Quote from: VectorSigma;399273The single-syllable nature of 'clip' is its strongest feature in this battle.

Most refer to them as "mags".  A single syllable, if that's what you're needing.

Quote from: Vellorian;399292Is this the "morning star" errors from the early days of RPGs that you're speaking about?  That one irks me, too.

I've lost track of how many times I have explained the difference between a mace, a flail and a 'morning star'...

*Snicker* Maybe someone should go on the big purple and complain that calling magazines clips is offensive to people in the military, and wait for the modstapo to make a new rule banning people for doing it....

Quote from: Cylonophile;399296*Snicker* Maybe someone should go on the big purple and complain that calling magazines clips is offensive to people in the military, and wait for the modstapo to make a new rule banning people for doing it....

LOL

I do not visit "the place that shall not be named" and anyone who goes there drops about 8 points on my 10 point scale of an estimation of whether I want to associate with them...

When I was playing Shadowrun everyone used "clips".
When I was playing Rifts or other military campaigns, everyone said "mags".
It was the same people, weird now that I think of it, we all switched to mags or magazines when in military context.

Quote from: Tetsubo;399295I've lost track of how many times I have explained the difference between a mace, a flail and a 'morning star'...

Y'know, I had this really difficult time with changing my slang with both the Morning Star/Ball-and-chain and the Magazine/Clip.  

I think it's human nature to latch onto a specific name/concept for something and when we find its incorrect, to make excuses for our incorrect use of it.  It took me years to back off of calling a ball-and-chain a "morningstar" because the "morningstar" was a "cool word"!

My Marine buddy would punch me every time I used "clip" innappropriately (and at 6'5 and 350 without an ounce of fat, that was a significant event).  This negative reinforcement worked wonders on me!

However, it was when I received compliments from gun enthusiasts in my writing for using the correct term and "elevating" myself above the "uneducated masses" (to use terminology in this thread ) it really struck home to me just how many people who are "in the know" pay attention to such details.

Quote from: Vellorian;399302Y'know, I had this really difficult time with changing my slang with both the Morning Star/Ball-and-chain and the Magazine/Clip.  

I think it's human nature to latch onto a specific name/concept for something and when we find its incorrect, to make excuses for our incorrect use of it.  It took me years to back off of calling a ball-and-chain a "morningstar" because the "morningstar" was a "cool word"!

My Marine buddy would punch me every time I used "clip" innappropriately (and at 6'5 and 350 without an ounce of fat, that was a significant event).  This negative reinforcement workds wonders on me!

.

Get a stungun and every time he punches you poke him in the groin with it, that'll teach him some manners.

Quote from: Vellorian;399298LOL

I do not visit "the place that shall not be named" and anyone who goes there drops about 8 points on my 10 point scale of an estimation of whether I want to associate with them...

I am doomed than...

Quote from: Vellorian;399292................ exactitude, I consider this the mark of a professional.  If you are a writer, of novels, RPGs, articles, or whatever, you should know both the correct name for something and the slang.  Obviously, use the one that is appropriate for the situation.  In game rules, however, the appropriate thing is to call something by it's correct name. Feel free to reference the slang, of course, but don't show yourself to be uneducated and inexperienced in your writing.

Nope.

If you want a game to sell to as many people as possible - then you use the word or phrase that is in common usage.

The majority of people that might play a game know what is meant by 'clip'...

...or 'reload'...


....or 'more ammo'


...or 'nother mag please'.

......they also know the sentence: "Hey look there's a jerk slowing down the game by getting picky about word usage. Could you just roll the damn dice already?!"


- Ed C.

Quote from: CRKrueger;399300When I was playing Shadowrun everyone used "clips".
When I was playing Rifts or other military campaigns, everyone said "mags".
It was the same people, weird now that I think of it, we all switched to mags or magazines when in military context.

What about sci-fi weapons that use energy cells or e-clips?

Quote from: Spike;399254A design flaw? Maybe.  If you are a lone gunman stalking his prey (armed humans?) through the deathly silent battlefields of some futuristic TV bloodsport.

Real life soldiers frequently YELL OUT that they are reloading so their buddies know that they are out and don't do something that requires him to shoot (like... reload themselves, or dash across open ground...).  

...

I can, and will, out pedant you, or anyone, on this, or anything.

If there is one thing I've learned from the gun culture, it's that everyone has a distinct perspective and preference and some of these preferences--though opposite--are not necessarily conflicting.

As you point out, in a single-man situation, this could be a design flaw.  In a team environment, perhaps less so.

