So here goes, finally found a source, while going through Dark Heresy's stuff to add something new to a roleplay.
From the Inquisitor's Handbook, page 173:
"Indeed a human trying to fire such a weapon [Astartes Bolt weapon of some sort) would likely suffer recoil of such strength that it would rip their arm out of their sockets."
This doesn't really make much logical sense to me-- a bigger, more reinforced weapon should have LESS recoil, rather than more-- but there it is. My guess is that it also means that there's a superior charge in the shell as well, as Astartes boltgun shells are supposed to be rare and coveted for anyone who themselves are not Astartes.
edit: mostly posting this because it's a bit of a contentious issue.
Not sure about this, but it could be because the gun was designed for astartes they didn't bother to deal with the recoil caused by the the charge of the bolt shell, as they are basically bullet sized grenades.
Agreed. Not to mention the small initial charge would make negligible recoil, even for a normal human, somewhat like an RPG on auto, which isn't to bad from my experience. Must be including the rate of fire.
Kasrkai wrote:Agreed. Not to mention the small initial charge would make negligible recoil, even for a normal human, somewhat like an RPG on auto, which isn't to bad from my experience. Must be including the rate of fire.
There's a HUGE initial charge, not a small one. If it had a small initial charge you could block it by putting a hand up against the exit to the barrel. As it is, the weapon is very powerful at close range AND long range, so having a weak initial charge doesn't make sense.
And it isn't just a grenade. It's closer to a HEAT round with a secondary rocket propulsion. Penetrate THEN explode.
I think that's what he was saying, with the rocket propulsion you don't necessarily need a large force to get the bolt where it's going to go. But I do agree that by the very fact that they work at point blank range there must be a large initial charge.
Melissia wrote:
There's a HUGE initial charge, not a small one. If it had a small initial charge you could block it by putting a hand up against the exit to the barrel. As it is, the weapon is very powerful at close range AND long range, so having a weak initial charge doesn't make sense.
And it isn't just a grenade. It's closer to a HEAT round with a secondary rocket propulsion. Penetrate THEN explode.
Is it really secondary, though? The old "fluff" used to have boltgun rounds being kicked out of the barrel by a small charge and then being self-propelled - which would mean little or no recoil:
(2ed "wargear" booklet, p. 21)
"The bolt contains an armour piercing tip, an explosive, and a mass reactive detonator. It is shot from the barrel under low velocity, its own propellant igniting once the missile is clear of the barrel."
Melissia wrote:
There's a HUGE initial charge, not a small one. If it had a small initial charge you could block it by putting a hand up against the exit to the barrel. As it is, the weapon is very powerful at close range AND long range, so having a weak initial charge doesn't make sense.
And it isn't just a grenade. It's closer to a HEAT round with a secondary rocket propulsion. Penetrate THEN explode.
Is it really secondary, though?
Yes, because if it was such a weak charge it'd suck at close range, and it doesn't.
As far as I know, Bolters are a bit like mini RPGs. I asume they'd have a similar recoil, though with the armor Marines shouldn't realy feel it. Also have iin mind that Bolters are semi-auto (rapid fire) for a reason. If they didn't had a big recoild, why not make them automatic (assault)?
Kasrkai wrote:Agreed. Not to mention the small initial charge would make negligible recoil, even for a normal human, somewhat like an RPG on auto, which isn't to bad from my experience. Must be including the rate of fire.
There's a HUGE initial charge, not a small one. If it had a small initial charge you could block it by putting a hand up against the exit to the barrel. As it is, the weapon is very powerful at close range AND long range, so having a weak initial charge doesn't make sense.
And it isn't just a grenade. It's closer to a HEAT round with a secondary rocket propulsion. Penetrate THEN explode.
'
I remember specifically reading somewhere that you COULD stop a bolter shot just by blocking the barrel with your hand. The initial shot force was supposed to be that weak. It's supposed to accelerate after exiting the gun.
But then again, that was before GW made changed the fluff to let bolters release casings since apparently every single piece of art showed that.
I assume it's a double propulsion system now. Like an artillery shell initially (hence the super recoil) followed by the ignition of the rockets once the round leaves the gun.
A bolter, to my knowledge, is a gyrojet weapon, the round containing it's own propellant charge. This would leave next to no recoil due to the make up of a gurojet round ( basically a minature missile, complete with explosive warhead). Only thing in the design i can think of causing recoil could be a internal hammer system, but even then that would be minimal.
Also noticed in the latest movie, the weapon making a loud, sharp, bang when fired.... I dont see how thats possible imo.... Giving that it's 40k... It might not matter
Okay, I got something here! I've been doing research and aparently, the bolter family was based on the Gyrojet, a family of firearms that shot small rockets instead of actual bullets. Here you can learn some things about it and here you can see a man firing his Gyrojet handgun. Compare the handgun to the Bolter Pistol and add some power for the whole 41tst century technology thingie; now you have something.
The gyrojet weapons are incredibly ineffectual at short range, a problem that bolters do not have. The gyrojet weapons also don't leave shell casings, the bolters do. The gyrojet weapons don't have recoil either, but bolters have insane levels of recoil without compensators.
The thing is, it's not something that has an equivalent in modern tech yet, at least in small arms. There are other things which are roughly equivalent though...
terranarc wrote:I assume it's a double propulsion system now. Like an artillery shell initially (hence the super recoil) followed by the ignition of the rockets once the round leaves the gun.
That is exactly what it's like
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Belexar wrote:As far as I know, Bolters are a bit like mini RPGs. I asume they'd have a similar recoil, though with the armor Marines shouldn't realy feel it. Also have iin mind that Bolters are semi-auto (rapid fire) for a reason. If they didn't had a big recoild, why not make them automatic (assault)?
Rapid Fire is full auto.
Assault has other meanings than merely rate of fire.
I believe Melissia has proved time and time again (cause people bring it up time and time again) that bolters are not gyrojets.
That being said, it make sense that a Marine's bolter would have a large initial charge. Marines are meant to fight close ranged battles as they drop into sensistive locations for a surgical strike, they aren't meant to be front-line infantry. That being said, you'd expect them to have a weapon that'd be powerful at close range, hence the presence of a large initial charge to ensure the bolt has lethal velocity at any range.
IN addition to humans being smaller, and thus unable to hold a weapon designed for an 8 foot tall superhuman in powered armor, it makes sense that the non-Astartes bolter should have a smaller charge, and be smaller overall.
Hmmm... arent bolters an option for use in necromunda? They are more likely to jam, but not rip your arms off. I also remember that in the audiobook 'the Dark King', NightHaunter gives a bolter to a terrified prisoner, who then uses it to shoot the Primarch (hitting his armour). That prisoner dies of 'Primarch-fist-to-the-head', not recoil related dismemberment.
They still have the same caliber. But it's more likely that they actually merely use more recoil-reducing technology instead, because the difference between human and Astartes bolters is pretty negligible.
Both of which are more than enough to kill most targets in a single hit, what with the X (explosive) damage type having the absolute most deadly critical hits and the two weapons very easily getting high rolls due to re-rolled damage, but the Astartes one is given a slight advantage in damage (though shots from the civilian boltgun ca easily exceed the Astartes one regardless with a good roll). The Astartes Boltgun has ten percent more range and a little bit more ammunition in its magazine I believe (four shots) as well, although this only compares the civilian pattern boltgun, as I'm too lazy to be arsed with the rest of hte patterns.
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darkkt wrote:Hmmm... arent bolters an option for use in necromunda? They are more likely to jam, but not rip your arms off. I also remember that in the audiobook 'the Dark King', NightHaunter gives a bolter to a terrified prisoner, who then uses it to shoot the Primarch (hitting his armour). That prisoner dies of 'Primarch-fist-to-the-head', not recoil related dismemberment.
Fear gives great strength to people.
At any rate, the necromunda bolters are civilian pattern ones. Less effective than the Guard ones, which are less effective then the Sororitas and Astartes ones.
Recoil for a bolter is probably similar to trying to fire a Mk.19 or AGS-17 Auto Grenade Launcher without a tripod while standing. Wouldn't rip your arms out of your socket, but it'd knock you over. I've always envisioned Bolters just to be fancy auto grenade launcher rifles as it is.
Nobody cared abut my other post. That makes me sad.
That being said, in the manual you can read that Rapid Fire weapons are usually semi-automatic rifles. I know assault weapons aren't all automati rifles (there are the Kustom MEga Blastas and flamethrowers, among others), but since we're talking about rifles here, I assumed the assault rifles would be automatic.
Storm bolters are basically LMGs, and they're assault 2. Shootas are also essentially LMGs, which are assault 2. Shuriken Cannons are assault, but this is also to represent the agility and mobility of the Eldar.
Shotguns are also assault 2, though it depends on what kind... dark heresy shows us break-open, pump action, and the semi-automatic combat shotgun, and the full automatic vanaheim (a skitarii special).
Of course not, that's because nobody cares about gyrojet weapons except for people who like to mention them to wrongly claim that that's what bolt weapons are.
They are not gyrojet weapons. Gyrojet weapons are caseless, bolters are not (in fact, spent bolter shell casings are considered lucky charms). Gyrojet weapons are purely rocket propelled, bolter weapons are not (as they are able to penetrate armor and do maximum damage at close range-- remember they do not explode until after penetration, and the explosion itself wouldn't get through flak armor because flak armor is intended to protect specifically AGAINST explosions. But bolter shells penetrate and THEN explode, circumventing this strength. This is why flak armor works against Ork shootas, which are often explosive shells, but not against bolter shells.). Gyrojet weapons have very little recoil, bolter weapons have a lot, and need compensators for humans to use without injury (which is noted in both Dark Heresy AND Deathwatch, amongst other places).
Melissia wrote:They are not gyrojet weapons. Gyrojet weapons are caseless, bolters are not (in fact, spent bolter shell casings are considered lucky charms). Gyrojet weapons are purely rocket propelled, bolter weapons are not (as they are able to penetrate armor and do maximum damage at close range-- remember they do not explode until after penetration, and the explosion itself wouldn't get through flak armor because flak armor is intended to protect specifically AGAINST explosions. But bolter shells penetrate and THEN explode, circumventing this strength. This is why flak armor works against Ork shootas, which are often explosive shells, but not against bolter shells.). Gyrojet weapons have very little recoil, bolter weapons have a lot, and need compensators for humans to use without injury (which is noted in both Dark Heresy AND Deathwatch, amongst other places).
Of course they're gyrojets, they just have an initial charge to launch them because apparently gyrojets weren't pointlessly complex and inefficient enough for them already. I'm a little surprised they didn't come up with a justification to have mini-chainsaws on the bolts...
I think there's some flawed logic being expressed here.
Bolters should have minimal(or less-than-typical) recoil compared to conventional firearms, as has been pointed out above. The thing is, for practicality's sake, they should also be effective at close range.
The flawed logic comes in when one assumes that because premise 'A' has bolters being low-recoil, it cannot possibly be true while premise 'B'(bolters being effective at close-range), is also true, so premise 'A' must be thrown out.
It in a logical world, it would indeed be tricky to have bolters being low-recoil AND effective even at point-blank range but frankly, 40k writers, GW, and whoever can pretty much ignore logic, the laws of physics, etc. when it comes to fluff.
Okay, awkward thing here, that post I posted before I ould read your prevous post. Sorry.
So yeah, Boltguns might be based upon the Gyrojets, but they add their punch to the shot. Okay, how about this. The bolt gun does have recoil, but it shouldn't be enough to do any actual harm to a human. We've heard of unarmored humans shooting them wthout haivng their arm torn off, though it must still have quite the kick for even armored humans to feel it.
Here's an idea! How about we look at the official art? I know it's a bit stretched out, but the position of the Marine's arms at the moment of shootign should help us see about how much of a kick the gun has.
So because something has ONE similarity and is glaringly different in every other way, it's the same?
Ronin-Sage wrote:It in a logical world, it would indeed be tricky to have bolters being low-recoil AND effective even at point-blank range but frankly, 40k writers, GW, and whoever can pretty much ignore logic, the laws of physics, etc. when it comes to fluff.
Which basically amounts to "I don't like the idea of boltguns having lots of recoil so I'm just gonna say science fiction!, throw my hands up, and hope you accept it".
We have official recent sources saying it has high recoil.
It's like that grey knights bathing in the blood of Sisters to keep themselves pure thing. A lot of people don't like it, but it IS canon.
So because something has ONE similarity and is glaringly different in every other way, it's the same?
Ronin-Sage wrote:It in a logical world, it would indeed be tricky to have bolters being low-recoil AND effective even at point-blank range but frankly, 40k writers, GW, and whoever can pretty much ignore logic, the laws of physics, etc. when it comes to fluff.
Which basically amounts to "I don't like the idea of boltguns having lots of recoil so I'm just gonna say science fiction!, throw my hands up, and hope you accept it".
We have official recent sources saying it has high recoil.
It's like that grey knights bathing in the blood of Sisters to keep themselves pure thing. A lot of people don't like it, but it IS canon.
I don't see how this invalidates my point. Nothing in 40k needs to make sense, period, so trying to apply real-world laws to certain things which just don't make sense just doesn't work. I'm not arguing whether or not it's 'canon'(I have no opinion on that), but what I am saying is that high-recoil bolters makes no sense.
Okay, I'mma stop you right there. Have in mind that sometimes things have drawback because the manufacturers couldn't see how to take them out. Have you considered that Boltguns have recoil for the same reason all current firearms do?
Melissia wrote:Aside from pulling something out of thin air, why is that?
To me, them having little recoil makes absolutely no sense.
Are you asking why Bolters make no sense?
If so, the recoil on the weapon would make it hard for a human to shoot. While an Astartes could shoot one no problem, the weapons high recoil is impractical. If logic were applied in 40K, the Astartes would use a a high powered rifle with less recoil and greater armor penetration. Firing a bolter, if we go by the round most commonly referenced in lore, is like firing a Mk. 19 on full auto. While very pro-core and macho to the max, the common sense is a tad bit lacking.
Not sure if that is what you were talking about though...
Belexar wrote:Okay, I'mma stop you right there. Have in mind that sometimes things have drawback because the manufacturers couldn't see how to take them out. Have you considered that Boltguns have recoil for the same reason all current firearms do?
I don't think I had to add anything else to reply.
BeefCakeSoup wrote:If so, the recoil on the weapon would make it hard for a human to shoot. While an Astartes could shoot one no problem, the weapons high recoil is impractical.
Not really. Space Marines wear power armor and have ludicrous amounts of strength to begin with.
It's like complaining that a tank cannon has too much recoil for a human to wield. Well yeah. It's not really designed for a human to wield. It's designed for a TANK.
Keep in mind, this is only Astartes boltguns. Human boltguns are built for humans to wield. They are marginally less effective, but still very much overkill for anything that's T3 or equivalent (but quite useful against hordes of Orks as long as the ammo holds out).
What she said! Space marines are perfecty capable of shooting a gun with a high kick, with al the boosts their armor gives them. Also, not every single weapon in the SM arsenal has to be fawless. Everything has certain drawbacks. you can't expect a gun not to have recoil just becaue it would be better that way.
BeefCakeSoup wrote:If so, the recoil on the weapon would make it hard for a human to shoot. While an Astartes could shoot one no problem, the weapons high recoil is impractical.
Not really. Space Marines wear power armor and have ludicrous amounts of strength to begin with.
It's like complaining that a tank cannon has too much recoil for a human to wield. Well yeah. It's not really designed for a human to wield. It's designed for a TANK.
Keep in mind, this is only Astartes boltguns. Human boltguns are built for humans to wield. They are marginally less effective, but still very much overkill for anything that's T3 or equivalent (but quite useful against hordes of Orks as long as the ammo holds out).
Ok, I see what you are saying now.
As for my statement about the practicality of the Bolter...
In TT the weapon makes perfect sense to me, but in a real setting the weapon seems a terrible choice for a Super Human to use. If anything, a superior weapon would be a more powerful variant of a Lasgun. If Lascannons can fire stronger shots with great AP, a smaller version would feasibly fit a Space Marine just fine. Sort of like a Rail gun being scaled down to a rail rifle.
Maybe the reason for that is similar to the reason why Railguns can't be scaed down to Railrifles. They just can't be made that small if you want to actauly kill something. Bolters are a much more practical option in terms of mobility, even if it's inferior in power.
You mean hellguns? They're still not as explosively powerful as bolt weapons., and they consume much more energy than lasguns do.
Remember, the higher the power setting on a las weapon, the more exponentially higher its power requirements are. Guard lascannons fire once and then reload a new battery in. Even with a backpack power pack, Astartes only get six shots out of their lascannons.
Besides, the boltgun allows for a wide variety of special ammunition, which las weapons don't have.
Belexar wrote:Maybe the reason for that is similar to the reason why Railguns can't be scaed down to Railrifles. They just can't be made that small if you want to actauly kill something. Bolters are a much more practical option in terms of mobility, even if it's inferior in power.
Actually Rail Rifles are scaled down to rail rifles and they do work quite well. In TT a path finder team can be kitted out with them as heavy weapons that punch through power armor with a pretty strong shot. This is the small frame of a Tau though, an Astartes could most likely carry a heavier rifle with no problem. Using TT and Lore in tandem shows that a Bolter is certainly good at what it does, I am merely stating that a variant of a more practical weapon would be a more logical choice with real world stuff factored in like carrying extra ammo etc.
Yeah, that too. It's like comparing a SMG with a Carbine.
EDIT: Damnit, BCS beat me this time :(
Now, Rail Rifles have to be big for their magnetic field to give the proyectile the power to actuay do soe damage. If they made it the size of a oltgun, they would be worthless for anything but point blank, and even then a Bolter pistol would do better.
Belexar wrote:Maybe the reason for that is similar to the reason why Railguns can't be scaed down to Railrifles. They just can't be made that small if you want to actauly kill something. Bolters are a much more practical option in terms of mobility, even if it's inferior in power.
Actually Rail Rifles are scaled down to rail rifles and they do work quite well. In TT a path finder team can be kitted out with them as heavy weapons that punch through power armor with a pretty strong shot. This is the small frame of a Tau though, an Astartes could most likely carry a heavier rifle with no problem. Using TT and Lore in tandem shows that a Bolter is certainly good at what it does, I am merely stating that a variant of a more practical weapon would be a more logical choice with real world stuff factored in like carrying extra ammo etc.
It would, if Marines were front line soldiers, which they are not. Ammo expenditure is not an important consideration for a company of Marines, compared to a few regiments of Guard.
Belexar wrote:Maybe the reason for that is similar to the reason why Railguns can't be scaed down to Railrifles. They just can't be made that small if you want to actauly kill something. Bolters are a much more practical option in terms of mobility, even if it's inferior in power.
Actually Rail Rifles are scaled down to rail rifles and they do work quite well. In TT a path finder team can be kitted out with them as heavy weapons that punch through power armor with a pretty strong shot. This is the small frame of a Tau though, an Astartes could most likely carry a heavier rifle with no problem. Using TT and Lore in tandem shows that a Bolter is certainly good at what it does, I am merely stating that a variant of a more practical weapon would be a more logical choice with real world stuff factored in like carrying extra ammo etc.
It would, if Marines were front line soldiers, which they are not. Ammo expenditure is not an important consideration for a company of Marines, compared to a few regiments of Guard.
I see what you're what getting at. Yeah, in 40K the bolter is a great weapon given the capacity in which it is used. I was talking more about the use of real world logic and how it applied to a bolter. A bolter in 40K is great, in real world settings, not so much. It's bulky, has a terrible looking sight, the rounds would be flinging all over the place in windy enviroments, the mags look like spares would be a nightmare to keep handy etc.
As for the original question, a larger weapon would have less recoil if it was designed properly internally to deal with the recoil. Judging the bolter from purely an external view, I'd say it would have massive recoil simply due to it's somewhat compact size given the size of the round it is firing.
The problem is that the Bolter is not used in this world. It's used in the 40K unievrse. In the 41st century. By guys with power armors and a virtually unlimited reserve of ammo. My keyboard keeps skipping keys. It's annoying. Yes.
Yes, they have quite high recoil, they must do. As the shot is fired they are for all instants and purposes an automatic grenade launcher. The rounds are large and they are highly effective at point blank range, ergo the recoil is not negligible.
Then, after they're in flight and the recoil has already happened the rounds activate their jet and fly like an RPG. It's a two stage shot that makes it very effective at short range and long range too (but also stupidly complex and powerful compared to modern day weaponry).
The first gun has a lot of recoil, hence the stand. The second rpg, little recoil (watch the guy sway slightly as it goes off). But seeing as the rocket isn't activated untl mid-flight and the speed of the bolt starts to drop, there's no worry about it!
How there are casings flying everywhere I can't imagine.
It in a logical world, it would indeed be tricky to have bolters being low-recoil AND effective even at point-blank range but frankly, 40k writers, GW, and whoever can pretty much ignore logic, the laws of physics, etc. when it comes to fluff.
Like regularly ignoring the square/cube law in almost everything. Of course, it being science fiction, it's to be expected.
I have always imagine that they are making 2 types of bolter. For ordinary humans ( Guardsman, Commisars, SoB ) and a stronger ones for Astartes and Inquisitors.
Kasrkai wrote:Agreed. Not to mention the small initial charge would make negligible recoil, even for a normal human, somewhat like an RPG on auto, which isn't to bad from my experience. Must be including the rate of fire.
There's a HUGE initial charge, not a small one. If it had a small initial charge you could block it by putting a hand up against the exit to the barrel. As it is, the weapon is very powerful at close range AND long range, so having a weak initial charge doesn't make sense.
And it isn't just a grenade. It's closer to a HEAT round with a secondary rocket propulsion. Penetrate THEN explode.
The original gyrojet rocket carbine which the Bolter is based on could be stopped with a hand or even a sheet of thick paper across the barrel tip (by that point it had a very low velocity. But the Bolter is a two-stage projectile. A conventional charge in the shell launches it out at high speed whereupon a secondary solid stage projectile begins to burn, further speeding the mass-reactive shell.
Astartes Bolters are meant to be many times the size and caliber of the few human ones, with faster rates of fire. They're supposedly so big that they can barely be lifted.
I always assumed they worked and looked like Normal bullets, only the back end of the acctual bullet having a rocket strapped onto it, and like 7x bigger..
As for the differences between Humans and Astartes, going with a 3 round burst here, I thought Humans would pace the shots. Giving themselves a chance to recover between shots, But still killing the target. Marines on the other hand, would give a small rapid "pppphht" if you will, which (I picture it to be like the sound a A-10 Thunderbolt/Warthog makes), the combined shots would pulp a humans arm, and pulp the target.
