Does anyone have some tips or resources to help me design guns for a WW1 inspired setting?

Have some sort of jamming mechaninc. A lot of WW1 weapons were very complex and with a lot of moving parts, which wasn't exactly good for muddy trench warfare.

Don't shy away from having machine guns be extremely powerful. Like they're also firing the same types of cartridges as a lot of the rifles, so they should do about the same damage. Balance them by having there be fewer of them (and requiring a crew of at least two to operate effectively)

>implying /k/ is any better

Im running a survival style campaign focused around prehistoric creatures. I thought about using bolt action weapons as a way to easily end an encounter but with limited ammunition present they'd have to pick and choose engagements.

Nice meme friend

Right, hardcore weapons mechanics for WWI style weapons. As stated above, the primary arms for WWI infantry soldiers was the rifle. Firing large, powerful bullets accurate to 1,400 meters (about 4,593 feet if you want it in Yankee) on average. These weapons were bolt-action, meaning the soldier had to manually chamber each round. Each army issued their own unique rifle (again listed above) and issued their troops bayonets for mass charges. For defense machine guns were king. Firing full rifle rounds at 550 round per minute, the Maxim machine gun is the most iconic. The first true machine gun, it was water cooled and very heavy. Officers were issued pistols, such as the Mauser C96 or Webley Model 1887 revolver. Late in the war the first automatic rifles and sub-machine guns cropped up, as well as the use of shotguns for clearing trenches. Soldiers also wielded an array of knives, clubs, swords, and shovels for melee use. Artillery and field guns (smaller artillery) also played their part in wrecking a poor lads day. Then we have tanks, planes, zepplins (big blimps), poison gas, hand grenades. You can have some fun here!

>The Gewehr 98 had a 1 round capacity.
That is incorrect. The Germans gave their soldiers 5 rounds like normal people.

Yeah, and the French Lebel rifle had an 8-round tubular magazine. I think that guy is just a dope

Go play a bit of Verdun, its not incredibly acurate but you getvthe idea of long rangevtrench warfare.
Use rifles as the norm, pistols were for aristocratic which by their nature were officers.
The french ruby is fun , I have one. Pistols generally were in .32acp, .30 cal revolvers and the like.
Gas was a mix but the most common was chlorine from what ive read, mustard is basicly chlorine and bleach.......you dont want to breath it in.
Artillery killed more than rifles, and illiness was rampant. The trenches in all seasons but summer were wet crappy places. Rats, plauge, colds, flu.....ect. trench foot was defined here as you just never got dry.

>What is your favorite way for guns to be represented mechanically?

Abstractly. The shooter matters a lot more than if he's using a Mauser or an Enfield.

>you need level 4 body armor to stop rifle rounds.

Level 3. Level 4 is what you use to stop AP .30-06

Go watch C&Rsenal

Do it now

Only the Berthier had a 3-round capacity and it was primarily fielded for cavalry. The Lebel was the standard infantry rifle.

Hmm, the war in which alpine troops were fitted with body armor, shields and whose staff-scissors to cut barbed wire could fit bayonets. Said troops died more of avalanches than because of the enemies enjoying their quarters dug into the Marmolada Glacier.

user, go nuts with it.

worldwar1.com/itafront/marmolada.htm

>Magical Slang: Ritual, Language and Trench Slang of the Western Front
firstworldwar.com/features/slang.htm

firstworldwar.com/weaponry/index.htm

battlefield.wikia.com/wiki/Category:Weapons_of_Battlefield_1

encyclopedia.1914-1918-online.net/home/

tanks-encyclopedia.com/ww1/belgium/Belgian_Minerva_Armoured_car.php

>Yeah, and the French Lebel rifle had an 8-round tubular magazine
He was likely thinking of the Berthier, which did indeed have a three-round en-bloc clip.

>WW1 inspired setting

Is this somekind of half-fantasy setting where Franco elves with their FT tanks and bunch of angry ballerinas goes against artillery centric Human Jerries with bunch of mustard gas and red barons? With magic-runned blimp carriers and dragon-riding dragoons that carries machine guns and rocket lance?

