does this happen to people hit by .50BMG though? People seem to hunt deer with it enough, and the deer are not exploded. A deer is smaller or roughly a similar size as a man, so I assume that if it won't explode a 100lb deer, it wouldn't explode a 150lb man.
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Old 09-23-2015, 12:44 AM   #27
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12.7 x 99mm torso hit within effective range is instant death !
The temporary wound cavity expands so far beyond the bodies' recoverable elastic limit it bursts apart like a balloon .
"Temporary cavity" is like "Hydrostatic shock", as in it can happen and these are real effects but those effects on an actual target are variable and not as clear and uniform as is often reported and repeated. There are a lot of interlinking factors and effects.

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S.O.P. when hit by .50 BMG is to spread yourself out over 10 square meters in several pieces then discover if there is an afterlife only in reverse order .
It is actually one of only 2 things Sylvester Stallone has ever portrayed accurately in a movie , those things being : shortness and what happens to a Human that is shot within 1,000 meters by 12.7 x 99mm or greater .
It's a funny line, but not necessarily true. (well OK Stallone is short) Also is the film in question the one which has human targets flying back several meters when being hit by bullets that are being fired by people.

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Also , the 20mm H.E. you mention at the end generally had fuses meant for harder material than flesh such as Duralumin-like alloys {it was an anti-aircraft gun} and might not even trigger passing through a Human torso {I pretty certain Minengeschoß was not available in 20 x 138b}
As I said the fuse timing maybe an issue (also with the caveat that Hollywood is Hollywood, if you watch the scenes they not actually exploding but having bits blown off them or having great big holes blown through them).


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The FlaK 38 has well over twice the .50 BMGs' muzzle energy and that effect they showed of bodies violently disintegrating would happen entirely from kinetic energy transfer {basically inducing the flesh to accellerate away from the projectile so energetically it literally rips its' self to pieces} .
Cite please, because as has been pointed out people shoot deer that are smaller and it doesn't happen. Remember the bullet doesn't have time to transfer all it's energy in the target, that exactly what the rules in HT is showing. (And why there is a whole industry devoted to bullets that do). Although that said energy isn't shed evenly as it travels through and out and keeps going.






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Here is an example of why it matters :
*The target is H.T. 10 and hits are to torso
*Weapon A delivers a blowthrough maximum damage of 20
*Weapon B delivers a blowthrough maximum damage of 30
*To reduce subject to -50 Hit Points where upon survival is impossible requires 3 hits From Weapon A but only 2 from Weapon B
*If both did only 10 Hit Points , not only would it require 6 hits for both but would also require the same from 12.7 x 99 , 14.5 mm soviet , 15mm Besa etc {or 4 if wound modifiers are factored in} which is purely cinematic {again , it takes exactly 1 in real life} .
Its only a problem if we take it as read that any hit from 12.7mm or higher is instant explody death, I don't so it's not a problem



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If the results with My proposed system are too much with bleeding rules factored on total damage , then factor bleeding on My blowthrough limits ; I can't see armour piercing bullets causing as much as ball any way .
It's not a factor of it being too much with bleeding factored in, it's that bleeding will kill your target perfectly well in a realistic(ish) fashion without your add on. It's just it's not instant (well unless you hit a location without an injury cap of course).

If you want to emulate the effect you've described than go for it, and I think you tweak will do that (although you might want to add a ex cr effect to hit), just that's not necessarily the same as matching reality.

Last edited by Tomsdad; 09-23-2015 at 08:00 AM.
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Old 09-23-2015, 03:21 AM   #28
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Originally Posted by DouglasCole View Post
Fackler actually discusses this in one of his papers, and notes that if the temporary cavity is large enough to exceed the elasticity of the internal or containging tissue, terrible things can result. But only in that case (or in the case of fragments lowering elasticity artificially), and otherwise the temporary cavity can only disrupt by pushing up against nerve clusters.

The most famous cases of the "exploding body" observation tend to be prairie dogs hit by rounds like the .220 swift (4,000 fps). The body can't contain the cavity, and splorch.
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Originally Posted by Verjigorm View Post
Does this happen to people hit by .50BMG though? People seem to hunt deer with it enough, and the deer are not exploded. A deer is smaller or roughly a similar size as a man, so I assume that if it won't explode a 100lb deer, it wouldn't explode a 150lb man.
Given that prairie dogs are between 1-3lbs and humans are what 150lb - 175lb on average so what roughly 80x the mass

that .220 swift is 4213fps and 2138 J

a normal 12.7x99mm is 3044fps and 18,050 J so slower but 9x the energy

Now body shape, the way temporary cavity forms and a whole other bunch off other stuff means

.22 to a 2lb Prairie Dog

and

12.7mm to a 160lb human


are not two points on a straight linear scale of effect. But that is a 9:1 drop in ratio of impact energy to target mass

Last edited by Tomsdad; 09-23-2015 at 06:38 AM.
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Old 09-23-2015, 05:33 AM   #29
DouglasCole
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Originally Posted by Verjigorm View Post
Does this happen to people hit by .50BMG though? People seem to hunt deer with it enough, and the deer are not exploded. A deer is smaller or roughly a similar size as a man, so I assume that if it won't explode a 100lb deer, it wouldn't explode a 150lb man.
I've only heard about it anecdotally, where a sniper engaged a target on the wall, and managed to bisect him with a low torso shot. I'm presuming he severed his spine, and gravity did the rest. This is, again, only an anecdote. Attempts to find what was supposed to be a video online did not help me sleep.
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Old 09-23-2015, 06:16 AM   #30
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I've only heard about it anecdotally, where a sniper engaged a target on the wall, and managed to bisect him with a low torso shot. I'm presuming he severed his spine, and gravity did the rest. This is, again, only an anecdote. Attempts to find what was supposed to be a video online did not help me sleep.
FWIW I had a look around and while finding various gruesome things didn't find anything like bodies exploding, or being cut in half without other factors.

"Pink mist" is a thing, but it tends to be from other stuff when it comes to torsos or whole bodies, when I've seen it applied to snipers it tends to be for head shots.

And well the skull as a small rigid container of stuff with high water content and little in the way of more resistant material in the mix, is particularly prone to the special effects mentioned.

Last edited by Tomsdad; 09-24-2015 at 02:56 AM.
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