Good weapon for a combat engineer

As for my Na No Wri Mo project, I'm working on a RWBY fanfiction.

For those of you who don't know the series, one of the series' main characteristics is sheer absurd combinations of weapons, such as sniper rifle/scythes, shotgun/gauntlets, grenade launchers/warhammer, which are used in a very versatile and stylish manner in combats. Check out this vid for the sample.

One of the original characters I'm designing is an engineer/mechanic. Now, I need a weapon that:

• Has both melee and ranged weapon forms.
• Is based on industrial tools, such as drills, jackhammer, Gravity Gun, and nail guns.
• Is not TOO complex.

The only thing I came up so far is a jackhammer that is also a harpoon gun.

The size isn't too much of an issue; he's a very big guy.

Any suggestions?

edited 4th Nov '13 7:14:43 AM by dRoy

I'm not familiar with RWBY, but I'll do my best to help.

Though it's unoriginal, perhaps the melee form is a wrench of some description, with an anode and cathode inserted in its "prongs". If he manages to get something trapped in between them, well... ZZZZZZZZAP! Perhaps it might also have a water cutter of some sort installed in the body of the wrench in the "socket" where you'd normally insert things to be twisted?

An alternative idea that occurs to me is using friction drilling (conveniently ignoring the fact that the depth of material it can be used on is limited), a flame jet drill, or perhaps using a drill with well drill bits. Not sure how you could convert them to ranged weapons, though.

Hmm...maybe a flame drill that can be modified as a flame nailguns?

Those (the real ones that you mentioned) are some rather fascinating tools.

That could work... though personally I would've said "rivet gun" rather than "nail gun" since the former seems to imply a larger projectile than the latter (it also sounds more engineer-y). And perhaps said rivets can explode?

And they are interesting, aren't they? Heavy industry in general is rather interesting. Though it's not so much "combat engineer" as "construction/demolition", I've been trying to figure out a way to weaponise hydraulic hammers in a portable manner for you and failing. Perhaps it is used in combination with the above mentioned flame jet drill (i.e. for the opening blow the hydraulic hammer puts extra impetus behind it and then the drill begins boring through armour or whatever). Unfortunately, that would be rather mechanically complex.

x-posted from this thread:

I've been sitting on this idea for a while. Improvised Weapon is one thing. But why not modify tools as a backup weapon?

There was a Black & Decker concept for a laser tree trimmer: just point and zap the branches away. There are all kinds of power tools for power tool-y things...

I came up with the "Spacer's Friend":

• modify a rivet gun or other power tool to fire a rivet or bolt at high speed, it doesn't even have to kill. A nasty welt or wound can end a fight.

• Laser cutters, welders, aiming devices modified as a weapon. Even a one shot is better than nothing.

• there might be "zip gun" style hold outs for when the local State Sec tells you to "put your hands up!", tip the tool and fire off a charge or make a loud bang to escape.

A simple one could be an augmented limb, like a partially mechanical arm or leg with minor weapon abilities.

, Those are neat ideas too.

Okay, I think I got basic idea.

So Ricardo (Ricardo Tesla, that's his current name) will be carrying two "guns". And yes, each gun is just small enough for him to carry with one hand; hey, soft science.

Right hand - A river gun that can fire rivets and nails (if he switches the "ammo") in a high speed. If he plug in a drill at the end, it can also be a power drill.

Left hand - A welder that can also be adjusted into a cutter and a flamethrower. When combined with the above, it can fire flaming rivets.

When out of ammo and fuel, they are both hard and heavy enough to be used as hammers. Also, he carries a roll of duct-tape with him. So, that makes, what, at least five kinds of potentially offensive weapons?

I wonder if I can throw a grappling hook launcher into them...

What kind of foes are you planning for your character to fight exactly?

Because you've not had enough of my history-powered rants in other threads, I can add a few notes!

Historically, combat engineers/sappers have been equipped with lots of deadly, close-range weapons that incidentally cause very big kabooms. The reason for this is that engineers are the ones to get close and friendly with enemies in the confines of trenches and buildings, so the fun tools like flamethrowers, rocket flamethrowers, thermobaric grenades, all of those, have been what they normally get. (Hey, why go to the trouble of clearing out a bunker the hard way when you can just flood-fill the bastard with napalm and then collapse it with a thirty-pound shaped charge?) Not to mention the ever-popular Big Bundle of 'Splosives. For this reason sappers, far from being rear-area troops, have often been in among the line infantry charging in when the barrage lifts.

All that in mind, keep in mind that each piece of equipment exacts a cost in terms of weight and carrying space. Instead of maximizing the amount of equipment, I suggest you go the opposite route and minimize. The modular arm-tools sound like a good start. With futuretech plasma-shaping, for instance, that welding torch/melta/plasma cannon combination sounds like it'd be his primary, so most of his systems will be dedicated to that; the rivet shooter sounds like a secondary. After that, you should be careful about giving him even more equipment to haul.

edited 20th Dec '13 11:55:00 AM by SabresEdge

Ooh, neat. Never heard about those until now. That's cool.

When I designed this character, I was pretty much thinking of a mixture of Isaac Clarke from Dead Space and Tony Stark. I always had a soft spot for Improvised Weapon.

It's been mentioned a couple of times already, but when you mentioned a large guy who was a combat engineer, the first thing I thought of was some sort of flamethrower (they were usually issued to The Big Guy) based on a welding/cutting torch of some sort.

Flamethrowers traditionally made excellent siege weapons (which is definitely something you might need to cut open a metal door for) and usually require more mechanical knowledge than a gun (since they rely on a pump and other such gubbins).

Funny you mention Issac Clarke because I was going to suggest taking a page from his book and have your character being able to make his own weapons.

All I can say is good luck making a weapon that isn't completely off the rails. You should at least have an insane weapon that your character designed a while back which sits somewhere collecting cobwebs, only for it to become a Chekhov's Gun/Axe/Flamethrower/Whatever later on.