Yeah i would play that game

As said, Forgotten Weapons on Youtube is good (found here: youtube.com/user/ForgottenWeapons )

I only recently discovered gun-Jesus & his channel, but it seems to have some good stuff; the Farquhar-Hill rifle might be of particular interest: - youtu.be/n8VtQt2EtJk

Since I'm too lazy to come up with my own advice, I'll just shit on others' instead so OP doesn't learn anything wrong:

Rifles today are still chambered in rifle rounds. Assault rifles aren't. The French main service rifle held 8 rounds and the Germans' 5.
The rifle rounds would have been accurate out to less than half of that due to wartime production standards. That aside, the rifles themselves wouldn't have been effective past 500 meters because it becomes hard to aim under battlefield conditions without a scope at that kind of distance.

Pistols weren't exclusive to officers. Cheaper ones were often issued to cavalry, artillerymen or signal troops or sold at the commissary (yes, really). Those guns would mostly be what we'd consider pocket pistols today.

I'm working on something right now OP

Do tell, OP. That sounds awesome.
Are you planning on having the PCs hunt for dinosaurs?

That looks real nice.

Two nitpicks though: Stallhelm means "(horse) stable helmet". You want Stahlhelms instead. And an Obrez has an effective range of much more than 5 meters. I'd use the same range profile as an SMG if I were you.

Oops, my bad on the stahlhelm. I'll fix it up.

Also, I thought the Obrez pistols were pretty inaccurate? I mostly have that entry as a joke, though, no sure if it'll make it into the final draft.

Otherwise, the intent of it was to capture the simultaneous lethality of rifle rounds and shrapnel, while still being able to block shrapnel with armour, but not being able to block the rifle rounds.

Cutting down a rifle was a relatively common (and punishable) field modification. I'd definitely keep it in in some form.
The limiting factor in their accuracy is that they usually lack a front sight, so it's all point and shoot. A barrel of that length may very well still be good out to 150m or more.

From a cursory glance, your equipment list looks great. Is the rest of the system homebrew as well or are you basing it off of an existing one? Personally, I'd probably have gone with Only War for simplicity's sake.

*50m, not 150m. The latter would be very optimistic.

Have you considered checking out GURPS or Ballad of the Laser Whales?

Thanks! I'll probably just change the description of the Obrez, then. All in all, I did a fair amount of research into weapons of the era, although I started off with a base of knowledge from Barbara Tuchmann & Dan Carlin so I had some solid ground to start my research from.

The WWI modification is based off of SWN, and was initially supposed to be primarily a reskin, but every day it deviates further from its source.

Just finished the Magic chapter, about to start on Super Science (these ones are optional for a less historically accurate experience).

OP, feel free to email me what you are trying to go for. I can probably help you select for a lot of scenarios/update if players force changes you didn't expect.

CandRsenal gmail

That's pretty fucking rad, user, I think I'd really enjoy playing a campaign in that. Good job so far!

what the fuck

are you legit Othias?

Actually extremely uncommon but repeated in movies etc. Only one named account of one tunnel rat requesting one cut down SMLE from a field armorer has surfaced. He goes on to say he ditched it for a US trench shotgun later on.

Most cut diwn rifles,including your photo, were the result of partisan or resistance forces making concealable weapons for use against occupiers in the inter-war and WWII eras

probabaly

It depends.

If they were literally made with a hacksaw, yes.

Or if they had no front sight with which to aim, yes.

So really, 95 percent of them would be close range trash. But, I've seen some well made pieces that could conceivably be used at some range.

Well, you're either an internet celebrity who just so happens to browse Veeky Forums, or you're a lookalike playing a cruel joke on a /k/ommando.

or I caught "c&rsenal" being mentioned off k

>a lookalike playing a cruel joke on a /k/ommando

Don't see how that contradicts with being a fa/tg/uy who just so happens to know C&Rsenal.

Not op, but my setting is a Roman Empire that never fell on the fringe of collapse in the late 1800's. The party needs to go back in time to colonize for Rome. From that point on the colony gets destroyed and it becomes a survival mission back home.

>colonizing for Rome
>prehistoric creatures

wait what?

Wacky time travel involving Sphinx gods that like to fuck with the pc's. Also im a latin major and I dont see the Roman setting done enough. I do paleontology as a hobby thought I'd put it into a campaign.

