DU Rounds

[Razzinold]

Haven't used them since I was a teenager and for the life of me I can't remember which book they were in. I kept thinking RMB or maybe Juicer Uprising. I checked both, may have missed it though.
Can anybody help?

[eliakon]

Triax 1 is where they first show up
Game Masters Guide reprints them I'm pretty sure
Heroes of Humanity has them as well I believe

[Razzinold]

Triax 1 is where they first show up
Game Masters Guide reprints them I'm pretty sure
Heroes of Humanity has them as well I believe

Thanks so much! I knew the DU Rounds did more damage and U-Rounds were good against the supernatural. I should have thought to check Triax because of all the gargoyles.

[Vincent Takeda]

I know what your thinking... Did he fire six shots or only 5? In all the excitement I kinda lost track myself. But being as this is a 41 pound 120mm smooth bore depleted uranium longrod flying 3700mph capable of annihilating anything on the battlefield at a range of over a mile and a half, you've got to ask yourself one question.

[Razzinold]

I know what your thinking... Did he fire six shots or only 5? In all the excitement I kinda lost track myself. But being as this is a 41 pound 120mm smooth bore depleted uranium longrod flying 3700mph capable of annihilating anything on the battlefield at a range of over a mile and a half, you've got to ask yourself one question.

"Do I feel lucky? Well, do ya, punk?"

[glitterboy2098]

The only issue i have with the WB5 stats for DU rounds is that they misrepresent the radiation hazard. They present U-rounds as radioactive and DU as not. Probably as a result of a misunderstanding of the 'depleted' term. It is a common mistake I've seen though.
DU is just as radioactive as standard uranium, the difference is just one of isotope ratios. DU having mostly an isotope that is useless for applications in nuclear weapons and powerplants, enriched uranium having mostly the useful isotope, and regular uranium having varying mixes of both.
This is why DU is so tricky to use in real life. Its density makes it very useful in armor and kinetic projectiles, but it also spreads little bits of itself around when it hits stuff (or stuff hits it, in the case of its use in tank armor) creating a radiation hazard.not usually a very intense one but one that can be tricky to clean up and have long term health hazards due to the material getting into biological cycles in the ecosystem. The same as with regular and enriched uranium. Really the only hazard you avoid is the possibility of a stored mass of rounds/material getting big enough to go critical or supercritical and release lethal levels of radiation.

The NGR would certainly be very careful in the use of both DU and U rounds. After all, they aren't going to want to risk contaminating the very ground they are trying to hold onto.

[Razzinold]

The only issue i have with the WB5 stats for DU rounds is that they misrepresent the radiation hazard. They present U-rounds as radioactive and DU as not. Probably as a result of a misunderstanding of the 'depleted' term. It is a common mistake I've seen though.
DU is just as radioactive as standard uranium, the difference is just one of isotope ratios. DU having mostly an isotope that is useless for applications in nuclear weapons and powerplants, enriched uranium having mostly the useful isotope, and regular uranium having varying mixes of both.
This is why DU is so tricky to use in real life. Its density makes it very useful in armor and kinetic projectiles, but it also spreads little bits of itself around when it hits stuff (or stuff hits it, in the case of its use in tank armor) creating a radiation hazard.not usually a very intense one but one that can be tricky to clean up and have long term health hazards due to the material getting into biological cycles in the ecosystem. The same as with regular and enriched uranium. Really the only hazard you avoid is the possibility of a stored mass of rounds/material getting big enough to go critical or supercritical and release lethal levels of radiation.

The NGR would certainly be very careful in the use of both DU and U rounds. After all, they aren't going to want to risk contaminating the very ground they are trying to hold onto.

Some very valid points.
Luckily the character that will be using the rounds is a full conversion borg so he doesn't have to worry about getting sick. He suffers from a slight insanity, intense hatred of any supernatural beings that are evil (vamps, werewolves, evil dragons, etc.), that causes him to act in an irrational manner, i.e. focuses so intently on their destruction above all else, and will use any means at his disposal to eradicate them.

