Okay so here are two descriptons lifted from Wikipedia...
"Particle beam weapon"A neutral particle beam weapon ionizes hydrogen gas by either stripping an electron off of each hydrogen atom, or by allowing each hydrogen atom to capture an extra electron. When hydrogen gains electrons it forms anions; when hydrogen atoms lose electrons they form cations. A particle beam weapon that accelerates anions uses a traveling wave type particle accelerator. In this kind of ion accelerator, the negative ions are released inside a cylindrical ion acceleration chamber. This chamber has an electrode with an alternating electric charge of up to 1,000,000,000 volts inside it.
These stages happen:
- While the charge on the electrode is positive, the ions are attracted to the negative charge on the electrode, and thus bunched around it.
- The alternating voltage switches the charge to negative on the accelerating electrode.
- The negative charge electrostatically repels the negative ions and accelerates them to near the velocity of light.
- The resulting high energy beam of anions passes through a chamber filled with low pressure gas.
- There, collisions with the gas strip the extra electrons from the anions, and thus make the particle beam neutral.
- The particle beam proceeds straight to its target, and damages it by running into it, and by disrupting the structure of the target with its kinetic energy.
"Directed-energy weapon"Particle beam weapons can use charged or neutral particles, and can be either endoatmospheric or exoatmospheric. Particle beams as beam weapons are theoretically possible, but practical weapons have not been demonstrated. Certain types of particle beams have the advantage of being self-focusing in the atmosphere.
Blooming is not limited to lasers, but is also a problem in particle beam weapons. Energy that would otherwise be focused on the target spreads out; the beam becomes less effective.
Thermal blooming occurs in both charged and neutral particle beams, and occurs when particles bump into one another under the effects of thermal vibration, or bump into air molecules.
Electrical blooming occurs only in charged particle beams, as ions of like charge repel one another.
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So, a blaster could be a neutral particle beam accelerator with high energy cost, lots of kinetic energy (impact and heat/radiation damage), but short atmospheric ranges.
And sorry for my ramblings... I'll stop now