MrCrowley wrote:1/4 mile distance
1/2 mile distance
3/4 mile distance
1 mile+ distance
I wouldn't advocate distance as a category. This might seem counter intuitive to some, but it'll be nearly impossible to verify a claim of even 1/2 mile, and let's be entirely honest, pretty hard to do safely.
If your projectile is coming down a mile away, how can you possibly be sure your target area is clear? Sure, it may be one in a thousand that there's anyone near where you're shooting, but if a projectile is going a mile, then it'll still have a LOT of energy left over at the end. It's a basic fact of firing that far.
If you
can fire that far safely, good for you, but I don't think we should actively be providing incentive to people to fire out into oblivion.
Penetration is a bit tricky, maybe it's better to do muzzle energy.
Muzzle energy is just a factor of cannon pressure and cannon size.
Penetration has other factors added in that make it more interesting.
Maybe chamber volume as well could be one, for people with ridiculously sized chambers.
I'm not really seeing the merit in "large" cannons. They may be neat, but it just shows a large budget and a large place to store it.
They aren't necessarily any more technically proficient than a cannon of any other size.
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Materials - in a similar vein to the above, why should it matter? If they're up to the job, should it matter whether it's aluminium, copper, steel, PVC or blue cheese? Perhaps separate metal into another category, but I see no reason to split types of metal.
I get the idea that some of the things people are suggesting are things they've done, rather than suitably generic goals.
If you're doing this, you should be able to justify the merit's existence. Why are the particular criteria of any real importance?
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I personally think the goals need to be a mark of proficiency, rather than budget or available resources. Personally, I'm more interested in someone doing a good job with limited supplies than someone being able to build the Blingcannon 5001 V3.1.8 from Grade Q Superalloy<sup>TM</sup>.
So, I'd put merits on the list for acts of innovation. Introducing a new idea, using something in a new way, that kind of thing.
Semi and Full-auto are fair enough categories to have, but I'd add a category for manually cycled repeaters. Pump, Lever and Bolt actions - even a revolver action - all of these are perfectly valid.
