High-Tech: Converted Glock Machine Pistols

The Glock pistol design allows easy modification into “select fire” or “full auto only” modes. This modification can be achieved using a variety of “low tech” methods, but all rely on the disengagement of the trigger bar from the striker tail at the appropriate moment in the firing cycle.

– Steven Pavlovich, “Select Fire Device Found on Glock Firearms Seized by Western Australia Police” (2014)

 

Machine pistols – that is, selective-fire or full-automatic pistols, not submachine guns – have few real applications. Entry teams use them sometimes because they are more manoeuvrable or can be used one-handed, for example while holding an entry shield or forcing open a door. Bodyguards occasionally use them because they are easily concealed even wearing a business suit yet offer substantial firepower allowing them to disengage from an attack on their patron.

It is important to realise that machine pistol are real close-quarters weapons. Typical range is supposed to be 3 to 5 metres according to firearms instructor Timothy Mullin. For shots at longer distances, they are to be used on semiautomatic to ensure hits.

The pistol manufacturer Glock has offered a machine pistol variant based on its successful Glock 17 semiautomatic pistol since May 1987. However, the Glock 18 machine pistol (GURPS High-Tech, p. 101; Investigator Weapons 2: Modern Day, p. 63) is extremely rare, as it is only sold to government agencies, and even those have few applications for such a weapon, as outlined above.

Investigator Weapons: Fending Off Sharks

Eugene F. McDonald, radio manufacturer and commander of the yacht Mizpah, back from a cruise about the Galapagos Islands in the eastern Pacific, greeted friends here with a tale of fighting great schools of sharks with machine guns. “They were so thick that we were afraid they would endanger the yacht. We killed hundreds of them,” McDonald said. McDonald related that his party, which included several scientists, made discoveries of a scientific nature on the islands so startling that they could not be revealed until after further exploration.

– The Enquirer & Evening News, “Machine Guns Used to Fight Off Sharks” (14-FEB-1930)

 

Lieutenant Commander Eugene “Gene” McDonald, an officer in the US Naval Reserve Force, was the millionaire owner of the Zenith Radio Company in Chicago, Illinois. On 03-JAN-1930, he embarked on a 5-week cruise of the East Pacific, starting in Miami, Florida, and travelling through the Panama Canal. McDonald was the owner and skipper of the Mizpah, a 56-metre luxury yacht built for then-outrageous $1.3 million using components of a discarded US Navy destroyer. While nominally based on Lake Michigan in the Lincoln Park yacht harbour in Chicago, the vessel was seaworthy and was often stationed in Miami. The Mizpah had a 27-man crew and sported eight fully equipped state rooms with real beds rather than cramped berths.

Investigator Weapons: Armed at the Opera

Although by now rather old news, I’d like to mention that The Unspeakable Oath #25 contains my article “Armed at the Opera,” in which I examine props and procedures that would be useful for a successful “Night at the Opera” of your modern DELTA GREEN agents. Large parts would also be interesting reading for Armed Investigators of the Mythos in any period. And of course, there are loads of other cool articles by other fine chaps in there. Check it out!

At the Movies: Sicario

Kate, this isn’t something that I dreamed up myself. I don’t have the authority to hire advisors, or authorize joint agency missions, or fly agents from Air Force bases. Are you understanding me? These decisions are made far from here, by officials elected to office, not appointed to them. So, if your fear is operating out of bounds, I am telling you, you are not. The boundary’s been moved.

‒ FBI Special Agent in Charge Dave Jennings in Sicario (2015)

This is a film review of Denis Villeneuve’s Sicario (2015) with an eye towards using it in Delta Green: The Role-Playing Game.

High-Tech: Baikal IZH-43KH

This a practical review of the Baikal IZH-43KH sawn-off double-barrelled shotgun, with an eye towards its performance in games like GURPS, Call of Cthulhu, and Delta Green: The Role-Playing Game.

High-Tech: H&K P30L

This a practical review of the H&K P30L V1 semiautomatic pistol, with an eye towards its performance in games like GURPS, Call of Cthulhu, and Delta Green: The Role-Playing Game.

A Night at the Opera: Ronin

Vincent: Under the bridge, by the river, how did you know it was an ambush?
Sam: When ever there is any doubt, there is no doubt. That is the first thing they teach you.

– Ronin (1998)

I have discussed John Frankenheimer’s Ronin (1998) in a previous post, dissecting a scene using GURPS. This time I look at how the same scene would play out using Delta Green: The Role-Playing Game. The latter is based on the Basic RolePlaying rules engine also used by Call of Cthulhu, but differs in many details. Watch just the scene here (the action starts at 1:56).

High-Tech: H&K MR223

This a practical review of the H&K MR223 semiautomatic carbine, with an eye towards its performance in games like GURPS, Call of Cthulhu, and Delta Green: The Role-Playing Game.

Book Review: The Cthulhu Wars

Kenneth Hite & Kennon Bauman, Osprey Publishing, 2016

The Cthulhu Wars ‒ The United States’ Battles Against the Mythos is an awesome book by H.P. Lovecraft grognard Kenneth Hite, author of relevant works like GURPS Horror (2011), GURPS WWII: Weird War II (2003), and Trail of Cthulhu (2007), and his co-author Kennon Bauman. This is not a game supplement, however, but an alternate history book in Osprey’s Dark History series. Following Hite’s earlier effort in that line, The Nazi Occult (2013), the book is written as if its subject matter were real and both authors were actual Mythos investigators; in a clear Lovecraft spoof, Hite is even presumed dead after a fire gutted his library …

High-Tech: Auto-Ordnance M1928A1 Thompson

This a practical review of the Auto-Ordnance M1928A1 Thompson gun, with an eye towards its performance in games like GURPS, Call of Cthulhu, and Delta Green: The Role-Playing Game.