I think the idea of Space Marines with heavy bolters is cool. But I never include them in any list because... they suck.

What stat line would they need to be a sometimes include?

What stat line would they need to be an auto include?

Or maybe you already take them and I just have horrible luck with them?



I didn't see the other thread about heavy bolters until after I posted this... oops

They need more shots. Maybe make them Salvo 2/4 guns instead of Heavy 3. The problem is it's hard to make them effective without turning them into assault cannons, which fill the same niche role and generally replaces the heavy bolter whenever given the chance.

Due to the D6 system, there is no mathematical niche for them. Also, 4+ armor is relatively rare, and that kills them as well. Maybe if you could upgrade them to AP 3...

In my group we made them Salvo 3/4 for the period of about a year.
It wasn't enough. They still weren't taken.
The only difference observed was that the one extra shot was nice, but we still only saw that extra shot come into effect on units that had the Heavy Bolter to begin with.
Nobody felt motivated to upgrade to Heavy Bolters or to take more of them.

Str 6/7 is the sweet spot, not Str 5. Thanks, D6 system.

If I were to do something to make them into something people would take, probably give them 5-6 shots a piece, but keep the AP and Strength.

This way mass-units of them (in dev squads) can put out enough S5 shots to reliably threaten all types of infantry; against hordes they'd wipe the floor with them. Against Heavy Infantry they have enough shots to force armor saves.

The problem with this though is that while it makes them viable, it ends up stepping on the toes of the assault cannon AND generic bolters, as the former would be readily replaced by this, while the latter loses what little utility they had left.

I would be happy if they were Salvo 3/5 with their current S/AP and price.

I would say the best way to make them more attractive is to let them be employed like they are in DoW2. Either Pinning or a modified version if Concussive would do it, or maybe even Strikedown.

Basically, make them a weapon that promotes synergy between units. Devastators fire on a unit with Heavy Bolters, which apply a Concussive effect when they hit on a 6, rather than when they inflict wounds. The enemy, now at I1, gets mercilessly charged by an Assault Squad.

That would be a much more fun and effective weapon. Hell, I'd take them for Guard if they could do that! Blobs suddenly become a lot more scary when they're striking first.

Awesome ideas! I think I will experiment with some of those stats with my buddy.

I would love to see some heavy bolters laying down some hate while my tacticals advanced

I really like the idea of the pinning HB. It would give more tactical depth and "realism" to a game that has real lacks in these matters.

IMO, I play Guard, and having to pay 10pts for a HWT with HB is even more depressing than doing the same for a devastator. I really think they should be 5pts with a small buff like : R24'' S5 AP4 Salvo 2/4.
They could thus be fielded en masse while being quite useful when put on vehicles; I'm pretty sure 4 shots at S5 can do well by stripping this last wound/HP from this annoying model you just seriously damaged with your main weapons.

Regarding assault cannon, it should be Heavy 6 like the current Kheres pattern from HH. For Termies, that would be great.

Salvo 3/5, Shred and the option to upgrade them to AP3.

If the stormbolter is supposed to be an automatic rifle, the assault cannon should be heavy 12.

To make the HB worth taking, the stuff it kills well needs to be more common.

Salvo 2/3 wouldn't hurt, too.

Bharring wrote:
To make the HB worth taking, the stuff it kills well needs to be more common.

Salvo 2/3 wouldn't hurt, too.

The stuff it's good at killing is only more likely to get LESS common.

Heck, the storm bolter is supposed to be more like an LMG, while the heavy bolter is more of an HMG. (It's pretty much a better version of the heavy stubber, which is a 20th century HMG).

The problem with refactoring the heavy bolter is that it would require retooling of the autocannon and assault cannon too. Not that this would be bad, but it would be yet more power creep. On the other hand, if we have power creep anyway, how do we make such weapons more useful?

Here's a first stab:

Storm bolter: R24 S4 AP5, Assault 2 XOR Heavy 4 (like psycannons and splinter cannons used to be)
Heavy bolter: R36 S6 AP5 Salvo 2/4
Assault cannon: R24 S6 AP4 Heavy 5, Rending
Autocannon: R48 S7 AP4 Heavy 3
Predator autocannon: R48 S7 AP4 Heavy 4
Reaper autocannon: R36 S7 AP4 Salvo 1/3, Twin-linked

Rationale: Predator autocannon brought forward from 30k. No real reason not to, also makes autolas Preds more interesting. Reaper autocannon trades range for mobility. Autocannon/assault cannon get a bump to not be overshadowed by the upgraded heavy bolter. Heavy bolter goes to S6 - its closest xenos equivalents usually are (shuriken cannon, scatter laser), or they have some other bit. Relative to its closest equivalent, the shuriken cannon, it gets better range and ROF in exchange for not having Bladestorm.

Devastators, Devastator Centurions and Retributors armed with heavy bolters gain Pinning. I think having Pinning on vehicle-mounted heavy bolters would be intensely obnoxious, but on infantry it's fine. Should Guard HWTs or Servitors have Pinning?

ETA: oops, gauss cannon is S5. Closest Tau/Necron equivalents are S7, then (missile pod and tesla destructor respectively)


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Also, I do use them but only on Retributors or vehicles currently. The Act of Faith that grants Rending is pretty useful.

jade_angel wrote:
Heck, the storm bolter is supposed to be more like an LMG, while the heavy bolter is more of an HMG. (It's pretty much a better version of the heavy stubber, which is a 20th century HMG).

The problem with refactoring the heavy bolter is that it would require retooling of the autocannon and assault cannon too. Not that this would be bad, but it would be yet more power creep. On the other hand, if we have power creep anyway, how do we make such weapons more useful?

Here's a first stab:

Storm bolter: R24 S4 AP5, Assault 2 XOR Heavy 4 (like psycannons and splinter cannons used to be)
Heavy bolter: R36 S6 AP5 Salvo 2/4
Assault cannon: R24 S6 AP4 Heavy 5, Rending
Autocannon: R48 S7 AP4 Heavy 3
Predator autocannon: R48 S7 AP4 Heavy 4
Reaper autocannon: R36 S7 AP4 Salvo 1/3, Twin-linked

Rationale: Predator autocannon brought forward from 30k. No real reason not to, also makes autolas Preds more interesting. Reaper autocannon trades range for mobility. Autocannon/assault cannon get a bump to not be overshadowed by the upgraded heavy bolter. Heavy bolter goes to S6 - its closest xenos equivalents usually are (shuriken cannon, scatter laser), or they have some other bit. Relative to its closest equivalent, the shuriken cannon, it gets better range and ROF in exchange for not having Bladestorm.

Devastators, Devastator Centurions and Retributors armed with heavy bolters gain Pinning. I think having Pinning on vehicle-mounted heavy bolters would be intensely obnoxious, but on infantry it's fine. Should Guard HWTs or Servitors have Pinning?

ETA: oops, gauss cannon is S5. Closest Tau/Necron equivalents are S7, then (missile pod and tesla destructor respectively)


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Also, I do use them but only on Retributors or vehicles currently. The Act of Faith that grants Rending is pretty useful.

I really like these. I don't think it really amps up the power creep so much as allows these weapons to "keep up with the Joneses" so to speak. I may actually talk to my buddy about playtesting these and tweaking them....

I think if HBs were even salvo 3/3 it would give them a niche as a cheep weapon to toss into a tac squad. Dropping them down to 5 points would help a lot there.

So if you wanted a heavy you could fire on the move, you’d have two choices, the HB and the grav cannon.

The hellfire rounds should also be free for scouts and sternguard.

I think salvo 3/5 and Pinning Is perfect for it. I makes it a tactical option over the Assault cannon. Marines really don't have any long range horde control, this would change that

My concern with a high second salvo number is the fact they they are on a lot of vehicles/relentless platforms.

And while I’d love to be tossing 10 shots downrange from a 45 point land speeder, “scatbikes for everyone!” is not a good answer IMHO.

What about giving them a special rule like Tesla so that a "6" gives them two extra hits?

Currently I'm a fan of "All Bolters reroll 1s to-wound". If the impact doesn't get you, the blast will. Specialist ammo would forfeit the Reroll 1s ability, as the mass-reactive warhead gets replaced by who knows what? Make the Heavy Bolter Heavy 4 and you're mostly set.

The molecular acid rounds for hh dark angels have made heavy bolters a must take for me.

Str 2 ap d6 poison 2+ heavy 3, I'm even considering taking a Mortis contemptor with 2 heavy bolters for that reason, when was the last time you saw that!

 Galef wrote:
I think salvo 3/5 and Pinning Is perfect for it. I makes it a tactical option over the Assault cannon. Marines really don't have any long range horde control, this would change that

Yep - this is what I have always thought too...it really is okay that it becomes strong because everything is strong now.

Martel732 wrote:
Due to the D6 system, there is no mathematical niche for them. Also, 4+ armor is relatively rare, and that kills them as well. Maybe if you could upgrade them to AP 3...

What version of 40k do you play Martel?

All Eldar- minus bikes and some aspect warriors
Dark Eldar are affected by AP4 - except maybe some MCs
Harlequins
All Nids except big beasts
All Orks except a few bigger elite models
All Tau infantry and fast attack infantry
All Astra militarum infantry
I'd also assume most inquisition
Necron Warriors and tombblades have a 4+ save, same with crypteks
Most Admech

Naaris wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Due to the D6 system, there is no mathematical niche for them. Also, 4+ armor is relatively rare, and that kills them as well. Maybe if you could upgrade them to AP 3...

What version of 40k do you play Martel?