I know DoW has its own sounds and animations for bolters, but this is what I picture my marines doing.
Internal Details 1- A solid-fuel rocket propellant base 2- An outer casing containing conventional charge 3- Gyrostabilizer 4- Mass-reactive fuse. Has a split-second timer to delay detonation upon impact until after the shot penetrates the target. 5- Hardened diamantine penetrating tip. This allows for the bolt to penetrate most armour before detonation. 6- Main Charge 7- Depleted deuterium core. This is a very dense material, adding weight and thus momentum to the round when in flight. This aids in the bolt's penetration of the victim.
Copied straight from 40k wiki. Just shows the internal workings of the shell for those who were interested.
Bolters are big weapons for human standars, but the bolt neutralises part of the recoil AFAIK.
Moreover, there are bolters in imperial guardsmen's squad, fired like any other gun. May it be that the extract you red was refered toa HEAVY bolter? If it was, I would agree.
Boltguns are supposed to be loud, large have a ridiculos amount of raw power becuse space marines are as much a threat physiclly as phycologicly so giving them lots of recoil makes sence.
The sad thing is that ultra-dense deuterium is theoretically possible... but it's something you get from fusion, a very complex process. Deuterium is just hydrogen with a neutron (most hydrogen atoms not having a neutron). Hydrogen, including Deuterium, is the least dense element in the periodic table in its natural form.
IronChaos wrote:Bolters are big weapons for human standars, but the bolt neutralises part of the recoil AFAIK.
Moreover, there are bolters in imperial guardsmen's squad, fired like any other gun. May it be that the extract you red was refered toa HEAVY bolter? If it was, I would agree.
No. It was for ASTARTES Boltguns.
As I noted several times in this thread, human boltguns have recoil compensators built into them, whereas Astartes boltguns don't.
Keep in mind, modern rifles also have a lot of recoil compensators built into them too, to the point where pretty much all video games are incredibly inaccurate about the recoil they have (I could fire those weapons with less recoil than the characters in those games suffer, and I'm not a trained soldier).
Belexar wrote:Maybe the reason for that is similar to the reason why Railguns can't be scaed down to Railrifles. They just can't be made that small if you want to actauly kill something. Bolters are a much more practical option in terms of mobility, even if it's inferior in power.
Actually Rail Rifles are scaled down to rail rifles and they do work quite well. In TT a path finder team can be kitted out with them as heavy weapons that punch through power armor with a pretty strong shot. This is the small frame of a Tau though, an Astartes could most likely carry a heavier rifle with no problem. Using TT and Lore in tandem shows that a Bolter is certainly good at what it does, I am merely stating that a variant of a more practical weapon would be a more logical choice with real world stuff factored in like carrying extra ammo etc.
It would, if Marines were front line soldiers, which they are not. Ammo expenditure is not an important consideration for a company of Marines, compared to a few regiments of Guard.
Don't you mean "they are front line soldiers" and then something about railguns being terrible weapons for close up, being sniper weapons that no doubt have extremely small ammo reserves due to the massive amount of power involved, if nothing else?
Bolters are ridiculously complex and inefficient weapons, in addition to being a logistical nightmare. Space Marines are shock troops that should theoretically only be deployed to break a specific strongpoint, allowing for conventional forces to pour through and carry the day, so they don't need something that can be resupplied by any available electrical generator, fire, or sunny spot. Of course, in practice they're nations unto themselves, who work independent of actual military forces, and engage in prolonged operations in which they spend many times the ammo they could physically carry...
We're not discussing the efectivenes of Boltguns. I will make a new thread for that. What we were discusing is the recoil of the Bolter. It has. It's big. Space Marines can handle it because of their armor. Look at the art, read the novels, read the codex, use common sense. The truth is out there. In there. Where I said it was.
PD: Also, we already established the paralels with the Gyrojet. The Bolter is based on it, but the main difference is that the Bolter adds its own punch to the thing and it's actually an effective weapon.
I didn't say anything about effectiveness, only efficiency. I also forgot to quote what I was responding to there, and sort of trailed off without ever getting to the point I was intending to make...
Have in mind that there are many kinds of Marines. Also, as promised, I made a thread for discussion about the Functionality, effectiveness and eficiency of the Bolter. Feel free to drop by.
Brother Coa wrote:I have always imagine that they are making 2 types of bolter. For ordinary humans ( Guardsman, Commisars, SoB ) and a stronger ones for Astartes and Inquisitors.
Found this over at B&C, and I thought it was relevant. It's a quote in a post by Aaron Dembski-Bowden, Black Library author:
And it goes the other way, too - in a subjective, loose license like 40K, where boltguns really can canonically work in 700 different ways and the IP overlords like it that way - you have people decrying quite well-written novels as terrible, purely because it didn't match their view of canon, or a previous canon source they liked.
IE, a fake bolter, a cheap weapon which imitates boltguns but isn't as good.
Seaward wrote:Found this over at B&C, and I thought it was relevant. It's a quote in a post by Aaron Dembski-Bowden, Black Library author:
And it goes the other way, too - in a subjective, loose license like 40K, where boltguns really can canonically work in 700 different ways and the IP overlords like it that way - you have people decrying quite well-written novels as terrible, purely because it didn't match their view of canon, or a previous canon source they liked.
Emphasis mine.
Nonsense. A lot of those "well-written novels" aren't.
IE, a fake bolter, a cheap weapon which imitates boltguns but isn't as good.
Seaward wrote:Found this over at B&C, and I thought it was relevant. It's a quote in a post by Aaron Dembski-Bowden, Black Library author:
And it goes the other way, too - in a subjective, loose license like 40K, where boltguns really can canonically work in 700 different ways and the IP overlords like it that way - you have people decrying quite well-written novels as terrible, purely because it didn't match their view of canon, or a previous canon source they liked.
Emphasis mine.
Nonsense. A lot of those "well-written novels" aren't.
Which has what to do with the point he was making about GW preferring 40K to be a world where boltguns really can canonically work in 700 different ways?
Rule of cool means something completely different for me than you.
"I don't care because I'm lazy and I don't want to decide on something" is not cool. Don't care if they violate the laws of physics or not, but laziness that leads to inconsistency is just bad writing.
Melissia wrote:Rule of cool means something completely different for me than you.
"I don't care because I'm lazy and I don't want to decide on something" is not cool. Don't care if they violate the laws of physics or not, but laziness that leads to inconsistency is just bad writing.
Whats lazy? I dont understand what your getting at
Melissia wrote:The sad thing is that ultra-dense deuterium is theoretically possible... but it's something you get from fusion, a very complex process. Deuterium is just hydrogen with a neutron (most hydrogen atoms not having a neutron). Hydrogen, including Deuterium, is the least dense element in the periodic table in its natural form.
IronChaos wrote:Bolters are big weapons for human standars, but the bolt neutralises part of the recoil AFAIK.
Moreover, there are bolters in imperial guardsmen's squad, fired like any other gun. May it be that the extract you red was refered toa HEAVY bolter? If it was, I would agree.
No. It was for ASTARTES Boltguns.
As I noted several times in this thread, human boltguns have recoil compensators built into them, whereas Astartes boltguns don't.
Keep in mind, modern rifles also have a lot of recoil compensators built into them too, to the point where pretty much all video games are incredibly inaccurate about the recoil they have (I could fire those weapons with less recoil than the characters in those games suffer, and I'm not a trained soldier).
So maybe they use the nuclear ultra-dense deuterium?
Well, I'm confused - since when did the bolter stop being a low-recoil weapon using 2-stage ammunition? That's how it's been since way back when (the original Space Marine novel for instance), and is still described as such in the Lexicanum.
The bolter has always been a low recoil weapon firing rocket-propelled large calibre projectiles. The arguement in my mind has always been whether caseless ammunition is used, as is the way it used to be described but not necessarily depicted in artwork.
It does not fire caseless ammunition. Spent bolter casings are used as good luck charms by Imperial citizenry, especially if the casing came from the weapon carried by a Space Marine, the Emperor's own Angels of Death.
The 2-stage propellant process is what gives it its incredible recoil. A single-stage rocket propulsion system would make it nearly recoil-less, but this is not the case.
The boltround "explodes", in the manner of a standard, real-world bullet, its stage 1 powder charge, forcing the round down the barrel and out of the muzzle at lethal velocity.
When it reaches a certain distance/time-since-stage-1-ignition, its secondary stage ignites, which is its rocket-booster, thus propelling the round even further along a flat trajectory, improving long-range accuracy and penetration.
This allows the bolter to maintain lethality in both short- and long-range battles, as a standard gyrojet round has non-lethal velocity at point-blank and short ranges, until the round has had enough time and travel distance to achieve lethality.
farmersboy wrote:Well, I'm confused - since when did the bolter stop being a low-recoil weapon using 2-stage ammunition? That's how it's been since way back when (the original Space Marine novel for instance), and is still described as such in the Lexicanum.
The bolter has always been a low recoil weapon firing rocket-propelled large calibre projectiles. The arguement in my mind has always been whether caseless ammunition is used, as is the way it used to be described but not necessarily depicted in artwork.
Yeah, but statements from GW authors do. As I said before, I'll take their assertions over your personal interpretation of fluff.
Interpretation?
How exactly do you interpret this:
"Indeed a human trying to fire such a weapon would likely suffer recoil of such strength that it would rip their arm out of their sockets."
To mean that it has very low recoil?
I take it to mean that's how that particular one works. Fortunately, as has been made clear, GW doesn't really give a gak and wants to keep as many canon methods of technology function as open as possible.
Which is good, because the vast majority of their technology makes no sense.
Seaward wrote:I take it to mean that's how that particular one works.
Yes, if "that particular one" means "all Astartes bolt weapons". It is a blanket statement for the entire range of Astartes bolt weapons, not just one pattern.
GW has said this rather consistently in recent years, and this is not the only source that supports it. Deathwatch also supports it with a similar statement.
Seaward wrote:Which is good, because the vast majority of their technology makes no sense.
THe vast majority of Imperial technology makes perfect sense.
Melissia wrote:Boltguns are not caseless, nor do they have no recoil. Deal with it.
No thanks. As I've said a couple times now, I'll take the word of someone who's paid to write for the company over the word of a scarily-committed fan.
Melissia wrote:Boltguns are not caseless, nor do they have no recoil. Deal with it.
No thanks. As I've said a couple times now, I'll take the word of someone who's paid to write for the company over the word of a scarily-committed fan.
Your complete and utter lack of ability to argue your point is amusing, but this is not my words, it's GW's.
Belexar wrote:Laws of physics say they have recoil.
Ah, yes, "physics." The natural science that involves the study of matter and its motion through spacetime, as well as all related concepts, including energy and force. We have dismissed this field of study as having anything to do with giant walking robots, interstellar travel and communication, and things like nova cannons.
GW makes gak up as they go along, and often change their minds later. Fluff is fluid and contradictory.
iproxtaco wrote:Real world physics indeed, does not apply. GW certified cannon does however. They have recoil. As Melissia said, deal with it.
Nah. As Melissia himself said in another thread, not all fluff should be considered equal. GW will slap canon-approved on anything. We need only point to C.S. Goto to prove that. Not to mention GW's long history of retconning, changing mechanics, etc.
And this is one such retcon. The Deathwatch and Dark Heresy corebooks and supplements are rather well written in the fluff, even if they have some issues with skill/talent trees for their various classes.
That's pathetic, just a way for people to explain away their lack of counter argument. Everything that GW approves, in whatever form, is cannon until it's contradicted by a more recent source or officially declared not cannon. Goto, is a moron, his work is horrible, but until it's officially "taken back" by BL or GW, anything inside the book that doesn't fall under the previous two catagories is cannon, although the community as a whole has wisely decided to resign everything he writes to a non-cannon state.
iproxtaco wrote:That's pathetic, just a way for people to explain away their lack of counter argument. Everything that GW approves, in whatever form, is cannon until it's contradicted by a more recent source or officially declared not cannon. Goto, is a moron, his work is horrible, but until it's officially "taken back" by BL or GW, anything inside the book that doesn't fall under the previous two catagories is cannon, although the community as a whole has wisely decided to resign everything he writes to a non-cannon state.
Actually, my counter-argument is based pretty simply on the irrationality of not putting a stock on a weapon that has considerable recoil, but I didn't want to go down that road, as we'd have more people coming out of the woodwork than we've already had to claim they know every last thing about firearms.
GW fluff contradicts itself, all the time. The thing everyone seems to be missing, as helpfully pointed out with a quote from a BL author earlier in the thread, is that GW doesn't care about the nitty-gritty specifics like whether or not a bolter has recoil. They're perfectly fine with it having recoil in one place and not in another. They're perfectly fine with calling it caseless and then using artwork that shows shells everywhere just 'cause it looks badass. In short? They're not nearly as obsessed.
iproxtaco wrote:That's pathetic, just a way for people to explain away their lack of counter argument. Everything that GW approves, in whatever form, is cannon until it's contradicted by a more recent source or officially declared not cannon. Goto, is a moron, his work is horrible, but until it's officially "taken back" by BL or GW, anything inside the book that doesn't fall under the previous two catagories is cannon, although the community as a whole has wisely decided to resign everything he writes to a non-cannon state.
Actually, my counter-argument is based pretty simply on the irrationality of not putting a stock on a weapon that has considerable recoil, but I didn't want to go down that road, as we'd have more people coming out of the woodwork than we've already had to claim they know every last thing about firearms.
Marines don't have a stock on it because to them the recoil is negligible even if to us it is not. Human boltguns are designed to imitate Astartes boltguns, even if it isn't ideal for humans.
As for the rest of text, even if that WAS a BL author's quote and not something you just made up, I don't really give a flying rat's left buttcheek. You know that thing called rule of cool? Lazy, apathetic writing is uncool. That author, if in fact it was an author, can shove it right up his arse.
Ehm, just because a weapon has recoil doesn't mean it will automatically have a stock.
The 9mm Uzi is stockless (by default) and, yet, has recoil like a mother-fether. The MAC-10 is in the same boat. This is not meant to state that I know everything about firearms... but I know enough to state that the inclusion of a stock is not an automatic consideration in a weapon's production.
The only way a bolter could be recoilless is if it was firing from an open breach with one-stage, self-propelled rounds, with all of the discharge exhaust being vented from the rear/rear sides of the weapon as the round traveled down the barrel. Without such venting... well, there must be some recoil, as the round pushes off against the weapon itself in order to travel down-range, with as much force pushing backwards as it carries going forwards. This is true of either "standard" ammunition (using an explosive charge to achieve lethal velocity before reaching the muzzle) or a gyrojet round with the same concern, which is "lethal at point-blank range", which this class of weapons has demonstrated being.
iproxtaco wrote:So, real world physics doesn't apply, except when it backs up your argument. Amazing. You now have no argument at all.
Actually, real-world physics would support it having recoil, not the reverse. Suggesting that the absence of the most common recoil compensator indicates it lacks recoil in the first place isn't physics, it's a little thing called deductive logic.
Psienesis wrote:Ehm, just because a weapon has recoil doesn't mean it will automatically have a stock.
The 9mm Uzi is stockless (by default) and, yet, has recoil like a mother-fether. The MAC-10 is in the same boat. This is not meant to state that I know everything about firearms... but I know enough to state that the inclusion of a stock is not an automatic consideration in a weapon's production.
Actually, the Uzi isn't stockless. Every example of the M-10 I've seen has a collapsing stock as well, but it's irrelevant; the recoil's pretty bad on it, and it's not meant to fulfill anywhere near the same role as the bolter. It's a suppression weapon. Fully automatic fire is impossible to control on damn near any gun just firing it from the hip, as Marines are so wont to do.
The only way a bolter could be recoilless is if it was firing from an open breach with one-stage, self-propelled rounds, with all of the discharge exhaust being vented from the rear/rear sides of the weapon as the round traveled down the barrel. Without such venting... well, there must be some recoil, as the round pushes off against the weapon itself in order to travel down-range, with as much force pushing backwards as it carries going forwards. This is true of either "standard" ammunition (using an explosive charge to achieve lethal velocity before reaching the muzzle) or a gyrojet round with the same concern, which is "lethal at point-blank range", which this class of weapons has demonstrated being.
That's all perfectly true, from a physics standpoint. But, again...nova cannons, void shields...
Seaward wrote:Actually, real-world physics would support it having recoil, not the reverse. Suggesting that the absence of the most common recoil compensator indicates it lacks recoil in the first place isn't physics, it's a little thing called deductive logic.
iproxtaco wrote:So, real world physics doesn't apply, except when it backs up your argument. Amazing. You now have no argument at all.
Actually, real-world physics would support it having recoil, not the reverse. Suggesting that the absence of the most common recoil compensator indicates it lacks recoil in the first place isn't physics, it's a little thing called deductive logic.
Apparently not, according to you it needs a stock to reduce its huge recoil, as it doesn't need one, it therefore has no recoil? Other than this, I can't see that you have an argument that isn't the application of real-world Physics or Logic, which we've already determined don't apply to 40k, as GW writers laugh in the face of physics and logic.
Seaward wrote:Actually, real-world physics would support it having recoil, not the reverse. Suggesting that the absence of the most common recoil compensator indicates it lacks recoil in the first place isn't physics, it's a little thing called deductive logic.
I would not call that logic.
I would call that a fallacy.
I couldn't ask for better confirmation that I'm on the right track.
The fact that you're using logical fallacies to support your claim is not, itself, proof that your claim is false. It's just proof that you are not using proper logic.
Melissia wrote:The fact that you're using logical fallacies to support your claim is not, itself, proof that your claim is false. It's just proof that you are not using proper logic.
I've seen you attempt to employ logic before. Thus, having you accuse me of doin' it wrong makes me cheerfully confident that I'm not.
Seaward wrote:Actually, the Uzi isn't stockless. Every example of the M-10 I've seen has a collapsing stock as well
The collapsing stock on the MAC-10 is an after-market add-on, or a variant model produced under license. Interestingly enough, you're right about the Uzi, I was thinking of the Hafdasa C-4, which came in both stocked (wooden or wire) and stockless variants.
If you check out the new ultra marines movie it has a scene of the bolter firing in slow motion and showing the bolt travel as it leaves the barrel it also has the heavy bolter firing aswell. It shows the SM's somewhat bracing while aiming and firing them. They are still getting jerked as they fire full auto and semi auto. If a space marine gets jolted by a bolt firing then that sucker has some recoil. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VTkYoAHXuNg 5:55 into the clip big fire fight and bolter shot in slow motion to see it propulsion system which is possible to create with current tech.
I would also postulate that a Space Marine's superhuman physique likely grants him the ability to control recoil on his weapon. It also bears notice that Marines are shock troopers, and thus bolters will not be intended for long range rifle fire. They'll be used at much closer ranges than that...perhaps it is enough that the addition of a stock was deemed superfluous for the Astartes.
In the second ed rulebook it had the different variant pictures of bolter the heresy patterns had stocks but here is the end game for this debate go go wiki http://warhammer40k.wikia.com/wiki/Bolter
Melissia wrote:
As for the rest of text, even if that WAS a BL author's quote and not something you just made up, I don't really give a flying rat's left buttcheek. You know that thing called rule of cool? Lazy, apathetic writing is uncool. That author, if in fact it was an author, can shove it right up his arse.
Well i would say they do have alot of recoil, in the gaunt's Ghosts novels bragg uses a heavy bolter that was originally pintle mounted and Gaunt mentions how firstly he has never seen any body use on with out power armour and secondly that he struggles with the recoil, also Varl uses a CSM bolter and logs it into an augmatic shoulder and it nearly flattens him any way, so i would say that from this GW approved fluff that yes bolters heavy bolters bolt pistols and every other bolt weapon does in fact have insane recoil, you just need to be a hard man to use one
The real problem here is that different authors have had different takes on the bolter.
The Wiki article noted above contradicts itself by desribing how the initial charge that fires the bolt round is very small, then goes on to say it has powerful recoil - well, is the first or the second?
The Lexicanum entry is, I believe, closest to what all the original fluff described, and to which future authors should have made the effort to stick to -
"The bolter has two advantages over a conventional firearm. Firstly, the amount of propellant required for the first stage is relatively small. This means that with the standard .75 caliber (about 20mm), the recoil is negligible when compared to a conventional projectile weapon of equivalent caliber. Secondly, recoil is further reduced by the smoothbore design of the bolter. Because spin is imparted by the rocket engine after the bolt exits the barrel, there is no need for rifling. The counter to this, however, comes from the fact that bolts are less powerful at closer ranges, as they need time to accelerate to top speed."
I think Ian Watson described the sound of a bolt gun firing the best, from the pages of Harlequin -
"Jaq sniffed the sharp nitric aftermath of propellant which had ignited after each bolf flew from the muzzle.
"Noisy," said Meh'lindi.
Yes, noisy. Yet with hardly any recoil. RAAARK, the gun would utter with each squeeze of the trigger.It hardly bucked at all in one's hand. With a plosive pop it would ejaculate a bolt. With a flaring swish, that bolt would ignite and accelerate away. Then there would come the thud of impact, followed by the blast of detonation.
RAARK-pop-SWOOSH-thud-CRUMP: thet was the lingo of a bolt gun."
Considering the fact that the bolter's caliber is roughly the same size as a slug round fired from a shotgun, the recoil they have it having in fluff is ridiculous. Yes shotguns kick more than a lot of rifles, but its still manageable.
So, unless they are no longer 2 stage, which is what I thought, fires the round out, ejecting the casing, cycling another round, while the first round leaves the barrel and has the motor ignite. Which would cause less recoil. They have have made it so the round and rocket fire off at the same time, meaning the receiver and bolt would need to be sturdier to withstand the back blast which would make the recoil high.
Really they just wanted their supermen to fire guns they only really wanted the supermen to have.
I'd like to make a second point that bolters in the real world wouldnt have to be as large as a bolter in Warhammer 40k.
farmersboy wrote:"Jaq sniffed the sharp nitric aftermath of propellant which had ignited after each bolf flew from the muzzle.
"Noisy," said Meh'lindi.
Yes, noisy. Yet with hardly any recoil. RAAARK, the gun would utter with each squeeze of the trigger.It hardly bucked at all in one's hand. With a plosive pop it would ejaculate a bolt. With a flaring swish, that bolt would ignite and accelerate away. Then there would come the thud of impact, followed by the blast of detonation.
RAARK-pop-SWOOSH-thud-CRUMP: thet was the lingo of a bolt gun."
God, is this representative of all BL writing? It's terrible!
