LMG vs. Railgun vs. GP-33 Grenade Launcher: Man-Portable Artillery at the Fire Team Level in Star Citizen
Machine gunners are cute to have, but grenadiers are a necessity.
In our article “Building an Effective Infantry Squad in Star Citizen”, a contributor for The Doctrine briefly looked at the structure of nine different squads from seven of the real world’s most successful militaries. Below, we explore insights into the ideal firepower capabilities that were touched upon but ultimately beyond the scope of that article.
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Key takeaways
Giving squads an indirect fire and anti-armor capability increases their their firepower and versatility.
Real-world examples from nine different militaries highlight trends and implications that are directly transferrable to Star Citizen gameplay.
The GP-33 grenade launcher and Scourge railgun have tactical advantages that no other man-portable weapons have in the game.
A squad’s role, mission, and vehicle accessibility should determine which and how heavy weapons should be distributed.
A brief background
With decades of maturity in the manufacture and tactical application of assault rifles, many armies are moving away from light and medium machine guns. Because firepower is now highly portable at the individual warfighter level, there’s an increasing focus on the ability to provide indirect fire and anti-armour capability at the fire team level. As a result the number of grenade launchers, and recoilless rifles or rocket launchers in a squad is increasing.
These radical changes in squad composition are forcing real-world militaries to reexamine the tactics and strategies around which fire teams are built. So how can we apply these learned lessons to Star Citizen?
Quick review of the world’s most successful militaries’ squads
The first two squads mentioned in “Fire Team Two: The Smallest Building Block of a Practical Squad Structure” belonged to France and the United Kingdom. Despite having won a similar amount of wars, and having been involved in several conflicts as both enemies and allies of one another, these nations came to noticeably different conclusions in squad organization and equipment loadouts.
A French squad—translated into english as an “Army Combat Group”—is equipped with 6 assault rifles, 1 light machine gun, 2 rocket launchers, and 1 grenade launcher.
The United Kingdom Army Rifle Section—“section” is British for “squad”— equipped with 6 assault rifles, 1 designated marksman rifle, 1 general-purpose machine gun, and 2 grenade launchers.
United States of America has two services that field vastly different rifle squads. The United States Army Rifle Squad is equipped with 7 assault rifles, 2 light machine guns and 2 grenade launchers. By contrast the United States Marine Rifle Squad fields 15 assault rifles and 3 grenade launchers.
Russian motorized rifle squads are equipped with 5 assault rifles, 1 general-purpose machine gun, 1 rocket launcher, and 2 grenade launchers.
The German Army panzergrenadier (motorized or mechanized infantry) group is equipped with 5 assault rifles, 1 general-purpose machine gun, 1 rocket launcher, and 1 grenade launcher.
The modern German military’s Fallschirmjjager groups—airborne squads—are equipped with 7 assault rifles, 1 designated marksman rifle, 2 light machine guns, 2 rocket launchers, and 2 grenade launchers.
Chinese Mechanized Rifle Squads operate with 5 assault rifles and 1 rocket launcher. Interestingly, they seem to take a similar approach to the United States Marine Rifle Squad, equipping their machine gunner with one of the assault rifles. But the key difference is that the Chinese machine gunner’s rifle uses a high-capacity drum magazine that the rest of the squad does not.
Turkey’s Land Forces Infantry Squad is equipped with 7 assault rifles, 2 general-purpose machine guns, 4 rocket launchers, and 2 grenade launchers.
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Observable trends in squad equipment
When we examine the loadouts of the nine real-world squads above, a few interesting weapon trends emerge. The most noticeable is that all nine squads have an indirect fire capability. All but one squad field grenade launchers for that purpose (the French use a mortar or mortar-like weapon). Additionally, slightly more than half of the squads are equipped with an anti-armor capability. We also see that two-thirds of the squads field some form of machine gun.
But when we look at how many of each weapon a squad equips… things get interesting.
Nearly all of the squads equip multiple grenade launchers. Three of them equip multiple rocket launchers; the same number equip multiple machine guns. And of course, every single squad equips all of its members with an assault rifle that has a cyclical firing rate of 600 or more rounds per minute.
This “infantrification” of artillery-like weapon systems seems to imply a few things. First is that an anti-armor capability is just as important to a squad as the increased direct fire capability of a machine gun. Second is that once all individual members of a squad can achieve a cyclical fire rate of 600 rounds per minute or more, providing the squad with an indirect fire capability becomes much more important than any advantages a machine gun provides. Lastly, increasing a squad’s indirect fire capability, and possibly even bringing that capability down to the fire team level, is also more important than a machine gun’s advantages at the squad level.
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Star Citizen FPS damage analysis
Using data extracted by a member of the community,1 we can see that one round of the GP-33 grenade launcher is on par with a single, uncharged round from a Scourge railgun. A single round from either weapon does slightly more damage than a burst from a P4-AR and slightly less than a burst from a Gallant energy assault rifle.
But area of effect is what primarily separates these weapons from rifles. Both weapons have a fairly similar area of affect radius, with the GP-33’s being marginally larger than the Scourge’s.
When it comes to tactical use, each weapon’s purpose couldn’t be more clear. The grenade launcher’s severe arc makes it the superior choice when there’s a terrain disparity—like when the enemy is behind sturdy cover, in an elevated position, or otherwise out of a direct line of fire. Meanwhile the railgun’s charged shot simply annihilates anything in its path, including vehicles and small fighters.
There’s also something to be said for the safety of stealth. The grenade launcher doesn’t require its operator to expose themselves, nor does it create a lightshow that betrays the point of origin of its rounds from a significant distance. On the other hand, the railgun does.
Practical in-game lessons for leaders
In the course of building your organization’s small-unit doctrine in Star Citizen, you should give serious thought to making at least one grenade launcher available at the fire team level and at least one anti-armor weapon available at the squad level.
For such a loadout to be practical, squad members will need be equipped with medium armor. Medium armor is currently the lightest armor that will allow infantry to equip two Size 2 or greater personal weapons.
Squads operating with light armor as part of a mechanized force could keep heavier weapons like grenade launchers and railguns on a vehicle weapon rack, such as that in an Ursa rover. But that would restrict the squad to operating in the rover’s immediate area.
One more option is for a squad equipped with only light armor to dedicate an entire fire team to heavy weapons. They could carry heavy weapons for assault and rely on pistols to defend their position, but leave infantry combat to standard rifle squad fire teams.
Apart from how heavy weapons are distributed, you should also consider the basic rifle that will be the hallmark of your organization’s infantry rifleman. If it’s capable of a high rate of fire utilizing a magazine of suitable capacity, then the drawbacks of equipping a rifleman with a light machine gun could outweigh any advantages. A light machine gun’s increase in volume of fire may simply not be worth the encumberment and unique ammunition needs if it can be replaced with additional ammo for indirect fire or anti-armor weapons.
It would be interesting to touch on the typical operational scenarios that influence real world squad composition particularly between different branches of the same military.