[Hotrod]

The hilarious thing to me is that neither natural uranium nor depleted uranium are particularly radioactive or toxic, but the books present them as such environmental threats that the Coalition bans them. This is absurd on many levels. Even if you used weapons-grade uranium in these bullets, there would be essentially no radiation hazard (unless you had too much ammo packed in the drum and caused a criticality accident). The actual evidence for DU munitions causing significant environmental harm is pretty weak. The tungsten alloys that many military munitions now use in lieu of DU for their high-density bullets is actually more toxic and cancer-inducing than DU.

DU was the scapegoat for Gulf War Syndrome, but that's more of a guilt-by-association argument that ignores the many other things that come into play during war (other nasty chemicals coming from weapons, fuel/exhaust fumes, stress, et cetera). RationalWiki has a good run-down on the on-again, off-again DU scare and its scientific issues.

Of course, it's also reasonable that the Coalition's self-inflicted ignorance (Books are bad? Really?) is to blame for this silly policy, but that doesn't explain why the narration seems to support it.

EDIT: fixed a broken link

[Razzinold]

The hilarious thing to me is that neither natural uranium nor depleted uranium are particularly radioactive or toxic, but the books present them as such environmental threats that the Coalition bans them. This is absurd on many levels. Even if you used weapons-grade uranium in these bullets, there would be essentially no radiation hazard (unless you had too much ammo packed in the drum and caused a criticality accident). The actual evidence for DU munitions causing significant environmental harm is pretty weak. The tungsten alloys that many military munitions now use in lieu of DU for their high-density bullets is actually more toxic and cancer-inducing than DU.

DU was the scapegoat for Gulf War Syndrome, but that's more of a guilt-by-association argument that ignores the many other things that come into play during war (other nasty chemicals coming from weapons, fuel/exhaust fumes, stress, et cetera). RationalWiki has a good run-down on the on-again, off-again DU scare and its .

Of course, it's also reasonable that the Coalition's self-inflicted ignorance (Books are bad? Really?) is to blame for this silly policy, but that doesn't explain why the narration seems to support it.

While that may be true, I am going to play them as written in the book.
I suspect they wrote them up that way in the book as a deterrence from everybody, player characters & NPCs, always using them instead of regular ammo. If everybody was loaded up with them they would, IMO, lose the uniqueness/impact of the item being unveiled in game for the first time.

[Shark_Force]

last i heard, drinking water contaminated by depleted uranium wasn't terribly good for your health. getting it on your skin is (relatively) fine. presumably it would be bad in extreme quantities (and of course having it fired at you with an extremely high velocity is going to be *very* bad for your health). getting it inside you and exposing your internal organs to it at close range, on the other hand, is not so good.

so while i wouldn't say that depleted uranium is guaranteed going to cause environmental problems, i'd expect the potential is there.

[Hotrod]

last i heard, drinking water contaminated by depleted uranium wasn't terribly good for your health. getting it on your skin is (relatively) fine. presumably it would be bad in extreme quantities (and of course having it fired at you with an extremely high velocity is going to be *very* bad for your health). getting it inside you and exposing your internal organs to it at close range, on the other hand, is not so good.

so while i wouldn't say that depleted uranium is guaranteed going to cause environmental problems, i'd expect the potential is there.

It's a question of concentration. As toxins go, uranium is so low that we don't have a reliable LD 50/30 (that's acute toxicity, meaning the level at which you have a 50% chance of dying within 30 days). There is some weak data that exposure to elevated concentrations of uranium in the air and water may cause some effects, but most of those are based on epidemiology studies, where the logic goes something like "people in the Gulf War were around a lot of DU. They had some health problems. Therefore DU may have caused those health problems." There have been some animal studies of DU contamination, but those studies aren't human studies and generally involve very high doses of DU.

By comparison, lead is acutely toxic (will kill you directly) and is proven to cause health problems even at levels that aren't acutely toxic. People shoot lead bullets all the time. Uranium sounds scary to the layman because it's used as a fuel in nuclear reactors and weapons, but unless you're splitting a lot of uranium atoms, its health effects are pretty mild compared to the other junk you find in military munitions.