If it makes anyone feel any better...
Spoiler:
It won't.
...I tend to model stocks onto boltguns that I give to my Guard officers who are firing, and having them in braced, kneeling positions. There's a lot of talk about gun-physics on this thread that is innacurate, though. I'll let you figure out which it is by yourselves.
Guess I'm a little late, but I'll throw in my two prayer beads here.
As much as I respect Melissia from all I've read in the past months before registering, I have to disagree about any difference between "civilian" boltguns and Astartes models as well as the canonicity of the RPG books. Whilst much in them is very well written, they remain a licensed product subject to the personal interpretation of their authors, and I have heard enough statements from Gav Thorpe, George Mann and other GW or ex-GW people that I can say I only deem GW studio material a "hard" source. I won't let an RPG book invalidate half the background of a proper Codex just because the P&P designers thought their gimped SoB had to be balanced in relation to revolver-wielding gangers and shockmaul-armed clerics instead of fighting alongside their overpowered Astartes who got their own book with different rules.
The RPG's invention of two bolter classes does not even hold up to its own assertion: A trained warrior who is perfectly able to operate a heavy bolter - a weapon with a 25% larger caliber and twice the weight/size of a Space Marine boltgun - is completely overwhelmed by the massive size and recoil of a cal 0.75 Astartes bolt pistol? Nope, sorry, don't buy it. Just like I don't buy that Space Marine flamethrowers are magically much hotter and thus more damaging than SoB ones, who pretty much have the monopoly on Cleansing Fire™ in the setting.
It may also be worth pointing out that the original designers of the P&P (Black Library) rated Astartes boltgun damage in the P&P at 2d10+0, which is pretty much the same as their "civilian" boltgun's 1d10+5. Astartes weapons and armour received a considerable power boost only as they got their own system, which is only superficially compatible with the existing ones. And said boost feels primarily necessitated by the broken Unnatural stats which enable a Marine character to throw a rock that would do as much damage as an "old" bolter, or that make a Marine invulnerable towards small arms fire.
The notion that boltguns are not gyrojets is a correct one, though. Bolt weapons are, in truth, hybrids between gyrojets and normal projectile weapons such as the caliber 0.729 fully-automatic AA-12, which (when used with Frag-12 explosive bolts) is probably the closest you could get to a bolter these days.
The AA-12 comes with a remarkable recoil compensation system that reduces its kick considerably, even allowing muscular people to fire them single-handedly, or dual-wielding them: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WOoUVeyaY_8#t=02m50s
Given that the far future of the 41st millennium may well feature even better recoil compensation, it does not strike me as that far-fetched that the recoil of boltguns is much lower than many people may assume. In the end, the kinetic energy only has to suffice to push the projectile out of the barrel and propel it to a speed where it is capable of hurting something that finds its unlucky frame in front of the business end of this gun. This kinetic energy may well be stronger than from the AA-12, but I would never suggest that it is too much for a normal human to handle, even less a human wearing power armour (note that Marine Scouts also use boltguns, and those do not wear power armour).
And that's why the fluff made no difference between boltgun and boltgun for the 20 years before this RPG came out. Even GW's Inquisitor RPG gave everyone the same guns.
Of course, there's also the theory of the happy medium, which I like best (because some recoil does have style):
"The boltgun is most commonly recognised as the standard weapon of the Adeptus Astartes and, though it is not unknown for certain high-ranking officers to bear such advanced and powerful weaponry, it is incredibly rare. Bolters are more effective weapons than the standard pattern lasguns and are able to punch through most forms of armour with little or no effort. They are, however, much more complex and are generally only ever carried by stocky individuals of great strength, given that they are incredibly heavy and generate enormous recoil when they fire what is essentially a miniature missile.
A bolter can fire a single shot, a four-round burst or fully automatic fire, though without bionic augmentation it is not recommended that anyone other than one of the Space Marines fires on anything other than the single shot setting." - from the Imperial Munitorum Manual
Most of everything we consider "canon" is novels published by the Black Library, or the background information provided in the FFGRPG line. All of this is subject to artistic license by its creators, and may not jive 100% with the WH40K table-top game Codices, which may be considered the *only* source of pure-canon information.
Unfortunately, the various codices only tell a very, very small part of the 40k story. If we assume that the RPG is "fluff only", then all of the Black Library novels, which provide the *most* information about the 40K universe background and story, are also "fluff only".
This is made even more complicated in that the "canon" of the codices has changed with every new edition, to the point that very little has any solid and true continuity between one edition and the next.
So this, then, leaves us at the following: either all the "fluff" (novels, RPGs, etc) is considered "canon", until superseded by a Codex, or the only true "canon" is what is in the Codices, which removes about 90% of the background details of WH40K entirely, and when a Codex doesn't mention a topic specifically to provide a "ruling"... then it's an "anything goes" situation, and one fan's view has as much weight as any other on that particular subject, as the Codex offers no stance whatsoever.
I absolutely agree that this is not a very good situation - yet things simply stand as they do. If you do open Pandora's Box and count every single novel as canon, then you're left with backflipping Terminator-Sergeants carrying Cyclone launchers on their back, Sisters of Battle playing cards and sleeping around out of boredom, and of course Goto's multilasers. And that's not to mention the average height of a Space Marine jumping between 7 and 9 feet depending solely on author (and I'm pretty sure I've even seen 11 feet once) ... or the very issue of bolter recoil that has sparked this thread. In short: half of 40k gets rewritten every month just because of some novel. Personally, that's way too fluid for me. I value consistency in a setting.
That's not to say that I don't care what some novels write at all - there are lots of beautiful books which have truly enriched the setting with their descriptions and ideas, and much of it has found their way into my own roleplaying and army background. Yet whenever there's a contradiction, I will stick to what GW says. Because only GW knows where itself is going, and because not everyone has the right to rewrite the setting based on his personal preferences just because he managed to get a license to write something for the Black Library and because GW's editing process is rather sloppy.
In short: I do it much like GW themselves. Gav Thorpe said that the studio pretty much picks stuff they like and deem fitting from the novels to incorporate into their own books whilst simply ignoring the rest.
Here is what I think. An Asartes-pattern boltgun fires a .75 caliber (calibre) round. Because the cartridge fired is a combination of a normal one and a gyrojet one, it should have a good, if not great, kick to it. The Space Marines must be able to handle it if they can handle a LMG version that fires 1.00 caliber rounds. Both WILL have recoil.
There's a lot of talk about gyrojets here. I really just can't get past why, in the 41st millennium, when mankind is faced with extinction from a myriad of different alien races, that they would bring back a dead technology that was rejected by all of the world's armed forces 40,000 years prior.
I'm also not positive about why a designer or manufacturer would spend time making a weapon more complicated in order to reduce recoil when it will be wielded by an eight foot tall superhuman wearing powered armor that will be as affected by the recoil of the weapon as he would be a newborn baby punching him in the shin.
The nonspecific and shifting nature of Warhammer canon makes this conversation mute, I'm sure a book will get published next year that has microscopic gremlins piloting bolter rounds to their intended target and ejecting before the round detonates. There's just too many people that have artistic license over the material to have any one person explain this conclusively and without any dispute.
I'm going to stay completely clear of this forum, reading this thread gave me a headache.
scotchwiskey wrote:There's a lot of talk about gyrojets here. I really just can't get past why, in the 41st millennium, when mankind is faced with extinction from a myriad of different alien races, that they would bring back a dead technology that was rejected by all of the world's armed forces 40,000 years prior.
I'm also not positive about why a designer or manufacturer would spend time making a weapon more complicated in order to reduce recoil when it will be wielded by an eight foot tall superhuman wearing powered armor that will be as affected by the recoil of the weapon as he would be a newborn baby punching him in the shin.
The nonspecific and shifting nature of Warhammer canon makes this conversation mute, I'm sure a book will get published next year that has microscopic gremlins piloting bolter rounds to their intended target and ejecting before the round detonates. There's just too many people that have artistic license over the material to have any one person explain this conclusively and without any dispute.
I'm going to stay completely clear of this forum, reading this thread gave me a headache.
I don't know why either, as they are not gyrojets.
forruner_mercy wrote:I don't know why either, as they are not gyrojets.
Also, the majority of all effective modern recoilless weapons exhaust gases to the rear of the weapon instead of out of the muzzle, reducing recoil. I've never seen a bolter depicted with a rear exhaust like that, which would make it impractical and dangerous to fire in close combat anyway because your squad mates would get a face full of hell every time you shot at something. As people have already stated many times in this thread, space marines are supposed to be shock troops that advance on and engage enemies in close combat, usually depicted surrounded, firing point-blank into enemies with his buddies grouped up around him. It makes zero sense for a bolter to be a recoilless weapon, because the properties of those weapons make it something you would not want to have for that purpose. I really don't think that the guys who write much 40K fiction research much, they just write down what sounds cool.
While I would love GW to tighten up their science in their science fiction, in reality 40k is space FANTASY not science fiction, and as such descriptions on how things work is pretty pointless because fantasy doesnt really care about that.
As evidenced by the very common rewrites to things like the bolter, which makes answering the question about recoil pointless as 3 sources provide 3 correct yet different answers.
scotchwiskey wrote:I really just can't get past why, in the 41st millennium, when mankind is faced with extinction from a myriad of different alien races, that they would bring back a dead technology that was rejected by all of the world's armed forces 40,000 years prior.
Probably because the idea itself is sound, 40k Earth isn't necessarily today's Real Life Earth, and because boltguns are less gyrojets but more RPGs. People just use the gyrojet term because despite being less correct it's easier to associate that one with a pistol/rifle, whereas RPGs make most people think of some huge tube.
scotchwiskey wrote:I'm also not positive about why a designer or manufacturer would spend time making a weapon more complicated in order to reduce recoil when it will be wielded by an eight foot tall superhuman wearing powered armor that will be as affected by the recoil of the weapon as he would be a newborn baby punching him in the shin.
All of this has, in my opinion, really nothing to do with recoil. The rocket motor of a bolt simply makes the projectile fly further, more accurate, and at higher speed, thus increasing penetration.
Given that a boltgun has a two-stage firing mechanism, and the first stage employs the most basic mechanisms of a conventional firearm, the rocket motor does not play any role in terms of lessening recoil. On the other hand, a bolt is a smaller projectile and (for the first stage) requires less kinetic energy than what existing weapons such as the KS-23 already use, so I don't see why a bolter would have any more recoil. Which in turn explains why bolters can be used by non-Astartes without problem - though frail individuals will obviously still have issues with accuracy, just like they'd have firing a KS-23. Hence me believing that the Munitorum Manual got it perfectly right.
As far as any different depictions go, GW has actually been pretty consistent here. It's just the writers working on licensed products (novels, RPGs) that occasionally slip up and contradict the source material.
scotchwiskey wrote:Also, the majority of all effective modern recoilless weapons exhaust gases to the rear of the weapon instead of out of the muzzle, reducing recoil.
Not that I'm saying they are completely recoilless. I do believe, however, that they have a degree of recoil compensation - like many modern firearms do. Mere theory, though. May just as well be pattern-specific, just like all those other gadgets (palm-print sensor, autosense links, etc) on the above schematic. Depending on what exactly the buyer ordered, his influence with the AdMech, and how much he's willing to spend on it.
And yeah, I agree about the suspected "rule of cool". I still appreciate that the guys at GW made an effort to make it sound somewhat believable. Most of the time, anyways.
Is that diagram from an earlier rulebook or something? I remember seeing it before, but I'm just getting back into the game after a dozen or so years away. At any rate, that's an interesting diagram that clears up a little bit of my issues with the fiction of the bolter.
I guess what I'm trying to get across in my posts is that anything that isn't published by GW is a mire of differing ideas that are just going to conflict. I personally can't consider anything not actually published in a codex or rulebook as canon.
scotchwiskey wrote:Is that diagram from an earlier rulebook or something? I remember seeing it before, but I'm just getting back into the game after a dozen or so years away. At any rate, that's an interesting diagram that clears up a little bit of my issues with the fiction of the bolter.
Aye, that's still from the 90s! I'm glad I found it, I really dig those detailed descriptions. And all those little gadgets there are a neat explanation for why bolt weapons are so incredibly huge despite being "only" caliber .75
scotchwiskey wrote:I guess what I'm trying to get across in my posts is that anything that isn't published by GW is a mire of differing ideas that are just going to conflict. I personally can't consider anything not actually published in a codex or rulebook as canon.
Exactly. I used to think different for a long time, but that changed the more I've seen licensed products deviate from established norms ... and after digging up a few statements from GW officials or novel authors who pretty much confirm your point of view.
scotchwiskey wrote:Is that diagram from an earlier rulebook or something? I remember seeing it before, but I'm just getting back into the game after a dozen or so years away. At any rate, that's an interesting diagram that clears up a little bit of my issues with the fiction of the bolter.
Aye, that's still from the 90s! I'm glad I found it, I really dig those detailed descriptions. And all those little gadgets there are a neat explanation for why bolt weapons are so incredibly huge despite being "only" caliber .75
I went digging and found that rulebook, I'm not sure what edition it was but I got it in the late 90's. Pretty good condition too, despite missing the back cover.
I guess what I'm trying to get across in my posts is that anything that isn't published by GW is a mire of differing ideas that are just going to conflict. I personally can't consider anything not actually published in a codex or rulebook as canon.
Excepting that Black Library is GW's publishing arm... so all their fluff novels are, technically, published by GW.
Now, I am (for the sake of argument) inclined to accept rulebook/codex over novel... but the rulebooks and codices don't include 90% of the background information, and even when they do, it often changes from one edition to the next (if not more frequently).
This is the one scenario where the Star Wars fandom is better than the 40K fandom. Lucasarts has a team of people who have categorized every SW-related publication on a level of canonicity, so that it heads off debates on what is true and what isn't for the SW universe.
I'd like to see something like that for 40K, but the problem remains that the bulk of our background information for the setting exists in sources that would be deemed "non-canon".
Another thing about this argument is, a lot of people that play Space Marines design their own chapters, color schemes, background fluff, etc, etc. Why not take that as far as this as well, if you've got a problem with the fiction there's nothing stopping you from doing some research on firearms and coming to your own conclusions. Pretty much everybody in the hobby and certainly the people that post here are extremely creative, there's no reason to hang on the words of a bunch of authors that can't keep consistent.
Psienesis wrote:Lucasarts has a team of people who have categorized every SW-related publication on a level of canonicity, so that it heads off debates on what is true and what isn't for the SW universe.
GW officials and novel authors have made some statements regarding this, but they're usually hard to find and not circulated very often (which is why these debates still exist). I'm very much a fan of consistent canonicity myself, so I'd prefer a "Star Wars" approach myself. Which is why I feel inclined to shy away from introducing too many new ideas.
What I often like to do, however, is look for potential explanations for why something from the official sources that may, on the first glance, appear silly might actually make sense. Such as the recoil of a lasgun, or how the Storm Troopers and SoB can have fewer numbers than the Space Marines. I find this much better than outright "retconning" it with something I'd deem more appropriate based solely on my personal preferences - because explanations mean that I'm still preserving this "common ground" that connects my perception of the setting to the studio material - and with that, hopefully a lot of other fans of the franchise. As opposed to creating my own little bubble of the universe, such as what Cassern S. Goto likes to do. From reading an interview, he actually seems like a nice guy, and I can see where he's coming from, but I still prefer to keep the established aspects of the setting "sacrosanct" rather than "playing with established convictions", as he put it.
It's also a bit more difficult for GW to establish a "canon" when so much of the setting is drawn from novels, written by authors given artistic license to kinda-sorta make it up as they go, as it's based on a table-top miniatures game with a fairly limited scope... whereas the SW canon is based on a universe created by a series of beloved films plus three others of varying quality, several comic book lines and enough novels to fill a library.
The SW canon is coming from a place that already established a significant portion of its background, and didn't go through several "editions" that, officially, completely changed how some things worked, didn't work, or existed at all (poor Squats).
For the record, since my WH40K stuff these days is all entirely Dark Heresy and related RPGs in focus... the boltguns in my game all have significant recoil, because that, to me, establishes a better-looking "scene", and tells a better story. Lasweapons? Negligible recoil, akin to a M16A2 (which myself and another member of my group have shared military experience in operating), with the lascannon having the slight push of an AT4 anti-tank weapon. Noticeable, but not all that bad.
I think GW just needs something like the Holocron continuity database that firmly keeps track of how things are supposed to work like, and then just force everyone to adhere to it.
The true "problem" is likely that GW doesn't feel a need to have consistency in the overall franchise. I recall having read an interview where it was said that GW values creativity, purposely letting some things in their background obscured so that both TT players as well as novel authors may toy around with them and come up with their own ideas. It's an extension of the freedom that lets us create things like our own Marine Chapters, IG Regiments or Sororitas Orders - and even though they won't become canon just because of this, there's also nothing in the setting saying "no".
Of course, this gets problematic as soon as you have fluff nerds like me who would rather wish for a slightly more uniform basis instead of obvious contradictions even throughout the licensed material, in turn leading to much debate about what information is the correct one.
In short, GW just seems to have a way more "laid back" attitude towards the whole canon thing than some of the fans.
As for Star Wars - that franchise actually went through another "edition" as well. It's just that Lucasfilm had the balls to have numerous years worth of licensed material (mostly those really old Marvel comics - and boy did they include some weird stuff) officially declared non-canon. The aforementioned Holocron database and its canonicity rules did not come into existence until about a dozen years ago, and up until that point of time, everything was working like it still does for Star Trek or the Black Library.
Belexar wrote:As far as I know, Bolters are a bit like mini RPGs. I asume they'd have a similar recoil, though with the armor Marines shouldn't realy feel it. Also have iin mind that Bolters are semi-auto (rapid fire) for a reason. If they didn't had a big recoild, why not make them automatic (assault)?
Also, bolters may be Rapid Fire, but they're not semi-auto. The description of this characteristic is a generalization, and does mention the word "usually", which automatically confirms the existence of full-auto Rapid Fire weapons.
It's just that bolters are not used on full auto "pray-and-spray" but rather full auto bursts - as is mentioned in the schematic. This conserves ammunition, but comes with the same recoil: there's no difference between the 4th shot of a "pray-and-spray" salvo and the 4th shot of a short burst.
Also, they actually did make Assault bolters - they're called storm bolters, and nobody seems to have a problem using them. Heck, just look at the heavy bolters, which have an even larger caliber and actually do employ "pray-and-spray" tactics for suppression fire. And still the problem with them doesn't seem to be the recoil so much as their pure weight.
Kasrkai wrote:Agreed. Not to mention the small initial charge would make negligible recoil, even for a normal human, somewhat like an RPG on auto, which isn't to bad from my experience. Must be including the rate of fire.
There's a HUGE initial charge, not a small one. If it had a small initial charge you could block it by putting a hand up against the exit to the barrel. As it is, the weapon is very powerful at close range AND long range, so having a weak initial charge doesn't make sense.
And it isn't just a grenade. It's closer to a HEAT round with a secondary rocket propulsion. Penetrate THEN explode.
40mm grenade launchers have minimal kick, much less than a shotgun. Well much less than a 10 or 12 gauge. Similar to a 20. I sure as heck wouldn't try blocking it with a body part.
I've shot a full auto 12 gauge and its neigh uncontrollable, I'd say IRL a bolter would be similar to shooting a full auto 10/12 gauge.
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starsdawn wrote:
Belexar wrote:As far as I know, Bolters are a bit like mini RPGs. I asume they'd have a similar recoil, though with the armor Marines shouldn't realy feel it. Also have iin mind that Bolters are semi-auto (rapid fire) for a reason. If they didn't had a big recoild, why not make them automatic (assault)?
The recoil is mostly Hollywood, like how silencers make guns reaaaaally silent and shooting a car would make it go boom.
Um, I have a few NFA items including silencers... and yeah if you use subsonic ammo, they are darn quiet...
My wife can't hear me shooting my ar-15 it in the back yard. Then again its chambered in 9mm but I use subsonic ammo and a big can.
My .22 on the other hand is dead silent, all you hear is the slide moving back and forth. It makes less sound than a cap gun with no caps.
But yeah, cars don't explode when you shoot them and grenade launchers and RPG's don't really have much/any kick.
Has anyone mention the points of a buffer spring? I wouldn't imagine a automatic weapon not having one, a bolter being one of those. Whether it's a burst or full in doesn't matter, both of those rate of fires are considered "automatic weapons" Depending on the buffer spring in a weapon will determine how much recoil the weapon has. Obviously there's canon out there that say Space Marines have no issues using them, regular people don't even try! You have to take in the fact that Space Marines are super-human, have powered armor and their body mass is much larger than the typical persons. Space Marine recoil, I would say probably next to nothing. For us regular guys and gals, you had better be prepare for one heck of a kick!
Even then, fully automatic weapons are going to have recoil.
Before they replaced it with the M249 SAW, I carried an M60D for my squad. Got to the point where I could fire it from the hip, or the shoulder if I had to but... I don't recommend it if you weigh under 200 pounds.
Psienesis wrote:Even then, fully automatic weapons are going to have recoil.
Before they replaced it with the M249 SAW, I carried an M60D for my squad. Got to the point where I could fire it from the hip, or the shoulder if I had to but... I don't recommend it if you weigh under 200 pounds.
Yes even with buffer springs in fully automatic they still have a lot of recoil. I personally am a .50 cal gunner, M2 is no joke and with a tripod and T&E it still has recoil. If I could imagine a shortened rifle version of the .50 cal would be impractical for troops using the ole leather express to get around! Let alone a .75 (or.70?) cal weapon like 3rd ed says "bolts" are!
Yeah, the M2 is... impressive. Hell, the old .30cal M14s were pretty punishing. A round half again as big as a .50? Yeah, no thanks! I'll carry the lascannon...
deffskulla wrote:Space Marine recoil, I would say probably next to nothing. For us regular guys and gals, you had better be prepare for one heck of a kick!
As long as there are some IG miniatures lugging around and firing heavy bolters solo (see here), I don't think the smaller calibre boltguns or bolt pistols (which many Commissars seem to have?) are much of an issue to the average human, though I do like the Munitorum Manual's suggestion that you'd have to be very strong or employ augmentation to use them accurately on autofire.
In terms of RL "controllability" comparisons, the 1.00 heavy bolter seems to be supposed to be the 40k equivalent of something like the aforementioned M60D or MG42, whereas for the smaller .75 guns I'd concur with CageUF's shotgun implication.
On the other hand, given the Retributor's description, it does seem to hint at the biggest issue of bolt weapons not being their recoil but their great weight (weight also has a compensating effect for recoil, by the way -> the heavier something is, the more kinetic energy you need to move it).
