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When was it decided that plasma gun's cooling fins glow brightly like a bottle of plasma as opposed to ceramic/metallic cooling fins?


*not mine, stolen from the 'net.

It looks fairly cool I guess but the idea of stealth troops, ot any troops for that matter having weapons glowing brightly is counterintuitive. Visible light policing and NDs are a problem with current tech.

Do plasma pistols just sit glowing in holsters?

Thing is... those aren't supposed to be cooling fins/vanes. They're supposed to be the magnetic containment/accelerator coils. Logically, if they're glowing white-hot, then it means you just rolled a 1 and the weapon is about to explode. They should really just be painted in a metallic colour. If you want a glowing OSL effect, the interior of the muzzle and the vents around the muzzle are the best place to do that.

Having said that, glowing containment coils do look cool. And Rule of Cool always wins in 40K.

If you can see the glow, you are probably going to be reduced to a pair of smoking boots in short order. 5/6th of the time at least.

Marines can do stealth, but they are also shock terror troops. They hit you so hard, so fast, and so brutally, your morale crumbles and you break, assuming you are still alive.

But as above, it looks cool.

 Duskweaver wrote:
Thing is... those aren't supposed to be cooling fins/vanes. They're supposed to be the magnetic containment/accelerator coils

eh, different sources say different things. There are pictures on the web with it labelled as cooling fins, and they do look like that IMHO. And the artwork, both 2d and miniature painting is giving conflicting info on it.

It is cool to have them glowing, but it is also incongruous.

Nevelon : not only Marines use plasma guns though.

True, but once the plasma gun starts shooting, the time for stealth is over. Regardless of army.

As for the glow giving away the wielder’s position, the blast of sun-hot fury it’s chucking downrange is probably doing that anyway.

I get your point. In an ideal world, you would not want that kind of iridescence coming off your wargear. But with plasma, I think those who issue it to their troops are willing to deal with that drawback for the firepower it brings. And it could be that plasma designs that put a damper on it are either impossible, impractical, more dangerous, or other trade offs deemed not worth it.

I totally see your point, and have no answer either. I always considered those the chamber storing the plasma bolt as it is "built" before launch. Course, I'm not mr. 40k fluff...
Rule of cool has been stated...and the 40k meta has never bothered with the military experience or common sense of our little planet.
For example:
You're thrown off by the glowing plasma coil, while 90+% of the individuals in the 40k universe wear brightly colored rainbow armor and carry swords. A topic brought up in other threads.

I get what you’re saying, but I think the general idea with all things 40k is less about making sense and more about making your models look cool. IMO doing anything extra such as OSL rather than just painting the area blue is fun and visually pleasing. I do like the way the person painted it in your example, it gives it more of a glowing core effect. I painted up a macro plasma incinerator for my redemption today and I think it looks awesome, but to each their own