Originally Posted by WillyPete

Don't get me wrong and think I'm bashing troops here, but the avg troop knows shit about ballistics. They wouldn't know that a 5.56 tumbled after hitting leaves unless you told them. And then they wouldn't care as long as it was tumbling real fast toward the guy the shot at.

The typical troop wants a weapon that is light, shoots where he aims it and that he can operate in the dark.
It has to hold a decent amount of rounds, 30 min and work under all sorts of crappy conditions without him having to care too much for it. If a 5.56 don't kill it with one hit, why hell, he'll pour 15 more into the same area.

A hunter or sniper worries about a kill with one round. they have to, it's their job. A grunt works with buddies. They move with a lot of noise and their job is to hold strategic ground, fighting for it if they have to. when they shoot, it's for area effect too. The nature of this dictates that the bullets don't have to be wonderstuff, just reliable.