Kasrkai wrote:Agreed. Not to mention the small initial charge would make negligible recoil, even for a normal human, somewhat like an RPG on auto, which isn't to bad from my experience. Must be including the rate of fire.
There's a HUGE initial charge, not a small one. If it had a small initial charge you could block it by putting a hand up against the exit to the barrel. As it is, the weapon is very powerful at close range AND long range, so having a weak initial charge doesn't make sense.
And it isn't just a grenade. It's closer to a HEAT round with a secondary rocket propulsion. Penetrate THEN explode.
40mm grenade launchers have minimal kick, much less than a shotgun. Well much less than a 10 or 12 gauge. Similar to a 20. I sure as heck wouldn't try blocking it with a body part.
I've shot a full auto 12 gauge and its neigh uncontrollable, I'd say IRL a bolter would be similar to shooting a full auto 10/12 gauge.
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starsdawn wrote:
Belexar wrote:As far as I know, Bolters are a bit like mini RPGs. I asume they'd have a similar recoil, though with the armor Marines shouldn't realy feel it. Also have iin mind that Bolters are semi-auto (rapid fire) for a reason. If they didn't had a big recoild, why not make them automatic (assault)?
The recoil is mostly Hollywood, like how silencers make guns reaaaaally silent and shooting a car would make it go boom.
Um, I have a few NFA items including silencers... and yeah if you use subsonic ammo, they are darn quiet...
My wife can't hear me shooting my ar-15 it in the back yard. Then again its chambered in 9mm but I use subsonic ammo and a big can.
My .22 on the other hand is dead silent, all you hear is the slide moving back and forth. It makes less sound than a cap gun with no caps.
But yeah, cars don't explode when you shoot them and grenade launchers and RPG's don't really have much/any kick.
Compare it to the Hollywood silencers though, where the sound of silenced guns are as soft as the sound of kittens hitting a pillow.
The recoil of a boltgun would wreak all fluff on guardsmen using them. The recoil would be enough to break bones in "normal" humans.
Acceleration, mass and momentum clearly dictates that it is impossible for the bolts internal charge to propel it to enough velocity on its own to be anything near lethal at point blank ranges. In otehr wordfs it takes time (thus distance) for the bolt to achieve enough speed to be lethal.
Therefore in order for the bolt to be able to kill as well at point blank range as at optimal range an initial charge (shell with propellant) would be required to give it the immediate burst of speed to be able to kill at close range.
The unspent internal bolt propellant could therefore be used in the bots own explosion making it even more lethal at close range.
Now for normal bullets this is not a problem due to their small sizes but the large caliber and mass being small. A bolt shell is a heavy thing though and takes a large amount of force to push out at enough speed.
The only thing able to lessen such a recoil would be a big mass of the bolter itself but again that means normal humans would never find them to be usable in the field where everything needs to be as light and portable as possible.
"Light" and "portable" has, traditionally, been very low on the list of design consideration for military hardware. This has changed some in recent years, but, back in the day, the M2 Browning weighed in at 80 pounds, empty.
Pyriel- wrote:Now for normal bullets this is not a problem due to their small sizes but the large caliber and mass being small. A bolt shell is a heavy thing though and takes a large amount of force to push out at enough speed.
The Soviet KS-23 fires the equivalent of a solid steel caliber 0.9 round (bolter rounds are 0.75) with enough force to wreck an engine block 100 meters away - and that's without the help of an internal propellant and an explosive charge. And without the potential recoil compensation of sci-fi high tech guns and their fictional internal components.
Bolt pistols also fire the exact same rounds as boltguns and are rather popular with Commissars and individual officers. And then we have individual Guardsmen like Ox who haul a caliber 1.00 heavy bolter around, and obviously use them in combat.
I'm sure a bolt weapon has quite a kick to it, but it's nowhere near the devastating bone-breaking effect that is theorized here - unless one really does not know how to use them (I've seen US soldiers getting hurt simply because they underestimated the recoil of a German G3 and thus held it wrong). These guns have been in the Imperial Guard's wargear since many editions past, and GW has never indicated they'd be incredibly difficult to use.
Agreed on the massive weight, though. It'd likely be enough to keep most Guardsmen from even wanting to carry such a beast, not to mention the more complicated mechanics and maintenance requirements as well as the need for a steady supply chain as opposed to simply plugging your lasgun battery into a charger station capable of using on-site resources. Hence they are not standard issue for the rank-and-file but remain optional to individual higher-ups who have the power to procure them.
"Light" and "portable" has, traditionally, been very low on the list of design consideration for military hardware. This has changed some in recent years, but, back in the day, the M2 Browning weighed in at 80 pounds, empty.
And you saw them mostly mounted on vehicles.
Perfectly ok for a vehicle mounted bolter for IG but that would be it unless you want a 3 person tripod mounted bolter team.
Bolter shells are even more heavy then browning ones.
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Considering the fact that the bolter's caliber is roughly the same size as a slug round fired from a shotgun, the recoil they have it having in fluff is ridiculous. Yes shotguns kick more than a lot of rifles, but its still manageable.
Caliber is completely irrelevant when it comes to recoil. It´s mass and velocity that matters.
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The Soviet KS-23 fires the equivalent of a solid steel caliber 0.9 round (bolter rounds are 0.75) with enough force to wreck an engine block 100 meters away - and that's without the help of an internal propellant and an explosive charge. And without the potential recoil compensation of sci-fi high tech guns and their fictional internal components.
Do you know if the masses are the same of the soviet round and a bolt shell?
There is no true data on bolt shells so we only have logic and deduction to work with.
I´d say the bolt shell is a lot heavier, it needs to contain a tough casing, it does have a super dense core (heavy), it needs to be large enough to contain a proximity sensor, impact fuse, mass sensor (piezo electric maybe?), propellant charge, reaction charge and on top of all that a mechanism for mass detection and perhaps stabilizing fins as well (unless you want to add friction by having a non smooth barrel).
Further on, what is the purpose of the KS-23, is it a close range shock weapon or is it supposed to take out targets at 300m with accuracy etc etc.
I see it as a low velocity kinetic weapon only whereas the bolter needs to be high kinetic at all ranges up to 300m (or more) plus be highly accurate to boost.
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I'm sure a bolt weapon has quite a kick to it, but it's nowhere near the devastating bone-breaking effect that is theorized here - unless one really does not know how to use them (I've seen US soldiers getting hurt simply because they underestimated the recoil of a German G3 and thus held it wrong).
Hehe, still remember my very first round fired using a scoped rifle, damn that hurt lol.
Bolt pistols also fire the exact same rounds as boltguns and are rather popular with Commissars and individual officers. And then we have individual Guardsmen like Ox who haul a caliber 1.00 heavy bolter around, and obviously use them in combat.
Truth be told a bolt pistol cannot possible be as powerful as a bolt rifle. And as for big individuals hauling big weapons well fluff *sigh* needs to be taken at what value it really has, none.
Look up IA weapon, wargear and vehicle books, those are a perfect example of the sheer idiocy some authors display. Landraider armour being as durable as a ww2 sherman tank etc, it´s so I weep when I read some of the fluff crap.
Pyriel- wrote:There is no true data on bolt shells so we only have logic and deduction to work with.
Exactly, and given how bolt weapons have always been used in the setting we should look to an explanation that favors its use by normal people instead of fabricating an unearthly recoil out of the very same thin air - one that isn't even backed up by modern day firearms. Note that the KS-23 does not use advanced recoil suppression as it is used in other guns like the AA-12, and it's still usable by human beings (meaning you could theoretically fire even heavier projectiles would you build a "hybrid" out of the two aforementioned weapons).
I'd say a bolt shell is lighter, because it's a lot smaller and 2x8 cm of solid steel sound quite heavy to me, whereas the core of a bolt shell is quite small. All the little gadgets you mentioned would only make it lighter as they limit the space for the deuterium core. We do have official pictures of bolt round cross sections, so we can get a good idea of their overall dimensions by eyeballing the length in comparison to the known caliber - it's definitively smaller than what the KS-23 shoots.
Pyriel- wrote:Further on, what is the purpose of the KS-23, is it a close range shock weapon or is it supposed to take out targets at 300m with accuracy etc etc.
Multi-purpose. Can use the following ammunition:
"Shrapnel-10" buckshot round with 10-meter effective range
"Shrapnel-25" buckshot round with 25-meter effective range
"Barricade" cartridge with solid steel projectile able to destroy the engine block of a car at up to 100 meters.
"Wave-R" rubber less-lethal cartridge
"Bird cherry" tear gas grenade with CN agent
"Lilac" tear gas grenade with CS agent
"Star" flash-bang round
The effective range varies between 100 and 150 meters, depending on sub-type of the rifle. Without a bolt round's internal rocket motor. Invent bolt rounds and you'll increase their range further.
Pyriel- wrote:Truth be told a bolt pistol cannot possible be as powerful as a bolt rifle.
Why not? It's the very same ammunition. A bolt pistol would likely have an even stronger kick, though, because it's not as heavy as the larger boltgun.
Pyriel- wrote:And as for big individuals hauling big weapons well fluff *sigh* needs to be taken at what value it really has, none. [...] Look up IA weapon, wargear and vehicle books, those are a perfect example of the sheer idiocy some authors display. Landraider armour being as durable as a ww2 sherman tank etc, it´s so I weep when I read some of the fluff crap.
Well, the canon status of fluff sources varies depending on their origin - but anything coming directly from GWis canon. And though I'm feeling with you when you say that some of it may sound ... weird ... you can't say that bolt weapons have bone-breaking recoil when GW says no - it is them who invented this weapon, after all.
It's just like the whole "Marines can only be male" deal - scientifically it makes no sense whatsoever, but it's just part of the setting (and no I would not want it otherwise!). Bolt weapons having recoil comparable to a modern day shotgun is way more realistic than that.
Incidentally, the M2 Browning was originally a squad automatic weapon, carried by infantry troopers. It was soon adopted for vehicular mounts but remained a crew-served, man-portable support weapon for two and a half wars.
Exactly, and given how bolt weapons have always been used in the setting we should look to an explanation that favors its use by normal people instead of fabricating an unearthly recoil out of the very same thin air - one that isn't even backed up by modern day firearms. Note that the KS-23 does not use advanced recoil suppression as it is used in other guns like the AA-12, and it's still usable by human beings (meaning you could theoretically fire even heavier projectiles would you build a "hybrid" out of the two aforementioned weapons).
I dont agree. The browning M8 for example would have broken your bones if it was fired one hand and the weight of it was reduced to that of a light soviet machine pistol.
Further on to make bolters workable for normal humans just reduce their weight and the mass of the bolt significantly and you are good o go.
I'd say a bolt shell is lighter, because it's a lot smaller and 2x8 cm of solid steel sound quite heavy to me, whereas the core of a bolt shell is quite small. All the little gadgets you mentioned would only make it lighter as they limit the space for the deuterium core.
I am of the contrary opinion, as with all military hardware, the more you stuff into it the more space it requires and the more it weighs.
The eternal dilemma with the space rocket and its fuel.
Multi-purpose. Can use the following ammunition:
Sorry, I was referring to what purpose with only its steel ammo?
We can alter the usability of a bolter by great degrees by using different ammunition like buckshot too so this is irrelevant.
Why not? It's the very same ammunition. A bolt pistol would likely have an even stronger kick, though, because it's not as heavy as the larger boltgun.
Barrel length!
Well, the canon status of fluff sources varies depending on their origin - but anything coming directly from GW is canon. And though I'm feeling with you when you say that some of it may sound ... weird ... you can't say that bolt weapons have bone-breaking recoil when GW says no - it is them who invented this weapon, after all.
I thought we´d stick to universal physics in here, if you want to bring up GW fluff (god no) then anything is possible and all discussions can be made null and void by refering to carious canon fluffs.
GW also "invented" the sci fi "plasma" that floods space ship hulls etc and acts like that weird startrekk stuff. Complete bogus but hey, it´s in the fluff.
We do not have to invent physics to suit GW fluff (and its variations), we could however "invent" real life theories base on what´s in the 40k future, that would be quite fun actually if you have the proper scientific background.
Frankly I find the whole deal with space marine bolters utterly unrealistic and counter productive from a warfare point of view.
There is zero synergy with the astartes physique and the bolter usage and role.
Pyriel- wrote:Further on to make bolters workable for normal humans just reduce their weight and the mass of the bolt significantly and you are good o go.
An unnecessary invention not supported by anything in the existing fluff, on the pretext of invented recoil. Why not just take bolt weapons for what they are? A big gun with a big boom, perfectly capable of being wielded by human beings with a certain amount of training and "Guard-average" muscles.
Pyriel- wrote:I am of the contrary opinion, as with all military hardware, the more you stuff into it the more space it requires and the more it weighs.
Obviously GW does not agree if you look at the pictures - or maybe it's just that in the 41st millennium all those nifty gadgets are not as big and heavy anymore? The picture is official and it won't go away by an attempt of inserting modern day(!) realism into a fantasy setting.
That's also a rather old dilemma, by the way. A mere two centuries back people thought we would use a cannon to fly to the moon. For all we canonically know a bolt weapon has a hypertech "recoil negat-o-mat" that reduces its kick to zero. You can't exclude this option, simply because we do not know better. We only know that ordinary humans in the setting can fire these guns, so obviously there has to be something that allows them to do so. Which means that either the kinetic energy of the initial charge isn't so large, or that the gun itself has some mumbo-jumbo assisting to deal with it.
Pyriel- wrote:Sorry, I was referring to what purpose with only its steel ammo?
Uh, it only says "car-stopping" in all the pages I could dig up on this weapon, so I assume that is this round's intended purpose. But isn't the entire point irrelevant? The question is less what the ammunition is meant for, but more what amount of energy is at play here, and how it could compare to a bolter.
Pyriel- wrote:Barrel length!
Mmhm, depends on how many shots you want to fire. If it's just one it doesn't matter as much - and in this particular capacity, a bolt pistol actually suits nicely to the image of a ceremonial weapon, or one to execute fearful Guardsmen with.
This actually fits nicely to the Munitorum Manual's description of only automatic fire being a problem to normal people unless augmentations are involved.
Pyriel- wrote:We do not have to invent physics to suit GW fluff (and its variations), we could however "invent" real life theories base on what´s in the 40k future, that would be quite fun actually if you have the proper scientific background.
That's true - and I actually like to invent "excuses" to justify things that, on the first glance, may seem odd. Which is why I see no problem with bolt weapon recoil when we already seem to have comparable weapons in real life. It doesn't become a problem unless you want it to be (by making the recoil a problem when all we know of this gun points to the opposite - after all, as you have pointed out, we know little of the round's actual properties).
Pyriel- wrote:Frankly I find the whole deal with space marine bolters utterly unrealistic and counter productive from a warfare point of view.
There is zero synergy with the astartes physique and the bolter usage and role.
Hmm, why so? They do seem like good weapons - armour-piercing, explosive, and the projectile's rocket motor increases its kinetic energy and penetration even more than with just the conventional first-stage charge. The Astartes' physique simply allows them to carry even heavier models of the weapon - heavier not referring to the caliber but to the actual gun, in that the weapon itself can be armoured in a way that would protect it from the severe stress of Marine-style deepstrikes and close combat where lesser weapons would jam.
Not to mention all those nifty gadgets that can find a place in such oversized weaponry. Which works just like their power armour - it isn't bulky because it offers so much more protection than other models, it's bulky because (aside from the Marines themselves being quite big) it contains a ton of useful tools for their campaigns that aid them to stay alive where otherwise they would die or at least become "neutralized".
In short: Astartes physique doesn't mean they have to carry more damaging guns and thicker armour, but better guns and more tools to wage their wars with. It's more complex - and, I would say, more useful - than the admittedly natural thought of simply giving every Marine a cannon. Not that they couldn't do that, too, for it should not be forgotten that heavy weapons normally do require a crew of 2 or more. This is unheard of in the Astartes, which makes them more mobile. Another advantage right there, which synchs nicely with their high mobility role.
An unnecessary invention not supported by anything in the existing fluff, on the pretext of invented recoil. Why not just take bolt weapons for what they are? A big gun with a big boom, perfectly capable of being wielded by human beings with a certain amount of training and "Guard-average" muscles.
Nothing invented by that, just pure logic.
A reason for the weight is at least for marines, to use the weapons in melee. Cant imagine swinging a macmillan rifle at orks and expect it to shoot later
A guardsman doesnt need the melee power so yes, bolt guns could certainly be made lighter and more fragile for them.
Obviously GW does not agree if you look at the pictures - or maybe it's just that in the 41st millennium all those nifty gadgets are not as big and heavy anymore? The picture is official and it won't go away by an attempt of inserting modern day(!) realism into a fantasy setting.
Apparently I dont live in lala land like GW does with unscientific fluff, paper thin tank armour, contradicting fluff (caseless bolters with pics showing casing etc).
I care not for GW flaws, I just want to add some sense and realism to the wargear in 40k.
That's also a rather old dilemma, by the way. A mere two centuries back people thought we would use a cannon to fly to the moon. For all we canonically know a bolt weapon has a hypertech "recoil negat-o-mat" that reduces its kick to zero. You can't exclude this option,
And were the debate is officially over. I can counter each and every of your claims with "it´s 40k, a magical world where everything is possible so if you say I´m wrong I say it´s magic".
Of course I can exclude this option, I follow occhams principle and not some wishlist strawgrasping to support my arguments. In other words I follow the most reasonable path, thus if faced with options like science and probable tech I´ll choose that over "you cant exclude" magic/necron tech/super advanced gadgets never heard of in the fluff etc etc.
We only know that ordinary humans in the setting can fire these guns
We do not know that, GW fluff tells us but then trusting GW fluff is also accepting a landraider tank would get stuck the soon it hit a small fallen tree or collapse under it´s own weight due to to weak armour.
We will also need to trust and accept contradictionary fluff as well as we cannot simply choose to pick bits and pieces of fluff that only support our own points and pretend like the rest isnt there.
obviously there has to be something that allows them to do so. Which means that either the kinetic energy of the initial charge isn't so large, or that the gun itself has some mumbo-jumbo assisting to deal with it.
While you say obviously "something" (like magic, not mentioned super tech etc), I say science and common sense physics.
We really need to agree to disagree here I think.
Uh, it only says "car-stopping" in all the pages I could dig up on this weapon, so I assume that is this round's intended purpose. But isn't the entire point irrelevant? The question is less what the ammunition is meant for, but more what amount of energy is at play here, and how it could compare to a bolter.
It is relevant since the heavy russian rifly bullet is only meant as a slow kinetic close range delivery system while the much more massive bolt shell (again, Occham) is meant to do so much more.
Thus reason states it also suffers from physical drawbacks unless of course you can provide a solid link to clear fluff stating each bolt shell is fitted with microscopical Admech suspensor technology or the equivalent.
Another and not fluff supported solution would be to make the bolt pretty weak kinetically wise (no recoil) and having its killing power depend only on an impact fused shaped charge but then again GW says they are built to p e n e t are a t e armoured targets which means a helluva lot of mass and velocity needs to be applied to the bolt (that is also supposed to do so much more then the soviet light rifle) which means a heafty recoil.
Mmhm, depends on how many shots you want to fire. If it's just one it doesn't matter as much - and in this particular capacity, a bolt pistol actually suits nicely to the image of a ceremonial weapon, or one to execute fearful Guardsmen with.
Nope, you need to read up on physics some more. Try cut of the barrel of a sniper rifle and see how much power is lost.
This actually fits nicely to the Munitorum Manual's description of only automatic fire being a problem to normal people unless augmentations are involved.
A source that lacks all and any form of scientifical backing. Lets talk about imperial armour shall we, we´ll have so much to laugh about as we read on gw fluff being applied on epic scales of ridicule.
Again, my point stands, taking fluff instances and non mentioned super tech, magic, psychic powers, whims of the gods, Emperors miracles etc does nothing but ruin any form of decent discussion as it can be used to prove A N Y point no matter how impossible.
I can claim with a straight face that nekkid sisters of battle can shoot heavy bolters one handed simply because in GW fluff they are subject to tons of miracles and to do so is certainly a miracle and there is nothing you can do to prove me otherwise because this c a n be true, we dont know (your own argumentation).
Quod erat demonstrandum.
That's true - and I actually like to invent "excuses" to justify things that, on the first glance, may seem odd.
I fully agree with you but if this is to work we need to agree to follow a simple set of rules such as:
The "excuse" most logical is true.
No excusing using contradictionary fluff.
Science and facts trump incompetent GW employers dreaming up fluff crap. (if GW says in their fluff that black holes in 40k are actually made of ice cream do we take this and build on it? Seriously?)
Failing that we can talk in circles for years to no end using everything from youknowwhat as excuses to support just about anything even vaguely hinted in the fluff.
Your take on this?
Hmm, why so? They do seem like good weapons - armour-piercing, explosive, and the projectile's rocket motor increases its kinetic energy and penetration even more than with just the conventional first-stage charge. The Astartes' physique simply allows them to carry even heavier models of the weapon - heavier not referring to the caliber but to the actual gun, in that the weapon itself can be armoured in a way that would protect it from the severe stress of Marine-style deepstrikes and close combat where lesser weapons would jam.
Simple.
Marines are geneered to be the perfect long range recon units supposedly operating for long peroids of time behind enemy lines.
This cannot be denied, the facts point to this foremost.
- they have the ability to eat and absorb memories specifically said to make survival easier (where to find clean water etc)
-protection from harmful radiation like UV from the sky (long term benefits)
-stamina that allows for days on running.
-ability to eat all kinds of junk and extract nutrients from it. (long term benefit if proper food is scarse)
-ability to handle poisons from food intake or blood contact (long term benefit is food is scarse and against wild life should armour be discarded)
-ability to track by taste (long term benefit)
-ability to sleep while half awake (long term benefit)
-abiity to breathe poisons, low oxygen atmosphere and I think even water but again, fluff is contradicting here (long term ability if suit is broken or air supply low or tough environment)
-ability to heal almost anything over time, bones mend over days etc.
Basically almost all the biological hardware in a marine is designed for the optimal long range survival unit. You dont need these things in order to do rapid shock assaults onto the bridge of anotehr ship for example, in that case all those memory implants, extra stomachs etc would be better used for even more muscles and such.
Now having established this what weapon systems synergize the best with a long ranged recon unit or a unit made to be out in the field for prolonged periods of time?
Lots of ammunition, light weapons and gear, highly resilent and easy to maintain things, weapons using power or ammo that is easily compatible with most used out in various battlefields etc.