Also an ancient civilization of lizard people who specialize in technomagic.

Did somebody say OBREZ PISTOL OF BOLT ACTION?

>The Germans gave their soldiers 5 rounds like normal people.
Not with the mauser 71.
That's what I said.
>Rifles today are still chambered in rifle rounds. Assault rifles aren't.
That's what I said.

Also of note is the doctrine of uniforms, some might find it unfortunate that france sent their troops to the field wearing red pants and blue coats, I find the british sending their troops out with tin hats a greater sin, you see the philosophy at the time was that armor was useless, until the later years of the war those "helmets" were actually hats that were just part of the uniform.

Fair enough. It certainly sounds interesting!

The Mauser Modell 71 was entirely replaced by '88, 26 years before WW1 even began. The Berthier wasn't France's main service rifle in the war and you said
"rifles today are usually chambered in what's called an intermediate round",
which is also bullshit.

So cut that out.

>The Mauser Modell 71 was entirely replaced by '88, 26 years before WW1 even began.
No it was not, it still saw service however limited.
>The Berthier wasn't France's main service rifle in the war and you said
I will concede this however it cannot be ignored france still fielded troops with a rifle of such a small capacity.
>which is also bullshit.
I was referring to service rifles, find me a nation with a service rifle in a full rifle cartridge.

ehhh... the 1871 was displaced by the 71/84 AND the 1888 before the war.

The only mention of 71s being used is in some work on an anti-balloon incendiary cartridge since 7.92 was too small for the chemical tech of incendiary cartridges in WWI.

They appear in a good number of photos but almost all of them are those staged "before you get killed" photo studio shots. Likely because they were the only rifles NOT being issued in significant numbers.

I've got a masters in WWI history. And I'm prior service (Army). Ask away.

Three questions just out of morbid curiosity.

>Question the First
It's 1914 and the First Battle of the Marne has just ended in the favor of France. What can the Germans do to win the war from here? If you have an answer: why didn't the Germans do that?

>Question the Second
Is there an outcome of the war imaginable that wouldn't result in France getting its shit pushed in come 1940 but would still be acceptable to Britain and America?

>Question the Third
Were there any significant differences between the weapons employed by the fighting factions, or were they basically all the same shit and everyone only created their own weapons out of patriotism? (Finally a question that's actually about the weapons!)

Play Ops and Tactics

If the Russians folded before the Germans declared unrestricted submarine warfare (instead of like, the month or so after), could Germany have won the war?

Not the same user but the main issue by the end of the war wasn't men on the front, it was economy. US entry into the war was predicated on the fact that if they didn't, french and british cheques were about to bounce mightily. French industry, despite the massive bleeding they were taking, was still largely able to shit out the tanks, plans and artillery the US and Balkans entente minors needed by the end of the war.

>could Germany have won the war?
I really don't think so. The real thing that killed Germany, in my interpretation of documents from the period, is their domestic economy. By the end of the war, there wasn't enough food to supply the homefront let alone either warfront. A Russian surrender would have made things a little easier on the Germans and freed up some supplies for the Western front, but by the last year of fighting, it would be too late to win the war. Again, IMO.

Getting to your questions. Just give me a moment.

>othais browses /k/ and Veeky Forums
How can one man be so based?

I'm another user, but to answer your third question each nation had pretty distinct weapons at the start of the war.

Germans had very accurate and long range Mauser Gewehr 98 rifles. However the German command expected battles to occur at distances of at least 400 meters, hence their rifles' shortest zeroing was at 400m. As a result they had bulky rear sights that were less than ideal in close range trench warfare and were very long.

Britain wanted fast and sustainable rifle fire so their Lee-Enfields had a larger magazine capacity (10 rounds vs the standard 5) and very smooth bolt actions.

France was the first nation to develop smokeless powder but they rushed their rifle design to get an early edge over other nations. As a result, the Model 1886 Lebel was severely out of date by 1914. It had a fixed 8 round tube magazine that had to be reloaded one round at a time instead of using stripper clips like everyone else. French efforts to replace the Lebel with a more modern rifle were interrupted by the war.

