RE: [DL] shootin' folks

["Mark Chiddicks" <Mark.Chiddicks@descisys.com>]

I guess with the NYPD statistics the reason is that cops, by and large have an aversion to killing while the bad guys don't, hence the extra training is cancelled out by the added ruthlessness of the opposition.

I'm not so sure that Civil War Generals DID learn much from their mistakes - at Fredericksburg Burnside charged the same wall 13 times and nobody got within 50ft of it, now THAT is faulty pattern recognition! Then again you have to have to question the intelligence of a species who, when ordered to make the 13th charge did not turn around, kill all their officers and go home!

-----Original Message-----
From: Allan Seyberth [mailto:darious@darious.com]
Sent: Monday, 29 July 2002 10:00 a.m.
To: deadlands@gamerz.net
Subject: RE: [DL] shootin' folks


At 08:48 AM 7/29/2002 +1200, you wrote:
 >I once read that in the American Revolutionary War, it is estimated that
 >only 1 in every 200 musket balls fired hit someone! One of the main reasons
 >the civil war was such carnage is that the introduction of rifled barrels
 >increased this to about 1 in 20, but the generals took 3 years to notice!

That's a bit of a simplification, as there was the fact that the effective 
range of firearms doubled as well, as well as an increase in the rate of 
fire.    Our esteemed Wrasslin' Reckoner, Mr. McGlothlin is far more 
knowledgable on this subject than I, but I do believe that commanders 
noticed the changes, but the evolution of the firearm was so rapid that a 
lot of times what they learned from last year's campaigns didn't apply 
anymore.

There is always the study done on New York's finest.  It stated that 
accuracy in the line of duty for police officers was 10%.  This was 
somewhat alarming because the same study showed that the bad guys' accuracy 
was 11. . .

 >Of
 >course training helps a lot, and professional soldiers do better than
 >civilian conscripts. There could well be a case for a Grit bonus when
 >shootin' - remember Clint Eastwood in Unforgiven saying that in a gunfight
 >the man who has done it before almost always wins, because being cool under
 >fire increases you chance of hitting HUGELY. The gunfight at the end of that
 >movie struck me as very realistic - the grunts all panicking and firing
 >wildly as Bill Munny picks them off one at a time with slow, methodical
 >precision.

Wyatt Earp once gave the advice to "take your time, but take your time 
quickly" when in a gunfight.


-------------------
Allan Seyberth
darious@darious.com

How much better is it to weep at joy than to joy at weeping!
                 - Much Ado About Nothing


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