You dont use a 40kg bolter with rounds the size of sausages and ammo magazines weighing in at 7 kg each.
The average long ranged soldier takes around 10 magazines, enough to last an intensive contact and to breake and escape from it. You talk about GW pictures and fluff, how many bolter magazines have you EVER seen or heard of in pictures or fluff?
One magazine holds 30 bolt shells, is huge and heavy like hell and a marine would need about 10 of those to last an intensive engagement against say, traitor marines so he walks aound basically covered with huge extra clips...and then?
Imagine the long range patrol wading through rough terrain or a swamp, each marine weighing in at half a ton, on top of that a 30kg bolter, on top of that 30 clips at 210 kg and then some grenades, extra gear etc, the poor marines would sink instantly and expel so much calories simply moving that a broken power armour would spell starvation.
What happens with the squads ammo supply after only one contact with the enemy? 2 small contacts towards the objective and the squad arrives completely dry. Bolt rounds dont grow on trees, slaughtered heretics, orks, tau, necrons etc dont really carry spares in their pockets.
I´d imagine the bolter being a highly specialized, highly situational weapons, used where short and intense contacts are expected like boarding actions or clear and guaranteed lines of supply can be had.
I still laugh at the GW fluff on Shrike and the raven guards being behind ork lines for 2 years causing all kinds of mayhem...how and with what? After the first ambush not one marine would have any bolt shells left. Did they kidnap a mek and his workshop with helper grots and a local ore mine and made him produce extra ammo?
Or wait, they ran around in the jungles for 2 years ambushing orks with their melee weapons, you know the chainswords etc that they could actually recharge using their power armour generators?
Logically speaking the typical SM squad is equipped with beefed up hellguns that have to all means an inexhaustable amount of ammunition since given some time the power packs and armour henerators will constantly reload the guns.
So here you are, why should the emperor make/invent super warriors and geneer them in all purposes for ultimate long ranged and long time survival and efficiency when their weapons are made for super short engagements.
Thus, screw GW fluff that simply doesnt make any sense. The bolter is eather a weapon used only in rare instances where its humongous drawbacks can be negated OR more likely the bolter does not use supersized and heavy rounds but rather mm sized needle ammunition that penetrate by being fired at hypersonic velocities and cause damage by mass reactive sensors causing internal explosions in the targets.
That would solve all problems, ammo capacity, weight, accuracy, very little initial propellant needed and pretty much no recoil what so ever. It would also be in tune with the bolt rounds restriction in range as light ammo loose power fast.
This is actually how I see the "true" bolter being used and designed and not the unrealistic coca cola bottle fireing crap GW dreamt up just to sound cool.
What are your thoughts on that?
Problem is... Marines generally don't deploy on long-duration missions. They really are shock troops, and generally deploy in small numbers.
They're equipped for the long battles, yes, because when they were first designed, this is what the Legions were facing against the Xeno empires and the Human societies that did not want to join the Imperium. Then the Emperor was interred in the Golden Throne, and he was the one responsible for the design of the Space Marines.
They couldn't (and still can't) change the blue-print of a Space Marine, and so they have all the organs and such necessary for long-term wars while they are also used, primarily, as shock troops, rapid-reaction forces, and small-unit hunter-killer teams. The ability to handle poisons and radiation and other "survival" traits is also of importance when deploying, for a short time, on a planet that doesn't have a human-friendly atmosphere... or being blown out an airlock into space.
The bolter is eather a weapon used only in rare instances where its humongous drawbacks can be negated OR more likely the bolter does not use supersized and heavy rounds but rather mm sized needle ammunition that penetrate by being fired at hypersonic velocities and cause damage by mass reactive sensors causing internal explosions in the targets.
Neither. It's the mainstay weapon of the Adeptus Astartes, firing a .75 calibre rocket-boosted, armor-piercing and mass-reactive explosive round. Spent bolter casings are often collected by common citizens of the Imperium and kept as good luck charms, especially if they were fired from the weapons of the Emperor's own Angels of Death.
Human-scaled bolt weapons, like pistols, are often awarded to people like Commissars, IG and Naval Officers, and Inquisitors as signs of favor and also as symbols that these individuals act with the authority of the Imperium.
Just because the sci-fi weapon doesn't fit what we understand of weapons technology and physics doesn't mean we can discard the established canon of what these weapons are and how they generally function.
We can debate the relative recoil, weight, impact, muzzle velocity and what-all-else of the boltgun all day and night... but we can't really get away from the "facts" already established in canon, as that diverges from anything represented in the game, and becomes... a completely different topic, really.
Though, as far as the IG using boltguns and heavy bolters go, I will point out that these soldiers in the IG are, generally, some truly burly, Rambo/Arnold Schwarzenegger-sized guys out there fighting orks in hand-to-hand and beating back waves of Tyranid and fighting off the Archenemy and so on and so forth... they're not some 120 pound (or even 190 pound) pencil-necked guys out playing paintball.
Pyriel- wrote:Of course I can exclude this option, I follow occhams principle and not some wishlist strawgrasping to support my arguments.
No, you really don't. Occham's principle works by taking into account the existing facts, and this I fear includes those you conveniently dismiss as "GW flaws" because they don't suit your "pure logic" - which is based solely on the premise that bolt weapons absolutely need such a strong recoil it would break normal people's back, in spite of what 20 years of 40k have told us. You say "acceleration, mass and momentum clearly dictate it" and then leave it at that, as if we'd actually have these numbers. I dispute the "clarity" of this claim.
You're putting the cart before the horse. What you are doing is looking at one aspect of the gun (its power) and then apply basic physics (recoil), without having actual numbers to work with and without caring about whether the end result actually "fits in" or creates a conflict. Options to avoid these conflicts - many of which already exist in modern day firearms (mercury recoil suppressors, constant-recoil principle, redirected momentum, etc) - are summarily dismissed as "grasping at straws". This is not "following the most reasonable path", it's constructing a one-way road to a predetermined outcome that clashes with the only information we actually have on this weapon system. My only question is: Why?
My approach is looking at all aspects of the gun (power, design, weight, size and applications as well as techlevel), then take into consideration basic physics (recoil), and come up with theories how these could be combined without breaking any of the facts within the setting.
You may view this approach as flawed because you "don't trust GW fluff" - but then again, if you really want and go ahead deconstructing the entire setting, or building a world of your own, go ahead. Let us agree to disagree, as you proposed. I'll continue to grasp at my straws - but at least my straws are the ones from the books. And a "blast compensator" was mentioned on an official storm bolter cross section, if you've read my post on the previous page where I provided a link to the scan.
I just hope you too see the irony in "not trusting GW fluff" but at the same time citing parts of it as evidence.
Pyriel- wrote:We will also need to trust and accept contradictionary fluff as well as we cannot simply choose to pick bits and pieces of fluff that only support our own points and pretend like the rest isnt there.
Hear, hear. Just that studio canon isn't contradictoryin this case.
Pyriel- wrote:It is relevant since the heavy russian rifly bullet is only meant as a slow kinetic close range delivery system while the much more massive bolt shell (again, Occham) is meant to do so much more. Thus reason states [...]
No. The recoil is from a bolt shell's initial charge - which is meant to do so much less, namely simply pushing that projectile out of the barrel with enough force so that the rocket motor can take over without affecting trajectory. Your reason is flawed. Without the rocket motor, you might have a point.
Pyriel- wrote:Thus reason states it also suffers from physical drawbacks unless of course you can provide a solid link to clear fluff stating each bolt shell is fitted with microscopical Admech suspensor technology or the equivalent.
That's not quite how it works. The massive recoil is your hypothesis, so it's up to you to present some evidence here. But given that we lack the necessary data from the projectile, I'd suppose this is a dead end.
Pyriel- wrote:Another and not fluff supported solution would be to make the bolt pretty weak kinetically wise (no recoil) and having its killing power depend only on an impact fused shaped charge but then again GW says they are built to p e n e t are a t e armoured targets which means a helluva lot of mass and velocity needs to be applied to the bolt (that is also supposed to do so much more then the soviet light rifle) which means a heafty recoil.
Forgetting the rocket motor again.
Nope, you need to read up on physics some more. Try cut of the barrel of a sniper rifle and see how much power is lost.
I think you really need to read up on guns some more, or more specifically how recoil is generated.
There isn't actually one recoil when a gun is fired but two - the first when the charge is ignited and the projectile gets pushed down the barrel and the second when the round leaves it. A longer barrel results in greater muzzle velocity, which in turn means greater recoil through momentum. Depending on the weapon, this can be off-set by a longer barrel adding more weight, and a shorter barrel will also result in the gas having a higher pressure when secondary recoil kicks in, so the difference may be negligible and comes down to the individual model as well as the ammunition used. Especially when we compare bolt pistols to boltguns and note that the length isn't drastically different, as all boltguns do is add a foregrip and a longer magazine.
Pyriel- wrote:I can claim with a straight face that nekkid sisters of battle can shoot heavy bolters one handed simply because in GW fluff they are subject to tons of miracles and to do so is certainly a miracle and there is nothing you can do to prove me otherwise because this c a n be true, we dont know (your own argumentation). Quod erat demonstrandum.
No, but thanks for playing. Fluff tells us that heavy bolters are "of great weight and cumbersome nature" (which, by following the laws of physics you hold so dear, would greatly reduce recoil), and that a Sister of Battle is only able to handle such equipment due to her power armour, which augments the wearer's strength.
But I suppose this must be another "GW flaw".
As far as Marine operations are concerned, Psienesis has already delivered a good explanation. Long campaigns is what the Guard is for, why do you think Space Marine ships and company composition (mechanized infantry, airborne transport, DROP PODS) focus on speed?
Marines are equipped for long duration because their most common combat doctrine often results in them getting surrounded by enemies, having to fight without support for an extended duration. What was the longest time? The 3E Codex mentioned something about 3-4 days of continuous fighting, I believe?
Only this:
Pyriel- wrote:It would also be in tune with the bolt rounds restriction in range as light ammo loose power fast.
Again, rocket motor.
Don't make the mistake of taking TT range as absolutes. Apart from the simple difference between game mechanics and fluff, the TT may well use this as an abstraction representing "effective combat range", meaning that while your miniatures may be able to fire further their shots would miss. Just another of my excuses, but I've found they make the setting appear so much more realistic and enjoyable.
Problem is... Marines generally don't deploy on long-duration missions. They really are shock troops, and generally deploy in small numbers.
Yes that is the problem but you fail to see it from the right perspective.
Here, let me clarify it for you:
Why did the big E himself, night infallible, use up tons of resources and time to construct a super soldier geneered to above all else act as a super effective long range recconisance unit when they are in the end almost only used as short range, intense in-and-out units?
That´s the problem in a hutshell.
If the usage of a marine is meant to 80% of the time to be used as a rapid shock trooper and only 20% of the time to be used as an attrition or long range/time unit wouldnt it be better to create them from the start to be better at the 80% of what they do rather the 20%?
They're equipped for the long battles, yes, because when they were first designed, this is what the Legions were facing against the Xeno empires and the Human societies that did not want to join the Imperium. Then the Emperor was interred in the Golden Throne, and he was the one responsible for the design of the Space Marines.
I dont see it as that. The legions acted just like chapters do albeit on a grander scale. Rapid shock assaults onto planets/spaceships, rapid battles, quick victories and then out as fast as possible.
Your entire argument is flawed by the simple fact that planet compliance was supposed to be as fast as possible. Even the Man himself chastised his sons for taking to long in turning over planet victories.
That is anything means the marines were used as rapid shock troops from the very start.
Ergo: GW screws up again by inventing marine fluff and wargear that goes totally against how they were supposedly geneered to be used.
They couldn't (and still can't) change the blue-print of a Space Marine, and so they have all the organs and such necessary for long-term wars while they are also used, primarily, as shock troops, rapid-reaction forces, and small-unit hunter-killer teams. The ability to handle poisons and radiation and other "survival" traits is also of importance when deploying, for a short time, on a planet that doesn't have a human-friendly atmosphere... or being blown out an airlock into space.
So much bio hardware is steered toward long turn survival and efficiency that it is unquestionable that was the marines primary purpose.
Also there are so many instances in the fluff where they are deployed in long term situations like attrition, behind enemy lines, kill teams traveling across whole planets through warzones to kill specific targets (deathwatch etc) and still in every instance we see marines equipped with a 30 round bolter and no spare magazines.
Really, how effective would that be if we equipped all our soldiers with super specialized weapons using super rare ammunition and only gave each soldier a handful of rounds?
Again, there are logically and realistically only two options:
Either the bolter is a very situational weapons or the magazine contains hundreds or thousands of hyper velocity mm sized rounds.
Pick the one that sounds to be the most logical and sane.
Neither. It's the mainstay weapon of the Adeptus Astartes, firing a .75 calibre rocket-boosted, armor-piercing and mass-reactive explosive round
Right, GW fluff. And the land raider gets stuck after 10 meters of driving by the way it is designed. Common, think for yourself, dont use GWbs.
Just because the sci-fi weapon doesn't fit what we understand of weapons technology and physics doesn't mean we can discard the established canon of what these weapons are and how they generally function.
Ah, explained away by "its magical". I see...
but we can't really get away from the "facts" already established in canon, as that diverges from anything represented in the game, and becomes... a completely different topic, really.
Of course we can.
Would you like to debate 40k "plasma" as well? A scientifical joke that can only be excused by "it´s magical"?
The whole established fluff on space marines can be likened with our own medeval knights.
We see shining polished SM carrying gigantic bright banners into battle etc just as we see pics shining, oversized medeval knights on clean horses charging very small castle walls manned by gigantic crossbowmen armed that shoot bolts the size of lances.
In reality the medeval knights were battered, dirty on mud caked horses with to weak legs (historical fact, they had weak leg bones from using them to seldom...a life in the saddle does that)
charging a h gigantic castle wall manned by realistically sized crossbowmen that shoot very small bolts, oh and that supersized banner the shiny knight in the picture is always toting was thrown away a long time ago since all the rain and mud made it weigh a ton and it really hindered the knight in melee.
So how do you thing the "real" space marines are if you can be bothered to look away from GWs flawed "established fluff"?
Probably dirty, blood soaked armour, completely covered with spare ammo magazines (that allow him to stay in a firefight for days rather then waste his 30 sausage sized rounds in under a minute like in the "established" GW fluff)
and arguing really strongly with his seargent about how to assault those heretics hidden on top of that building since the marines weight would make a mockery of any stairs and that only whole concrete stairwell is probably boobytrapped.
I will point out that these soldiers in the IG are, generally, some truly burly, Rambo/Arnold Schwarzenegger-sized guys out there
Yes because it is more probable that the imperial guard uses up years and tons of resources to turn kids into rambo muscled super soldiers rather then simply having bolt weapons mounted on cheap transports that can be shot by a white shield for cheaps.
lol
No, you really don't. Occham's principle works by taking into account the existing facts, and this I fear includes those you conveniently dismiss as "GW flaws" because they don't suit your "pure logic"
No, when "facts" contradict Occham relies on logic and common sense. Thus, what is more probable.
Until you explain away the GW "Fact" that bolters are caseless and the GW pics showing bolters spewing out propellant casings I cant take your argument seriously and that is just the start of it.
You're putting the cart before the horse. What you are doing is looking at one aspect of the gun (its power) and then apply basic physics (recoil), without having actual numbers to work with and without caring about whether the end result actually "fits in" or creates a conflict.
Again, gw "fact" inconsistencies.
A marine bolter being held one handed by a normal human?
You tell me to only use established facts but yourself excuse your arguents by mercury recoil mechanisms, really stop being such a hypocrite and show me the established GW "facts" on bolter mercury recoil suppressors and what else have you made up.
Again, we follow the same rules or no rules at all, which one is it?
Sure, we can add those to bolters and simply make an assumption they are there but that means you acknowledge my assumptions not seen in the fluff as well!
My approach is looking at all aspects of the gun (power, design, weight, size and applications as well as techlevel), then take into consideration basic physics (recoil), and come up with theories how these could be combined without breaking any of the facts within the setting.
That sounds cool, lets give it a try.
First fact first:
1 bolter is quite heavy to be durable, survive fiend treatment and be useful as a club in melee.
2: Initial propellant is very powerful to give the large bolt mass enough force to be lethal at point blank.
3: This created a helluva recoil.
4: Now what? What can we put into the bolter or it´s ammo to ease the recoil to managable levels so that the weak limbed lIG eutenant can fire it as well?
There are as you say tons of modern day toys to add, do your best and we´l go from there.
but at least my straws are the ones from the books.
Make my day, try to strawgrasp-excuse the landraider to actually be able to roll across rough terrain without changing any of GWs fluff
Hear, hear. Just that studio canon isn't contradictoryin this case.
You still havent excused the bolt casing vs caseless contradictionary fluff.
What about Guilliman, the IG commander...or wait, was it the primarch, I dont know, what canon fluff and I supposed to follow again?
Lets discuss the fang, the SW super fortress shall we and how it can be breached.
Thing is do we discuss the super high mountain peek on fenris or that funny sandy french legionary alike mini bunker onto of that little mountain that is also the canon SW home fortress a little while back.
No. The recoil is from a bolt shell's initial charge - which is meant to do so much less, namely simply pushing that projectile out of the barrel with enough force so that the rocket motor can take over without affecting trajectory. Your reason is flawed. Without the rocket motor, you might have a point.
Nope, your wrong here.
The initial charge being only enough to propel it out of the barrel as you claim would leave the bolt totally harmless at point blank. In fact I would stand nekking right infront of the barrel and at most get a rib broken.
Your lack of grasp of physics is frightening. it takes time for the bolt pulse rocket to imbue it with enough velocity to be lethal and time + velocity = range.
The very same problem remains if you choose to magically lessen the mass of the bolt, the kinetic energy will remain just as low.
To be lethal at close/point range the bolt already HAS to be as fast enough as it will be after the rocket has had enough time to effect it.
If we remove the rocket the initial charge will give the bolt the same power at very close range but due to its mass and size (drag) it will very quickly loose its power (and accuracy) and here is where the rocket comes in, as it starts to rapidly loose power the rocket kicks in and keeps it up for those 300meters or whatever GW said.
With no rocket and only propellant the charge would have to be very high and the barrel very long in order to get the bolt to have killing power at long ranges. Thus the mixture of initial propellant and rocket needs to be balanced to that the bolt has equal the killing power from the moment it leaves the barrel to where it reaches it´s range limit.
Forgetting the rocket motor again.
Forgetting physics ABC again?
I think you really need to read up on guns some more, or more specifically how recoil is generated.
Aw, dont avoid the question. Please provide me an answer why a very short barrel will produce the same power as a long one if all things like mass, caliber and charge remain the same.
No, but thanks for playing. Fluff tells us that heavy bolters are "of great weight and cumbersome nature" (which, by following the laws of physics you hold so dear, would greatly reduce recoil), and that a Sister of Battle is only able to handle such equipment due to her power armour, which augments the wearer's strength.
But I suppose this must be another "GW flaw".
But...but...but gw fluff (that you hold so dearly) clearly states that sisters are subject to miracles thus I´m in the right, a sister can shoot a heavy bolter one handed since that is a miracle
Now you understand the idiocy of slavically following established GW fluff?
As far as Marine operations are concerned, Psienesis has already delivered a good explanation. Long campaigns is what the Guard is for
Not at all. Compliance was planned to be made as quickly as possible, marines went in, ruined the defenses and guard took over the time consuming mopping up that the marines were actually geneered to do best.
Marines are equipped for long duration because their most common combat doctrine often results in them getting surrounded by enemies, having to fight without support for an extended duration. What was the longest time? The 3E Codex mentioned something about 3-4 days of continuous fighting, I believe?
lol Having to fight for extended periods without support with what exactly? 30 bolt rounds? This is my ponit exactly, thankyou.
Longest I remember right now in the codex is 2 years by the way, cant imagine how long 30 bolt rounds last but if they shoot one every month they might even have some ammo left at the end of that engagement.
Again, rocket motor.
Don't make the mistake of taking TT range as absolutes.
Again, physics ABC.
I take the data from the RPG books, rouge trader, deathwatch etc, at least there is some data there while in GW fluff we only get 12 inches and 24 inches lol
Pyriel- wrote:No, when "facts" contradict Occham relies on logic and common sense. Thus, what is more probable.
What facts are contradicting here? The fact is you don't know how much kinetic energy is in a bolt weapon's discharge. You are assuming, but that doesn't make your claims any more solid. The actual facts we have (the "GWBS") paint a fairly consistent image. You just don't seem to like it.
Pyriel- wrote:Until you explain away the GW "Fact" that bolters are caseless and the GW pics showing bolters spewing out propellant casings I cant take your argument seriously and that is just the start of it.
Where exactly is bolt ammunition actually being described as caseless? I've heard that bit a lot, but have yet to see an actual source for this. In the end it's just another community myth like the impossible recoil or Marine height inflation.
But hey, it's actually fairly easy to explain it away even if it were official. Different Forgeworlds, different weapon patterns. There, problem solved.
A marine bolter being held one handed by a normal human?
Depends on the human, I'd say. Didn't the 3E Space Marine Codex describe a Chapter doing bolter drills with youngsters to see who would be a worthy recruit?
Pyriel- wrote:You tell me to only use established facts but yourself excuse your arguents by mercury recoil mechanisms, really stop being such a hypocrite and show me the established GW "facts" on bolter mercury recoil suppressors and what else have you made up.
As I said: "Blast Compensator". It's on the official cross section image. Look it up.
Pyriel- wrote:Sure, we can add those to bolters and simply make an assumption they are there but that means you acknowledge my assumptions not seen in the fluff as well!
Hey, I'm just delivering a possible explanation as to why canon facts aren't as stupid as you think. What you are doing is constructing scenarios that absolutely have to result in an unnecessary conflict. Again: Why?
We could also drop both our arguments and go back to just what the books show us. That would leave me content (as nothing changes), but you probably not.
Pyriel- wrote:That sounds cool, lets give it a try.
First fact first:
1 bolter is quite heavy to be durable, survive fiend treatment and be useful as a club in melee.
2: Initial propellant is very powerful to give the large bolt mass enough force to be lethal at point blank.
3: This created a helluva recoil.
4: Now what? What can we put into the bolter or it´s ammo to ease the recoil to managable levels so that the weak limbed lIG eutenant can fire it as well?
There are as you say tons of modern day toys to add, do your best and we´l go from there.
