Heavy machine gun
) 
| |
|---|---|
| Name | heavy machine gun |
| Appearance | heavy machine gun |
| Damage vs. small | 1d2 |
| Damage vs. large | 1d2 |
| To-hit bonus | -4 |
| Weapon skill | firearms |
| Size | two-handed |
| Base price | 2000 zm (+10/positive enchant) |
| Weight | 500 |
| Material | iron |
A heavy machine gun is a firearm that appears in SLASH'EM and SlashTHEM. It is a two-handed launcher that can fire bullets at a very high rate, and is always on full automatic mode.
Contents
Generation
Yendorian army lieutenants have a 1⁄2 chance of generating with a heavy machine gun, and captains have a 1⁄4 chance of generating with one.
Rate of fire
The heavy machine gun's rate of fire depends on its enchantment and skill of the user.
| Enchantment | Unskilled/basic | Skilled | Expert |
|---|---|---|---|
| -7 to -6 | 8 | 8 | 8 |
| -5 to -3 | 8 | 8 | 1d2+7 |
| -2 to +2 | 8 | 1d2+7 | 1d3+7 |
| +3 to +5 | 1d2+7 | 1d3+7 | 1d4+7 |
| +6 to +8 | 1d3+7 | 1d4+7 | 1d5+7 |
| +9 | 1d4+7 | 1d5+7 | 1d6+7 |
Strategy
The heavy machine gun is generally not a viable weapon - at 500aum, it weighs the same as a loadstone and takes up half of a vanilla NetHack character's maximum carrying capacity; in SlashTHEM, where the maximum is set to 4000, it may be worth using for its superlative rate of fire, but its two-handedness still renders it quite inconvenient. Assault rifles in both games offer a comparable rate of fire with smaller to-hit penalties and less than 1/10th of the heavy machine gun's weight.
Origin
The term "heavy machine gun" has historically been used to refer to several different classes of weapons. In modern usage, it generally refers to weapons such as the World War I-era M2 Browning - a large weapon weighing approximately 100lbs and intended to be fired by a small crew from a stationary tripod, the Browning is also found mounted on aircraft and tanks.
Note that real-life heavy machine guns actually tend to have a lower rate of fire than their smaller counterparts: their heavy construction instead enables them to fire heavier ammunition, to fire accurately at longer ranges, and to fire for longer periods of time without overheating.
