Talk: Laser rifle

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AER12 materials vs AER9?[]

Am I the only one who can't understand how using gold in the AER12's housing would make it less resistant to environmental conditions? I'm trying to think of a metal that's more resistant to the sort of environmental conditions that these rifles might be subjected to in the wasteland, and I can't. Water doesn't damage it, air doesn't damage it, and it's very resistant to corrosion. It says they used an alloy, did they just make a bad choice in what they combined it with, or what? I don't get it, am I just no good at chemistry or did someone not do the research, there? ComradeJim270 04:24, July 18, 2011 (UTC)

Gold may be water proof and tarnish proof, but it is a rather soft metal. On the Mohs Hardness Scale, gold ranks at only around 2.5, whereas other common metals, like steel rank near 7. So yes, gold is resistant to environmental factors, but if thrown around and not handled carefully, the rifle would be damaged. --Kastera ^(talk) 07:25, July 18, 2011 (UTC)

That's true, but the explanation for the AER12 rifle being rare in the wasteland was environmental damage, and getting beat up from that sort of rough use is hardly an environmental factor. I think someone just made a poor choice of words or didn't think that explanation through very well. ComradeJim270 03:17, July 21, 2011 (UTC)

You have to remember that most, if not all, energy weapons use some type of mechanism to direct energy through a tip to create the projectile responsible for dealing damage to things. In laser rifles case, its an array of crystals that magnify a light-source to the point its intensity can destroy material, or denature organic material. These crystals are said to be extremely brittle, and require expensive/hard to get materials to re-create in a laboratory(let alone a wasteland based one), so that's the reason why energy weapons are extremely expensive(but have the highest chance of being renewable, compared to small guns and explosives. F.E = flamethrower with homemade fuel). Now, the laser pistol in Fallout 2, Algernon somehow found a way to tighten the beam emission to the point it lost some of its reflective properties, allowing it to pierce armor more effectively, but I have no idea how he did that. 184.56.90.168 00:20, September 10, 2013 (UTC)