All Eldar- minus bikes and some aspect warriors
Dark Eldar are affected by AP4 - except maybe some MCs
Harlequins
All Nids except big beasts
All Orks except a few bigger elite models
All Tau infantry and fast attack infantry
All Astra militarum infantry
I'd also assume most inquisition
Necron Warriors and tombblades have a 4+ save, same with crypteks
Most Admech

He plays Blood Angels. I would feel sorry for him.

Nids have 5 MCs with 4+ btw
- helps the argument a little.

I like HBs, and from being a Nid player the HB feels fine. I have a whole Dev squad with them. I do however like the idea of salvo, but still i feel they are "okay" as they are.

 Tactical_Spam wrote:

Naaris wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Due to the D6 system, there is no mathematical niche for them. Also, 4+ armor is relatively rare, and that kills them as well. Maybe if you could upgrade them to AP 3...

What version of 40k do you play Martel?

All Eldar- minus bikes and some aspect warriors
Dark Eldar are affected by AP4 - except maybe some MCs
Harlequins
All Nids except big beasts
All Orks except a few bigger elite models
All Tau infantry and fast attack infantry
All Astra militarum infantry
I'd also assume most inquisition
Necron Warriors and tombblades have a 4+ save, same with crypteks
Most Admech

He plays Blood Angels. I would feel sorry for him.

All I'm trying to show is that AP4 is actually abundant through out 40k. EXCEPT FOR MARINES, who have what? 1 unit with AP4? Almost every army in the game, other than marines, have troops that ap4 would negate their armor saves.

Naaris wrote:

 Tactical_Spam wrote:

Naaris wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Due to the D6 system, there is no mathematical niche for them. Also, 4+ armor is relatively rare, and that kills them as well. Maybe if you could upgrade them to AP 3...

What version of 40k do you play Martel?

All Eldar- minus bikes and some aspect warriors
Dark Eldar are affected by AP4 - except maybe some MCs
Harlequins
All Nids except big beasts
All Orks except a few bigger elite models
All Tau infantry and fast attack infantry
All Astra militarum infantry
I'd also assume most inquisition
Necron Warriors and tombblades have a 4+ save, same with crypteks
Most Admech

He plays Blood Angels. I would feel sorry for him.

All I'm trying to show is that AP4 is actually abundant through out 40k. EXCEPT FOR MARINES, who have what? 1 unit with AP4? Almost every army in the game, other than marines, have troops that ap4 would negate their armor saves.

Compared to AP1, 2, 3 and 5, AP4 is a rarity for IoM

Autocannons
Heavy Bolters
Power Mauls
Power Lances
Storm Eagle Rockets
Whirlwind rockets
Thunderfire cannons
Heavy flamers

That's 8 weapons...

 Tactical_Spam wrote:

Naaris wrote:

 Tactical_Spam wrote:

Naaris wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Due to the D6 system, there is no mathematical niche for them. Also, 4+ armor is relatively rare, and that kills them as well. Maybe if you could upgrade them to AP 3...

What version of 40k do you play Martel?

All Eldar- minus bikes and some aspect warriors
Dark Eldar are affected by AP4 - except maybe some MCs
Harlequins
All Nids except big beasts
All Orks except a few bigger elite models
All Tau infantry and fast attack infantry
All Astra militarum infantry
I'd also assume most inquisition
Necron Warriors and tombblades have a 4+ save, same with crypteks
Most Admech

He plays Blood Angels. I would feel sorry for him.

All I'm trying to show is that AP4 is actually abundant through out 40k. EXCEPT FOR MARINES, who have what? 1 unit with AP4? Almost every army in the game, other than marines, have troops that ap4 would negate their armor saves.

Compared to AP1, 2, 3 and 5, AP4 is a rarity for IoM

Autocannons
Heavy Bolters
Power Mauls
Power Lances
Storm Eagle Rockets
Whirlwind rockets
Thunderfire cannons
Heavy flamers

That's 8 weapons...

Do you mean it's common?

Yeah it should be common. Why do marines need weapons that would be designed to purposely kill other marines. Their job is to kill the xenos, heretics, purge worlds and kill demons that don't have armor saves.

Perhaps Marine players need a wake up call.

Well, if you you want to count AP4 saturation, SMs actually dominate.

With the Krak Grenade alone, if you want to be technical. The vast majority of SMs have AP4.

On the more reasonable front, let's list some AP4 SM weapons:
-Heavy Bolter
-Autocannon
-Assault Cannon
-Heavy Flamer
-One Special Issue Ammo type
-Krak grenades
-Whirlwinds
-TFCs

Let's compare that to CWE:
-Hawks' Grenade Pack
-The small blast version of EML
-Plasma Grenades

Harlequins:
-Haywire Blaster

Basically, SM heavier weapons that aren't anti-Armor tend to be AP4. Its just that SM typically care about using weapons that are AP2.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Edit- Oh, Naaris meant units with a 4+, not AP4 weapons.

Naaris wrote:

 Tactical_Spam wrote:

Naaris wrote:

 Tactical_Spam wrote:

Naaris wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Due to the D6 system, there is no mathematical niche for them. Also, 4+ armor is relatively rare, and that kills them as well. Maybe if you could upgrade them to AP 3...

What version of 40k do you play Martel?

All Eldar- minus bikes and some aspect warriors
Dark Eldar are affected by AP4 - except maybe some MCs
Harlequins
All Nids except big beasts
All Orks except a few bigger elite models
All Tau infantry and fast attack infantry
All Astra militarum infantry
I'd also assume most inquisition
Necron Warriors and tombblades have a 4+ save, same with crypteks
Most Admech

He plays Blood Angels. I would feel sorry for him.

All I'm trying to show is that AP4 is actually abundant through out 40k. EXCEPT FOR MARINES, who have what? 1 unit with AP4? Almost every army in the game, other than marines, have troops that ap4 would negate their armor saves.

Compared to AP1, 2, 3 and 5, AP4 is a rarity for IoM

Autocannons
Heavy Bolters
Power Mauls
Power Lances
Storm Eagle Rockets
Whirlwind rockets
Thunderfire cannons
Heavy flamers

That's 8 weapons...

Do you mean it's common?

Yeah it should be common. Why do marines need weapons that would be designed to purposely kill other marines. Their job is to kill the xenos, heretics, purge worlds and kill demons that don't have armor saves.

Perhaps Marine players need a wake up call.

Where on the Emperor's golden Terra did you come up with these thoughts? The Heavy bolter is about as underwhelming as Harlequins. Give that sucker AP3 and suddenly its become a smidgin better.

Right Bharring,

Marine players need wake up calls. Your armies are actually pretty fluffy. They have weapons designed to kill the Xenos from range. Tough Xenos that your AP4 don't kill are mean to be taken out in glorious combat and all that crap that marines live for. Get that blood all over them and such, with their AP 3 and 2 close combat weapons.

If they made them like the old Deathwatch HBs (assault 3) but with a range closer to the current heavy bolted, that would be a nice upgrade to have. Not so much with their current profile as a heavy weapon.

Naaris wrote:
Right Bharring,

Marine players need wake up calls. Your armies are actually pretty fluffy. They have weapons designed to kill the Xenos from range. Tough Xenos that your AP4 don't kill are mean to be taken out in glorious combat and all that crap that marines live for. Get that blood all over them and such, with their AP 3 and 2 close combat weapons.

Have you played against Tau as Marines? Marines can't outrange gak against Tau. Close Combat? Feth that nonsense. 15" away from a Fire Warrior squad is a kill zone.

I don't think anything is wrong with them. I use a devi squad of 4 of them and use the Imperial Fist tactics because I play crimson fists. They are a great support for my deepstriking sternguard.

 btgrimaldus wrote:
I don't think anything is wrong with them I use a devi squad of them a use the i.perial fist tactics cause I play crimson fists they are a great support for my deepstriking sternguard.

Were you asleep everytime your school teacher did a lesson about the use of punctuation or something?

I'd say make them:

18"/36" S5 AP 4 2/4 salvo. 36"

10pts

Ammo types-
Standard-as above
Hellfire 18"/36" S1 AP5 2/4salvo poisoned(3+) soulblaze rule
Kraken 12"/24" S5 AP3 Salvo 2/4

Must declare ammo type when choosing target

Naaris wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Due to the D6 system, there is no mathematical niche for them. Also, 4+ armor is relatively rare, and that kills them as well. Maybe if you could upgrade them to AP 3...

What version of 40k do you play Martel?

All Eldar- minus bikes and some aspect warriors
Dark Eldar are affected by AP4 - except maybe some MCs
Harlequins
All Nids except big beasts
All Orks except a few bigger elite models
All Tau infantry and fast attack infantry
All Astra militarum infantry
I'd also assume most inquisition
Necron Warriors and tombblades have a 4+ save, same with crypteks
Most Admech

I play a version of 40K where my opponents don't frequently have units with 4+ armor.

Eldar never have 4+ armor anymore because scatbikes. There's no reason to use any of the Eldar 4+ units when scatbikes exist. I can't tell you how much I hate that unit.

Necrons have 4+, but warriors are the only thing. It's not worth bringing the HB, when autocannons generate more wounds vs Wraiths and such.

A lot of what you listed has 5+ armor, which is penetrated by boltguns.

There's just no reason to ever voluntarily bring a heavy bolter.

"There is no reason to use any of the Eldar 4+..."
Because Scatter Bikes are stupid.

That is reason enough for many Eldar players. Perhaps not in your meta. But Eldar 4+s do get fielded.

Against Necrons, rarely do Loyalists get to pick between Autocannons and HB.

I actually agree with Martel on maybe S6. It would still be just 3 shots, but they'd be slightly better quality.
Outside of that, Heavy 4 would be better.

I also propose Storm Bolters be S5 top but that's a different topic.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Also, Bharring, Tomb Blades don't have 4+ armor because literally everyone and their mother takes the 3+ upgrade.