I've already named several components that are *missing* from an already existing gun that fires a larger and more massive projectile. Anything that can wreck an engine block at 100 meters away is surely sufficiently lethal in close combat before a bolt's rocket motor kicks in.
I'd actually consider it interesting to calculate the exact recoil (there are even programs for it!) - but at the end of the day, we are missing the numbers and have to gauge. Nothing that I have seen convinces me that a bolt's initial recoil is bigger than that of a shotgun, though I am somewhat undecided myself what the best RL comparison might be. I've chosen to stick with the Munitorum Manual's description, which - despite only being a licensed product and not true studio material - fits best to my personal interpretation, because while I would consider it entirely possible that a bolt weapon's recoil is even lower there's a part of me that simply thinks these guns should have a proper kick to them.
Pyriel- wrote:Make my day, try to strawgrasp-excuse the landraider to actually be able to roll across rough terrain without changing any of GWs fluff
Hmm, what are you referring to? I'm not that familiar with all details of Astartes fluff, focusing mainly on IG and SoB.
Pyriel- wrote:What about Guilliman, the IG commander...or wait, was it the primarch, I dont know, what canon fluff and I supposed to follow again?
Huh? Space Marines were in command of the Imperial Army during the Great Crusade. This is nothing new and not contradictory at all. It's why the Imperial Guard split in two during the Heresy.
Pyriel- wrote:Lets discuss the fang, the SW super fortress shall we and how it can be breached.
Ugh. No. SW fluff is broken, I'll admit that much.
Pyriel- wrote:Your lack of grasp of physics is frightening.
Before you throw around insults: It's not my mistake when you do not read the thread. I do not feel like reiterating every detail I have already mentioned before. You don't even have to read everything, though - my first post in this topic already mentioned that which you wanted to "lecture" me about.
Pyriel- wrote:Aw, dont avoid the question. Please provide me an answer why a very short barrel will produce the same power as a long one if all things like mass, caliber and charge remain the same.
What do you even mean with power? The bullet's power (muzzle velocity) or the gun's kick (recoil)? Of course a longer barrel makes the bullet travel faster, what I'm argueing is that you are seriously overestimating the difference in recoil. Both factors are related, but they do NOT stand in direct relation to each other.
Pyriel- wrote:But...but...but gw fluff (that you hold so dearly) clearly states that sisters are subject to miracles thus I´m in the right, a sister can shoot a heavy bolter one handed since that is a miracle Now you understand the idiocy of slavically following established GW fluff?
What? Where did a Sister fire a heavy bolter one-handed?
Pyriel- wrote:lol Having to fight for extended periods without support with what exactly? 30 bolt rounds? This is my ponit exactly, thankyou.
20-30 bolt rounds per magazine, 60 for a drum, with a Marine carrying several magazines with him. And you know, it doesn't take that much imagination to consider that a Rhino or a Drop Pod might actually include some extra ammo. An entire company being cut off doesn't mean that every Astartes has only 30 shots and then has to switch to melee, y'know. Especially since supply drops could theoretically still be made even in hostile zones.
Pyriel- wrote:Longest I remember right now in the codex is 2 years by the way, cant imagine how long 30 bolt rounds last but if they shoot one every month they might even have some ammo left at the end of that engagement.
2 years without a base or anyone bringing supplies? Source pls.
I take the data from the RPG books, rouge trader, deathwatch etc, at least there is some data there while in GW fluff we only get 12 inches and 24 inches lol
The TT numbers are made for TT game mechanics, the RPG numbers are made for RPG game mechanics. But apart from licensed products not being hard canon and the RPG suffering from some serious contradictions (both with itself as well as with GW fluff), in what way is that data "better"? It's in meters, but it's still an abstraction. Maximum range for a bolt pistol is capped at 120 meters. For the the very same projectile as the one from a boltgun, whose range is capped at 360 meters. Not to mention that a rocket propelled projectile would fly much further than that (for comparison, an M82 sniper rifle has an effective range of 1.800 meters).
Incidentally, the Fang, as a super-huge mountain, has been the canonical home of the Space Wolves since I played table-top, and that's nearly 20 years ago now.
Yes because it is more probable that the imperial guard uses up years and tons of resources to turn kids into rambo muscled super soldiers rather then simply having bolt weapons mounted on cheap transports that can be shot by a white shield for cheaps.
What resources?
"You! Soldier! Drop and give me a hundred!"
... keep doing that, every day, for months, if not years... you're going to be a burly SOB, and I don't mean a Sister of Battle. Guardsmen get very little leave time/R&R, and while in transit to the next war-front, they spend their transit time training. A soldier's life is spent in training, in preparation for the next battle. Training never, ever stops.
There's also the 40K art we have to base our understandings of the "average" Guardsman on. Take a look at the front cover of the IG Omnibus, Volume 1.
So how do you thing the "real" space marines are if you can be bothered to look away from GWs flawed "established fluff"?
Probably dirty, blood soaked armour, completely covered with spare ammo magazines (that allow him to stay in a firefight for days rather then waste his 30 sausage sized rounds in under a minute like in the "established" GW fluff)
and arguing really strongly with his seargent about how to assault those heretics hidden on top of that building since the marines weight would make a mockery of any stairs and that only whole concrete stairwell is probably boobytrapped.
There's no argument. You send the Tactical Squad forward under cover to begin drawing the attention of the defenders. When the defenders start shooting at the Tactical Squad, thus giving away their position by muzzle-flash or silhouette, the Devastator Squad opens up with the heavy weapons.
If the stairs up to the top of the wall are trapped? You send in the Assault Marines on jump-packs. Feth the stairs. If you're fighting humans or human-scaled xenos? So much the better, you can kill two or three just landing on them.
Now that the enemy forces are pressed in melee, dying in droves as a pack of nine-foot-tall giants are cleaving them limb from limb with chainsaws-on-a-stick, your Tactical Squad can provide fire support, launch magna-grapples to climb the wall, make use of their flamer or missile launcher or melta-bombs or krak grenades or what-have-you to breach the gates/walls and move in under cover from the Devastator Squad.
As far as carrying extra ammo? Yeah, it's done by mag-plates mounted on various points on the armor. They carry their boltguns in the same manner, no holsters required, though some do make use of shoulder slings, by personal peference. Just slap it against your leg, or under your arm, and it sticks there. Some Marines even have mag-plates mounted in their gloves. This way, they can, by the flick of a mental switch, reverse the polarity of the mag-plates on the armor, causing their weapon to fly off the armor and into their hands... going from unarmed to unleashing torrents of explosive, armor-piercing death in the blink of an eye. They don't carry just the one magazine. There's also storage space built into the armor on either side of the powerplant exhaust manifold on the back.
Do they get dirty and covered in blood? Sure. Warfare is not a clean endeavor, and not at all the place for people worried about the dry cleaning bill. I don't believe that SM art implies anything differently.
Also, when you're sawing xeno and heretic scum in half with a chainsaw, there's going to be a bit of splatter.
Would you like to debate 40k "plasma" as well? A scientifical joke that can only be excused by "it´s magical"?
No, because it's science fiction. It doesn't matter to me how plasma works IRL, because we're not debating RL applications. In 40K, it's a super-heated ball of energy contained within a decaying magnetic shell. When it strikes something, the magnetic shell collapses in on itself and the now-uncontained plasma charge explodes with the fury of a very small star.
Until you explain away the GW "Fact" that bolters are caseless and the GW pics showing bolters spewing out propellant casings I cant take your argument seriously and that is just the start of it.
Bolters haven't been canonically caseless in... decades, actually. When they were caseless, caseless ammunition was a new thing in the world of sci-fi, it was the brand-new shiny gee-gaw that captured the imaginations of many... so GW used the term, however incorrectly.
The fluff changes from one edition to the next. What is said in one Codex may not hold true when the same Codex comes out in a new edition. It's just the way GW works.
4: Now what? What can we put into the bolter or it´s ammo to ease the recoil to managable levels so that the weak limbed lIG eutenant can fire it as well?
There are as you say tons of modern day toys to add, do your best and we´l go from there.
A suspensor unit, for starters. These bits of wargear have made appearances in a number of sources throughout the game's history. This does not, of course, exist IRL.
Could also put springs in the stock, if you're firing the weapon from the shoulder, though this is not going to open the weapon up to being fired by small people without worry.
Barrel venting to reduce muzzle-climb. Weighted barrels for the same thing.
Electric trigger assembly to minimize trigger-pull on affecting accuracy... also reduces (however slightly) the weight of the weapon because it removes the physical components of a firing pin and related materials.
Gyro-stabilization harness for the heavy bolter.
Though, speaking of the bolt-pistol (which is what the IG looey is going to be carrying)... it's just a pistol. Modern military officers, in some armies, can select to carry a .50cal handgun instead of their normal 9mm or .45ACP side-arm (officers do not, generally speaking, carry assault weapons). The recoil is stiff... but not so much that it can't be operated by a normal human.
Incidentally, a RL tank is not at all good at smashing through obstacles. The engine power is devoted into moving it forward, not pushing the tracks over fallen trees or concrete barriers or, hell, even tree stumps of a couple of feet thick and high. If the track has to attempt to pull the 80+ ton weight of the tank up a near-vertical surface (like a fallen tree)... the tank stops moving, and the obstacle will need to be cleared by hand.
Tanks are "road clearers" in the sense that parked cars get pushed out of the way or, if they're a smaller passenger car and will fit, in one dimension or another, under the curvature of the track, flattened (bumpers are very good at sliding under tracks, shortly followed by the rest of the car... God help anyone in the car at the time). It is the rare tree that is used as a tank-trap that is less than a meter and a half in diameter, and that is too high for the track to fit over.
Tank-traps are easily built by two guys with a pair of shovels, a few bags of concrete, and a couple of hours to kill.
However, it makes great dramatic imagery in a sci-fi action setting to have tanks crushing everything before them under their tracks and smashing through walls and buildings, burning down women, kids, houses and villages and creating a nuisance at every turn because, well, it just looks cool.
But...but...but gw fluff (that you hold so dearly) clearly states that sisters are subject to miracles thus I´m in the right, a sister can shoot a heavy bolter one handed since that is a miracle
Not even Space Marines fire a heavy bolter in one hand. Could a Sister of Battle, under the effects of a miracle provided by the God-Emperor, fire a heavy bolter in one hand? Sure... but don't hold your breath waiting for it to happen. Without the miracle taking place, she's going to need to be in her power armor... or be some Amazonian Feral Worlder that could snap normal men like twigs.
Not really sure what your point is with the statement, since you're requiring the application of a Miracle in order to allow the Sister to do this. It's a miracle, Jim... anything can happen. She might, under a miracle granted by the Emperor, pick up two CRASSUS ARMORED ASSAULT TRANSPORTS, one in each hand, and proceed to beat the ass of a Daemon Prince like a set of bongos. That doesn't mean that this is a normal occurrence or anything short of, well, a miracle.
Miracles defy all scientific and rational explanation, yet they happen anyway. This is why they call them miracles.
It's also important to remember that this setting is a sci-fi game written by a bunch of sci-fi geeks, not engineers, scientists, physicists or anything of the sort. It's meant to look and sound cool, first and foremost, and if it also matches real science? That's a bonus, not a design feature.
"The fluff changes from one edition to the next. What is said in one Codex may not hold true when the same Codex comes out in a new edition. It's just the way GW works. "
And therein lies the problem. What I feel is the root of the canon - Ian Watson's Space Marine - isn't even considered canon any more! What we've got here is constantly evolving science fiction, some of it based on very poorly thought-out principles, some of it never explained at all, and we're all trying to apply RL values to it.
Melissia wrote:So here goes, finally found a source, while going through Dark Heresy's stuff to add something new to a roleplay.
From the Inquisitor's Handbook, page 173:
"Indeed a human trying to fire such a weapon [Astartes Bolt weapon of some sort) would likely suffer recoil of such strength that it would rip their arm out of their sockets."
I believe that they were talking about Godwyn ( and Stalker) pattern bolters, there are lower power bolters in existence which are used by officers frequently...
Similar to BL novels, BI's and FFG's interpretation of the setting often goes against details of established GW canon, the invention of two weapon classes ("civilian" and "Astartes") being amongst the major differences. This thread is about the setting as promulgated by GW, though, whose own RPG (Inquisitor) had Marines use the very same guns as everyone else. Not to mention what's said in the WH Codex.
Lynata wrote:the invention of two weapon classes ("civilian" and "Astartes") being amongst the major differences.
There's no invention. It's always been such that there's many, many patterns of boltguns.
Get it out of your head that all Imperial equipment is the same. The existence of wide varieties of patterns of equipment is older than the date in which you were first interested interest in 40k
Different patterns, but all being usable by everyone. The Inquisitor RPG - which was really produced by GW themselves - did not make this distinction between Astartes and normal humans, and I've never seen any other studio material that would say otherwise either. So it's an invention. That also happens to contradict the WH Codex line about SoB guns being equal to Marine ones.
But it's probably really, really the best if the two of us do not get into an argument about the validity of FFG's RPG, for neither of us will back down on this.
So just a quick note which has, multiple times, been mentioned, but again, just a quick physics thing.
As the bolt round is self propelled, it is feasible that, given an efficient propulsion system, the bolt round could ignite its second stage of boosters outside of the barrel, drastically reducing recoil. And let us not forget that given current advances in plastics and firing mechanisms, much of the energy outputted from some weapons can be absorbed by gun (though this is moot, as the force needed to 'merely' eject the bolt from its barrel [i.e. only taking it to the end of the barrel] does not have to be very powerful.) As well, such an ignition could have no feasible loss in effectiveness at close range, as this factor would only depend on how fast the bolt-round accelerates via its 'post-barrel-accelerator'. It is, in fact, even possible that the bolt round, upon being ejected from the barrel, could have an initial burst (a charge for fast acceleration) followed by a continuous, low energy propulsion source capable of keeping the bolter moving, while simultaneously being used to counter air-friction.
Either way: no need for the bolter (via physics) to have an incredibly powerful recoil. Maybe it does, but that, then is only a matter of what is considered canon.
Yes there is. Because it needs to be lethal at point blank range. If the boltgun cannot achieve a velocity needed to penetrate flak armor, it won't do anything against the guardsmen except toss him around and maybe break a few ribs (flak armor is specifically designed to protect against blasts-- a bolter shell exploding OUTSIDE the armor would be working towards Flak Armor's strengths, which is why bolter shells penetrate and THEN explode).
Well first a clarification then a question:
Clarification: A single explosion outside of a bolter's barrel, if directed by a secondary casing, could easily accelerate a bolt to the max velocity (of extremely close to max velocity). The explosion is not the explosive shell, but rather an acceleration burst. In fact, the explosion could happen in the perforated area at the end of the barrel, as is seen in the miniatures themselves, which would help to reduce any shockwaves from said acceleration burst. This could then still launch the bolt into a target at roughly point blank range with near maximum velocity (not to mention the addition of superheated gasses being ejected from the barrel)
The question I have, though, is, given the abrupt push to max velocity from the initial burst near (or post) the barrel, why this would diminish combat effectiveness. In fact, as long as the bolter is pushed to high velocity from this burst, the shell would have the penetrative force at pointblank range roughly equaling that at are further distance
Because it still needs to actually penetrate the armor, which is capable of providing some protection even against standard bullets which are specifically designed to be armor-piercing.
Seriously, flak armor isn't as bad as people make it out to be.
And why would the Imperium need to include recoil-reducing features in an Astartes boltgun? Even outside of power armor Marines are capable of wielding cannons that any normal human would have to use a tripod to wield. In power armor they're autostabilized...
Again the clarification comes forward. Recoil or no, if an initial burst caused the round to reach near max velocity in an extremely short period of time (hundredths or thousandths of a second), there is no major effect on combat effectiveness or armor piercing capabilities.
It just seems more logical to use a system like that, especially given the design of the bolter on the models.
Whether the lore disagrees is another issue, but based on observation, an immediate-post barrel burst makes sense. it does not diminish effectiveness at close or long range (and also seems to match the picture on the from of the SM codex, where a blast field similar to a post-barrel burst (occuring within the perforated end of the bolter) seems to be depicted.
Botten3 wrote:I could see a bolter ripping arms off normal men, the guns designed for superhuman genitically enhanced warriors!
Actually, I think that bolters - just like power armour - have been in use before the Space Marines were even invented (see the so-called techno-barbarians in the time before the Emperor had conquered all of Earth). The very fact that Space Marines, even their non-powerarmoured Scouts, also utilize a much bigger version of the bolter - the heavy bolter - already establishes that a boltgun is obviously not requiring the peak of a Marine's strength. Further, all available studio sources continuously mention weight and cumbersome nature to be the problems faced by most people employing bolt weaponry, but never recoil. The latter quite simply seems to be made up by some people and is not backed up by any material published by GW.
Ah, also I've just found this in the Wargear book:
"The bolt contains an armour-piercing tip, an explosive and a mass-reactive detonator. It is shot from the barrel under low velocity, its own propellant igniting once the missile is clear of the barrel."
Basic physics tells us that lower velocity means less recoil. Additionally, a bolt weapon's massive weight would decrease recoil further, as larger mass requires more kinetic energy to be moved.
I'd imagine it works something like this puppy does. The conversion from mm to caliber puts it at like .98 or somewhere around there, I believe... I don't have any of the fluff in front of me but that sounds close enough. Instead of being airbursting though it bursts after penetration.
Yeah, bolt pistol and boltgun rounds are cal .75 (19mm), whereas the heavy bolter is cal 1.00 (25mm).
Of course, a bolt missile still has to accelerate the projectile to sufficient speed as to punch through armour, but this does not seem to be a problem in the setting. The combined effect of the initial propellant and the rocket motor appears to be enough.]
The problem with Lexicanum is that it treats non-studio information just as "canonical" as the stuff coming directly from GW, which is plain wrong and contradicted by comments from the people who are actually working for either GW and/or BL.
There is also non-studio material suggesting that the bolters are exactly the same (such as the Munitorum Manual), so for Lexicanum it depends on who enters what information from what source. Doesn't change the contradictions, though, or that this is quite simply not necessarily how it works as per GW, where such differences have been entirely absent since over 20 years.
Andy Hoare wrote:It all stems from the assumption that there’s a binding contract between author and reader to adhere to some nonexistent subjective construct or ‘true’ representation of the setting. There is no such contract, and no such objective truth.
KamikazeCanuck wrote:I think DH makes a distinction too.
That's what I mean - and that RPG is probably the reason for why a growing number (the ones who think that everything the franchise is churning out is "canon") is coming to accept it as a fact. Regardless of whether it makes sense or not.
If you're going by DH, the Sisters Militant don't even get the "real" bolters that whoever wrote that line into Lexicanum would grant them but rather "civilian" ones. Which goes against both the codex material as well as the fact that they do occasionally fight Astartes which are nigh-invulnerable against these "civilian" weapons. Which is a (bad) joke in itself, though that's more of a balancing issue rather than a fluff one.
They have, but a pattern does not make an entirely new category. When you go by GW material, their weapons are equal. If you go by DH, they're very clearly not.
Matt.Kingsley wrote:Wait, Battle Sisters are normal humans, just very devoted AND their power armour isn't the same as the SM version
And why would it be? A human couldn't even fit in a Marine's power armor.
KamikazeCanuck wrote:I think Sisters have their own pattern of Bolter.
They do, the Godwyn-Deaz pattern boltgun. There's many other patterns of boltguns, which are designed for "civilian" purposes (mostly nobles, bounty hunters, enforcers/arbites, etc).
Well, an astartes couldn't use a regular human sized bolter just based on the fact that they are 1.5 times the size of a human... I mean, with his armored gauntlets his fingers couldn't fit inside the trigger guard.
How could it ever be a two-handed weapon for them, if they were the same size as normal human sized bolters?
Evocatus wrote:How could it ever be a two-handed weapon for them, if they were the same size as normal human sized bolters?
The mistake that some people - including BL and FFG writers - make, is that size doesn't change anything about the caliber or ammunition size/composition/efficiency. When you look at the cross section GW made, there's much more stuff you can fit into the casing aside from the basic weapon mechanism - examples include integrated autorepair or a sensor that makes sure only the real owner can use the gun. In addition to this, I seem to recall reading somewhere that the Astartes slap a bit of armour around the weapon and even the magazine to guard it against the increased physical stress of Astartes combat (read: using the gun as a club or busting through a wall).
That said, size differences between Astartes- and non-Astartes-patterns would probably be negligible either way. First off, there are normal people who can grow as tall as a Marine, and the short ones will likely lack the strength to comfortably carry such a weapon in the first place - so the only ones running around with this gun will be the people who either employ power armour or bionics, or those who are strong enough by nature or mutation. Anyone else would be better off with a bolt pistol, which will still look massive and weigh a lot, but should be more bearable. And the massive look is probably one of the factors that make some individuals opt for using one such weapon in the first place, so ... working as intended.
GW's own Inquisitor RPG had Marines and non-Marines use the same bolter profile, too, by the way. DH on the other hand simply works by the principle of artistic license - be it with its Vindicare Assassins now being permanently attached to an Inquisitor's retinue rather than having every single mission ordered by the High Lord, or by its Deathwatch no longer being a part of the Inquisition, or by its invention of a split between "civilian" and Astartes bolters / plasma guns / flamethrowers etc. All of these deviations from studio material have very likely been made for playability or balancing reasons, for I suppose it would look strange if a Marine would cause more damage by throwing a rock than shooting his bolter. To me, this rather suggests that the Marines' stats (or rather the broken Unnatural traits in general) should be revisited, but I'm just a player, so ...
Don't get me wrong, I love the RPG for its basic ruleset and have great fun playing it, but it breaks codex fluff on more occasions than a Titan has bolts (yes, I may be exaggerating, sue me ).
Which is why you'll have to look elsewhere for an answer, nomotog.
The gun may be bigger, but it also likely has fewer recoil-reducing features, in order to make the weapon simpler and more robust. Similarly, the ammunition is also different in standard Astartes boltguns, doing slightly more damage than non-Astartes versions despite being the same caliber (.75 cal/19mm). They very likely have more kick or a longer, heavier shell (similar to magnum rounds) which would also influence recoil.
Course, this doesn't do enough to explain the weight difference-- the Godwyn pattern boltgun is ~18kg in weight, while the "civilian" version (though owned mostly by those whom are relatively well off due to the expense of obtaining ammunition-- it costs more to fill a boltgun's magazine than it does to supply a squad of guard infantry with two lasgun packs per guardsman) weighs ~7kg.
And yes, Lynata, I know you don't consider Dark Heresy canon. Given that we have no other source that really talks about weight and cost of weapons.... I don't care. Don't even bother responding.
