Assault Rifle

An Assault Rifle is a Small Arm that fires intermediate-caliber bullets from a magazine, and is capable of "Selective Fire" - switching between Semi-Automatic and Fully-Automatic firing modes as necessary. Assault Rifles are significantly lighter than Automatic Rifles, and are comfortable for use in medium-range combat (up to ~300 meters) as well as CQC. However they lack the magazine size required for sustained fully-automatic fire.

Assault Rifles are the most common weapon on the battlefield in both real-life and in ShackTac videos; Most Infantry are Riflemen. In low-tech scenarios Assault Rifles may be replaced with Battle Rifles or Bolt-Action Rifles, but such scenarios are rare. The most common models of Assault Rifles used in ShackTac belong to either the M16 family (BLUFOR) or the AK-74 family (OPFOR). Other less-common Assault Rifles in ShackTac videos include the HK 416, SA80, and AUG, and many others.

Assault Rifles fire an "intermediate-caliber" bullet, with a diameter of 5-8mm and a length of approximately 40mm. The most common rounds are 5.45mm and 7.62mm for OPFOR weapons, 5.56mm for BLUFOR weapons, and a variety of ~6mm rounds for ArmA 3's "futuristic" weapons. Assault Rifle rounds can easily penetrate soft or thin materials such as wooden and corrugated-metal walls, doors, and small trees. They can puncture normal car/truck tires as well, but are not capable of piercing any significant metal armor.

Assault Rifle Magazine s are standardized, typically containing 30 bullets each. The relatively-small size of these magazines discourages continuous, fully-automatic fire, but allows for prolonged semi-automatic fire with relatively short reload times. Assault Rifles are therefore more effective at engaging targets accurately with deliberate semi-automatic fire at medium range, while maintaining the option to fire short bursts at close range.

Assault Rifles can be fitted with a wide variety of attachments. Due to the lack of magnified optics in ShackTac, the available variety is usually limited to a red-dot sight and/or under-barrel Grenade Launcher. During night-time operations, a Flashlight and/or Laser may also be included. A Foregrip can very effectively stabilize the weapon when firing from a standing position or even on the move. Bipods on are rare to non-existent on Assault Rifles, since these weapons do not have a very powerful recoil and are rarely used for sustained fire; They can easily be stabilized by resting one's elbow(s) on any solid object.

Design
Assault Rifles were first developed by the Germans near the end of World War II. They essentially took the concept of the Sub-Machine Gun and translated it from pistol-caliber ammunition (short 9mm bullets) to an intermediate cartridge (7.92mm), which was significantly more effective on the battlefield. This resulted in the StG 44 rifle, which arrived too late to make any impact on the battlefield but impressed designers in other countries.

Following the war, the Russians were the first to adopt this concept fully with the AK-47, chambered for intermediate 7.62mm rounds (no relation to the 7.62mm NATO rounds still in widespread use today). This weapon was so successful that it was manufactured in vast quantities and sold to anyone who would buy it - making the AK-47 the most common weapon in the world. The Americans stuck to their Battle Rifles (albeit fully-automatic ones) for over a decade after the war, only switching over to standard-issue Assault Rifles during the Vietnam War with the development of the M-16 - firing a 5.56mm caliber bullet.

Modern Assault Rifles are chambered for calibers around 5.5mm to 6mm, with the most common being 5.56mm (BLUFOR) and 5.45mm (OPFOR). These are known as "Intermediate"-caliber bullets, straddling the line between pistol rounds and "full-powered" rounds. Intermediate caliber bullets have enough stopping power to be lethal in most circumstances, but are significantly lighter and produce less recoil than the full-powered rounds they replaced. This allows carrying more ammunition, and to use weapons with a high rate of fire and good stability, without giving up much lethality. Such bullets are slightly less effective against troops behind cover (and against lightly-armored vehicles or bullet-proof glass), but the compromise allows soldiers a much greater volume of fire - following the principle of "more bullets = more hits".

Assault Rifles are capable of both fully-automatic fire and semi-automatic fire. This is known as "selective fire", as it allows the shooter to choose the best firing method for any given situation. Some model also allow for a "3-round burst", where a single trigger pull fires exactly three bullets - though this feature has become less common over time. Assault Rifles are generally set to semi-automatic for engaging targets at longer ranges - around 150-200 meters. When engaging closer targets, and especially during CQB, the weapon is switched to fully-automatic mode to increase the likelyhood of a hit while expending more ammunition overall.

The vast majority of modern Assault Rifles are loaded with 30-round magazines. Exceptions do exist, especially with early models. For example, the original standard-issue M-16 used 20-round magazines. Magazines are typically standardized and can be used in multiple different models (especially true for NATO weapons).