Wouldn't know.

I was just saying that Autocannons being better vs Wraiths doesnt do much to Heavy Bolters, as you almost never pick between the two.

At S6 it starts infringing on Plasma Cannon territory. Perhaps the better solution there is to allow Loyalists to take Autocannons as weapons?

As for Salvo 2/4 S6, you've basically invented the ScatterLaser +2.

Yeah, it's pretty close to the scatter laser at that point - but the scatter laser isn't, by itself, OP. What's OP is the ability to mount arbitrarily many of them on cheap, ultra-fast, relatively durable Troop-slot units. (War Walkers can generate scatspam too, but they could in the last codex, and how often did you see that?)

The Imperium mostly doesn't have the ability to spam scatter lasers in those kind of numbers.

Bharring wrote:
"There is no reason to use any of the Eldar 4+..."
Because Scatter Bikes are stupid.

That is reason enough for many Eldar players. Perhaps not in your meta. But Eldar 4+s do get fielded.

Against Necrons, rarely do Loyalists get to pick between Autocannons and HB.

If they're not fielded against me, it doesn't help me in the slightest. And it will completely color my view of the heavy bolter. Which, as it turns out, is unpopular in general. Wounding MCs on 5's and allowing armor saves blows as well. There's nothing they are any good against that anyone cares about anymore.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

jade_angel wrote:
Yeah, it's pretty close to the scatter laser at that point - but the scatter laser isn't, by itself, OP. What's OP is the ability to mount arbitrarily many of them on cheap, ultra-fast, relatively durable Troop-slot units. (War Walkers can generate scatspam too, but they could in the last codex, and how often did you see that?)

The Imperium mostly doesn't have the ability to spam scatter lasers in those kind of numbers.

It's pretty OP by itself in the 7.5 ruleset. It's anti-infantry, anti-heavy infantry, anti-MC, anti-light vehicle, anti-medium vehicle and effectively ignores cover for infantry, since it was never relying on armor penetration anyway. It's the ultimate weapon for 7th ed, but has been tabling people since around 4th.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Bharring wrote:
Wouldn't know.

I was just saying that Autocannons being better vs Wraiths doesnt do much to Heavy Bolters, as you almost never pick between the two.

At S6 it starts infringing on Plasma Cannon territory. Perhaps the better solution there is to allow Loyalists to take Autocannons as weapons?

As for Salvo 2/4 S6, you've basically invented the ScatterLaser +2.

Who care about plasma cannons, anyway? They are awful garbage.

If plasma cannons were, say, Salvo 1/3 without Blast, they might be somewhat interesting. As it stands, every time I take them I'm disappointed. The kind of targets they'd be interesting against mostly don't exist anymore. (Terminators are rare, you'll only hit one Centurion, Grotesques and Tyranid Warriors survive it, Oblits survive, and there are better, more generic ways to take out clustered jump pack Marines).


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Also, if 3 shots of S5 AP4 is garbage, and 4 shots of S6 AP6 is OP, there's not much room in there for a weapon that's useful but not broken, ne?

Martel732 wrote:
Due to the D6 system, there is no mathematical niche for them. Also, 4+ armor is relatively rare, and that kills them as well. Maybe if you could upgrade them to AP 3...

The troops choices of the Tau, Eldar & Necrons have a 4+ save or worse. And they're arguably the best army's in the game

But it still needs some love. So do Terminators, Tac squads, Asm...frack, all of the SMs & associated codexes with their 2nd ed equipment. 3rd EDITION STYLE REBOOT Y'ALL!

jade_angel wrote:
If plasma cannons were, say, Salvo 1/3 without Blast, they might be somewhat interesting. As it stands, every time I take them I'm disappointed. The kind of targets they'd be interesting against mostly don't exist anymore. (Terminators are rare, you'll only hit one Centurion, Grotesques and Tyranid Warriors survive it, Oblits survive, and there are better, more generic ways to take out clustered jump pack Marines).


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Also, if 3 shots of S5 AP4 is garbage, and 4 shots of S6 AP6 is OP, there's not much room in there for a weapon that's useful but not broken, ne?

That's been my contention this whole time. The D6 system is not granulated enough to accommodate the number of weapons in the game. The click from S5 to s6 is enormous in 7th ed. S6 kills IK. S5 does not. S6 glances out falcons and dreads. S5 does not. The platforms also matter, as I could argue that the heavy bolter should BETTER than the scatterlaser, because of the limited and slow platforms it comes on. This, however, is not the case, and that just makes the plight of the heavy bolter doubly bad.

 Red Marine wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Due to the D6 system, there is no mathematical niche for them. Also, 4+ armor is relatively rare, and that kills them as well. Maybe if you could upgrade them to AP 3...

The troops choices of the Tau, Eldar & Necrons have a 4+ save or worse. And they're arguably the best army's in the game

4+ is also the general cover save. Your argument is flimsy

 Red Marine wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Due to the D6 system, there is no mathematical niche for them. Also, 4+ armor is relatively rare, and that kills them as well. Maybe if you could upgrade them to AP 3...

The troops choices of the Tau, Eldar & Necrons have a 4+ save or worse. And they're arguably the best army's in the game

The troop choices of Eldar have 3+. Other Eldar troops are irrelevant, as they are inferior. Eldar and Necrons usually get cover, making AP 4 worthless. The frequency of cover really kills the AP 4 on the heavy bolter and makes it so only S and ROF are relevant. Scatterlasers just burn you down through cover. A confluence of mathematics make the scatterlaser so OP.

Given the mathematical constraints, my answer to the OP is likely, "nothing". They are just bad now and forever will be bad.

Another answer then might well be reworking the Cover System to be either hit/wound modifiers instead of Cover providing an alternate cover save.

Other troop choices are irrelevant, you say?

1) You mean irrelevant to you. It isn't irrelevant to those who field or face them frequently.
2) Why do you never see those choices? Because the things that kill them well are too common/cheap. So why buff something that's best at killing things that already don't compete?

 Tactical_Spam wrote:

 Red Marine wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Due to the D6 system, there is no mathematical niche for them. Also, 4+ armor is relatively rare, and that kills them as well. Maybe if you could upgrade them to AP 3...

The troops choices of the Tau, Eldar & Necrons have a 4+ save or worse. And they're arguably the best army's in the game

4+ is also the general cover save. Your argument is flimsy

If my argument is flimsy yours is irrelevant. A cover save is immune to ALL AMOR PENETRATION. The relevance of cover in this discussion is minimal at best. Ignores Cover is an uncommon usr, & if you want to talk about cover saves you must include FNP & invul saves.

We need to narrow the debate to a few points. As it stands we're comparing it to every weapon in the game & against every miniature in the game. The HB a tool foe a specific purpose. Its supposed to take out light & medium infantry.
-Does it do that well?
-What weapons do that job better?
-How does the HB compare?
-Etc, etc.

The Heavy Bolter is better compared to the Shuriken Cannon. That is the more analogous weapon.

Heavy 3 24" S6 AP5 fake-rending.

The reality of why scatter lasers are so good is how many of them you can get for so cheap and the fact that everything in the eldar codex can move and shoot the MF. If heavy bolters were assault 4 and costed 10 points they would be on every tac squad. 4 man Devs with HB would be common place support units. The fact that you are anchored to the ground to shoot the thing makes it worthless.

 Xenomancers wrote:
The reality of why scatter lasers are so good is how many of them you can get for so cheap and the fact that everything in the eldar codex can move and shoot the MF. If heavy bolters were assault 4 and costed 10 points they would be on every tac squad. 4 man Devs with HB would be common place support units. The fact that you are anchored to the ground to shoot the thing makes it worthless.

If Heavy Bolters were assault 4, they still would be useless, at least in my meta.

 Red Marine wrote:

 Tactical_Spam wrote:

 Red Marine wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Due to the D6 system, there is no mathematical niche for them. Also, 4+ armor is relatively rare, and that kills them as well. Maybe if you could upgrade them to AP 3...

The troops choices of the Tau, Eldar & Necrons have a 4+ save or worse. And they're arguably the best army's in the game

4+ is also the general cover save. Your argument is flimsy

If my argument is flimsy yours is irrelevant. A cover save is immune to ALL AMOR PENETRATION. The relevance of cover in this discussion is minimal at best. Ignores Cover is an uncommon usr, & if you want to talk about cover saves you must include FNP & invul saves.

But the scatterlaser doesn't rely on armor penetration. It doesn't have any to speak of. Therefore, it has defacto ignores cover. Except against 2+ rerollable jink, etc. Defacto ignore normal cover shall we say.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Bharring wrote:
Other troop choices are irrelevant, you say?

1) You mean irrelevant to you. It isn't irrelevant to those who field or face them frequently.
2) Why do you never see those choices? Because the things that kill them well are too common/cheap. So why buff something that's best at killing things that already don't compete?

No, we don't see those choices because 36" guns on a platform that moves 12" is stupid good. The scatterbike would be awesome with 5+ armor, it just wouldn't be quite as broken. Heavy bolters don't keep DA off the field, scatterbikes do.

S5 doesn't abuse the hull point mechanic enough to be worth it. That's the bottom line. Shuriken cannon are still better than heavy bolter because of rending and S6. S6 is the panacea.

We need to narrow the debate to a few points. As it stands we're comparing it to every weapon in the game & against every miniature in the game. The HB is a tool for a specific purpose. Its supposed to take out light & medium infantry.
-Does it do that well?
-What weapons do that job better?
-How does the HB compare?
-Etc, etc.

I still think they are fine. The only thing I can see giving them, for fluff and not game reasons, is rending.

