.38 Special (no ontology)
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*[[Charter Arms Undercover]] | *[[Charter Arms Undercover]] | ||
*[[Colt Detective Special]] | *[[Colt Detective Special]] | ||
| - | *[[Smith ＆ Wesson Model | + | *[[Smith ＆ Wesson Model 242 Airlite]] |
| - | *+ '''all | + | *+ '''all revolvers''' chambered in [[.357 Magnum]]. |
== Gallery == | == Gallery == | ||
Revision as of 04:51, 8 December 2012
The .38 Special (also referred to as .38 S&W Special and shortened to .38 Spc) is a handgun cartridge developed just prior the beginning of the 20th century. It is considered a low-tier caliber.
Real-life data
The .38 Special caliber's name is deceptive, as the bullet width is actually 0.357 inches. This is why the more well-known magnum variant of this caliber, the .357 Magnum, is named that way.
The story of this caliber begins in 1898, as an improved variant of the .38 Long Colt, which was known for having inadequate stopping power, as demonstrated when U.S. troops fought the Moros in the Philippine-American War. Originally a blackpowder cartridge, it went on to be loaded with smokeless powder just a year within its introduction, due to its quickly increasing popularity.
Quickly enough, big name American firearms manufacturers started proposing handguns that would fire the caliber, such as the Smith & Wesson 38-44 Heavy Duty, or the Colt Official Police, both of which intended for law enforcement use, and successfully so, the Official Police even going on to become one of the best selling firearms for American LE and police agencies up into the 1950s. .38 Special revolvers went on to become iconic, representing the typical police officer's weapon.
New .38 Special loadings also started to appear rapidly, such as the .38 Special Hi-Speed (158 grain metal-tipped bullet) which was designed to penetrate cars and body armor. But the most well-known of those is the development of a magnum cartridge, with the same width, but a longer case: the very popular .357 Magnum.
.38 Special went on and remained the standard police/law enforcement caliber, up until the introduction of Wonder Nines in the 70s, which was the nickname typically given to 9x19mm Parabellum semi-automatic pistols with double-stack magazines, typically holding 15 rounds or more. It has since been largely phased out, though its big brother, the .357 Magnum, still sees marginal uses in certain police and LE agencies throughout the world; an example is France's GIGN counter-terrorist unit, which uses the Manurhin MR 73 revolver, typically chambered in .357 Magnum. It has also been adopted for use in the US Air Force, using the M41 Ball loads, before being phased out as well.
As of nowadays, despite being mostly phased out of LE and military use, .38 Special still sees popularity, as ammunition is cheap and suitable for a variety of applications, ranging from varmint hunting, to civilian target shooting, and even personal defense. New, modern loads are still being developed for this caliber, such as the .38 Special +P, which has about 10% more energy than the original load.
Mazeworld overview
| Type | Unarm | Light | Hardskin | Kevlar-2 | Kevlar-3 | Kevlar-4 | HEV |
| Bullet | 25% | 24% | 20% | 14% | 6% | 2% | 0% |
.38 Special is among the weakest calibers available in Mazeworld. With anemic performance, .38 Special has little uses outside of unarmored targets. It is largely only a self-defense caliber, which unfortunately has little applications as there are no automatic or high-capacity weapons chambered for it to compensate for the low power. So low, that it becomes wasteful on high ACs, and practically useless against Kevlar-4 and HEV. Only well-placed shots, exploiting weak points, may increase this caliber's lethality.
As a result, .38 Special is relegated to the role of backup, last-ditch caliber. It does, however, benefit from one advantage; because it is a shorter variant of the .357 Magnum (or more accurately, the latter is a longer variant of .38 Special), revolvers chambered for .357 Magnum can also fire .38 Special, eliminating the need for a separate, backup weapon in .38 Special if the contestant owns a .357 Magnum revolver. It does not apply to semi-automatic weapons, however, as they cannot be fed reliably in a magazine (as a result, it is not possible to load .38 Special in weapons such as the .357 Desert Eagle.)
The caliber is quite rare - only a select few weapons are chambered for this caliber. When bought, gun shops and weapon shops sell .38 Special in boxes of 30 or 150 rounds, for a price of 0.5 P$ per round; which is very cheap; perhaps one of the only other strong points besides compatibility in .357 revolvers.
Weapons compatible
Class 3 weapons
- + all revolvers chambered in .357 Magnum.
Gallery
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