@Shatara, I don't think you quite get it, whatever current guns are firing, be HE, penetrators or something else entirely DO NOT perform very well against BT armor, in fact it's stated as such in TRO1945, page 31, too whit:
Weapon Damage
The damage values for each weapon given in the 1945 Gameplay Weapons Table reflects the effectiveness of these weapons against other 1945 units with an armor BAR of 5. When used against vehicles with a BAR of less than 5, add 1 point of damage to each hit for every point of BAR the target has below 5. Thus, an attack that would deliver 3 points of damage to a BAR 5 target would deliver 4 points against a BAR 4 target, and 5 points against a BAR 3 target. Armor stronger than BAR 5 simply did not exist in the World War II era.
Against any target with a BAR of 6 or greater, treat the damage effects of these weapons as equivalent to their BattleTech Equivalent Weapon as noted in the construction tables.
*sigh*...you're going to make me look up and apply every one of those rules, aren't you?
The rules in XTRO1945 only apply to units in XTRO1945. The rules for Rifles are in Tac Ops, page 338.
HE: A can of explody stuff, such as TNT, CompB, C4, RDX, or even some fancy 31st century stuff. Intended for anti-infantry use, as well as clearing buildings and such. Would behave most closely to Flechette AC ammo, which works as follows:
Apply the standard damage value...to conventional infantry as though the attack were from an infantry unit; half damage to all other units (round down).
Therefore, a heavy rifle would do 9 damage to an infantry platoon, 18 if they're in the open. Against a battlemech, however, the base damage would be halved to 4, and than reduced further by the -3 penalty due to having greater than BAR8 armor to 1.
Flak: A can of explodey stuff, as above, but this time with a fuse to set it off in the air. Typically assumed to be proximity, which was fitted to guns as small as 3" during WWII, though when paired with a laser or radar rangefinder, timed fuses probably work well enough for our purposes. What does our rules say about them?
Flak Ammunition... is treated as a cluster (ballistic) weapon that deals its damage in 5-point clusters. Against eligible targets, it counts as a Flak attack
Since Rifles can't be used against aerospace, we only need concern ourselves with VTOLs. Upon hitting thanks to that nice -2 modifier, the damage of our Heavy Rifle is split into a 5-point cluster and a 4-point cluster. But since this is a modern bird with modern armor, each gets reduced by 3, to 2 and 1. Not a lot, but still two chances to slap the rotor, and VTOLs don't usually have much armor anyway.
Incendiary: A can of burny stuff. A bit tougher, since it looks like Incendiary ACs didn't make it to Tac Ops. Incendiaray missiles, however, get a nice +4 modifier to starting fires. Can't show exacts for damage, but I'd assume anti-infantry would be higher, and anti-armor would be lower.
Cannister: A can of oversized shotgun pellets. Would function like LBX Cluster, so our heavy rifle would roll on the '9' table to determine the number of 1-point hits. Of course, this would do 0 damage to any heavy armor of BAR8 or greater, due to the -3 modifier.
Apologies for the bit of a hijack, but getting the book thrown at me as if it's actually relevant to my argument is annoying.
