Militech XR-1 MAG- PULSE Gun

"First time I saw one of these used was in that affair in Akron. Silent Slim had one, and he popped a Standard-B's chest pod at 500 meters. Wonderfully accurate, and deadly. Kicks like an autocannon, though, and it breaks down if you look at it side-ways."

- Morgan Blackhand

A couple of years back, Rhinemetall won the race to put out the first man-portable railgun. Their closest competitor, Militech Electronics, was developing a different concept—instead of a monster railcannon, they wanted the next step in the common battlefield firearm, a rifle that could be carried and fired by the normal soldier. They had just begun testing the final prototypes when the war broke out Suddenly, there was a real market for incredible sniper rifles with high armor penetration, and the prototype went into production without testing.

The XR-1 (like all other railguns) is not silent—the round makes an almighty "crack" as it goes hypersonic. Ifs not invisible, either. When the round's shock wave pushes atmosphere out of its way as it leaves the muzzle, the air flashes incandescent. In addition, the XR-1 does kick heavily Its recoil factor is 6 (see recoil rules, Blackhand's Street Weapons, page 48—these rules are NOT optional where the Gauss rifle is concerned!).

Note that the XR-1 may be the size of a large rifle (say, an auto shotgun), but its battery is larger than that of a cads requiring a 16 kg backpack. The hyper-velocity EAP (extra armor penetration) ammo counts all armor as 1/4 SP and halves all damage that penetrates armor.