Item from Dune by Frank Herbert
A continuous-beam laser weapon — devastating against unshielded targets, but its interaction with a Holtzman shield produces a nuclear-scale explosion that kills attacker and defender alike.
The lasgun is the most powerful personal weapon in the Imperium and the most constrained. Against unshielded targets — buildings, vehicles, unprotected people — it cuts through virtually anything. Against a Holtzman shield, it triggers a pseudo-atomic explosion that annihilates everything in the vicinity, including the person firing the lasgun. This shield-lasgun interaction (called the Holtzman Effect) has fundamentally shaped warfare in the Imperium. In any engagement where shields are present — which is virtually every engagement involving trained fighters — lasguns become mutually assured destruction devices. The result: personal combat has reverted to blade weapons, and lasguns are reserved for situations where shields are definitely absent. On Arrakis, where shields attract sandworms and are rarely used in the open desert, the calculus shifts. Lasguns become viable field weapons again, changing the tactical landscape in ways that offworld military doctrine doesn't account for.
A rifle-length weapon with a smooth, minimalist housing. The emitter is a crystalline lens array at the barrel's end. No visible ammunition — powered by a compact energy cell in the stock. The beam itself is visible as a continuous line of intense light, color varying by model from deep red to blue-white. The weapon has no recoil but generates significant heat; extended firing causes the barrel housing to glow.
Also known as: laser gun, lasrifle, las-weapon