 Red Marine wrote:
We need to narrow the debate to a few points. As it stands we're comparing it to every weapon in the game & against every miniature in the game. The HB a tool foe a specific purpose. Its supposed to take out light & medium infantry.
-Does it do that well?
-What weapons do that job better?
-How does the HB compare?
-Etc, etc.

Other weapons do this job as well as other jobs. And aren't on ass-terrible platforms like devastator marines and predator tanks.


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 btgrimaldus wrote:
I still think they are fine. The only thing I can see giving them, for fluff and not game reasons, is rending.

You can certainly have that opinion, but there's little evidence to back it up.

Anytime you read about them they are shredding up infantry or a light transport. The # of shots is good and the strength isn't the worst. The rending would be that extra umph to tear things apart.

 btgrimaldus wrote:
Anytime you read about them they are shredding up infantry or a light transport. The # of shots is good and the strength isn't the worst. The rending would be that extra umph to tear things apart.

I don't trust batreps or anecdotes. I trust math. I should have said mathematical evidence. And math says they are terrible against nearly every vehicle and most commonly used infantry. And infantry can trivially get a 5+ cover save, Negating 66% of the AP 4.

What would you take for 110pts to sub into that slot then.

What are we talking about? The dev squad? Don't crimson fists get bonuses with bolters? Regardless, devastator marines are awful and should probably be left at home.

Rending does make heavy bolters moderately scary - you can already do it with Misfortune, or if you're one of those stubborn cusses that insists on trying to play Sisters (like me).

If you give a squad of Retributors four heavy bolters, a storm bolter on the Superior, a priest with the Litanies of Faith so the act doesn't fail (and another storm bolter, because Rending means you want as much dakka as you can get), you can actually do some pretty good damage. It's not setting the world on fire, but I've wrecked a few Devilfish, taken down a few Avatars of Khaine, Keepers of Secrets and suchlike with it. It's not awesome, but it can work. So yeah, Rending helps. (Then again, Bladestorm is a good chunk of why the shuricannon is good, so who does this shock?)


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Imperial Fists do get bonuses with bolters, yeah - re-roll 1s to hit.

Also, Inquisition heavy bolters (on vehicles) can be S6 with psybolt ammo. Has anyone used that to much effect? (I play Inquisition some but don't have any Chimeras or standard Land Raiders - haven't tried it myself.)

jade_angel wrote:
Rending does make heavy bolters moderately scary - you can already do it with Misfortune, or if you're one of those stubborn cusses that insists on trying to play Sisters (like me).

If you give a squad of Retributors four heavy bolters, a storm bolter on the Superior, a priest with the Litanies of Faith so the act doesn't fail (and another storm bolter, because Rending means you want as much dakka as you can get), you can actually do some pretty good damage. It's not setting the world on fire, but I've wrecked a few Devilfish, taken down a few Avatars of Khaine, Keepers of Secrets and suchlike with it. It's not awesome, but it can work. So yeah, Rending helps. (Then again, Bladestorm is a good chunk of why the shuricannon is good, so who does this shock?)

I still feel like you're still not getting enough shots to really make rending good. Maybe the range would make up? I guess it would let you hurt AV 12/13/14, so there's that.

In a world of tfc's, scatbikes and hydras the humble heavy bolter isnt doing its job. Its been left behind in the power creep of 7.5ed & theres no formation to patch it.

I'd say salvo 2/4. Also as a fully automatic, 30mm, shaped charge rocket launcher id say Sunder. Also the HBs role is one of suppression, like a base of fire/squad automatic weapon. So I'd throw in pinning too. At which poit maybe 15 points?

I just thought I'd mention that those free Razorbacks wouldn't maybe need any upgrades with some of these buffs. Moar points to take something fun instead!

You guys keep referring to scatbikes and hydras, stuff that is not in the standard SM codex. Sure you can Ally them, but then you paying for more units. I meant what would you replace the 110pt devi unit i can take. Keep in mind that i play crimson fist and have HB that are tank/monster hunters and reroll 1's to hit.

As for for devi squads in general i use them all the time as support or anti flyer/tank with the other weapons. I do agree taking grav cans with them is silly, but stack 4 of a kind in them of a weapon of your choice can make them descent to use. I use there flakk missles and las cans also.

 btgrimaldus wrote:
You guys keep referring to scatbikes and hydras, stuff that is not in the standard SM codex. Sure you can Ally them, but then you paying for more units. I meant what would you replace the 110pt devi unit i can take. Keep in mind that i play crimson fist and have HB that are tank/monster hunters and reroll 1's to hit.

As for for devi squads in general i use them all the time as support or anti flyer/tank with the other weapons. I do agree taking grav cans with them is silly, but stack 4 of a kind in them of a weapon of your choice can make them descent to use. I use there flakk missles and las cans also.

I suppose I'd keep it then. Other chapters don't have special rules that make their heavy bolters worthwhile.

I'm gonna suggest some madness, heavy d6+1 dakka dakka

Salvo 3/5 AP:4 Pinning, Range 48"

That may work.

Seems to me the best would be:
Salvo 2/3 36" S5 AP4 Pinning, 5pt upgrade in most cases

Bharring wrote:
That may work.

Seems to me the best would be:
Salvo 2/3 36" S5 AP4 Pinning, 5pt upgrade in most cases

That's still a useless weapon.

Well, we need to ensure we don't overshadow the Heavy Flamer, or move it away from its intention. While still keeping the basic weapon simple.

If you're taking a Tac squad for anti-light-infantry (Not Martel - he plays a different game), at a 5man this let's you pick between a normal Flamer (s4 ap5) for super close range, or a HB for reasonable range, better S and AP, but a few shots instead of templates. And let's the Heavy fire reasonably on the move.

If you're taking a 10man that wants to move, its 5pts for better anti-light/medium infantry.

It gives a super cheap Heavy option, that can be used in most circumstances.

How's about allowing free upgrades, take 5 bolters in a unit and one can be a heavy bolter for free.

Hell if not rending then st least shred. if you can't change the stats cause it becomes to similar to other weapons then a special rule is the only real way to improve.

 Lammikkovalas wrote:
I just thought I'd mention that those free Razorbacks wouldn't maybe need any upgrades with some of these buffs. Moar points to take something fun instead!

Well you point out a major reason the formation is only slightly broken as opposed to super broken. You still have to spend 240 points in upgrades for your free razors to get something useful. What other base heavy weapon is so bad that armies turn it down even when its 100% free?

 Xenomancers wrote:

 Lammikkovalas wrote:
I just thought I'd mention that those free Razorbacks wouldn't maybe need any upgrades with some of these buffs. Moar points to take something fun instead!

Well you point out a major reason the formation is only slightly broken as opposed to super broken. You still have to spend 240 points in upgrades for your free razors to get something useful. What other base heavy weapon is so bad that armies turn it down even when its 100% free?

I don't think there are any other heavy weapons like that. How about we just equip the Razorbacks with stolen scatterlasers?

 Lammikkovalas wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:

 Lammikkovalas wrote:
I just thought I'd mention that those free Razorbacks wouldn't maybe need any upgrades with some of these buffs. Moar points to take something fun instead!

Well you point out a major reason the formation is only slightly broken as opposed to super broken. You still have to spend 240 points in upgrades for your free razors to get something useful. What other base heavy weapon is so bad that armies turn it down even when its 100% free?

I don't think there are any other heavy weapons like that. How about we just equip the Razorbacks with stolen scatterlasers?

Hurrah!!!! In a real war, everyone would be using scatterlasers very quickly. Efficacy trumps heresy.

 Lammikkovalas wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:

 Lammikkovalas wrote:
I just thought I'd mention that those free Razorbacks wouldn't maybe need any upgrades with some of these buffs. Moar points to take something fun instead!

Well you point out a major reason the formation is only slightly broken as opposed to super broken. You still have to spend 240 points in upgrades for your free razors to get something useful. What other base heavy weapon is so bad that armies turn it down even when its 100% free?

I don't think there are any other heavy weapons like that. How about we just equip the Razorbacks with stolen scatterlasers?

The eldar have a few places where they start with shurcannons, and have the option to upgrade. Vypers, Falcons, Wave Serpents, War Walkers, etc. How often are they kept there? Vypers might be the only place.

Compare to SMs and HBs. Razors, Speeders, Attack Bikes, Stormtalons, Stormravens, etc. You might see them on TML/HB speeders, but otherwise they are ripped off and replaced ASAP.

Generally killing light troops in the open is not something most lists need help with. So when it’s the default free weapon, like the HB or SC, it gets replaced. But it’s not just HBs.

Eh, I see Wave Serpents with shuricannons fairly often - the scatter laser is less interesting when you want to get into 24" range anyway (due to the shield being 24" now, and the hull-mounted cannon), and it was mostly interesting in the previous book because of Laser Lock. Though admittedly, I don't see them much on Falcons or War Walkers (generally brightlance and either brightlance or scatter laser, respectively. Once in a great while I'll see starcannons)

That said, that's because the shuricannon is useful for taking down MCs and light tanks, too.

Oh, I almost forgot. You don't upgrade the HB on a Darkshroud to an Assault Cannon either because it's going to be always jinking.

...am I nuts? Or just a fool? Because I've never seen any major issues with the HB...but then again, I'm also not taking them frequently either, so maybe I'm unconsciously ignoring them?

..though I suppose one idea I would have is probably crazy - but what about making them rapid fire instead of heavy? Still 3 shots base (6 at 12")...but that way the squad can shoot on the move as effectively, without the HB slowing them/impeding them. Right now, taking a HB is a decision between that and other heavy weapons (and if I'm making a fire support Tac squad, I'll opt for another heavy weapon in that case) - but if I want a tactical squad on the move, then I will likely forgo the HB and heavy option entirely for the extra bolter marine. Rapid Fire may make it more plausible in a moving squad option?

