Thursday, April 20, 2023

Fictional Firepower: Seburo C-25A

Hey! Want to hear some The_Ryujin_LP deep lore that you might not know?

Ready?

This is gonna blow your mind!

I ...kinda like cyberpunk. I know, I know. Who could tell, right? But all jokes aside, next to R. Talsorian's Cyberpunk 2.0.2.0 and William Gibson's Neuromancer, it was the works of Masamune Shirow that grabbed me at a young age and never let go. While Appleseed will always be my favorite of his, there is no doubt that of all his works none if more well known and influential on popular culture then Ghost in the Shell. Hell, even before anime became a household term, there was a good chance someone you ran into was at lest aware of something by that name existed.

And its from the cyberpunk world of Ghost in the Shell where I draw the inspiration for this post here, the Seburo C-25A (been a while since I dusted off this blog topic heh). This was the main weapon of Security Section 9 in the manga and  was pretty much a not future P90 (I know, kinda redundant with how the thing looks) firing powerful, HV rounds capable of stopping even moderately armored cyborgs.

While not as famous to the general audience as the CZN M22 from the movie (which actually fired the P90's 5.7×25mm round) or even the totally not just a FN F-2000 C-26A from Stand Alone Complex (which always struck me as a bit  weird, the C-26A lost out to the 25A...); to me the C-25A will always be THE gun of Ghost in the Shell. After all, the other two wouldn't even be a thing without the C-25A to set the rules.

Follow me after the jump is you wish to download the deets on this personal favorite of mine.

 

Quick Note: Masamune Shirow went against the grain of many of his contemporaries in the 80's and didn't not see  caseless ammo catching on (given quite the essay for his reasoning in Appleseed: Hypernotes, which has stood the test of time) so in any Shirow work the guns are going to be regular cased ammo.

Seburo C-25A, 6×25mmHVDP (Japan, 2025-)

Introduced in 2025, the C-25A was designed by Seburo (a subsidiary of Poseidon Global Industrial Technologies) to be a lightweight and compact PDW that could give SWAT, SPEC-OPs, and security forces the means to stop medium body armor and cyborgs. The C-25A was built around a High-Velocity, Dense Penetrator concept (HVDP). This used a bulk-amorphous tungsten cored 6mm round fired by high explosives based High-Velocity propellant capable of punching though and impressive 12mm of RHA equivalent. This made if one of the first firearms to be built around firing HV ammo and featured a robust barrel allowing it sustain dumping 6 entire magazines of HV rounds before overheating.


The C-25A comes 4× day and night vision optic (see  Electro-Optical Surveillance Camera, Ultra-Tech p. 60)  and a integrated brass catcher (0.5 lbs). The optic is normally mounted near the front of the gun but when the brass catcher is attached it can be placed on top of it.

The follow year Seburo introduced the the sleek C-26A which was a modified C-25A reworked based on feed back. The differences are minor enough to use the same stats and which is better is manor of preference though in the end the 25A held better sales.  

Besides 6×25mm HVDP (in table), the C-25A and C-26A can also use 6×25mm HVHESH (Dmg4d+1 (0.5) pi- with 1d-1 cr ex linked; see HESH, High-Tech p. 170) and the cheaper 6×25mm HV (Dmg 4d+1 pi-).

GUNS (SMG) (DX-4 or most other Guns at -2)
TL Weapon               Damage   Acc  Range      Weight  RoF  Shots        ST Bulk Rcl Cost            LC    Notes
9   Seburo C-25A,     5d (2) pi-  4      320/3,400 5.6/1     15      50+1 (3) 8†   -3      2    $2,300/$35  2
      6×25mm HVDP

 

 

The one on top is the C-26A

 

Seburo C-27A, 6×25mmHVDP (Japan, 2025-)

The C-27A was the true follow up to the C-25A and did it's best to maintain the look of the original to help sales after the lukewarm sales performance of the 26A model. Design wise, it looks like a full carbine sized C-25A with a blocky barrel extender/sound baffler attached to the front. This extended barrel length offered by the baffler increased the penetration of the 6×25mmHVDP to almost a full 13mm of RHA equivalent while giving a -6 to hear shots fired by it; though the primary reason for the baffler was to muzzle in the deafening sound of its report in enclosed spaces. The baffler can be removed, this drops perforce of the gun's rounds to the same level as the 25A and lessens weight by 1 lbs. and betters bulk to -3. The 27A has the same detachable optic and brass catcher as the 25/26A.

Besides 6×25mm HVDP (in table), the C-27A can also use 6×25mm HVHESH (Dmg 4d+2 (0.5) pi- with 1d-1 cr ex linked; see HESH, High-Tech p. 170) and the cheaper 6×25mm HV (Dmg 4d+2 pi-).

Another new feature is a mount for a single shot, break action CG-27A 20mm underbarrel grenade launcher in front of the trigger guard. Besides HESH (in table), the CG-27A can also fire HE (Dmg 3d+2 [1d] cr ex), HEDP (Dmg 12d+2 (10) cr inc with linked  3d_2 [1d] cr ex), and beanbag rounds (Dmg 1d-1 (0.2) cr dkb, Acc 1, Range 50/300). The 27A is also available without the grenade launcher and its mounting point, this drops LC to 2 and removes $150 from the cost. 

Note: The English translation for Ghost in the Shell 1.5: Human Interface Error has some odd errors regarding the technical information regarding, for example saying it holds 6 25mm HESH grenades. This is not is not only a mistranslation, but also not physically possible! Noticed that 6 25mm looks a lot like 6×25mm, the original notes were saying it was loaded with 6×25mm HESH rounds. They made no mention of what the grenade launcher was loaded with or even what caliber it was. 25mm seems to large given the size of the gun so I went with 20mm though even that might be a little to big (honestly it looks more shotgun sized making it line with a pulse rifle but to keep things simple I went for 20mm since it's that much of a stretch).

GUNS (SMG) (DX-4 or most other Guns at -2)
TL Weapon             Damage       Acc   Range        Weight RoF  Shots      ST   Bulk   Rcl    Cost             LC   Notes
9   Seburo C-27A,   5d+1(2) pi-   4      340/3,0  6 7.2/1     15      50+1 (3) 8†    -4       2       $3,300/$35   1
      6×25mm HVDP
9    Seburo CG-27A,   3d (0.5) cr      2   360/2,200  0.6/0.11  1   1         -   -   3     -
     20mmPC HESH          
     linked                     3d+2 cr ex


Ammo Table
Name                        WPS     CPS       Notes
6×25mm HV             0.015    $0.75
6×25mm HVDP        0.015 $2.25
6×25mm HVHESH  0.015   $2.25

Name                       WPS   CPS      Notes
20mm PC HESH      0.11   $6.60
20mm PC HE           0.11   $4.40
20MM PC HEDP     0.11   $8.80
20mm PC Beanbag  0.11 $6.60

 

My first wifu.

Have you ever wondered if I go back into my old posts and add random stuff just for the fun of it 0_0
 


2 comments:

  1. Alrady saw this?
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DtdmsZ4Csn8

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    Replies
    1. I knew of these rounds but not of this YouTube channel. Those are some spicy, spicy bois ain't they. And pretty close to HV ammo as shown in the manga. The big difference is they seem to use tungsten cored and aren't sabot rounds. However if I were to run a Ghost in the Shell game I'd probably model them as extra hot, dense cored SLAP rounds.

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