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Old 07-23-2019, 09:07 PM
Vespers War Vespers War is offline
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An 18th-century best that never was is the infamous Puckle Gun. An early manual repeater, it was a 32mm smoothbore black powder revolver mounted on a tripod with a 3 foot barrel. It has a nine-shot cylinder. A crank at the rear cams a cylinder to or from the breech, and when cammed back the cylinder can be manually rotated. A flintlock fire mechanism at the top of the frame will drop sparks into a priming pan and fire the top-most chamber. Rotating the crank all the way back allows the cylinder to be removed and replaced. A single shot can be fired per 5-second round, and replacing a cylinder requires three rounds, so a cylinder can be fired and replaced in one minute for an average rate of fire of 9 rounds per minute.

A grand total of two Puckle Guns were purchased for an expedition to the West Indies. The expedition was a failure and it's not known if the Puckle Guns were ever fired in anger.

Puckle Gun (3.2 cm L/28)
Gun Weight: 40 kg
Tripod Weight: 10 kg
SAR, Mag 9, Rld 3, Bulk 8, SS 2, Rng 90 (SS and Rng include tripod bonus)

Shot: Dam: 7 Pen: 2-Nil
Canister: B: 45 Dam 2/1 Pen: 1-Nil

Each loaded cylinder is approximately 5 kilograms. Loading a single chamber takes 2 actions, so it requires 18 actions to fully reload a cylinder. Three cylinders and a crew of 3 (1 gunner, 2 loaders) should be able to keep a Puckle Gun firing at its maximum rate, though extra cylinders may be desirable to maintain flexibility between shot and canister. Explosive shell was not developed due to a lack of reliable detonator; if it was developed it would be B: 4, C: -1, Pen: Nil. If an effective shrapnel shell was developed, it would be B: 8, Dam: 2/1, Pen: 1-Nil.
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