Most of my thinking is "single man survival" -- and thus I consider it a design flaw.  

For instance, the SKS has what I consider to be a "design flaw"--but only when it has been modded to accept removable mags.  It is a "feature" when it has a fixed-mag that requires a top down reload (typically using stripper clips).  

For those who are SKS enthusiasts, but want to mod their rifle to accept removable magazines, there is a small adjustment that can be made to make the operation a little less cumbersome.

But it's a matter of perspective.  If you have a fixed magazine, you *want* your bolt to stay open when you're out of ammo so that you can reload it faster.  When you have a removable magazine, you want it closed so that removing the mag does not require a two hand effort and a complete re-allignment of the firearm.

Yeah.  Perspective.  

Quote from: Cylonophile;399303Get a stungun and every time he punches you poke him in the groin with it, that'll teach him some manners.

Yeah....  This is the guy that clocked me with a rattan practice sword so hard that I saw stars and my ears rang for an hour.  He is able to rush me, remove my pistol from my grasp and put it to my head if he's within 30 feet of me before I can pull the trigger--when I'm already aiming it at him and my finger is on the trigger.

He's also a very dear friend that I greatly admire and appreciate.  

@Koltar: Not sure how being exact can alienate a group of people if you're mentioning both points.  Also, I don't think that any of this discussion relates to slowing down the dice rolls at all.  Not sure where that point came from...

@Tetsubo: That's a really interesting question.  I've been giving it a lot of thought lately. I've been using the term "cells" to represent "power cells" or "energy cells".  I think it's important to distinguish different things in worlds where you have both.  A "mag" or "clip" would be for a slug-thrower and a "cell" or "juice" (if you want to toss in some slang) would be for an energy weapon.

Also, Tetsubo, just think!  You can rise 8 whole points in my estimation by avoiding "the place that shall not be named"!  

Quote from: Vellorian;399310Yeah....  This is the guy that clocked me with a rattan practice sword so hard that I saw stars and my ears rang for an hour.  He is able to rush me, remove my pistol from my grasp and put it to my head if he's within 30 feet of me before I can pull the trigger--when I'm already aiming it at him and my finger is on the trigger.

He's also a very dear friend that I greatly admire and appreciate.  

@Koltar: Not sure how being exact can alienate a group of people if you're mentioning both points.  Also, I don't think that any of this discussion relates to slowing down the dice rolls at all.  Not sure where that point came from...

@Tetsubo: That's a really interesting question.  I've been giving it a lot of thought lately. I've been using the term "cells" to represent "power cells" or "energy cells".  I think it's important to distinguish different things in worlds where you have both.  A "mag" or "clip" would be for a slug-thrower and a "cell" or "juice" (if you want to toss in some slang) would be for an energy weapon.

Also, Tetsubo, just think!  You can rise 8 whole points in my estimation by avoiding "the place that shall not be named"!  

Koltar's probably alienated a lot of players with his pompous arrogance, so he might know something about the subject.

As to weapons using power cells, I wonder if they might be called "Batts" in combat, as in "Need a new batt here!"

Or maybe they'd just be called "Charges". "Changing charge!"

In some cases a weapon may need power AND some form of material, like gauss darts or some form of matter for a plasma gun. I guess they'd come in clips and be called clips., with enough battery to fire the whole load of material.

Making a sperarate power cell and material holder would be complex and make people watch 2 things in battle.

Quote from: Spinachcat;399257I have also heard that revolver and pistol are considered different categories of handgun.  So a skill in pistol isn't a skill in revolver to any degree more than shotgun is to rifle.
.

If you can shoot a pistol you can shoot a revolver. The only real difference, outside of practice with a particular weapon, is reload time.

Pete

Interesting debate.

Inaccuracy can destroy the 'suspension of disbelief' extremely quicky. For me in movies, it is people who get their medals wrong. Even worse if they are more than mere window-dressing (an instance in a legal show comes to mind where a witnesses's military record was of significance, the medal they said he had was not amongst his ribbons and also was not one that someone of his rank, branch of service and stated history would have been awarded!)

However, as someone said, CHARACTERS will often know more (or indeed, less) than their PLAYERS.

In a game of Aftermath many years ago, we had a very obsessive GM who decided that he had to know precisely where every single round of ammunition was, never mind the magazines! A roomfull of players started drawing up detailed lists, while the only two veterans present said in chorus, "Full magazine in weapon, spare in pocket, rest on the truck" and went off to make coffee.