History LIterature / HammersSlammers

* CompleteMonster: In-universe, it's oddly averted with Joachim Steuben. Despite witnessing some of Joachim's horrific actions (including ''harming a child''), Pritchard doesn't consider him evil, "just loyal". However, Hammer's fiancee points out, evil or not, Joachim is simply too dangerous to live.

* CycleOfRevenge: Played with in the short story ''Cultural Conflict''. A Slammers soldier [[NiceJobBreakingItHero shoots what he thinks is a dumb animal]]. It isn't. The primitive natives and Slammers begin to skirmish with each other in an escalating cycle of violence, ending with the decimated Slammers nerve-gassing their nests and wiping out almost all the breeders. The remaining native males prepare for one final ZergRush just as the Slammers landing craft arrives.

* MindProbe: Partially {{subverted}}, particularly the story called " The Interrogation Team". There, the mind probe is semi-painless and takes the form of a directed hallucination. BOTH the interrogator and the person being interrogated are given the drug, and a second interrogator asks questions while the first, in rapport with the victim, experiences his/her memories as the questions are asked. The drug in question is a combination truth serum and hallucinogen, and is described by the first interrogator as akin to a drug high. In this particular story, the interrogated person comes from a heavily defended town, a "red-pill target" - and when the authorization to nuke the town is given, the interrogator shares one last vision with the interrogated person - as he envisions his baby girl's eyeballs melted by the nuclear blast. Both the interrogator and the interrogated individual were disconnected from the machine when it happened. DavidDrake does not write ''nice'' stories - perhaps because he WAS a interrogator assigned to the 11th Cavalry during Vietnam.
* ObligatoryWarCrimeScene: Usually by way of [[IDidWhatIHadToDo doing whatever victory required]]. In one of the stories, Colonel Hammer catches some flak from [[ArmchairMilitary rear-echelon types]] for dealing with an insurgency by having [[HumanShield family members]] of known insurgents ridding on Slammers' vehicles while moving through hostile territory; ambushes of Slammers armor columns dropped, and several attempted ambushes failed because, "somebody noticed their wife or kid on the lead vehicle." Also, gassing a village being used as a heavily fortified base by those insurgents, using gas rather than a nuke only because a gas attack could be done without drawing the attention of reporters. Hammer's actions are about par for the course in the setting.
* OhCrap: Happens to one Slammer's unit [[spoiler: who through miscommunication, accidentally end up in the center of an enemy firebase.]]

* WarfareRegression:

* ''The Tank Lords'' - Available free [[http://baencd.thefifthimperium.com/15-WhentheTideRisesCD/WhentheTideRisesCD/The%20Tank%20Lords/index.htm here]].

* CommLinks: Each soldier is fitted out with a tiny communicator that's implanted in the jawbone. It's activated by clenching the teeth and can even pick up subvocal speech. Handy things.

* HollywoodTactics: {{averted}}. Weapons and tactics are (usually) intelligently used by both sides, to the point that an intelligence operative recommends nuking a rebel stronghold rather than trying to dig them out.

* PlasmaCannon: Powerguns use precicely arranged copper atoms stored in a plastic matrix. The atoms are pulled down the mirror-smooth barrel of the weapon by electromagnets. The barrels are cooled by liquid nitrogen and air, as most use a rotary assembly.

* CentralTheme: AnyoneCanDie.

There is also a {{Traveller}} Splatbook for the setting, available [[http://paizo.com/products/btpy86ef?Hammers-Slammers-Hardcover here]].

There is also a {{Traveller}} Splatbook for the setting.

There is also a {{Traveller}} SplatBook for the setting.

* AgentPeacock: Major von Steuben.
* BeamSpam: One of the staple weapons in the novels is the vehicle-mounted tribarrel, a weapon with three rotating barrels that shoots energy blasts (called "bolts") so fast that the bolts leaving the weapon appear to be a solid line - not individual bolts. The weapons scale up, too - his tanks in the series have both a tribarrel ''and'' a 20cm "main gun" that can literally cook mountainsides with one shot.
** The tribarrel is based on a cross between the real-life MG42 machine gun and the Gatling gun, both of which have beam-spam-class rates of fire.
* {{BFG}}: Panzer's main guns have 20cm. (200mm) bores and can bake a mountainside. Modern tank cannons are about 110mm. and can blow up another tank.

* PrivateMilitaryContractors: While Drake mostly uses them to tell stories based on historical events, their mercenary nature plays an important role in their characterization. In the series background, war has become so very expensive that mercenaries are common, and usually the most competent soldiers. The Slammers interact with other mercenary companies and are sometimes shortchanged by their employers. At other times, they play both sides off against each other.
** The mercenaries and their employers are kept in line by the Terran Bonding Authority, which forces both sides to stick to their agreed contracts. Mercenaries which break their contracts are declared outlaw and hunted down. The Slammers' political maneuvering usually consists of sticking to the letter of the contract while violating the spirit.

* ShurFineGuns: ZigZagged, when powerguns work, they work great. However, when they jam, it's usually because the copper-containing plastic matrix they use has melted into the workings so they need to be replaced.

* KineticWeaponsAreJustBetter: ZigZagged. Some armies use railgun rifles instead of powerguns because they have better armor peircing capabilities. However, railguns don't [[{{BFG}} scale up like powerguns do]], are no cheaper since, while their workings are much simpler, their barrels have to be made from diamond, and are energy-intensive. Lasers are a no-go because they require a 400-lbs. fusion reactor to reach killing power, and explosive bullets are "just as likely to vaporize a leaf as an enemy".

* KineticWeaponsAreJustBetter: ZigZagged. Some armies use railgun rifles instead of powerguns because they have better armor peircing capabilities. However, railguns don't [[{{BFG}} scale up like powerguns do]], are no cheaper since their barrels have to be made from diamond, and are energy-intensive. Lasers are a no-go because they require a 400-lbs. fusion reactor to reach killing power, and explosive bullets are "just as likely to vaporize a leaf as an enemy".

* KineticWeaponsAreJustBetter: ZigZagged. Some armies use railgun rifles because they have better armor peircing capabilities. However, railguns don't [[{{BFG}} scale up like powerguns do]], are no cheaper since their barrels have to be made from diamond, and are energy-intensive.

* KineticWeaponsAreJustBetter: ZigZagged. Some armies use railgun rifles because they have better armor peircing capabilities. However, railguns don't scale up like powerguns do.

* {{BFG}}: Panzer's main guns have 20cm. (200mm) bores and can bake a mountainside. Modern tank cannons are about 110mm. and can punch a hole in another tank.

* HandCannon: Pistols have 2 centimeter bores. This works out to having a 20 millimeter. pistol. 20mm and up are ''grenade caliburs''.

* ''The Sharp End'' - Rewrite of DashiellHammett's ''Red Harvest'' on a CrapsackWorld in the Slammerverse, except that the hero is leading one of Colonel Hammer's contract teams.

'''This series provides examples of:'''

* HollywoodTactics: Brutally {{averted}}. Weapons and tactics are (usually) intelligently used by both sides, to the point that an intelligence operative recommends nuking a rebel stronghold rather than trying to dig them out.

* StandardSciFiArmy