In fact, the settings of electronic games in this regard are better than movies. For example, the Spartan laser rifle in "Hao":
The gun is designed reasonably. Although it is feasible to charge the laser weapon by storing energy in the battery, although the energy will be consumed faster; I don't think it will cause the gun body to vibrate when charged. But at least the laser emitted hits instantly. The laser weapons in "Fallout" are also very good:
However, the name of the gun's accessories doesn't sound very scientific, such as "Gamabo emitter", "photon amplification harmonic", etc.
As for movies, they are much inferior in this regard. Take Star Wars as an example. The characters can avoid the attack of light bullets, and the light bullets do not advance at the speed of light; the characters actually jump when they shoot - in theory, a ball of plasma gas will cause a certain backlash when it is shot, but I don't know how many. Although I am only fascinated by holding weapons, it is still necessary to mention: you can't see lasers in space! The only reason we can see lasers in the wavelength range of visible light is that the photons in the beam are scattered into our eyes by air molecules on the path forward. Space is in a vacuum state, so naturally there is no laser light.
Advantages of laser weapons
The advantage of the laser beam moving at the speed of light is that the target is still unconscious when hit - just as a bullet arrives at the target before the sound waves generated by the fire. Also, soldiers do not need to take into account the time of ballistic flight when aiming, nor do they need to worry about the impact of gravity on ballistics. However, this advantage also limits the target of laser weapons to the range of sight.
Laser damage can be adjusted. This means that the same laser gun can be used to suppress violence (the effect is not just a stimulus: for example, the ADS system or the "PhaSR" laser rifle) can also be used to assassinate, diversifying its combat status; and it has no recoil.
Last, given that the ammunition of laser weapons is essentially just stored electricity, its single-round ammunition is much cheaper. As mentioned below, the LaWS carrier-based laser short-range weapon defense system only costs $1 per shot, while the traditional point defense system will fire a missile of $400,000.
Laser weapons defects
The biggest problem is the energy supply. Our best lithium-ion battery has a capacity of 1.8 megajou/kg, while a 7.62mm caliber plug is bored with 3.3 kilojou kinetic energy. This means that soldiers using laser guns must carry energy bags or external power supplies with them. Although this will never be a problem with the advancement of battery technology, as the rule says: "It is more appropriate to use any battery material suitable for laser guns as a blasting warhead." Once the energy pack on the laser gun is hit, it will explode like a plasma grenade in "Hao".
The "heat halo effect" is also a big problem. The energy of a laser light is strongly weakened as it passes through dust, smoke, clouds and raindrops. The presence of these obstacles also exposes the shooter's exact orientation, which is more obvious than the gunshots when a normal gun is fired:
A beam of laser light in the smoke looked like a strange sword.
Soldiers also have to carry spare lenses for their weapons; one of the major drawbacks of laser weapons is here. These lenses cannot be used by polishing them. In order to accurately focus the laser, the quality of the lens is extremely high; a little defect on it will burn the lens quickly under the irradiation of a strong laser, so that the laser weapon will be damaged faster.
I also want to mention the heat dissipation issue. In the future, the laser efficiency may reach 20-50%. In this way, a laser weapon with a 1 kilojoule needs to dissipate up to 4 kilojoule of waste heat every time it is launched. Thinking about the thermal magazine in "Mass Effect"? A doctor suggested: "The hot surface is embedded with liquid metal microchannel heat sinks", which is really fancy. If the laser weapon is designed like this, it will be so hot that it will be out of reach.
If the laser weapon power is adjusted too low, the user needs to focus the beam on the target for several seconds in order to achieve the expected effect. The result is to let the enemy notice that the clothes on their bodies catch fire and then hide.