Melissia wrote:slightly more damage than non-Astartes versions
Heh, "slightly". They'd easily be S5 in the TT.
Well, either that or the "civilian" bolters would be S3 - given that there's just a 2 point difference from the lasgun.
Melissia wrote:And yes, Lynata, I know you don't consider Dark Heresy canon. Given that we have no other source that really talks about weight and cost of weapons.... I don't care. Don't even bother responding.
Well, the Inquisitor RPG includes a weight value, and it is equal for the bolter regardless of to whom it is issued. *shrugs*
I know by now that you dislike having your argument challenged, but I feel it necessary to "bother" and point out that some of your points are in violation to GW studio material so other people can make up their own minds on this controversy by analyzing both our arguments. What's confusing me even more is that you insist on accepting this RPG's nerf to the Sisters as "canonical", though. I thought you of all people would protest this.
I don't see why a normal person would be bothered by the recoil of a 19mm low recoil weapon considering that soldiers happily fire 40mm grenade launchers.
Melissia wrote:Which is why you'll have to look elsewhere for an answer, nomotog.
The gun may be bigger, but it also likely has fewer recoil-reducing features, in order to make the weapon simpler and more robust. Similarly, the ammunition is also different in standard Astartes boltguns, doing slightly more damage than non-Astartes versions despite being the same caliber (.75 cal/19mm). They very likely have more kick or a longer, heavier shell (similar to magnum rounds) which would also influence recoil.
Course, this doesn't do enough to explain the weight difference-- the Godwyn pattern boltgun is ~18kg in weight, while the "civilian" version (though owned mostly by those whom are relatively well off due to the expense of obtaining ammunition-- it costs more to fill a boltgun's magazine than it does to supply a squad of guard infantry with two lasgun packs per guardsman) weighs ~7kg.
And yes, Lynata, I know you don't consider Dark Heresy canon. Given that we have no other source that really talks about weight and cost of weapons.... I don't care. Don't even bother responding.
That would make the marine boltgun less advance then a normal bolt gun. It's probably just that the ammo is more powerful. Though the gun is also twice as heavy. That means that the ammo would need to be something like 4 times as powerful to go from usability to rip your arm off. (not real math)
Kilkrazy wrote:Does it not shoot low velocity bullets that are sped up by a rocket after leaving the barrel?
Correct, it does not. Because then it'd be unable to penetrate flak armor at close range.
It shoots HIGH velocity shells, which then ignite the rocket fuel after leaving the barrel to maintain speed and heading over distance.
Except that GW's Wargear book very clearly states that the projectile is shot at, and I quote, "low velocity".
Perhaps we should accept that this is a sci-fi setting, where a miniature rocket motor apparently is powerful enough to accelerate a projectile to superior speed in a split-second because of technobabble.
Kilkrazy wrote:Does it not shoot low velocity bullets that are sped up by a rocket after leaving the barrel?
Correct, it does not. Because then it'd be unable to penetrate flak armor at close range.
It shoots HIGH velocity shells, which then ignite the rocket fuel after leaving the barrel to maintain speed and heading over distance.
Except that GW's Wargear book very clearly states that the projectile is shot at, and I quote, "low velocity".
Perhaps we should accept that this is a sci-fi setting, where a miniature rocket motor apparently is powerful enough to accelerate a projectile to superior speed in a split-second because of technobabble.
Well, the closest we have in the real world was the Gyrojet, and that left "the barrel with low energy, and accelerates until the fuel is exhausted at about 60 feet (20 m), at which point the rocket has a velocity of about 1250 feet per second (FPS), slightly greater than Mach one". That's within 60 feet!
The point is that bolt rounds are high velocity shells after they have left the barrel, not before - bolt guns are intended to be low recoil weapons, otherwise why bother having the round rocket-propelled? If recoil wasn't a problem you'd just make it a bloody great conventional round and sod any puny human who tries to fire it.
farmersboy wrote:Ah, that depends on which canon you're going by...
The recent canon, not the ancient stuff which has long since been superceded.
If I wanted to use ancient stuff, I'd go around saying Space Marines are afraid of Sisters of Battle who go around casually killing off Space Marine chapters that prove disloyal.
If we're going to go that route, then it doesn't matter whether or not they fire cased, caseless, gyrojet, autocannon or mini-Terminators with hand grenades, as there is no "canonical" answer... if we're assuming that "everything is canon".
I'm aware that those comments aren't exactly common knowledge - half a year ago I was going by the "it's all canon" assumption myself. Yet that cannot be true when one book says something and another says the opposite (Aaron's blog was quite enlightening on this), so I went hunting for actual citations.
The "it's all canon" thing is, in my opinion, just as much hearsay as half the fans claiming Marines are 8+ feet (despite Jes Goodwin saying otherwise) or the BA having gotten their full book just "a few months" after the WD 'dex.
Bottom line, when even Andy Hoare - who is currently writing for FFG, if I may add - says that that "there's no obligation to adhere to a 'true' representation of the setting", then that pretty much negates those products' value as reliable sources of information for a uniform representation of the setting.
Yep, that's the thing... we can only go with "canon" established by latest-edition-of-something-related-to-the-topic, but that can have it's own problems.
What happens when two books, identical edition, print conflicting information? Is the pub date of the book the trump card? That seems, to me, to make the most sense, though given the way GW publishes books, might not be entirely accurate.
I would pass it off to "maybe in your world..." explanations, as different GMs/Refs/Players/Groups are going to have different interpretations of rules and fluff.
Psienesis wrote:If we're going to go that route, then it doesn't matter whether or not they fire cased, caseless, gyrojet, autocannon or mini-Terminators with hand grenades, as there is no "canonical" answer... if we're assuming that "everything is canon".
Only if you can find a recent example of them firing mini-terminators with hand grenades.....
Overall I think people sometimes have the wrong attitude about canonicity. 40K is an expansive enough universe were almost anything is possible. We should be thinking about about ways how it is possible for things to work rather than how they contradict (much of which is blown out of propartion) anyway.
Quite so - which is why I personally like to come up with "excuses" on how things can be made to fit. Actually, judging from the comments of Andy Hoare, Aaron Dembski-Bowden and Gav Thorpe or that interview with George Mann, that degree of freedom and artistic license is quite appreciated.
Andy Hoare wrote:I understand that Tolkien took decades developing his setting before publishing the stories set within it, and still made mistooks. 40k is an ever-evolving setting designed first and foremost to house a really cool game, and as such things don’t always mesh or translate, or they (actually very occasionally) get changed outright. I know which I’d rather be reading and writing
Aaron Dembski-Bowden wrote:Within the possibility of endless interpretation lies the potential for freedom. What matters is respecting the source material, contributing to it, and sticking to the theme. And that ties right back into my first column, because no matter who’s writing the details, 40K has some unalterable themes, etched in the stoniest of stone. They’re the key. They’re what matter most.
Get the atmosphere right, and you’re halfway there.
I admit I'd still wish for a stricter "control" over the setting and for a more "solid" background, but I can see the points of these authors, too.
What is a problem, of course, is when some of these interpretations outright clash with the aforementioned "unalterable themes" - and, personally, I feel this is the case with DH's treatment of bolt weaponry. Be it because they are far more prevalent there than GW fluff makes it sound like, or because the Sisters get robbed of the equipment equality that was mentioned time and again throughout the years in the studio material.
I wish for tighter editrial control too. And I'm going to assume Andy Hoare purposely misspelled mistake there
Anyways, the bolter thing is not one of these issues. It makes no sense that Astartes would use the same bolters as people. Their fingers wouldn't even fit in the trigger guard. It simply makes sense that humans would have guns made ergonomically for them and Astartes for them.
KamikazeCanuck wrote:It simply makes sense that humans would have guns made ergonomically for them and Astartes for them.
Absolutely. I'm "just" complaining about the supposed (going by some of the licensed sources) inequality in terms of efficiency, given that GW material specifically pointed out that the weapons of Astartes and Sororitas are equal.
I'd also expect most if not all Astartes patterns to be somewhat larger (though not by much, given that size differences are not as pronounced as often assumed - see the earlier remark about Marine heights) and sport the aforementioned additional armour and/or contain a few gadgets that are not present in the basic models.
You know, like the WH Codex pointed out the differences between Marine and Sororitas power armour: same armoured protection, but Astartes get more tools.
In DH, anyway, the Deathwatch standard-issue boltgun is leagues superior to the standard-issue Godwyn-pattern boltgun the Sisters carry.
The DWSM from DH are, basically, Fluff-Marines made playable characters. Yes, you can play a Sister, too, and get some really nifty abilities (not just the Faith-based powers, but just regular talents and such)... a Sister is no match for a Space Marine in any reasonable manner, and under no "regular" combat scenario would ever be able to defeat a Marine, unless we're talking Canoness vs scrub-Marine... and even then, it will be a hell of a battle.
Maybe if the Marine were naked, and asleep, and the Sister in a sound-silencing cone, with a battleship strapped to her arm... then, maybe...
That said, with the canonicity as fluid as it apparently is... well, we can have Chaos BTs, Daemon Prince GKs, Termies doing kung-fu backflips, and Sisters throwing themselves onto the chainswords of passing Space Marines... with no one really being able to say anything about it, outside of personal opinion.
KamikazeCanuck wrote:I see. Surely, we are not talking about that big of a difference? Couldn't it simply be attributed to a higher muzzle velocity on a bigger gun?
Ruleswise, the difference in FFG's RPG is about 33% of raw damage. On average, a "civilian" bolter would do ~10 damage, the Astartes one would do ~15. Just for a fun comparison, lasguns do ~8, which means the civilian bolters are closer to las weapons than the bling the Astartes get tossed, at least in terms of raw damage (there are still differences in armour penetration, should the target wear armour).
The civilian bolter profile gives us a peak damage of 15 damage with a penetration of 5, totaling 20 damage against a target wearing power armour. Unfortunately, the broken Unnatural toughness and the superior armour of a Marine makes him pretty much invulnerable to this, so unless you're rolling a 10 and do a critical hit, you can't even wound one, bolter or no. That would pretty much negate the Sororitas' ability to engage rogue Marine Chapters, which has been part of their job description for years.
Those are just balancing issues preventing proper crossover games, though. A larger problem is that this disparity is also deeply rooted in the game's fluff, specifically in certain texts of the DH and DW core rulebooks establishing that Marine equipment is >>> anyone else, regardless of whether you're a Lord Inquisitor, a senior Mechanicus Tech-Priest or the Prioress of Ophelia VII. Which clearly contradicts what GW themselves have written on the subject.
The cause of this is likely a general problem within the game system in that characteristics advances can be gained too fast, forcing Astartes into even higher levels to maintain a difference, and in the so-called Unnatural traits simply doubling one such characteristic, which makes for a pretty steep progression and results in naked Space Marines being tougher than the armour they wear.
It may also be certain authors' influence on the game's development, though, for Dan Abnett is notorious for making his Marines much larger than Jes Goodwin had originally defined them. It could well be that this played a part, too.
As far as muzzle velocity is concerned, according to GW the projectiles get shot at low velocity and only "speed up" after they left the barrel by using their rocket motors. The caliber remains the same, too, and we have official images of how a Marine bolt projectile looks like, and they are quite short in general (so you can't really go and say that Marine bolts are simply twice as long or some such stuff, because then everyone else would shoot balls).
Why does this canon, non-canon thing come up so often? I'm fairly certain that we all agree that codices and the like take precedence. Black Library books simple offer a lot more in-depth information, so they're useful for discussions about our games of toy-soldiers. It's getting to the point that I'm considering ignoring anything to do with the argument and continuing to use from Black Library regardless.
Because 2 BL sources can differ on a point or topic not covered by the Codex.
At that point, who's to say which side is "correct"?
Based on what I read in a BL novel, Space Marines have pinky fingers the same size and shape of a police baton, the AdMech churns out brand-new Titans every year, and a frigate-class starship can be piloted by under 100 people.
Psienesis wrote:The DWSM from DH are, basically, Fluff-Marines made playable characters.
Actually the Deathwatch player characters start off as veterans, as generally only veterans are forwarded to the deathwatch. But a DH character of the same XP level would very likely be more talented in combat, while the marine would have better stats and biology. The Marine char and the DH char would have similar WS/BS stats most of the time-- Marines start of higher, but their stat increases cost more, and DH characters have more stat increases to purchase (most of which are quite a bit cheaper).
The Marine char and the DH char would have similar WS/BS stats most of the time
Maybe so, but a DH character of the same Rank isn't going to have Unnatural Strength, Unnatural Toughness, a dozen implanted biological systems, access to Astartes-class Power Armor and Weapons, or the Cohesion rating. Shoot, there is some DW gear that DH characters simply *cannot* get, regardless of Rank, if you're going strictly by-the-book.
Lynata wrote:The cause of this is likely a general problem within the game system in that characteristics advances can be gained too fast, forcing Astartes into even higher levels to maintain a difference, and in the so-called Unnatural traits simply doubling one such characteristic, which makes for a pretty steep progression and results in naked Space Marines being tougher than the armour they wear
This has been a failing of the Warhammer RPG franchise since the very beginning. At least, in this format, stats only advance by 5 points per purchase, and not 10, like they did in WHFRPG! The skin of a naked dwarf provided more defense than a suit of the stoutest platemail in the Empire!
Personally, I wish they would go with something like R.Talsorian's Cyberpunk 2020 combat system. In that system, everyone had 40 "hit points", every 4 points moved you along a track rating a general sense of how wounded you were (Light, Serious, Critical, etc), once you had about 13+ points of damage, you were in danger of dying, and only the toughest of the tough could survive a "Mortal 5" wound (30+ damage, give or take).
Armor and an equivalent to the Toughness Bonus reduced damage as it does in DH, but you relied far more on your armor than you did on being a tough guy (or gal.).
In all honesty? DH should either double the AP of all armor sets and triple the dice-range of damage from weapons, or limit the TB to half the Toughness score, divided by 10. So, for example, a Toughness 65 character has a TB of 6, but under my system, it would be 3.
This keeps armor important (as the big stuff is providing you with AP you cannot really hope to meet) while still providing benefit to the really big guys (AdMech with far more ranks in The Flesh is Weak than is healthy, Ogryn, juiced-up IG...)as well as those with the Unnatural attribute talents, which would otherwise maintain their current effects (so that TB 3 becomes TB 6 again with Unnatural Toughness x2).
Psienesis wrote:Shoot, there is some DW gear that DH characters simply *cannot* get, regardless of Rank, if you're going strictly by-the-book.
I suppose the majority of DW gear would be inaccessible due to the "Astartes" tag.
That's another miffy thing - the game doesn't even give you the chance to possibly grow strong enough like, say, a Sergeant Harker, it just says flat out no, no matter your actual characteristics. The puny Strength 20 Hive Noble has no issue whatsoever pewpewing about with his civilian bolter, but the Strength 60+ Catachan brute can't touch a Marine's pistol without that beast feeling like a fridge for him. If you put the guy into power armour, he might even surpass an unarmoured Marine Scout's Strength (if the latter rolled crappy during creation), and still he wouldn't be able to use that Scout's gun properly. The system just doesn't much sense even by itself in this regard.
I get that the game was going for bolters being more common as they are a signature weapon, but I think one single category and a general Strength requirement (like the 40+ on the Sacristan) would have been the better way. But that's just me.
Lynata wrote:Personally, I wish they would go with something like R.Talsorian's Cyberpunk 2020 combat system. In that system, everyone had 40 "hit points", every 4 points moved you along a track rating a general sense of how wounded you were (Light, Serious, Critical, etc), once you had about 13+ points of damage, you were in danger of dying, and only the toughest of the tough could survive a "Mortal 5" wound (30+ damage, give or take).
Hmm, that's sort of like the Inquisitor RPG handled it, just that these stats were based on the character's Toughness - meaning they basically replaced traditional hitpoints in that surpassing one's Toughness (after armour) meant an automatic injury level. This is also an interesting way to simulate how a superior physiology would affect a game, whilst the absence of hitpoints meant injuries were more common if the character would just get shot at enough.
That anecdote from WFRP sounds bad, though.
In general, I think you're on to something about halving TB. Toughness already starts to become a problem as soon as people put on Carapace and become resistant to lasgun fire, but with Marines and their x2 bonus they just go into invul mode.
In a way, I think they didn't properly "map out" the individual character types' stats at the beginning of the game and just went building it up "on the go" - though this could also be the result of the developer team having changed during the transition from BI to FFG. Quite a number of people have noticed a "power creep" after that, and it is probably worth pointing out that the first Marine stats in the BI books gave them 2d10+0 bolters and AP8 armour, which was rather close to what other player characters used. The push to godmode did not come until DW, though the fluff texts already paved the way for them.
Anyways, if you look at the DH core rulebook, there's that neat little table outlining rough comparisons for characteristics between 1 and 100. And I think the system should have stuck with those and a 100 as an upper limit - making humans go from, say, 20 to 40 and Marines from 40 to 60, without any Unnatural traits as an additional bonus beyond this already higher range. A smaller progression means that the gap between characters will be somewhat smaller, too, which might actually open the doors for some proper crossovers like they happen in the fluff. In a way, I guess the end result would be similar to your half TB.
Err, but I guess we are digressing much from the original topic. By now it's pretty much just "what if" talk, anyways.
Psienesis wrote:Maybe so, but a DH character of the same Rank isn't going to have Unnatural Strength, Unnatural Toughness, a dozen implanted biological systems, access to Astartes-class Power Armor and Weapons, or the Cohesion rating. Shoot, there is some DW gear that DH characters simply *cannot* get, regardless of Rank, if you're going strictly by-the-book.
Go check the FAQed DW weapons.
Regardless, more likely than not, the DH characters will also have more talents and skills than the Astartes characters.
I'm not doubting that the Astartes are excellent combat characters, but they ARE rarely useful outside of combat, and humans CAN outdo them in terms of raw skill (and certainly primaris psykers can outdo librarians in terms of having more useful powers).
I imagine a normal human firing a bolter being something similar to this with the addition that once the round leaves the barrel it is further propelled by an additional ignition to target.
Still conjures comical images though... imagine this being full auto... lol!
Melissia wrote:This doesn't really make much logical sense to me-- a bigger, more reinforced weapon should have LESS recoil, rather than more-- but there it is.
I know absolutely nothing about guns and I would initially assume that bigger guns have more recoil. Especially since what experience I do have comes from Hollywood movies where the slow motion shots show a large weapon chugging away kicking back with each shot fired!
Also, limited science knowledge tells me the bigger and faster a projectile is fired, the more recoil a weapon would have. This comes from knowing absolutely nothing about how recoil dampers (or whatever the real term is) work!
Also, creators are artistic types who care less about everything being totally realistic, then us collectors do. We have fundamentally different mindsets!
PrometheusZero wrote:I know absolutely nothing about guns and I would initially assume that bigger guns have more recoil.
Only if the projectile size and the kinetic energy discharged upon shooting are similarly increased. Otherwise, a bigger gun will just lead to more weight, which actually lowers recoil - because the more weight there is, the more kinetic energy would be required to move it.
A funny thing about boltguns is that they look absolutely ginormous, yet still shoot "only" 19mm projectiles (regardless of who uses them). We've got rifles that shoot bigger slugs in real life, with apparently considerably more power than the low-velocity bolter whose ammunition relies on an internal rocket motor to deliver the punch required to penetrate armour.
PrometheusZero wrote:Also, creators are artistic types who care less about everything being totally realistic, then us collectors do. We have fundamentally different mindsets!
Absolutely. But in the end, I think I'm fine with what they have come up with. It's "realistical" enough to not sound like complete groxshit, when we keep in mind this is still a sci-fi setting.
Lynata wrote:Only if the projectile size and the kinetic energy discharged upon shooting are similarly increased. Otherwise, a bigger gun will just lead to more weight, which actually lowers recoil - because the more weight there is, the more kinetic energy would be required to move it.
Ahh, of course! That does make sense! Although a large mass gun wouldn't recoil as fast but the momentum (now is that one 'mass times velocity' or 'half mass times velocity squared, can never remember) would still be big! I'm thinking of the 'ripping your arm off' thing here. How much force can an arm withstand?
Ugh.
I'm going nowhere with this! I just cant remember/dont know enough!
PrometheusZero wrote:Although a large mass gun wouldn't recoil as fast but the momentum would still be big! I'm thinking of the 'ripping your arm off' thing here. How much force can an arm withstand?
True about the momentum, though the momentum is, as you say, dependant on the velocity as well. And of course a heavier gun would require more kinetic energy to be moved at all - the weight would basically affect both the user's ability to deal with recoil as well as the projectile's ability to "generate" it in the first place.
A common way of recoil compensation is adding weights to a rifle barrel, by the way!
As far as "ripping off an arm" goes ... I'm not sure this is actually possible. If there was ever a gun that would create as much force, it'd probably just fly away. Unless your arm gets entangled with it. Worst case it could probably take your trigger finger off.
PrometheusZero wrote:I'm going nowhere with this! I just cant remember/dont know enough!
Tis okay, I don't think any of us is a physics professor. The internets have a lot of professional discussions about recoil and what affects it in what way, though - I read up on a lot of them before posting here to make sure my perception doesn't clash with real life physics. It's actually rather interesting stuff ... well, sort of!
The problem with the momentum aspects of the "arm ripping" equation is that the boltgun is, at the outset, "at rest". That is to say, it's not moving, until the round ignites and pushes back against the weapon as it travels down the barrel. In order for it to tear your arm off, this push will have to be enough to overcome the weapon's inertia and then also provide enough push to accelerate the weapon to such speeds that it applies enough force to tear your arm off.
This is an unlikely event for any weapon that is in any way, shape or form considered man-portable.
Perhaps the stock folds inside the weapon. There's enough room for it. The reason for a stock is to help with a solid aiming stance, not just for recoil. SMs wouldn't worry about that, because they are perfect.
We should all bear in mind that 40K isn't science fiction, it's science fantasy. There is no more than a vague pretence at realism in the science. "Rule of Cool" is the important factor.
Likewise the "canon" is not meant to be taken seriously. GW themselves describe it as a mixture of history, half-truths, propaganda, lies and legend. In such an background, it means nothing if sources contradict each other.
Kilkrazy wrote:The reason for a stock is to help with a solid aiming stance, not just for recoil.
Indeed, but it'd probably one of the first things one would put on a gun if there's a problem holding it steady whilst firing.