 Nevelon wrote:

 Lammikkovalas wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:

 Lammikkovalas wrote:
I just thought I'd mention that those free Razorbacks wouldn't maybe need any upgrades with some of these buffs. Moar points to take something fun instead!

Well you point out a major reason the formation is only slightly broken as opposed to super broken. You still have to spend 240 points in upgrades for your free razors to get something useful. What other base heavy weapon is so bad that armies turn it down even when its 100% free?

I don't think there are any other heavy weapons like that. How about we just equip the Razorbacks with stolen scatterlasers?

The eldar have a few places where they start with shurcannons, and have the option to upgrade. Vypers, Falcons, Wave Serpents, War Walkers, etc. How often are they kept there? Vypers might be the only place.

Compare to SMs and HBs. Razors, Speeders, Attack Bikes, Stormtalons, Stormravens, etc. You might see them on TML/HB speeders, but otherwise they are ripped off and replaced ASAP.

Generally killing light troops in the open is not something most lists need help with. So when it’s the default free weapon, like the HB or SC, it gets replaced. But it’s not just HBs.

I built my WS back in the old rules - I probably would be using a SC top mount if I didn't glue the SL on turret - it's only a 5 point upgrade though so I don't really feel like converting it. On vypers for sure - keep them cheap and still get 6 psudo rending shots on MC - I love my vyper. I would think falcons coming stock with a pulse laser are almost always going to take a 5 point bright lance. WW are really the only place you will never see the SC though - just because it's only 5 points for a weapon of your choice and they really make use of long range weapons well with their battle focus. I think the SC is a much better weapon than the HB - thats for sure.

Can't really think of another similar arrangement. Cept maybe with raiders and disintegraters and I feel like there is a good mix there. It just seems that most everyone would prefer almost any other heavy weapon to a HB in almost ever situation.


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 General_K wrote:
...am I nuts? Or just a fool? Because I've never seen any major issues with the HB...but then again, I'm also not taking them frequently either, so maybe I'm unconsciously ignoring them?

..though I suppose one idea I would have is probably crazy - but what about making them rapid fire instead of heavy? Still 3 shots base (6 at 12")...but that way the squad can shoot on the move as effectively, without the HB slowing them/impeding them. Right now, taking a HB is a decision between that and other heavy weapons (and if I'm making a fire support Tac squad, I'll opt for another heavy weapon in that case) - but if I want a tactical squad on the move, then I will likely forgo the HB and heavy option entirely for the extra bolter marine. Rapid Fire may make it more plausible in a moving squad option?

Or just make them assault like a big shoota.

Increasing the HB's stats in just about any way makes autocannons into niche weapons.

The exception is the Pinning idea, but conceptually that should apply to any high rate of fire weapon and I don't think we want to go there.

Assault 3, Pinning Shred. Still not perfect but makes them mobile and more likely to score wounds/hold a squad in place.

Cheaper. Make them 5 points for a MEQ to take a Heavy Bolter.

 Vankraken wrote:
Cheaper. Make them 5 points for a MEQ to take a Heavy Bolter.

Still useless.


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HoundsofDemos wrote:
Assault 3, Pinning Shred. Still not perfect but makes them mobile and more likely to score wounds/hold a squad in place.

I'd actually think about this.

I never understood why they where heavy for Marines. These are guys who can punch through a tank, they should be able to move and shot with them.

Prolly to simplify game mechanics for all the armies that use them.

Heavy is a pretty relative term, a railgun is also heavy, and that surely has more kick than a HB.

HoundsofDemos wrote:
Assault 3, Pinning Shred. Still not perfect but makes them mobile and more likely to score wounds/hold a squad in place.

This makes HBs better against Monstrous Creatures than Autocannons are. This may be fine, but they're supposed to be light infantry killers.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
and again there's the issue that if HBs should get Pinning, then Burst Cannons, Splinter Cannons, Gatling Cannons etc etc etc should have it; after all, all of them have a higher RoF.

Actually, burst cannons are an interesting comparison. Same cost (10) and same strength, but only AP5 and 18", but with one more shot and assualt. What makes them a useful, viable option, when HBs aren't?

price lowered to 8pts per model like scouts do, with 5 points for hellfires again like scouts

Chaos Space Marine only

Heavy Hel-Bolter

36" s5 ap5 heavy 5 rending...

If you wanna see heavy bolters on the field, make windrider jetbikes have a 4+ save.

Did that for my house games (I am the eldar player, btw) and there are one or two every game I play against imperial players. Killing a bike every turn (or every other with cover/jink but they lose shooting capabilities) is well worth the 10 points.

 Co'tor Shas wrote:
Actually, burst cannons are an interesting comparison. Same cost (10) and same strength, but only AP5 and 18", but with one more shot and assualt. What makes them a useful, viable option, when HBs aren't?

One more shot and assault. The AP doesn't matter anymore. The range is nice, but not when mixed in with bolters.

Alcibiades wrote:

and again there's the issue that if HBs should get Pinning, then Burst Cannons, Splinter Cannons, Gatling Cannons etc etc etc should have it; after all, all of them have a higher RoF.

I think Pinning is fine. I mean, it's not just high RoF, you're being shot at with high caliber explosive shells.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z1PrIY3Mgf4&t=1m50s

 Co'tor Shas wrote:
Actually, burst cannons are an interesting comparison. Same cost (10) and same strength, but only AP5 and 18", but with one more shot and assualt. What makes them a useful, viable option, when HBs aren't?

The best platform for a Burst Cannon is a Crisis Suit which can spend 20 points to take 2 guns. Two Heavy Bolter marines have the same durability but worse points efficiency as a Crisis Suit with 2 Burst Cannons who also has a load of extra benefits like relentless, deep strike, jump shoot jump, markerlight support, supporting fire, etc. Stealths have never been considered a cost effective combat unit while you aren't taking vehicles for their burst cannons. Possible exception for the Piranha which when factoring the value of the drones and burst cannon comes to a 6 point AV 11 skimmer chassis so having a dirt cheap AV11 skimmer with a burst cannon isn't that bad of a proposition. Even then very few people are really interested in burst cannons when the best platform can just take plasmas, fusions, or cyclic ions for 5 points more per crisis suit weapon.

Naaris wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Due to the D6 system, there is no mathematical niche for them. Also, 4+ armor is relatively rare, and that kills them as well. Maybe if you could upgrade them to AP 3...

What version of 40k do you play Martel?

All Eldar- minus bikes and some aspect warriors
Dark Eldar are affected by AP4 - except maybe some MCs
Harlequins
All Nids except big beasts
All Orks except a few bigger elite models
All Tau infantry and fast attack infantry
All Astra militarum infantry
I'd also assume most inquisition
Necron Warriors and tombblades have a 4+ save, same with crypteks
Most Admech

Tau take Battlesuits and Mechs, which have 3+ or better
Nids/Orks/Imperial Guard don't care about your AP4.
Necron warriors have 4+ RP, Tomb Blades also have jink, DE have Jink, Eldar run bikes with Jink or Wraithknights.

I think the "If CWE Jetbikes were 4+" is an underrated answer.

Bharring wrote:
I think the "If CWE Jetbikes were 4+" is an underrated answer.

The misprint from Rogue Trader must be preserved at all costs!

Seriously though, IK exist, and with them there is a hard, hard break point on S5 vs S6. Actually there are a lot of AV 12 vehicle/walkers and that makes long range S6 SOOOOOOO much better than S5. Heavy bolters could be free and I still wouldn't use them because of the movement problem.

If the S5/S6 breakpoint were as critical as you suggest, the most common troop with access to S6 across the board - Tac Marines - would clean house.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
The movement problem is where Salvo 2/3 becomes interesting - its a heavy weapon that still beats Boltguns on the move.

But the HB isn't supposed to answer an IK. That's what nearly every other Heavy option is supposed to be better against.

Bharring wrote:
If the S5/S6 breakpoint were as critical as you suggest, the most common troop with access to S6 across the board - Tac Marines - would clean house.

S6 ranged. Scatterlaser. Multilaser. Autoannon. Web Spinner. Not goddamn krak grenades. Which can't even hit the side of an IK unless you throw one. Remember assault doesn't exist really for marines in 7th. They're too busy being scooped up by scatterlasers, multilasers, autocannons and webspinners.

Multi lasers aren't on every IG Guardsmen.

Autocannons aren't on every CSM.

Web Spinners cannot be taken on any troops in any way.

SL Spam is bullcrap OP. But that isn't their "common troop" in fluff or intention.

My point is that S6 isn't the end-all-be-all. Other factors make the most ubiquitous source of S6 matter very little, whereas spammed S5 can be scary (Tau have some good S5).

A good fix for a lot of that would be to make the scatter laser and the deathspinner S5. I'm less sure about multilasers - make them S5 and they become strictly worse than heavy bolters (make them assault, and none of the platforms that carry one even notice).

Autocannons are mostly fine IMHO, though I think the high-yield missile pods on Broadsides could stand to be toned down or made more expensive.

That said, I'd still want to be able to fire a heavy bolter on the move, for them to be interesting. Assault or Salvo, either is fine IMO.

So the current proposal is:
HB: Salvo 2/3, still S5AP4
CWE Jetbikes: 4+
CWE Spinners and SL: S5

?

Seems like "Balance other things" is a critical part of the answer.

Oh, no doubt. There's a lot of other things that need tuning - and probably not just nerfing into uselessness. (Yeah, I know, funny me saying that, when I've proposed to nerf the Riptide into uselessness a few times, mostly to try to get a handle on what people really object to about it.)