Laser weapons may also have a serious problem that no one has raised: it can permanently blind anyone who looks directly at the beam. This means that in real life, people within 5 kilometers of users are at risk of blindness (5 kilometers is the limit of human vision). Under the premise that the laser power is so strong that it is disabled, once it is reflected by smooth objects such as clean car body, windows, and door handles, it will turn all unlucky guys on the reflection route into blind. Once such weapons are put into actual combat, they will cause heavy civilian disabilities, and violate Article 4 of the 1980 Convention on Specific Conventional Weapons: the use of permanent blinding laser weapons is prohibited, and all signatories require all feasible measures to avoid blinding. Besides, this only mentions the use of blinding weapons. Governments in various countries have long been in a state of suffocation for civilians. Moreover, active-duty military personnel using laser weapons must wear anti-laser goggles.
These glasses are so handsome.
Laser has an unexpected drawback. When the light beam heats the body, it will overheat the superficial moisture of the skin into plasma, which will weaken the energy of the laser and have a certain protective effect on deep tissue. To avoid this, the laser can be emitted in pulsed form. If the beam is focused in place and the pulse frequency is high enough, each pulse will cause a small-scale explosion effect to the target body surface, leaving a pit; when the residue evaporated by heat dissipates, the next pulse can hit the bottom of the pit. The doctor predicts that before this effect loses its effect, the beam can drill a 30-centimeter-deep tunnel along the soft tissue—the equivalent of the penetration of a pistol bullet.
Miscellaneous talk:
Other answerers mentioned that mirrors can be used as armor. But be aware that even the best quality mirror will absorb 10-20% of the incident light. Since a laser weapon can effectively kill enemies, it is easy to melt the mirror. However, to block the laser, you only need to use a special ceramic material 1 cm thick - or other materials that can absorb a lot of heat energy without melting.
The range of laser weapons also needs to be carefully calibrated before use. Laser weapons require lenses to focus the beam, otherwise the laser will destroy the weapon itself. The lens will focus the light beam to a point at a certain distance, where the light is the strongest and the most deadly. This way, you need to know the distance of the target before firing - maybe it can be done with laser ranging.
What would it feel like to use a laser weapon?
It's similar to the current general gun, but it doesn't have recoil! Because the built-in reflective scope of the laser weapon (which can be made with a mirror that refracts the beam) is quite accurate, you only need to press the trigger after aiming at the target.
What does it look like when you fire?
When firing, the weapon itself will probably produce some buzzing sound of electric current, and soldiers will never have to worry about the gunfire and the ears will be deaf. When the laser hits the body, a blast will appear, which is the reverberation effect of the beam constantly digging holes on the surface of the tissue and then exploding. As for the visual effect, it depends on the wavelength of the laser. Near-infrared lasers will ignite dust on the path to form Mars; lasers at visible light wavelengths... of course they are visible; near-ultraviolet lasers will form a fluorescent glow around the beam.
What happens when the target hits?
To be honest, it is similar to a gunshot wound; the difference is that there are no shrapnel left in the body. Because of the effect of pulsed laser, the entire wound will not appear clean and neat, but will be uneven. There will be no blood on the wall behind the target, which is different from gunshot wounds; this is because the laser will not bring out the body tissue when it passes through the body.
What does a laser rifle look like?
Luke's laser rifle is the most scientific design I can find:
It looks quite similar to the assault rifle in Halo 3, personal opinion.
A beam contains 50 200 focal pulses, with pulses separated by 10 microseconds. The weapon uses near-infrared light (wavelength 1 micron). The total energy of one round contains 10 kilojoules - the power is equivalent to a .460 Weather than Magnum bullet (currently the most powerful bullet). Its maximum firing rate reaches 120 rounds per minute, its gun weighs 4.5 kg, and its best range is 350 meters. Its energy pack can shoot 100 rounds after it is filled.
Will laser weapons be used on a large scale by the army?
According to the famous website "War", laser rifles do not need to replace kinetic guns, but in fact, laser rifles are more effective and consume more ammunition. Legendary Ken believes that the first hand-held laser-directed energy weapon will play the role of a sniper rifle and is used to conceal the killing of enemies. The initial application of directional energy weapons was in point defense, which is also the current research direction: lasers can instantly accurately intercept rockets, mortar shells and drones. The U.S. Navy is now testing LaWS carrier-based laser short-range weapon defense system:
OK, all the answers you want are here. The future laser weapons may be very different from what we see in science fiction works: (
