And I'd not heard of the LMG, that needs adding to Traveller. And speaking of which, someone needs to add Traveller to that wiki page as a game that has used the design as inspiration. Yes, I'm aware that I'm volunteering for both No problem It'll just take me a little while, so if anyone wants to beat me to it that's cool.
I'd never wondered why it didn't make it into wider use because I'd heard the stories and even seen a tape of a firing where the round did the corkscrew out of the barrel. Pity that was all because of sloppy manufacturing and the original was actually superior in range, accuracy and power to conventional with the bonus of lighter weapon and negligible recoil.
A few minor problems that could have easily been corrected and this would have been a great weapon technology. But instead it is relagated to history as a failure. A story all too familiar in the field.
Based on my new knowledge I'm thinking maybe the Traveller versions need a little updating too. I can't recall if they were that effective or not. Certainly no mention was made of stopping the round before it leaves the barrel by just putting you hand over it Note to self, do not use Gyrojet weapons in close quarters combat except as (very light) clubs.
well, the simple fact is that it failed due to the fact that , whetever its neato factor, aside from concept coolness as a weapon it plain stunk.
In the military field there were simpler, cheaper, more reliable ways of shooting someone that was more accurate, less prone to exploding in the hand, and didnt require the target to be 50 feet away for the weapons projectile to acheive lethal velocity.
In other words, in the dollar of its day, it was outperformed by the average 150 dollar .38
coupled with the fact that to date theres been no established need for a space operable firearmn, and the fact that whatever technology is brought to bear it offers nothing an AK47 can't provide, it will remain what it is, a footnote of yet another interresting but impractical gun design.
That said, in traveler terms, accelerator rifles are in fact Gyrojets, which were in turn no more than handheld rocket launchers. In a vacuum environment they make sense, though anywhere else they have limited use- just as the SF staple the laser pistol will never realistically supplant the kinetic wepaons like projectile firearms and such. They simply dont do that sort of thing as well, tho in other cases they work dandy.
Like any tool, it depends on the job at hand
Officially at any rate 