Bharring wrote:
Multi lasers aren't on every IG Guardsmen.

Autocannons aren't on every CSM.

Web Spinners cannot be taken on any troops in any way.

SL Spam is bullcrap OP. But that isn't their "common troop" in fluff or intention.

My point is that S6 isn't the end-all-be-all. Other factors make the most ubiquitous source of S6 matter very little, whereas spammed S5 can be scary (Tau have some good S5).

No S5 really isn't. Even for BA. Who suck out loud. S5 kills my Rhinos at half the rate of S6, and wounds me 20% less. And can't hurt AV 12 at all. And the units with S5 aren't as mobile as scatterbikes or warp spiders. S6/7 is THE sweet spot in this game. Wounds almost everything at a high rate, can glance out almost everything from the side, and has high ROF frequently. If the click from S7 to S8 was remotely as good as 5 to 6, it wouldn't be quite as bad. S8/S9 just sucks now.




Automatically Appended Next Post:

Bharring wrote:
So the current proposal is:
HB: Salvo 2/3, still S5AP4
CWE Jetbikes: 4+
CWE Spinners and SL: S5

?

Seems like "Balance other things" is a critical part of the answer.

Not quite, because the AP 4 is so incredibly niche. Cover, which is ubiquitous and FREE, is one of the biggest downfalls of the heavy bolter. Compare to a a weapon like webspinner or scatterlaser that just spams wounds and doesn't care about penetrating armor. Wound spam always works. Rely on AP gets worse the more terrain there is.

So:
Xenos APing Power Armor is broken and OP.
IoM APing Xenos is niche and pointless, because cover.

Sure, losing 3+ saves is worse than losing 4+ saves, but they both matter.

And Cover is rarely "free". It forces where you put your models - which can he her important. Force those 4+ models into the open to get to your juicy bits, and things change. Or flank their position, where possible. Where not possible, many platforms (jetbikes, Warp Spiders) need to take DT tests. Sometimes, a player will need to expose one unit or move them out of position to give another a 5+.

Cover really isn't free.

The AP4 isn't the main selling point of the HB. Its just one of its stats. Mostly, its supposed to be additional small arms shots, just a little stronger. Basically, for all the situations you list where S6 beats S5, the HB shouldn't be the answer. Want to pop an IK? Don't use a machine gun. Wound Marines like Eldar or IG? Not the HBs job. Pop a battletank (AV12)? Heck, it should (and does) struggle vs AV11/10. Tanks antitank.

Heavy Bolters are heavies which perform as Boltguns +1, better range. Better S. Better AP.

They wound anything not as tough as Marines on a 2+. They AP anything with less than Marine armor. They shoot faster than a Rapid Firing Boltgun. Take them to kill anything less than Marines.

For all the complaints about Marines, they still either outshoot or out chop almost every other Troop in the game, point for point. For many, they do both better. Its just that you never see these options, because there is so much that destroys them so easily. These "less than Marines" choices are what HB are for. IG. Ork 'Ard Boys. Dire Avengers. Kalabites. Even the Boltgun does a number on them. The HB is designed to hurt them.

" Want to pop an IK? Don't use a machine gun."

But S6 machine guns do it so well...

"Xenos APing Power Armor is broken and OP. "

Hardly. Eldar aren't scary because they pen power armor. They make it save 75 times a turn.

Tau don't just pen power armor; they slather it with ignore cover at will.

Necrons don't pen power armor; they just glance out ever vehicle ever and never die.

"
The AP4 isn't the main selling point of the HB."

Looking at its stats, that appears to be the intention. S5 ROF 3 sucks.

" they still either outshoot or out chop almost every other Troop in the game, point for point."

That's not really true. Only when other lists gimp themselves. Scatterbikes are THE Eldar troop now. Accept it.

IG have their counter meta thing going on, though. All your anti-meq weapons are now inefficient.

Because multi*Lasers* are machine guns?

Oh, you meant scatter*LASERS*? Because such an OP platform obviously has nothing to do with Scatter Bikes being OP.

Do Multi lasers really do well against IKs? SL bikes only do so because you get so much, for far too cheap.

At any rate, if you're looking for an SM Gatling cannon, that's the Assault Cannon, not the Heavy Bolter. They are, and should be, very different weapons.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Scatter Bikes are one of the top troops right now. They outshoot SM by a mile. But:
1) SM are better at choppy than CWE Bikes, per point or per model, by a lot. The bikes are OP because their shooty is absolutely stupid, so of course Tacs aren't as shooty.
2) I said almost every troop choice in the game. Not only was the statement true about SL bikes anyways, but also, that is only one troop option. There are many troop options in the game. You may not care about anything but BA troops and SL Bikes, but many of the rest of us do.
3) Making a weapon that slaughters so many other troops choices that already can't compete won't help them compete. It won't do anything to fix the situation. It'll just reinforce the current situation. Are DE "gimping themselves" when they chose Kalabites? And when they chose Wyches?
4) Does every thread really need to devolve to "But Scatter Bikes!"? Is that really what we need to do to make HB viable?
5) Making HB-toting Tacs as good at shooting as SL Bikes even really a good idea?

Three shots that wound on 2s for most targets at 36"? For a negligible price, doesn't seem so bad.

It's because you can't move.

Being able to outchop in 7th ed is incredibly not useful. I live it every time I play this game. Even other marine lists just grav my dudes before they can chop.

Necron warriors are better than tacs because of gauss.
Fire warriors are inferior in a vacuum but superior on the table because shooting counts for so much and they get synergistic buffs.
Scat bikes are scat bikes.
Guardsmen are inferior in a head to head but are counter meta in a game where 3+ is either denied or scrubbed through by mass wounds. More wounds is better in a game where quality of wound means nothing lives until you get to godly mcs.

The 3+ isn't denied by massed wounds. It cuts those wounds into thirds. Those with a 5+ lose twice as much, and 4+ lose half again. Works out well for IG dudes, as they cost less than half a Marine, but much less well for Kalabites, Wyches, Kroot, Fire Warriors, Guardians, Dire Avengers, Rangers, Harlequins and Scouts. In other words, unless the selling points of the models is eating a lot of firepower (Guards, Orks, Gaunts, and Necron Warriors), Marines lose *less* point-for-point from S6 AP6 firepower. Even SL Bikes lose more points per shot (but have insane shooting).

The quality of the wound does mean something. If you want to play as a general who believes otherwise, stop taking units that pay for survival.

I'm not arguing that Tacs are the best troop in the game. I'm saying that the things the HB is good against are in a worse spot than Tacs right now.

That's possibly true. But the hull point mechanic still puts s6 so far ahead of s5 its crazy.

Yeah, because anti-Infantry weapons aren't as good at popping vehicles as heavy lasers or cannons or shaped charges

Shouldn't heavy lasers and cannons and shaped charges be better for popping vehicles?

When you take a weapon designed to kill sub-MEQ units, shouldn't it not be great at popping vehicles?

I get that S5 is worse vs IKs and battle tanks than S6. I don't get why that is a bad thing.

Because s6 gives too much utility for the cost. And difference in capability is too stark.

Sounds counter intuitive, but give heavy bolters ap3. Now it can do something in return for being heavy and not generating enough wounds.

So you think the HB should be S6 so that it can do everything?

Why should a Heavy Bolter be a good choice for killing battletanks and IKs?

What makes S6 more appropriate than Fleshbane + Haywire?

Eldar have multiple guns that do evertything while the imperium have a bunch of guns that don't do enough.

So, you want the HB to be the IoM SL?

Bharring wrote:
So, you want the HB to be the IoM SL?

No, not really. There's already the multilaser. My main thesis is that the heavy bolter is a useless weapon in 7th ed because of the limitations of gw's system. It has no mathematical niche against 7th ed lists. It's not worth not moving to fire one of these things. Eldar never have to make these choices because eldar.

Make Tyranids not suck, while retaining their 4+ statline. Then you'll see HB with a niche.

 Furyou Miko wrote:
Make Tyranids not suck, while retaining their 4+ statline. Then you'll see HB with a niche.

A single army is not enough. Heavy bolters suck vs the whole field currently.

So... Resolved that scatter lasers should not be S6, and probably deathspinners and most other S6 spamguns shouldn't be either. Got it. I'll even concede that HYMPs need to be nerfed too. (Missile pods and CIBs, we'll say the jury is out - apparently Crisis Suits don't attract all that much rage).

If the heavy bolter were R36 S5 AP3 Salvo 2/3, Pinning, would they have any use at all? I agree that as they are - Heavy, especially - they're lackluster at best, and useless at worst. I think at that point they'd be pretty good against MEQs and below while having some utility against MCs. (Remember that, as much as you revile the Riptide, Tyrannofex, Ghostkeel and NDK for their defenses, most MCs are T6/Sv3+, not Sv2+).

Even with a 3+, heavy bolters will clear VERY few wounds against MCs. Even scatterlasers start to look less overpowered against T6, because the 3+ has to save against so many fewer wounds.

HYMPs at least aren't supermobile and T4 2+ W2 is not that hard to neutralize in 7th ed. Crisis suits don't get rage because they die like meqs. Even faster than meqs against S8. I mean crisis suits are weak to krak missiles, a garbage heavy weapon if there ever was one.

If AV 13/14 were more common, then the S6 spam would have a real downside. But they aren't, and most AV 13 has very vulnerable sides. If IK had AV 13 sides, for example, they'd be a real counter to scatbikes. But they don't, so they are just trivial victims for them.

S5 ap3 salvo 2/3 pinning would make it perhaps more effective vs infantry than its points. Remember that it still wounds Marines on 3s, and now it APs them.

Bharring wrote:
S5 ap3 salvo 2/3 pinning would make it perhaps more effective vs infantry than its points. Remember that it still wounds Marines on 3s, and now it APs them.