[Sohisohi]

U-Roumds.

Where can regular Us be found, since we are on the topic.

[Hotrod]

U-Roumds.

Where can regular Us be found, since we are on the topic.

If you mean where in Rifts canon you can find info on U-rounds, Triax 1 has the info.

If you mean where can Uranium be found, then all over the planet. Seawater and dirt contain uranium, as well as many rocks and hot springs

[Shark_Force]

last i heard, drinking water contaminated by depleted uranium wasn't terribly good for your health. getting it on your skin is (relatively) fine. presumably it would be bad in extreme quantities (and of course having it fired at you with an extremely high velocity is going to be *very* bad for your health). getting it inside you and exposing your internal organs to it at close range, on the other hand, is not so good.

so while i wouldn't say that depleted uranium is guaranteed going to cause environmental problems, i'd expect the potential is there.

It's a question of concentration. As toxins go, uranium is so low that we don't have a reliable LD 50/30 (that's acute toxicity, meaning the level at which you have a 50% chance of dying within 30 days). There is some weak data that exposure to elevated concentrations of uranium in the air and water may cause some effects, but most of those are based on epidemiology studies, where the logic goes something like "people in the Gulf War were around a lot of DU. They had some health problems. Therefore DU may have caused those health problems." There have been some animal studies of DU contamination, but those studies aren't human studies and generally involve very high doses of DU.

By comparison, lead is acutely toxic (will kill you directly) and is proven to cause health problems even at levels that aren't acutely toxic. People shoot lead bullets all the time. Uranium sounds scary to the layman because it's used as a fuel in nuclear reactors and weapons, but unless you're splitting a lot of uranium atoms, its health effects are pretty mild compared to the other junk you find in military munitions.

as i recall, last time i looked into this, depleted uranium tends to shatter and create a lot of dust. i haven't studied up on whether lead does that, but it seems unlikely, as lead is pretty malleable. plus, even if it's only like a 5% chance that you cause long-term damage to the environment, if it's *your* environment you'd probably be pretty inclined to not take chances that it's going to give you radiation sickness

as to the question of getting your hands on U-rounds, last i recall the NGR weren't telling people about it and definitely weren't selling U-rounds. but i haven't read triax 2 at all, so that may have changed.

[glitterboy2098]

Triax2 didn't change that. though it was established in one of the SOT books i think that the CS had been informed of U-rounds, but had chosen to not use the technology. given reason was safety and contamination concerns. but IMO presumably the fact the CS didn't have the infrastructure in place to make the things at the time probably played a part. with the NGR not willing to export, the CS would have to manufacture its own, and that would require converting railgun ammo production facilities over to handling a finicky fissile material.
DU wasn't mentioned but i suspect it fell under a similar ruling by the CS, for similar reasons.

i don't know if the minion war has caused a change in policy there.

[Vincent Takeda]

I mean I'm pretty sure most of the damage from a DU round comes from the fact that its coming at you at mach 4 and it weighs as much as a car battery. At least in terms of the 120mm abrams round.

[Shark_Force]

I mean I'm pretty sure most of the damage from a DU round comes from the fact that its coming at you at mach 4 and it weighs as much as a car battery. At least in terms of the 120mm abrams round.

it is also coming from the fact that as it hits, depleted* uranium fractures in such a way as to sharpen the tip of the projectile as it is moving, which in combination with its density makes it very good for penetration.

* i would suspect enriched and non-depleted uranium have the same feature, being mostly made of the same material, the key difference being largely that nations had plans for their non-depleted uranium (to turn it into enriched uranium and use in nuclear reactors i believe) and their enriched uranium (to make nukes), but as a result of making all that enriched uranium they had a whole crapload of depleted uranium lying around that just so happens to be really good for punching through armour.

[glitterboy2098]

In addition DU is pyrophoric, so the dust and fragments that break off as a result of the self-sharpening will basically spontaneously set themselves on fire and burn white hot. Usually while passing through the target. So it has great kinetic energy, good penetration, and turns into a jet of flaming metal once through.

