M40A1 Sniper Rifle

The M40A1 Sniper Rifle is a weapon used by the HECU Snipers in Half-Life and the male Black Ops in Half-Life: Opposing Force. It is a powerful rifle that can kill many types of living beings in a single hit. It has a scope attached to it to make it easy to engage long range targets. First introduced in Half-Life, the rifle model name was given in Opposing Force.

Half-Life

 * The M40A1 is first introduced near the end of the Half-Life chapter On A Rail in Sector E Materials Transport, right before the High Altitude Launch Center. In the chapter Surface Tension, two Snipers are spread around the Ordinance Storage Facility in the Topside Motorpool, and have shot a security guard who dies when Freeman reaches him. They add to the threat that the Land Mines and the Tripmines spread around the building already pose. The fourth and last HECU Sniper to be seen is found in the next map, in the same chapter, hiding in a window beside the barracks.


 * With this rifle, the HECU Sniper is able to drain a player's health in as little as four to five hits.

Opposing Force

 * In Opposing Force, the M40A1 is first introduced by Senior Drill Instructor Barnes in the Sniper Range at Santego Military Base, during the training chapter.


 * In Black Mesa, it is found in the chapter Foxtrot Uniform. If not picked up there, it can be picked up from a dead male Black Ops in the chapter "The Package".


 * The M40A1 is a bolt-action rifle, resulting in slower firing speed, about the same of the Crossbow.


 * It has perfect accuracy, no matter what the player is doing when it is fired.

Tactics

 * The M40A1 is best used to kill enemies in one shot from long range. One should try to pick off strong targets, such as Shock Troopers, that would otherwise take a lot of ammo and time to kill at close range.


 * In Hard mode, some strong enemies that used to take one bodyshot before dying (such as Shock Troopers) now take two. However, headshots can still kill those targets in one hit.


 * There is little ammo for this weapon throughout the game, so targets should be picked up wisely.


 * If an enemy takes more than one shot from this weapon to be killed, one should simply take one shot at the enemy, then switch to the Desert Eagle or the M249 and finish it off. This preserves M40A1 ammo, which can be very helpful for later on.


 * In Deathmatch and easier difficulties one can use the M40A1 unscoped to kill single enemies just as well as the shotgun due to its perfect accuracy and high power.

Behind the scenes

 * In Half-Life, the Sniper Rifle is a brush using the "func_tank" entity. It is not affected by the console code "notarget".
 * Killing the HECU Sniper, consisting of a human shooting target using the "func_breakable" entity, makes both the rifle and the silhouette brushes disappear.
 * Its early viewmodel is featured in.

Trivia

 * When used by a Black Ops Male Assassin, the M40A1 is reloaded after each shot, and it does somehow only 15 points of damage per hit. This is solely for balance, as it would be very difficult and frustrating to navigate through the part without getting hit, as it would result in an instant kill.

List of appearances

 * Half-Life
 * Half-Life: Opposing Force