You raise a good point regarding the seriousness of the setting, though. That's also the impression I've gotten from quite a large number of writers and designers or the prevalence of tongue-in-cheek humour in official material. It's not as "bad" as during the days of Rogue Trader, but just this week I've spotted a "Mung Vase" amidst the list of valuable items in the Necromunda rulebook. For what it's worth, the community seems to completely miss the point in that people look for consistency even in places where none is intended to exist. I did the same, for years. It just seems to be one of those unwritten laws that people who like the style of a given setting will invariably strive to know more about it, and in the course of this journey look for rules to hold on to.
Heh, I'm even still doing so, having merely dismissed the licensed products from my recognition.
Given the loose handling of consistency and the continueing retcons, I've almost reached a point where I must ask myself if there is any "canon" at all to the setting, or if it is not rather so that the current studio material merely serves as an indicator regarding the direction where the franchise and its style is moving. This is something I have not yet cast judgment on for myself, though I have a feeling that I - as a fan who greatly enjoys a uniform continuity - would not like the answer.
For the moment I am merely irritated at certain outsourced products trying to override core facets of the setting that have remained inviolate in studio material for decades. Or rather the acceptance this movement finds amongst members of the community - especially in the face of certain comments and citations from people who have either worked on said products directly, or were involved in similar projects of the franchise.
Hmm but scouts i think are about size of a regular humen and they can fire bolters properly.... or are scouts enhanced? Lol i dont know that much spass marines fluff
Scouts are Space Marines minus a Black Carapace implant. They get that before becoming full Battle Brothers. Prior to and during the implantation process, they're still Initiates (or whatever alternate name the Chapter uses) and are more-or-less as human as any other teenager... at least for awhile.
Scouts are about as strong as a full Astartes, except that the yaren't wearing power armor. But power armor alone isn't enough to raise someone's strength category in tabletop, as humans in power armor also don't get a strength increase.
Psienesis: There are many other implants, drugs, hormones, chemicals, and whatever other slop they're fed and injected and suppository'd to make them a Space Marin.e The only thing scouts are missing is power armor and maybe black carapace.
Aye, the only potentially important thing they'd miss for a comparison would be the additional strength from power armour servos, which they don't get to wear until becoming fully-fledged Battle Brothers.
That said, I also remember a fluff bit where an Apothecary reported on his Chapter letting kids fire their bolters to select potential recruits for the Chapter (-> anyone who did not injure himself during this trial).
Kilkrazy wrote:Perhaps the stock folds inside the weapon. There's enough room for it. The reason for a stock is to help with a solid aiming stance, not just for recoil. SMs wouldn't worry about that, because they are perfect.
We should all bear in mind that 40K isn't science fiction, it's science fantasy. There is no more than a vague pretence at realism in the science. "Rule of Cool" is the important factor.
Likewise the "canon" is not meant to be taken seriously. GW themselves describe it as a mixture of history, half-truths, propaganda, lies and legend. In such an background, it means nothing if sources contradict each other.
a Boltgun would be like an RPG without a rear exit point meaning the kick would be hitting your shoulder with the full force of a RPG round being fired and it would probably hurt you a little bit
Actually, the 3rd edition Rulebook has a cross-section of a bolt weapon and it clearly shows a "blast compensator" on the top acting as exit point. Even comes with little arrows showing where the blast is directed through (kind of like in a recoilless rifle).
Which is more than a modern day solid-slug shotgun has, and those fire their projectiles with much more force (-> less speed) than a boltgun and still give only a manageable kick.
Nothing in the studio material suggests an issue with recoil, the only things that are (repeatedly) talked about are size and weight, as well as a more complicated mechanism prone to failure when not maintained properly.
I posted a video in an earlier post showing a real weapon used by normal humans firing what is essentially an 80mm mortar round. If there are present day technologies that can reduce the recoil to something tolerable in this instance then I'm quite sure that in the 41st millenia they would be able to mitigate recoil entirely. Especially if you consider there is a secondary ignition outside of the weapon.
The .75 caliber of a bolter is closer to a 19mm round so, here is a video of an actual "hand-held" weapon firing a 20mm round... without the bolters secondary ignition of course.
Uhlan wrote:I posted a video in an earlier post showing a real weapon used by normal humans firing what is essentially an 80mm mortar round. If there are present day technologies that can reduce the recoil to something tolerable in this instance then I'm quite sure that in the 41st millenia they would be able to mitigate recoil entirely. Especially if you consider there is a secondary ignition outside of the weapon.
The .75 caliber of a bolter is closer to a 19mm round so, here is a video of an actual "hand-held" weapon firing a 20mm round... without the bolters secondary ignition of course.
This reminds me, Stalker bolts are described as travelling at subsonic speed to reduce noise, meaning that even with active rocket motor, the projectile's speed is capped at a value quite close to the muzzle velocity of the gun you just posted!
That said, I guess the "low velocity" described in GW material would produce even less recoil than that. Still, great vid. If only they could add autofire to that...
All in all, I see no problem with the studio material here. Given how they explained bolt weaponry to work, it seems logical that people don't have much of an issue using them. Even a normal stubber or some of the heavier stub-handguns are probably more of an issue in that regard.
I do notice that the guy firing that thing is getting kicked back a fair amount. On full auto that thing could easily knock you down, if it had a full auto mode.
Grey Templar wrote:I do notice that the guy firing that thing is getting kicked back a fair amount. On full auto that thing could easily knock you down, if it had a full auto mode.
...but not if you were a space marine in power armor.
Grey Templar wrote:I do notice that the guy firing that thing is getting kicked back a fair amount. On full auto that thing could easily knock you down, if it had a full auto mode.
Possibly, likely depends on one's exact physiology - there are people who can auto-fire an MG42 without bracing it, too. It would fit to the Munitorum Manual's description of not recommending automatic fire for anyone other than a Space Marine or enhanced with bionics or power armour, but that's Black Library stuff and as such not very reliable. The low velocity of the initial stage as well as a bolt weapon's own weight would likely diminish recoil to lower degrees than the PAW-20 does.
Nowadays, there's also 12g automatic shotguns that have next to no recoil, internal spring mechanisms granting sufficient compensation to allow you to even firing them with a single hand or outright dual-wield them. 12g is approximately 19mm - or caliber 0.74 (a bolter has 0.75).
The fully automatic caliber .74 AA-12 has a muzzle velocity of about 350 m/s, which is faster than both the grenade launcher in the video above as well as a bolter-fired Stalker shell's rocket motor in its 2nd stage.
Personally, I have yet to see any argument why bolt weapons should produce such massive recoil other than personal preferences. The studio material makes it clear that a lot of people aside from Space Marines are employing this gun, and its technical descriptions are sufficient to back up the physics behind it - even though that should not even be necessary, this being a sci-fi/fantasy setting and all.
Grey Templar wrote:I do notice that the guy firing that thing is getting kicked back a fair amount. On full auto that thing could easily knock you down, if it had a full auto mode.
...but not if you were a space marine in power armor.
Which is kind of the point, yes? A Space Marine in power armor can handle this weapon, but on an unaugmented human they need different patterns of manufacture and features and etc in order to make it usable.
Grey Templar wrote:I do notice that the guy firing that thing is getting kicked back a fair amount. On full auto that thing could easily knock you down, if it had a full auto mode.
...but not if you were a space marine in power armor.
Which is kind of the point, yes? A Space Marine in power armor can handle this weapon, but on an unaugmented human they need different patterns of manufacture and features and etc in order to make it usable.
It just dosen't rise to the point of ripping your arm off. Actually well I am here, that gun looks plastic. Plastic weapons have more kick because they are lighter. A bolter would be metal armored, and have a recoil dampener.
Grey Templar wrote:I do notice that the guy firing that thing is getting kicked back a fair amount. On full auto that thing could easily knock you down, if it had a full auto mode.
...but not if you were a space marine in power armor.
Which is kind of the point, yes? A Space Marine in power armor can handle this weapon, but on an unaugmented human they need different patterns of manufacture and features and etc in order to make it usable.
It's not plastic, it's carbon fibre. Yeah, a solid steel gun would be heavier and reduce recoil... but that thing looks punishing. I wouldn't want to have to deploy that in a protracted engagement, you'd be feeling it for days. Also, the semi-automatic nature of it suits it better as an anti-vehicle or sniping weapon, though it was obvious that the soldier firing it was having trouble re-acquiring sight-picture for follow-up shots.
Not ideal for a soldier without proper support to fire it.
With the various powered suits that are being developed, it wouldn't be all that difficult to make an armored suit with one of those things wrist mounted and fully automatic.
I think the main reason that powered suits of armor havn't been developed already is because most conflicts are waged in a very limited aspect lately. a suit like that wouldn't be highly maneuverable until more powerful servos are developed. It would only be practical in a protracted and more traditional form of warfare, not the kind waged against insurgents or rebels.
Either we need small scale fusion reactors like Space marines have(probably not happening anytime soon) or we need batteries capable of holding massive reseviors of power(easier solution)
Its all going to be based on Hydraulics which actually wouldn't have a massive power drain. assuming something around 7 feet tall with the pilot inside. Its any auxiliary systems, like comms, radar, or additional sensors, that will really drain power. If you went for a simple suit of armor and a comm system, the thing wouldn't have huge power problems. Servo capabilities might be more limiting then anything.
Well, as far as I can reason, the main issue would be reload capacity.
Truthfully, comm systems in a suit of power armor would take up similar power to other systems. A sensor system that can predict movement/counter incoming projectiles takes more energy, but overall software on the system shouldn't cause too many issues.
Then we come to the real problem, an automated reload system. A bolter implanted in power armor is pretty simple, and would function much the same. The main issue, then, is how do you load it, how do you balance it, and what benefits do you gain over a traditional bolter?
A reload system powered via an external feed could be a solution, but then damage to the feeder would render the weapon useless until the end of the battle (or a repair session. It would then be difficult to acquire another weapon if all were in armor).
What's the utility of such a weapon over the other system? It may free up one hand, but a storm bolter already does that. If the implant has manual reload, again, there isn't much gained.
So power system or not, is there a feasible reason for the Astartes to implement such a change? Is the benefit great enough? I find that, sadly, they don't.
Kasrkai wrote:Agreed. Not to mention the small initial charge would make negligible recoil, even for a normal human, somewhat like an RPG on auto, which isn't to bad from my experience. Must be including the rate of fire.
RPGs have an open back, allowing the force to exits from both sides. Bolters do not have an opening at the back, so all the force becomes recoil.
As is stated about bolters as gyrojets, they leave the barrel at low velocity, and then accelerate via an explosion (hence the perforated end barrel) allowing them to reach near terminal velocity almost instantaneously, providing potent close and long range combat. Because they are '2 stage' devices, that force does not have to become recoil
Hashbeth wrote:As is stated about bolters as gyrojets
They aren't gyrojet weapons. They're two-stage weapons, which first fire as a bullet (thus leaving shell casings-- no, boltguns aren't caseless) and then ignite the rocket after it leaves the barrel.
This is true. However, firing a bolter shell at the speed of a bullet or less from the barrell (let's say 300mph) to the end perforation would still take milliseconds, and have normal recoil [btw,the muzzle velocity of an M16 is 2,180 mph, so that's 1/7th of its speed] . Then at the beginning of the second stage, the bolter could achieve closer to full velocity (rapid acceleration) allowing it to still be more than deadly at point-blank range (including armor piercing).
Either way, there is no necessary force behind that second acceleration (especially if done at the perforated end of the barrel). Thus it really could have a low recoil (similar to an M1 garand or less) and be effective and a rocket-propelled round in its second stage.
im2randomghgh wrote:RPGs have an open back, allowing the force to exits from both sides. Bolters do not have an opening at the back, so all the force becomes recoil.
im2randomghgh wrote:It would still penetrate, because
a, It is a .75 caliber round with a diamondite tip.
and
b, Because GW says so.
And of course c, because of the rocked motor that seems to have no problem accelerating a bolt to sufficient speed in no-time (which goes back to b).
Ronin-Sage wrote:People seem to be ignoring the fact that just because something's canon, it doesn't necessarily have to make sense.
This too.
Though I think that given what we know, this actually sounds fairly realistic. More than a lot of other stuff in the setting that people don't seem to mind, anyways.
If, at the edge of the barrel, at the perforated end, the second stage kicks in (starting with explosive acceleration) the round would be going 90% of full velocity or greater. At this level and at close combat, the round would reach 100% of full velocity incredibly quickly (a matter of feet). The Jet propulsion only keeps it at that speed, as the bolt must overcome friction of atmosphere. If a full acceleration was used by the bolt weapon (i.e. it starts the jet acceleration in the barrel) it would be terribly inefficient, as bolt weapons would only be efficient to use against ranged targets, and it would not address cc kills at all. Due to that inefficiency, I must assume bolt weapons behave in the former way, via a two stage (with explosive 2nd stage starting acceleration) process
Also, a bolt moving at 90% of full speed is still capable of penetrating flak armor. This point keeps coming up, but it is consistently questioned.
Really here's the question of this article: Can a bolt be quickly accelerated in a second-stage ignition process? I say yes, as this technology is not too difficult to achieve. If so, then it is more than effective at all rages, without much recoil.
The misconception is that you think that once launched from the barrel, the bolter stays at low velocity with a slow acceleration. A fast, explosive acceleration followed by continual thrust (to keep speeds constant) is not only plausible but, from what I know of bolt weapons, the intended design. As such they can have low recoil and still be deadly at all ranges of combat.
im2randomghgh wrote:It would still penetrate, because
a, It is a .75 caliber round with a diamondite tip.
going at a low velocity against armor designed to resist bullets going at a much greater velocity.
Velocity is simply an objects speed in a given direction. Speed =/= penetrating power.
Penetrating power is going to be the Velocity X Mass which will give the force of the impact, distributed over the armor piercing tip. a low speed object is still capable of penetrating armor and killing you, especially if it explodes as well.
300 mph times the mass of the bolt round(which is unknown)
the increased mass of the bolt round and its armor piercing tip certaintly make it capable of penetrating armor at point blank range.
Hashbeth wrote:I think there is a misunderstanding.
If, at the edge of the barrel, at the perforated end, the second stage kicks in (starting with explosive acceleration) the round would be going 90% of full velocity or greater. At this level and at close combat, the round would reach 100% of full velocity incredibly quickly (a matter of feet). The Jet propulsion only keeps it at that speed, as the bolt must overcome friction of atmosphere.
If a full acceleration was used by the bolt weapon (i.e. it starts the jet acceleration in the barrel) it would be terribly inefficient, as bolt weapons would only be efficient to use against ranged targets, and it would not address cc kills at all. Due to that inefficiency, I must assume bolt weapons behave in the former way, via a two stage (with explosive 2nd stage starting acceleration) process
Also, a bolt moving at 90% of full speed is still capable of penetrating flak armor. This point keeps coming up, but it is consistently questioned.
Really here's the question of this article: Can a bolt be quickly accelerated in a second-stage ignition process? I say yes, as this technology is not too difficult to achieve. If so, then it is more than effective at all rages, without much recoil.
The misconception is that you think that once launched from the barrel, the bolter stays at low velocity with a slow acceleration. A fast, explosive acceleration followed by continual thrust (to keep speeds constant) is not only plausible but, from what I know of bolt weapons, the intended design. As such they can have low recoil and still be deadly at all ranges of combat.
You're absolutely spot-on here! The closest we have got to the bolt round (the Gyrojet round) reached maximum velocity within 50-60 feet. so I think we can assume that in several thousand years time they can have whittled this distance down somewhat. The time taken by the fast-burning rocket to accelerate the bolt to maximum velocity would be fractions of a second, and it would be happening outside of the barrel, hence no recoil from the rocket.
they have the missile as the actual slug, but unlike Gyrojets they also have an initial stage which is identical to a normal bullet. i
in other words it is fired like a normal bullet, but after exiting the barrel the rocket ignites and propels the round even faster and keeps it stable in flight. This eliminates the Gyrojets weakness of non-lethality at close range.
Bolts are more properly described as rocket assisted exploding rounds.
It mentions in the Ultramarines novels (several times, although I'm not sure how far they are considered as 'canon') that if you are shot at very close range by a bolter, the bolt round will often punch straight through (even through astartes armour) without exploding, as the explosive warhead hasn't had time to arm yet.
Combined with tho other fluff about bolters this would indicate to me that:
At very close range the bolts are already travelling at extremely high velocity.
The bolt round 'heads' are extremely tough, designed to penetrate and also to have minimal energy transfer (deformation/expansion) & frangibility upon terminal impact with hard materials.
The bolt gun shells are actualy very complex, containing at the very least a casing, primary propellant, secondary 'rocket' propellant stage, explosive payload, mass-reactive sensor for detonation, and an extremely tough penetrating tip.
The nature of an ammunition incorporating any sort of 'rocket' propellant stage would probably necessitate a smoothbore barrel, so bolt rounds may be extending fin-stabilised, or possibly some kind of a discarding sabot fin-stabilised arrangement.
I would think the most logical (lol!) build for a bolt round would be a main primary conventional charge to launch the things, a short burn, high yield rocket stage (probably ignited by the primary charge), and the mass-reactive warhead finally arming once the rocket stage is completely exhausted.
they have the missile as the actual slug, but unlike Gyrojets they also have an initial stage which is identical to a normal bullet. i
in other words it is fired like a normal bullet, but after exiting the barrel the rocket ignites and propels the round even faster and keeps it stable in flight. This eliminates the Gyrojets weakness of non-lethality at close range.
Bolts are more properly described as rocket assisted exploding rounds.
I know, I was just using the Gyrojet as an example of the closest we've got in the real world to a bolt.
Grey Templar wrote:Velocity is simply an objects speed in a given direction. Speed =/= penetrating power.
Flak armor provides protection against armor piercing special ammunition from autoguns. Yeah, specially designed slug ammunition that's meant to pierce body armor is essentially only AP6 in 40k Bolter shells need all the help they can get to penetrate the armor, and in fact, good quality flak armor (not the standard issue kind, this kind is probably commissioned rather than ordered en masse) still provides some limited protection against bolter shells.
Grey Templar wrote:Velocity is simply an objects speed in a given direction. Speed =/= penetrating power.
Flak armor provides protection against armor piercing special ammunition from autoguns. Yeah, specially designed slug ammunition that's meant to pierce body armor is essentially only AP6 in 40k Bolter shells need all the help they can get to penetrate the armor, and in fact, good quality flak armor (not the standard issue kind, this kind is probably commissioned rather than ordered en masse) still provides some limited protection against bolter shells.
Wait, you mean IG armor? I think that is what carapace armor is supposed to be.
Carapace armor is basically Flak armor with Ceramite plates added to the vital areas. Flak jackets, which are probably very similer to our modern body armor of various bullet resistant fabrics and ceramic plates, don't provide much protection against bolt rounds.
Ceramite is a step above our current ceramics. From what I have read, it seems to be Ceramic in build, but its constructed and reinforced at the atomic level with crystallan structures. with PA this is then additionally reinforced with Adamentium, which is a metal of some kind. heavier and stronger then steel.
Grey Templar wrote:Velocity is simply an objects speed in a given direction. Speed =/= penetrating power.
Flak armor provides protection against armor piercing special ammunition from autoguns. Yeah, specially designed slug ammunition that's meant to pierce body armor is essentially only AP6 in 40k Bolter shells need all the help they can get to penetrate the armor, and in fact, good quality flak armor (not the standard issue kind, this kind is probably commissioned rather than ordered en masse) still provides some limited protection against bolter shells.
Melissia, a bolter could easily be at 100% acceleration at less than 1 feet (even immediately) in the 40k universe without major recoil. The explosion at the perforated end of the bolter (the second acceleration) can easily be powerful enough to launch the bolter to full speed (which I believe is an unknown). It would still pierce armor, and have little recoil!
Now, if you say that this kind of acceleration is impossible (providing a source) then I would agree. But physics hold that it is, indeed, quite possible. Hence no matter the distance, a second stage acceleration can bring a bolt to full speed incredibly fast, making it JUST AS POWERFUL IN CCASIT IS AT DISTANCE.
Grey Templar wrote:Velocity is simply an objects speed in a given direction. Speed =/= penetrating power.
Flak armor provides protection against armor piercing special ammunition from autoguns. Yeah, specially designed slug ammunition that's meant to pierce body armor is essentially only AP6 in 40k Bolter shells need all the help they can get to penetrate the armor, and in fact, good quality flak armor (not the standard issue kind, this kind is probably commissioned rather than ordered en masse) still provides some limited protection against bolter shells.
Melissia, a bolter could easily be at 100% acceleration at less than 1 feet (even immediately) in the 40k universe without major recoil. The explosion at the perforated end of the bolter (the second acceleration) can easily be powerful enough to launch the bolter to full speed (which I believe is an unknown). It would still pierce armor, and have little recoil!
Now, if you say that this kind of acceleration is impossible (providing a source) then I would agree. But physics hold that it is, indeed, quite possible. Hence no matter the distance, a second stage acceleration can bring a bolt to full speed incredibly fast, making it JUST AS POWERFUL IN CCASIT IS AT DISTANCE.
Actually, to be fair to physics, assume the round pops out of the barrel with no force. It then ignites it's motor and flies off. All of that recoil flies strait back. That's right! Right into the barrel of the boltgun, leaving you with the exact same problem you had to begin with. Recoil.
Grey Templar wrote:Bolters are show to have recoil compensaters. thats what those little coils on the top are.
I completely agree that bolters (all kinds) have recoil. Lasers have recoil. You just can't feel it due to the incredibly small mass of a photon. The real fix is that IG firing bolters take supplements and steroids so they can deal with the brutal punishment of firing a .75 cannon at arms length.
Recoil compensaters can only do so much. Full-auto is a bad idea without augmentation. risk of injury is probably mostly blown out of proportion. it probably has to do with accuracy rather then getting your arm popped.
But the issue is the perforated ends, as Templar said. Even at only a scant 10 mph, the bolt with an explosive acceleration can lead to the speed, and absorb much of the recoil. The issue is, are the recoil compensators at the end of the barrel good at their job. No reason for them not to be.
Really the issue comes down to how fast a bolt needs to travel to be at combat effectiveness. If we know this, we can decide if the recoil is too great, or if the recoil compensators can deal with the force.
Grey Templar wrote:Recoil compensaters can only do so much. Full-auto is a bad idea without augmentation. risk of injury is probably mostly blown out of proportion. it probably has to do with accuracy rather then getting your arm popped.
Agreed. Recoil compensator, not recoil eliminator. I imagine that an IG firing a bolt pistol would be much like an inexperience modern shooter firing a Smith & Wesson 500, or a Desert Eagle .50 Action Express. Very unpleasant, but doable.
