Mass Driver Weapons

Mass driver cannon (MDCs) work on the principle of accelerating a stream of metallic slivers via a pair of magnetic rails. The supersonic travelling speed of the projectiles means that mass drivers are one of the few weapon types able to engage targets at the ranges that space combat occurs at. Consequently, they are used extensively in interceptor craft, gunboats and corvettes. While the larger capital ships' main armament is their laser bays and missile systems, turreted mass drivers are used as anti-fighter defensive systems. Also, the "crowbars", the Leviathans' spinal-mount main guns, likewise operate on the mass driver principle.

Mass Drivers in Centurion

The TOG Stratos ground tank uses a hull-mounted mass driver cannon for long-range attacks.

Mass Driver Cannon (MDCs)

Mass drivers have a longer range than a tank's targeting computer can achieve a lock-on at. Like lasers, they are employed against distant targets. Their penetration power is far lower than a laser's, though; the damage profile of a mass driver is neither as deep as an HEAP round's nor as capable of undercutting armour as an APDS round's.

Gauss cannon work on the same principle as a mass driver, but where the Gauss gun fires a single projectile that is too heavy and travels too slowly to be deflected by flicker shields, the MDC spurts a constant stream of very small and very fast projectiles. Consequently, unlike a Gauss round, mass driver projectiles are easily stopped by shields and need a forward painting unit to achieve hits at range against a shielded target.

While a common weapon on interceptors, in modern tank warfare MDCs are outperformed in many ways by Gauss weapons, which use less energy, bypass shields and can fire a wide variety of rounds. Tanks that mount mass driver cannons are usually specialty designs.

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Gatling Mass Driver Cannon (GMDCs)

A Gatling Mass Driver Cannon (GMDC) is a land-based variant of the traditional mass driver cannon / gatling (MDC-G) used in Interceptor combat. It fires much heavier solid projectiles at a muzzle velocity lower than a conventional MDC, but higher than a Gauss cannon. While this makes it unsuitable for the long-range and high-speed environment of an Interceptor encounter, the heavier rounds are unaffected by shields and still speedy enough to make them potent weapons for ground combat. In addition, through the use of either multiple barrels or multiple capacitor banks coils, the GMDC has a higher rate of fire than the traditional MDC.

All GMDC weapons have a 20 hex (4 km) maximum range, and are not affected by an unpainted target's shields. Each combat round, the controlling player must declare the number of rounds each of their GMDCs will fire during a combat phase before making any attack rolls, up to the maximum allowed by the specific class of GMDC. All rounds must be fired at the same target.

Gatling mass drivers are fairly new weapons only just entering general production. Since they avoid the usual long-range weapons´ dependence on painting lasers, they are expected to find widespread use in the armament of ground tanks. Their advent may also cause a major change in infantry tactics, which up to the current year of 6830 involved the use of infantry as forward painting elements.

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Mass Driver Stats

Centurion Mass Driver Weapons

Weapon	Range	Damage Profile	Modified by Shields?	Indirect Fire?	Damage Against Infantry													Power Used	Mass (Tons)	Cost (Talents)
						-1	0	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10
MDC-8	20		Yes	No		-	-	-	-	-	-	1	2	2	3	3	3	6	24	168,000
MDC-10	20		Yes	No		-	-	-	-	-	1	2	2	2	2	3	3	11	42	250,000
MDC-12	20		Yes	No		-	-	-	-	-	1	2	2	2	3	3	4	12	46	300,000
GMDC-5	20	(5 shots per combat round)	No	No	1 shot hits	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	1	1	1	1	2	6	75,000
					2 shots hit	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	1	1	1	1	1
					3 shots hit	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	1	2	2	2	2
					4 shots hit	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	1	2	2	2	2
					5 shots hit	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	1	2	2	2	2
GMDC-8	20	(4 shots per combat round)	No	No	1 shot hits	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	1	1	1	1	1	4	12	125,000
					2 shots hit	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	1	2	2	2	2
					3 shots hit	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	1	2	2	2	2
					4 shots hit	-	-	-	-	-	-	1	2	2	3	3	3
GMDC-15	20	(3 shots per combat round)	No	No	1 shot hits	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	1	2	2	2	2	7	24	165,000
					2 shots hit	-	-	-	-	-	1	2	2	2	3	3	3
					3 shots hit	-	-	-	-	-	1	2	3	3	3	3	4
GMDC-18	20	(2 shots per combat round)	No	No	1 shot hits	-	-	-	-	-	-	1	2	3	3	3	3	12	35	235,000
					2 shots hit	-	-	-	-	-	1	2	3	3	3	3	4