Which would be something, even though my "meq" opponents usually have lists of bikes, invis centurions, or are huddled in 12 free razorbacks that the heavy bolter would still be ass against. See, meqs suck now, and my knowledeable opponents minimize their ACTUAL usage of meqs. But it would be something. I STILL wouldn't use it though. How dumb has this game gotten?

Oh no. Bikes. It only kills them on 4s!

On a more serious note, how many models in the top 10 lists from LVO were T3/4 3+/4+?

Hint: tons.

Bharring wrote:
Oh no. Bikes. It only kills them on 4s!

On a more serious note, how many models in the top 10 lists from LVO were T3/4 3+/4+?

Hint: tons.

But then they get their jinks and laugh at you.

I need to look at these magic lists using the crappy models in 7th ed. Infantry has very poor life expectancy in this game now.

Well, T6 surely has its advantages - point-for-point, splinter cannons are far better at bringing T6+ MCs down than scatter lasers are. (Actually, those are the exact cases that start seriously favoring the shuriken cannon due to Bladestorm, and I play against 'nids a lot, so I tend to think of that first...)

That said, with AP3, a squad of BS4 guys with 4 HBs (12 shots) gets 2.66 wounds on a Carnifex, versus 1.9 with AP4. I ran the numbers - S6 helps a lot more here. S6 AP3, that's a dead 'fex. S6 AP4, that's only 2.66 wounds. Hm.

Versus Marines, that's 5.33 expected wounds at AP3, versus 3.1 at AP4. So, at AP3, I think they'd be at least a little more useful.

The problem with most of these suggestions is the existence of the autocannon.

The autocannon is the light vehicle and monstrous creature killer. If you implement things like giving HBs S6 (or even 5), or Shred, or AP3 in the case of MCs, you make the autocannon obsolete.

This is also the case against MCs if you increase RoF beyond a certain point.

The HB is supposed to be an anti-light infantry weapon. These proposals turn it instead into a superior version of the autocannon.

What pops into my mind is giving it Shred and an increase in RoF to 4, but reduce S to 4. Yes you heard that right. Mathematically S4 with Shred will give it better killing power against infantry (S4 is better than S5 against anything below T7 I think), but it will not step over into a light vehicle killer.

Alcibiades wrote:
The problem with most of these suggestions is the existence of the autocannon.

The autocannon is the light vehicle and monstrous creature killer. If you implement things like giving HBs S6 (or even 5), or Shred, or AP3 in the case of MCs, you make the autocannon obsolete.

This is also the case against MCs if you increase RoF beyond a certain point.

The HB is supposed to be an anti-light infantry weapon. These proposals turn it instead into a superior version of the autocannon.

What pops into my mind is giving it Shred and an increase in RoF to 4, but reduce S to 4. Yes you heard that right. Mathematically S4 with Shred will give it better killing power against infantry (S4 is better than S5 against anything below T7 I think), but it will not step over into a light vehicle killer.

Clever. I like that a lot.

Like I said before, the primary issue is that there isn't a problematic unit in the game that it would fill the role of eliminating. Heavy bolters and autocannons are terrifying to eldar jetbikes according to the fluff, they don't even need to try and Dodge them in game.

No evasive maneuvers needed against something that could tear you apart because they will probably bounce off of your armor. You know, that exact same front plate the Harlequins have on their jetbikes of similar design that can't possibly stop those bullets...

The fluff has almost no bearing on the tabletop game. By the model of the game, space marines are not a match for Eldar. The scatterlaser would dominate every engagement.

To be fair, the scattlaser dominates nothing in regards to land raiders.

Space marines die too easily, according to the bolter porn books anyway. The eldar in the codex written fluff have always taken evasive maneuvers when fired upon by heavy bolters and autocannons. For them to warrant doing that their armor would have to not be proof against it.


Again, eldar jetbikes have only granted a 4+ save in my games since the DAY the 6th ed codex came out and heavy bolters (and grenade launchers) have been a staple for imperial armies around my tables for years now because of it. Also, it makes heavy flamers and manticor scary as all get out as well.

I would want to take heavy bolters if foot Howling Banshees and Scion squads were super popular and the most spammed units in the game.

It has to be those two, because other 4+ units like fire warriors can stay in cover and you'd just use weight of fire.

Lythrandire Biehrellian wrote:
, the primary issue is that there isn't a problematic unit in the game that it would fill the role of eliminating.

See?

Lythrandire Biehrellian wrote:
To be fair, the scattlaser dominates nothing in regards to land raiders.

Space marines die too easily, according to the bolter porn books anyway. The eldar in the codex written fluff have always taken evasive maneuvers when fired upon by heavy bolters and autocannons. For them to warrant doing that their armor would have to not be proof against it.


Again, eldar jetbikes have only granted a 4+ save in my games since the DAY the 6th ed codex came out and heavy bolters (and grenade launchers) have been a staple for imperial armies around my tables for years now because of it. Also, it makes heavy flamers and manticor scary as all get out as well.

Too bad land raiders are unusable garbage.

Point I was making is scatterlasers aren't the answer to everything, and wouldn't be a problem if they weren't too cheap on a unit that has too much survivability.

4+ save on the jetbikes removes how scary the scatbikes are, +5 points on the scatterlasers (or, in my houserules, they become 24") makes them on par with most heavy weapons in the game. If a single 10 point heavy bolter forces 60+ points of scatbikes to jink, then the heavy bolter becomes worth taking.

But the bikes are 3+, not 4+ in the actual game. Heavy bolter would still be garbage, because it isn't even good vs Orks.

Heavy bolters are Str5, which is the most useless strength value in the game. Its not high enough to wound MEQ on a 2+, and its not high enough to ID T3 (Eldar/Tau/Guard) characters. Its not high enough to scratch AV12, and against AV 11 its waste of 3 shots trying for a HP, when a simple Lascannon or Missile Launcher could do the job much better. If a weapon is strength 3 or below, at least you know it'll be cheap or have a rule like poisoned. Str 4 comes standard on most things. Str 6 is that sweet spot where you do 2+ wounding on MEQ/Necrons/Orks, and ID T3. Str 7 is similarly useless as the only bonus it really grants is vs T6 and AVs, but at that stage you might as well go all the way and get Str8 for the MEQ ID, 2+ vs T6 and ability to harm AV14.

Except this is the proposed rules section of the forum where you are supposed to... Propose rules changes.

So, my proposal is to simply change the windrider jetbikes to grant a 4+ save as opposed to a 3+ and change the windrider jetbikes dataslate accordingly. This would thereby give a viable target that is very common in the meta for the heavy bolter, has fluff validation, and would add a weakness to a unit most people agree is an issue.

So, that would be a win, win, win situation!

Edit: so except for these very useful scenarios, these strength ratings stink.
How about str7 versus toughness 5? Are there not a lot of biker space marines or orks in your area?

Make e'm work like HMG's, you can use those to do indirect fire and it increases the range of the weapon dramatically.

So give e'm a small STR 5 AP 4 barrage blast at 24-60'' to represent that (do the same with Hvt Stubbers, too, but with their own Str/AP) this kills mortars, but hey, its another topic. Make it apply to infantry hvy bolters only.

Easiest way to not make them suck, remove Heavy weapon Tag.

That way they can move and fire 3 times. Keep them limited as a heavy weapon but add suspension web or something to allow them full RoF on move.

That way no str increase to challenge other wpns but they now become a mobile support wpn.

Makes the most since and doenst increase their effectiveness terribly, and would maybe actually get people to play them.

Im actually like the idea of making them salvo, but something more like:
S5 AP 4 Salvo 3/5. Pinning
Im not really ok with them auto penning power arrmor, but they throw up enough shots to maybe matter... and suddenly they are actually useful against armies with lots of units. To me the heavy bolter has always been a weapon thatis designed to fill that roll against orcs and nids, and other squishy zerg lists. If someone else said the same I apologize.

Sorry, at AP 4, it's still too narrow of a niche.

Martel732 wrote:
Sorry, at AP 4, it's still too narrow of a niche.

ok so what reasoning is there to make it AP3? At what point do we stop making armor saves totally pointless in the game? That has to stop at some point. Heavy bolters are specifically used against targets like orcs and nids not against heavily armored targets.

 Dyslexican32 wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Sorry, at AP 4, it's still too narrow of a niche.

ok so what reasoning is there to make it AP3? At what point do we stop making armor saves totally pointless in the game? That has to stop at some point. Heavy bolters are specifically used against targets like orcs and nids not against heavily armored targets.

3+ armor is already so poor that I'd rather have a gun that does something to dangerous Xenos than worry about it killing my marines that already don't live. Back when scatterbikes dropped, I said make autocannons and heavy bolters AP3 and be done with it. The guard becomes more dangerous as well. 3+ armor is no longer heavy armor. It just lasts a bit longer against wound spam than 4+ armor. This is a game with D-scythes and ion acclerators in it. Who cares about AP 3 anymore?

Str 5 AP4 Heavy 3 blast....giggles

Can't remember if it's been suggested, but give Heavy Bolters specialist ammo? Being able to choose between AP3, Ignores Cover, and Poisoned (2+) would certainly make the Heavy Bolter a much better generalist weapon.

3+ armor is already so poor that I'd rather have a gun that does something to dangerous Xenos than worry about it killing my marines that already don't live. Back when scatterbikes dropped, I said make autocannons and heavy bolters AP3 and be done with it. The guard becomes more dangerous as well. 3+ armor is no longer heavy armor. It just lasts a bit longer against wound spam than 4+ armor. This is a game with D-scythes and ion acclerators in it. Who cares about AP 3 anymore?

