Profugo-Barbatus
commented
1 year ago The steel penetrator that makes it really useful against armor also means it has a habit to punch clean through flesh targets, and sees less expansion. You end up with a smaller wound channel and less kinetic energy dumped into the target as a result. So a damage malus does probably make sense. The AP buff should put it around or just below 7N22 - Both are fundamentally the same idea, create a penetrator core for a standard cartridge, but the 7N22 was something like 15 years after the M855. So they got fifteen extra years of lessons learned to work from in cartridge design.
RobertoRobot
Is your feature request related to a problem? Please describe.
Currently, the standard 5.56 NATO bullet is really weak. It has 3 less damage than .223 Remington despite having a significantly higher muzzle energy and has much higher dispersion, which while true to life in terms of MoA (1.71 for m855) means it gets far fewer crits and thus delivers far less damage than 223. IRL, 5.56 is known to be really good at penetrating armor. It requires an entirely different NIJ standard than .44 magnum and while a ballistic vest IRL will prevent penetration from .44 (it will still hurt like hell and probably break a bone though) 5.56 shears straight through soft armor and requires hard plates to stop. This is because it's a small but really fast bullet, it's the same principle as 5.7x28, going like 2x as fast as .44 and faster than even 7.62x51. Yet in game, .44 magnum is stronger than 5.56 (.44 has 40 damage + 4 arpen while 5.56 m855 has 36 damage + 6 arpen assuming a mid-length barrel) IRL there is a massive difference between the two, .44 magnum might have similar raw muzzle energy but it can't even begin to compare against actual body armor.
Solution you would like.
Give 5.56 much higher armor penetration (12-16ish)
Describe alternatives you have considered.
Should 5.56 really be 3 points weaker than .223? I get that it's effectively a "FMJ" version of 223 but surely with a higher muzzle energy too it shouldn't be straight up weaker right? Like you cannot fire 5.56 out of a .223 rated gun, the difference is pretty substantial.
Additional context
No response