Distribution
In the vast majority of ShackTac missions, most Infantry carry an Assault Rifle. The specific model of Assault Rifle distributed to the troops changes depending on which military (or paramilitary) force is being played, according to the standard-issue model for that force. All members of the same Side are likely to carry the same model (or very similar models). Exceptions include low-tech scenarios (e.g. World War 2) where Infantry are armed with Battle Rifles instead.

A Rifleman uses the Assault Rifle as their primary weapon (and usually their only weapon, barring Grenades). Players in a leadership role, such as Fireteam Leaders, Squad Leaders and Platoon Leaders, carry an Assault Rifle specially modified with a Grenade Launcher, which they can switch to quickly. For optics, most Assault Rifles are issued with a Red-Dot Sight - though they can be used rather comfortably with no optics whatsoever. Other attachments may be provided for Assault Rifles, such as Lasers, Foregrips, et cetera.

Players are typically provided with around 10-12 Magazines at the start of the mission, each containing 30 rounds, for a total of 300-360 rounds. This may change from mission to mission. Resupply Crates typically contain enough magazines to resupply an entire Fireteam. If for any reason a player doesn't have an Assault Rifle, the only place to acquire one would be from the dead body of a friendly player, or in emergencies an enemy corpse.

Note that not all Infantry carry Assault Rifles, even in scenarios where most do. Automatic Rifles are usually distributed to Automatic Riflemen, who do not carry an Assault Rifle for backup (but may seek one if their AR runs out of ammo and cannot take standard 30-bullet magazines).

enemy Infantry also commonly carry Assault Rifles, of a model appropriate for their Side.

Models
Assault Rifles are by far the most varied weapons in the game, in terms of the number of different models available to be used. Weapons from all around the world are made available by ArmA 2 and ArmA 3 (through the CUP mod) as well the various other mods used by ShackTac. Dozens of different models - possibly upwards of 100 - have been used in ShackTac missions over the years.

The differences between these models is relatively minor in practical terms, though minor differences can have an impact on gameplay - especially when comparing BLUFOR weapons to OPFOR weapons. These primarily include the types of attachments a weapon can take, the size of standard magazines, interchangeability of ammunition, and several other factors.

The most common Assault Rifle models all belong to two "families" of weapons: The Soviet AK weapon family, and the American M-16 (or AR15) family. Well more than 50% of rifle models belong to these families, or are foreign derivatives of the mechanisms originally developed for these families. Other weapons developed independently from these families also appear in ShackTac, but are significantly rarer (to the point where some models have appeared in only a handful of videos).

The AK family was developed first, immediately following World War II, based on the first operational Assault Rifles designed by Nazi Germany. Initially chambered for 7.62x39mm bullets, the AK-47 was the most widely-distributed rifle in the world, with multiple variants being developed in the Soviet Union over the years. The first major variant was the AKM (M for "Modernized"). The AK-47 and AKM typically appear in ShackTac in early Cold War scenarios, or in the hands of low-tech para-military/guerilla/criminal forces.

The AK-47 was later replaced with the AK-74, a significantly more modernized model that eventually replaced the original as the most common Assault Rifle in the world. AK-74 rifles is chambered for 5.45mm bullets, more closely matching the performance of the NATO standard 5.56mm rounds. This is the also most common Assault Rifle seen in ShackTac, as Enemy Infantry are typically equipped with these weapons. Even more modernized AK variants based on the AK-74 are also used, including some rare post-1990s 5.56mm variants that use NATO ammo.

The Americans developed their first mass-produced Assault Rifle decades after World War II, in the form of the M-16 family. These rifles are chambered for 5.56mm ammunition, which quickly became the standard for most NATO rifles to this day. The original standard-issue M-16 used 20-round magazines and was used extensively in the Vietnam war, as seen in Vietnam-era ShackTac missions. Within two decades the M-16 rifle was reworked with several improvements, becoming the M16A2 - the most common rifle used by ShackTac players, especially during the ArmA 2 era. The most modern version of this family, the M16A4, is also quite common in ArmA 3.

The M4, directly descended from the M-16, is a shorter ("carbine") variant of the M-16 family that is also quite common in ShackTac. Though originally appearing during the Vietnam war as the "Colt Commando" (or other various names), it was eventually modernized to become the standard weapon of the U.S. Marines for many years, and has appeared in many ShackTac videos featuring this force.

Weapons directly derived from the AK and M-16 families have also made their appearance in ShackTac over the years. The most common foreign AK-74 variant in ShackTac is the Finnish Valmet M76, appearing in multiple ArmA 3 missions. The most common M-16 derived model is the German HK 416, a highly advanced weapon typically carried by Special Forces and other well-armed units.

Assault Rifles not belonging to either family have also made their appearance. The most common of these are the British L85A2 (also known as the SA80), the French FAMAS, and the Austrian Steyr AUG (often used by Australian forces). The German army more commonly uses Battle Rifles - especially the G3 and its many variants - which are not technically Assault Rifles due to their full-powered cartridge.