Russia had a huge population they could call upon but many were poorly educated so they needed a simple and robust rifle that anyone could use. The Mosin nagant is somewhat crude compared to the other nations, but it's cheap to manufacture, easy to use and passable in every other aspect.

Italy was in similar to Russia in that their carcano rifles were crude but got the job done.

That's the rifles anyways.

1. Battle of the Marne ends and you've got yourself in the stalemate of trench warfare. To be honest, the German soldiers had a better time in their trenches than anyone else (the Germans had nicer, cleaner, better supplied trenches than the other side). This causes the Germans to fight a bit more defensively. They want to stay in their nice trench more than the French, Americans, Brits, whose trenches are the worst things imaginable. So, how to the Germans win? I think it would require an overhaul of German military doctrine at the time and technology that just wouldn't come into it's own right until WWII (ie proper tanks and aggressive tactics).

2. Absolutely. Post WWI delegations were a mess. Germany was treated like utter shit and forced to give up too much, when they were already down, the war having hurt national pride and the economy. If France, Britain, and America had been less brutal to Germany, I don't think they would have come to what they were in the late 30's and 40's.

3. By and large, weapons on both sides were the same.
>everyone created their own weapons out of patriotism
Not really. Winchester was giving guns to pretty much everyone but the Germans. You had lend-lease shit. Everybody was using whatever they could get their hands on, in the early war, Austria-Hungary sent 1/3 of their army to war with sticks instead of rifles because of the weapon shortage.
Most Russians in the early war were using their hunting rifles (Russian deployment is a fascinating thing in WWI, btw). It was mostly a matter of countries using whatever they could get and supply. For Germany this meant they were using German-made everything, but for the Allies, everybody was going back and forth using guns from each other's nations, toying with designs to make more popular ammo work in different guns (american enfield, etc.). It was just a shitshow, supply wise, because you had a ton of different calibers on the Allies supply chain, relatively fewer on the axis

>They were using rushed 1886 rifles with attempts to replace them interrupted by the war
>They were still wearing red bright pants even though the first horizon blue uniforms were already being produced
Wow. France really was caught with their pants around their ankles, huh?

>Germany was treated like utter shit and forced to give up too much
There are a lot of people, including quite a few historians (BBC had an article on it a while back) that believe the opposite: Germany wasn't punished hard enough in any field other than their national pride, which gave them both the reason and the ability to strike back against a weakened and divided Europe. They believe that the belief that Germany was treated too harshly was popularized by Hitler's propaganda. What is your opinion on this stance?

>Austria-Hungary sent 1/3 of their army to war with sticks instead of rifles because of the weapon shortage.
You're exaggerating, right? Or do you mean literal sticks?

>Russian deployment is a fascinating thing in WWI, btw
Care to elaborate?

Thanks for the answers by the way.

>They believe that the belief that Germany was treated too harshly was popularized by Hitler's propaganda. What is your opinion on this stance?
There were two solutions: Punish Germany OR get them back on their feet.
If you're going to treat Germany harshly, do it for a LONG TIME, like what's happened to Japan following WWII.
Personally, I think Nazi Germany could have been better avoided by giving the Germans what they really wanted out of WWI which was to be considered a world power. "Hey, you fought hard, we're sorry we didn't let you sit at the grown up table, we'll do better from now on," instead of "you fought hard, better luck next time."

>You're exaggerating, right? Or do you mean literal sticks?
Literal sticks, tree branches about rifle size and shape so they had something to march with

The Treaty of Versailles of was pretty brutal. They saw hyperinflation that hasn't been seen outside of failing regimes like Zimbabwe and it totally killed their economy.

It was kind of like breaking someone's legs and then forcing them to carry you on their back.

>Care to elaborate?
Basically, everyone living near the border of Russia had there moving orders, guns, a uniform, etc. so when Russia told them to move out, they did it in a really organized and efficient manner, making the most advantage of local train systems, etc. It's the carry over of this system that made Russia so defensible in WWII

>There were two solutions: Punish Germany OR get them back on their feet.
Or just break it up, which is what happened after WW2 anyway.

Until 1990, and two decades later they're back to their old tricks.