That dust though is the major danger. While only an alpha emmitter and thus mostly harmless, if ingested or absorbed by the body via the lungs in too high aquantity, it can cause heavy metal toxicity as well as mes up cells with its radiation. In small quantities the body can deal with it via the usual filtering and excreting methods, but if the concentrations are high enough it'll still do a fair bit of damage before removal, and the usual means of removal from the body can be overwhelmed if concentrations are high enough. Such as the levels you'd get after a major battle where one side is firing thousands and thousands of DU railgun rounds.

[Hotrod]

That dust though is the major danger. While only an alpha emmitter and thus mostly harmless, if ingested or absorbed by the body via the lungs in too high aquantity, it can cause heavy metal toxicity as well as mes up cells with its radiation. In small quantities the body can deal with it via the usual filtering and excreting methods, but if the concentrations are high enough it'll still do a fair bit of damage before removal, and the usual means of removal from the body can be overwhelmed if concentrations are high enough. Such as the levels you'd get after a major battle where one side is firing thousands and thousands of DU railgun rounds.

The dust is not a major danger. No-one has died from uranium poisoning. Ever. Uranium hexafluoride, yes, but not elemental uranium. In fact, the evidence that it's any danger at all mostly consists of some pretty weak epidemiological studies. It's not acutely toxic like lead is, and the only cases in which people were known to breathe high concentrations of it for long periods of time are uranium miners, who were also exposed to a lot of silicates, smoked like chimneys, and worked in areas with concentrations of radon thousands of times higher than what you can find in the most "high level radon" basements (radon is another overblown hazard, but that's another topic). Radiologically, u-238 is an alpha emitter, but it's so weak that the amount you have to ingest is crazy high. To inhale that much, you'd have to cake the inside of your lungs with it, which would suffocate you. You could drink a lot of it in solution (and I mean a LOT) and kill yourself, but as I said, the chemical LD 50/30 for uranium is so high that it hasn't been established. The radiological LD 50/30 for acute radiation syndrome from ingesting DU is even higher.

Now, you're right, you could get a lot of particulate uranium in the air in a battlefield, but the violent action of it burning also disperses it. The solution to pollution is dilution. As it spreads out, its hazard (such as it is) diminishes, so unless your battlefield is in a poorly-ventilated tunnel, a gentle breeze will disperse it, as will rain.

Understand, if we want to call these sci-fi U-rounds that are much more radioactive than real life, that's fine. Triax isn't all that specific about the isotopic makeup of this ammunition, and there are some artificial isotopes of uranium that are much more radioactive than what we dig up out of the ground. Just please don't confuse what's in the books or the literature behind the DU scares with measurable and attributable real-life health risks. The nasty stuff that actually kills people is far more mundane: conventional pollution from internal combustion, lead, Tide pods, et cetera. Compared to that stuff, a DU round's chemical and radiation hazards are a joke.

[Axelmania]

I'd like to know how much we know about the difficulty of removing U-rounds from bodies for shapeshifting/teleporting gods and similar, since non-regeneratable damage is a HUGE asset in shutting down their ability to harry with hit-and-run.

Could a shapeshifting/teleporting god (which is many of them) simply shift to remove the bullets, or teleport without opting to take along the bullets embedded into them?

If not then I'd like to know the rules for speed-removing bullets since gods would want to do this very quickly to restore their regeneration. Does it take a certain amount of base time to do it safely (without inflicting more damage) and how much faster could you do it if you didn't care about inflicting some extra damage because your regeneration would make up for it?

I could see some 1D4x100/minute god thinking "screw it, I'll just carve out a cubic foot of flesh to get the bullet out" because they regen very fast, whereas something which regenerates per-hour would care more about doing it slowly without damaging themselves further.

[Blackwater Sniper]

Depleted Uranium is used in shielding of all sorts of military armor as well as medical radiation barriers. So I don't think it poses much of a hazard in the sickness department. Unless in the future refinement techniques and quality control are not what they are today.

If you want to limit the number and type of rounds used in your games, use the free enterprise system of bartering. Either the merchants don't have it, can't find it, or it's outrageously expensive.

You could also remind players that whatever they have can be used against them as well.