So barring some future revolutionary technology like caseless ammo, electronic ignition, or gaussguns...

Firearms suffer from what I like to call the "Good Enough" effect.

There are many technologies that could improve small arms quite a bit, but the entrenched mindset wants something like %300 effectness increase before committing to a new design. The 1980's ACR program is a excellent example of this, and the decision of the German Army in the 90's about the G11. Also the problem lies with politicians and Generals who have a vested interest in weapons procurement, often cancelling trials when their favored weapon fails, or completely stripping budgets for new weapons when they are procured.

I think the next revolution in firearms is the design of ammunition.

Like reloading while prone?

if we can get them to stop going off when we drop them it will be a good step forward

>bullpups are hard to reload
I'll school you.
1.Extend right arm
2.turn arm 90º palm facing up
3.strip mag with left hand
4.Insert new mag
5.Charge weapon if applicable

Law of Diminishing returns. Applies to a hell of a lot of things.

I had no idea the Anaconda was so huge, its just as big as a MG42

>like what
Not that user, but computerized optics like what you see in their very early stages with things like Tracking Point are going to be the next big thing, scopes that handle elevation and windage for you just by aiming at a target, sights that work like the zoom on a high-end digital camera and provide 0x-80x zoom.

Design me a gun that can shoot any caliber with some small quick adjustment. Something that shortens or widens the bore/gastube and adjusts the firing pin and magwell.

No wonder they're taking off and not being ditched by three quarters of their large scale adopters...

again, it doesn't matter if you design the most efficient killing machine possible, you still have to give it to million upon millions of troops. It's not the tech, it's the logistics.

What is going to improve drastically is information. Augmented reality, guns that can track targets and fire for you so that you never miss. This tech already exists, it just needs to get cheaper.

Going to arm a million soldiers with a rifle that costs a little more than a hundred used or one that costs nearly five thousand. A marine costs seventeen thousand dollars of equipment. An enemy insurgent costs maybe a couple hundred.

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As ridiculous as that sounds from an engineering perspective, IF, it can be done with reliable results then it's the perfect SHTF firearm. Besides that not sure what other application you would need besides switching ammunition for different range perspectives.

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ah okay. sorry but there are actually stupid people i've seen (on arfcom mostly lol) who think pistol red dots are so revolutionary.

>implying you can't just slap all that shit on a rail

Idk about bulpups, they're inherrantly harder to reload with their mag position, but then again people once that bolt actions were a gimmick in the 1800s and that stocked pictols were the way of the future.

I would buy a modern production Medusa for ~1k.

>extend right arm with palm up
>use left hand to get mag
>gun falls to the ground because you're not holding it anymore

why? The one thing bullpups have in their favor is a longer barrel length for a given total length of the firearm.

Wouldn't it be quite possible that future ammunition will be developed with faster burning propellants so as to not need a long barrel to get up to velocity?

OP specifically said "barring some future revolutionary technology like caseless ammo".

Even then, I fail to see how the added barrel length can't only help performance.

We will achieve the perfection if we will combnine flechettes (steyr-aug.com/acr2002.htm) with caseless ammo. Although I think that caseless ammunition is a lost cause.

,
We are currently in a Renaissance for optics. Rifles were fully fleshed out in the 70s and anything since then has been incremental in nature.

That being said, there have been cool advancements, namely in bullpups and the unique stuff you can do with them (like the P90, admittedly). The next big thing in firearms (and specifically firearms, no coil gun, plasma bullshit, etc.) will be caseless ammo (a chemistry and thermodynamics problem) and complete mitigation of recoil (which we're seeing come out of Radom, even if it's not perfect)

>when the step-by-step process of reloading a bullpup are so unintuitive even the proponents have trouble describing it properly

At some point, every technology gets to be 95% as good as it’s ever going to be. From them on, there are steady, incremental improvements, but nothing really revolutionary.

I remember back in the mid-90s when any computer you bought was obsolete in 18 months because every new iteration of Moore’s Law represented a quantum shift in what you could do with that machine. But now? I’ve had my current laptop a little over seven years, and feel no need to replace it. Yes, I maxed out the available RAM and swapped the hard drive it came with for an SSD, but now it’s fast enough and probably will be for the foreseeable future. Same with guns. If you bought a Gen 1 Glock in 1985 and it still works fine, we’ll, yes, the Gen 5 is a better gun, but not do much so that there’s any real need for a replacement. Hell, my boyfriend still uses the old 1911 his grandpa gave him as his nightstand gun. Why not? It functions fine. A new gun wouldn’t really do the job any better.

>bullpups
He did say the 70's, which is when bullpups really caught on, and they've been around for longer than that.

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>ergonomics
Gun ergonomics have not significantly changed through multiple world wars, hundreds of trials, and rifles have been the same since inception.
>reliability
Not really something that can be improved, either it is or isnt. Some guns are designed to be reliable, some are designed to be cheap.
>accuracy
The technology exists already. in-flight stabilizing bullets, previously unheard of optics, etc.
>lethality
airburst may make a comeback one day, but there's nothing really more lethal at the moment.

Contrary to all that, I think we are on the cusp of immense changes to firearms. If you look at the technologies we currently have, from airburst to gyrojets, from lasers to railguns, I believe the future of a standard rifle will be the same concept, of propelling a small object into your enemy, but with different propellant methods. From the javelin, to the sling, to the bow, to the gun, the concept has by and large been the same. small and fast to kill a person. As battery technologies improve, production methods advance, we'll eventually adopt it. It comes down to really convincing the people that it's a good idea to procure, and that is done by injecting the idea into the american mind. And we've thought lasers and railguns are tight as hell for decades, once we get working models, everyone is going to be tripping over themselves to get them. Even if they suck.

>Gun ergonomics have not significantly changed through multiple world wars
What? That's silly, they've changed massively.

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The basic concept, of putting gun to shoulder and shoot hasn't changed
>one hand in front
>one hand near trigger
>Gun on shoulder

Shooting guns has been the same, only thing that has changed was the proliferation of the pistol grip

Which wasn't a huge change either, but I see what you're saying

>are they perfect?
>lists potential improvements
You’re a fucking retard OP

Probably not. You'll know when they are because of the death of diversity. 99% of serious users will all move to the same platform and stop looking for improvements. We aren't there yet. Not to mention ever improving armor tech will always call for improvements in projectile and firearm design or preference. Just wait until anybody can 3d print a level 2 bullet proof hoody and they start showing up in rap songs. Soon enough they'll become a status simple among ne'er do wells and that'll be all she wrote for current handgun/ammo preferences.