>Or just break it up, which is what happened after WW2 anyway.
I mean, that didn't work out too well, either. Who are you going to give East Germany to? the Bolsheviks?

Poland

>believing there were any significant differences between the Mauser, the Mosin, the Springfield and the Carcano
They were mostly the same shit. German engineering was mostly known, at the time, for being rugged, not for being high precision.

The idea that Germany was treated unfairly is a complete lie that is easily disproven by how they themselves treated the countries they defeated. France had to pay a larger share of its GDP in reparations in 1870 and pulled it off in half the alloted time while the German supermen pissed and moaned about their own reparations.

Their territorial losses were minimal and consisted of thin strips of land that were either a) The grand duchy of Poznan, which by the stipulations of Versailles WAS NOT PART OF GERMANY or b) territories where germans were a solid minority. The main exceptions to that were minor shit like Alsace (which due to its status was treated like second class citizens anyway) and coastal West Prussia, which was largely there to give Poland a seaport.

Comparatively German demands from Russia were fucking gigantic, amounting to nearly three times the size of Germany, and it's very likely that they would have demanded the whole of Lorraine and significant African gains out of France, in addition to Belgian Luxembourg.

The maximal polish demands initially included Mecklemburg in its entirety, and Brandenburg and Saxony all the way to the Elbe, funnily enough.

The Entente leaders thought it was a joke.

sadly Europe always needed and still needs strong Poland dominating the central-eastern europe or else Germany and Russia will make grabs there which will upset the balance of power on the continent too much

>Poland is needed
Strictly speaking Poland as a space filler is just as useless and interwar Poland was all too happy to backstab its nominal allies in exchange for slices of shit Germany was offering (e.g. Vilnius, which had been the capital of Lithuania literally forever and ended up being a spoil of war in the soviet polish war despite the fact that Poland was allied with Lithuania, or their behavior at Munich).

That said Poland (along with the scandinavian states and Turkey) did figure extremely strongly in France's diplomatic system before the 19th century.

Given the needs of the time, Intermarium would not have been a bad idea at all.
>Provides a strong Eastern Europe that can keep Germany in check
>Provides a Cordon Sanitaire against the Soviet Union (important during what is called the First Red Scare)
>The Poles were already having a pretty decent relationship with the Entente
Take pic related, remove France and divide the Rhineland between France and Belgium (give Luxembourg to France or Germany for pretty borders. Either or, I don't care). Nothing wrong with that.

Intermarium was a pipedream of Pilsudski and the polish leadership would have had none of it unless it was turned into a polish empire, this despite the fact that poles would have been a literal minority at the most likely plurality would have been ukrainians, who were basically treated as second-class citizens by Poland.

I am guessing that you are from Lithuania

I understand that your relationship with Poland is complicated but it's geography that calls for this solution >the most likely plurality would have been ukrainians
at the time that would be ruthenians actually

>who were basically treated as second-class citizens by Poland
ruthenians were not treated as second class citizens and distrust between poles and ukrainians had it sources in banderism and the fact that many ukrainians sided with soviets during the war in 1920s

also keep in mind that there was a huge class divide in polish society back then so being treated as a peasant when you were a member of lower class was normal and not racially motivated

>the fact that many ukrainians sided with soviets during the war in 1920s
Poland siding with a massively unpopular cossack leader whose army was smaller than even Nestor Makhno's didn't help them.

Inter-war polish diplomacy was a bungling mess of bullshit and no amount of harkening to the great Commonwealth is going to change that, had the war started in 38, Poland would have been a minor axis power due to how flakey they were through the period.

A large Poland that is hindered by its dependency on the significantly more powerful economy or former austro-hungarian territory wasn't going to be powerful or stay together past Pilsudski's death.

Mausers were known for their accuracy during the Boer War. The boers out ranged the British soldiers

>Inter-war polish diplomacy was a bungling mess
it's hardly a surprise since Poland was simply too weak to survive on it's own between Germany and Soviet Union while both were actively hating it
all poles could do was gamble hoping that they will bet on the right horse - while having a very limited influence over the outcome

>A large Poland wasn't going to be powerful or stay together past Pilsudski's death.
that is your assumption but we simply have no way of knowing this for sure
common enemy can unite people suprisingly well

also your nationalistic hatred towards Poland might be clouding your judgement here a little

Honestly the best solution is to open wikipedia and start reading. People can give you general ideas but you won't get too much out of a few 2k character posts. If nothing else wikipedia can give you an idea of where to look based on what interests you. Does military doctrine regarding firearms interest you? Design of firearms? Training of soldiers? Overall equipment load for soldiers? Modifications and variants of guns?

