Successor State + Carthage 'What If?' Question

[Aemilius Paulus]

Also, although that picture of the Roman with the assault rifle is awfully cool, why does he have a thin iron helmet, when he has modern firearms?

Its purely to look "cool". And you gotta admit, it does look cool. Without the armour, gladius and helmet, the coolness would diminish greatly. Not to mention, most nations still use iron (well steel, but whatever - close enough) helmets. A helmet will never stop a bullet, unless it is a ricochet or it has been flying for already a very long distance. even then the chances are rather slim. Helmets are made to stop shrapnel, and they are quite effective in this role, as well as exceedingly useful. Modern combat helmets were developed in WWI, where 50 or even more % of the casualties were a result of injuries in the head, almost always shrapnel. (I found this data in John Keegan's WWI - so I am not just making it up) That was of course due to the nature of warfare exemplified by trenches and perpetual heavy artillery bombardments. So helmets were practically invaluable to soldiers. Not only that, but headshots are pretty rare.

Oh, and the legionary's firearm is actually more akin to the German WWII Maschinengewehr 42 (MG-42) light machine gun:

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