I've got myself in some sort of firefight. It's dark, and I fire my weapon at the bad guy and nothing happens. I run away a little and hide. Then I discover that my gun fires a spray of tiny ball bearings that don't do much damage individually (when I tried before, it fired, but not enough in one burst to notice).

I charge back at the enemy, who is standing in the open firing at me, just about ten feet away. I'm laying down a continuous spray of the harmless BB's, which don't seem to hurt him much, but knock him back enough that he can't fire back.