Also
is an idiot disregard what he says.

This is true. I once wrote a paper for my major about the evolution of artillery during WWI and I honestly only used sources cited by various wikipedia pages (I was in a hurry to get it done). Paper somehow managed an A.
Wikipedia is actually a really valuable resource if you actually follow up with their sources to get a bigger picture.

OP here. This thread gave me a good jumping off point doing just that. C&Rsenal is also helping.

Really glad this became a WW1 thread, I'm getting a lot of stuff for my setting.

Heck, I fucking forgot my trip was on.

MAYBE for drill but the Dual Monarchy had done a double-adoption by going with the Mannlicher 1886 and then having to rapidly adapt to smokeless and therefore adopting the 1895 right after, so they had a LOT of surplus on hand.

Infantry wasn't sent to the front unarmed.

Now drilling, yeah. I mean the British had dummy wooden rifles for drill training as well.

>nice meme

its not
/k/ doesn't know shit about anything and will argue about pistol caliber effectiveness in a world filled with rifles

One man gets the rifle, the next man gets some bullets
More than just the Russians adopted this doctrine during WWI

source?

That russian myth is from WWII btw.

can't have a WW1 guns thread on Veeky Forums without mentioning Call of Cthulu.
Have you checked it out?

Russians ran out of Mosin Nagants, were issuing Gras' and even those ran out. Many Russians supplied their own rifles because getting one from the government was a hassle.
Russia mobilized A LOT of citizen soldiers.

Britain almost ran out of artillery shells in 1915.
Massive weapon shortages and supply chain fuckups were more than common.

Even Alvin York had to scavenge a non-american rifle due to rifle, pistol, and ammo shortages.

Guns are almost always going to be lethal if you want to be realistic about it.

Depends on a lot of factors. You have to consider that most fatal gunshot wounds kill by bleeding out the target. Shot in the arm or leg by a rifle or pistol round? you're hurt but as long as you don't bleed out, you're fine. I've heard and even once seen a man survive an AK round through the neck (luckily missed the spine). Hell, something like 5% of people shot in the head survive it.

I don't have solid Russian numbers because the state collapsed but Austria-Hungary had:

2.9 Million M95 rifles
1.3 Million 88/90 Rifles (at start of war, larger than any other reserve by other powers)
82,000 Romanian Mannlichers
80,000 Gewehr 88
8,000 Greek Mannlichers
~10,000 Mauser Model 1912s

PLUS leftover Werndls in the hundreds of thousands and any captured weapons like Serbian Mausers and Russian Mosins.

They were extremely short on field kitchens, boots, winter clothing, field pieces, transportation, etc... Because the army was built on the Landsturm

But because of the double-adoption issue of the 1886 and then smokeless powder 1895, they had a crap ton of spare arms. Plus they got to seize OEWG's inventory and had the largest ammo producers in the world.

They were fine for rifles, it's every thing else that was borked.

Might have been the Serbs I was thinking about, being issued sticks

Probably the Romanians who had to turn their cavalry into infantry half way through because no horses.

They still had carbines but the carbines had no bayonet lugs so they kept their lances... on foot.

>Roman Empire that never fell on the fringe of collapse in the late 1800's
How well funded/connected is the expedition.

>Austria-Hungary sent 1/3 of their army to war
Says a lot about the Italian military
>tfw great-grandfather served for AH on the isonzo front

>The idea that Germany was treated unfairly is a complete lie that is easily disproven by how they themselves treated the countries they defeated. France had to pay a larger share of its GDP in reparations in 1870 and pulled it off in half the alloted time while the German supermen pissed and moaned about their own reparations.
The Germans also didn't put the entire French industrial sector under military rule for being late on payments nor was France as poor-off as Germany was post WW1.