So the answer is " there are other strong things so lets make everything strong" that is the reasoning... I don't see how that even makes them able to compete against things like scatter bikes? And as things are now nothing can compete with D so lets not even compare those things.. Its like comparing a club and a nuclear weapon! And yes it will survive a bit longer against wound spam then 4+ and that does and should mean something. if ALL the weapons in the game just deny armor then what is the point, it makes shooting EVEN stronger then it already is!




Automatically Appended Next Post:

 AlmightyWalrus wrote:
Can't remember if it's been suggested, but give Heavy Bolters specialist ammo? Being able to choose between AP3, Ignores Cover, and Poisoned (2+) would certainly make the Heavy Bolter a much better generalist weapon.

Im coll withthat, but they need to be paid for upgrades, not necessarily super expensive but you need to pay points for those for sure. Either way I think they need to get them away from the way heavy weapons currently work.

It gives more strong shooting to more lists, especially IG. Why limit which lists have strong shooting among those that should all have strong shooting?

Martel732 wrote:

Bharring wrote:
I think the "If CWE Jetbikes were 4+" is an underrated answer.

The misprint from Rogue Trader must be preserved at all costs!

Seriously though, IK exist, and with them there is a hard, hard break point on S5 vs S6. Actually there are a lot of AV 12 vehicle/walkers and that makes long range S6 SOOOOOOO much better than S5. Heavy bolters could be free and I still wouldn't use them because of the movement problem.

as much as I dont like you I thought that was funny. All this over powered stuff from missprints.

 Dyslexican32 wrote:



Automatically Appended Next Post:

 AlmightyWalrus wrote:
Can't remember if it's been suggested, but give Heavy Bolters specialist ammo? Being able to choose between AP3, Ignores Cover, and Poisoned (2+) would certainly make the Heavy Bolter a much better generalist weapon.

Im coll withthat, but they need to be paid for upgrades, not necessarily super expensive but you need to pay points for those for sure. Either way I think they need to get them away from the way heavy weapons currently work.

Why do they need to be paid for upgrades? The point is that no one takes Heavy Bolters because they're currently awful, that isn't solved by making them more expensive.

There is nothing wrong with the heavy bolter.

If it doesnt keep up with the wierdly named weapons 40K has been flooded with in the last three years it is because codex design has taken a nosedive and too many overpowered toys have entered play.

Give me a heavy bolter on a ten man tactical squad and I am happy. You can stick your Zylex pattern metagravwaveautocarbinette with autodominator shells somewhere I cant see them.

 Orlanth wrote:

If it doesnt keep up with the wierdly named weapons 40K has been flooded with in the last three years it is because codex design has taken a nosedive and too many overpowered toys have entered play.

It didn't keep up before that either.

I tend to take Heavy Bolters as standard, either in Devastators or Tactical Squads.

 Orlanth wrote:
There is nothing wrong with the heavy bolter.

If it doesnt keep up with the wierdly named weapons 40K has been flooded with in the last three years it is because codex design has taken a nosedive and too many overpowered toys have entered play.

Give me a heavy bolter on a ten man tactical squad and I am happy. You can stick your Zylex pattern metagravwaveautocarbinette with autodominator shells somewhere I cant see them.

Other than the fact that when you fire it, nothing happens, its perfectly fine.

 AlmightyWalrus wrote:

 Dyslexican32 wrote:



Automatically Appended Next Post:

 AlmightyWalrus wrote:
Can't remember if it's been suggested, but give Heavy Bolters specialist ammo? Being able to choose between AP3, Ignores Cover, and Poisoned (2+) would certainly make the Heavy Bolter a much better generalist weapon.

Im coll withthat, but they need to be paid for upgrades, not necessarily super expensive but you need to pay points for those for sure. Either way I think they need to get them away from the way heavy weapons currently work.

Why do they need to be paid for upgrades? The point is that no one takes Heavy Bolters because they're currently awful, that isn't solved by making them more expensive.

Outside of taking some formation that makes them free upgrades, I am always hesitant to standardly make something free just because. I think Specialist ammo would make them better as well, However they thing for me that really makes them pointless, is the way heavy weapons work and severely restricting your movement. I think Heavy bolters have their place, again against nids, orcs or other lightly armored targets, but no they will never compete with scat bikes and other silly stuff like that. I take Heavy bolters against orcs and nids on a regular basis and they do fine. They havea place, the problem is those two armies aren't the hot lists right now so you don't see them as much. If either where strong I think you would see Heavy Bolters more.

So I've finally got around to using the poison 2+ apd6 hh heavy bolters, and sweet jebus they are good, I'll be taking a full hs squad with them now, totally worth it, so I'm thinking, maybe special issue ammo added to bolters for 5pts

Poison 2+
Ap 3 range 42"
AP2 gets hot
Ignores cover

I'd use that in a second

 Orlanth wrote:
There is nothing wrong with the heavy bolter.

If it doesnt keep up with the wierdly named weapons 40K has been flooded with in the last three years it is because codex design has taken a nosedive and too many overpowered toys have entered play.

Give me a heavy bolter on a ten man tactical squad and I am happy. You can stick your Zylex pattern metagravwaveautocarbinette with autodominator shells somewhere I cant see them.

Ah yes, because the Heavy Bolter actually had a value at some point...
Oh wait, it didn't.

 Dyslexican32 wrote:

 AlmightyWalrus wrote:

 Dyslexican32 wrote:



Automatically Appended Next Post:

 AlmightyWalrus wrote:
Can't remember if it's been suggested, but give Heavy Bolters specialist ammo? Being able to choose between AP3, Ignores Cover, and Poisoned (2+) would certainly make the Heavy Bolter a much better generalist weapon.

Im coll withthat, but they need to be paid for upgrades, not necessarily super expensive but you need to pay points for those for sure. Either way I think they need to get them away from the way heavy weapons currently work.

Why do they need to be paid for upgrades? The point is that no one takes Heavy Bolters because they're currently awful, that isn't solved by making them more expensive.

Outside of taking some formation that makes them free upgrades, I am always hesitant to standardly make something free just because. I think Specialist ammo would make them better as well, However they thing for me that really makes them pointless, is the way heavy weapons work and severely restricting your movement. I think Heavy bolters have their place, again against nids, orcs or other lightly armored targets, but no they will never compete with scat bikes and other silly stuff like that. I take Heavy bolters against orcs and nids on a regular basis and they do fine. They havea place, the problem is those two armies aren't the hot lists right now so you don't see them as much. If either where strong I think you would see Heavy Bolters more.

I've been playing since 5th and the HB has pretty much always been a useless weapon because of cover. It's very easy to get a cover save, so the AP4 hardly matters. At best it's pushing you down from a 4 to a 5. Additionally strength 5 sucks, it's not strong enough to threaten most vehicles and doesn't ID anything.

Would HB be more valued if we went to a '6 always wounds' chart? Makes HB>AC not just for T1-4, but also T 9&10.

For super crazy, how about adding a 6 always glances rule too (maybe unless that 6 was also a pen)?

I feel like making them always wound and glance on a 6 still makes them useless when instead you can usually take grav spam like we do now and still do better. I would say taking special amo as upgrades would be a much more versatile solution. I for one am not really a fan of blanket rules that auto wound and glance on everything. A few weapons it makes sense for, like gause but most others don't.

What makes sense has no bearing in this game at all.

I meant in game terms, Why would we have two weapons that do the same thing. (relatively) What would be the point to change something to fill a role we already have.

I've said it many times now, but there is literally no mathematical niche for this weapon. The whole game needs a revamp.

The niche is killing medium infantry. If there were a very prolific threat that fell into its viability range there wouldn't be a problem.

Ergo, windrider jetbikes having a 4+.

What would make me to take HB? Hm...

How about Heavy 6?

Go back to 5th Ed Tacticals squads; They got a Heavy Bolter, Multi Melta or Missile Launcher for free as their heavy (but needed 10 men). So, Tactical Squads get Heavy Bolters for free if they are 10 men strong (not 5 men), and they are reduced to 5pts across the board and armies.

Still useless with six shots or free. Heavy and only S5 kills it.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Lythrandire Biehrellian wrote:
The niche is killing medium infantry. If there were a very prolific threat that fell into its viability range there wouldn't be a problem.

Ergo, windrider jetbikes having a 4+.

That's a non-niche in 7th ed.

Are you saying that if Windrider jetbikes had a 4+ save, folks wouldn't spam them?

Also, I beg to differ that S5 is useless - Tau get quite a bit of mileage out of S5 AP5 guns. Then again, they have a lot of volume.

jade_angel wrote:
Are you saying that if Windrider jetbikes had a 4+ save, folks wouldn't spam them?

Also, I beg to differ that S5 is useless - Tau get quite a bit of mileage out of S5 AP5 guns. Then again, they have a lot of volume.

But Windriders don't have that save. They have a 3+. Even if they had a 4+, the heavy bolter is so poor against other lists that I still couldn't justify it. Tau have S5 on their BASIC gun, not a precious heavy slot.

salvo 2/4 would be nice, although I think the problem is less 'the gun' and more 'a decreasing number of 4+ save infantry being taken'

 Brennonjw wrote:
salvo 2/4 would be nice, although I think the problem is less 'the gun' and more 'a decreasing number of 4+ save infantry being taken'

And the gun sucks at HPing out vehicles. That's probably the single biggest knock on it. AV 12 is immune, whereas AV 12 is dead meat vs scatterlasers.

Martel732 wrote:

 Orlanth wrote:
There is nothing wrong with the heavy bolter.

If it doesnt keep up with the wierdly named weapons 40K has been flooded with in the last three years it is because codex design has taken a nosedive and too many overpowered toys have entered play.

Give me a heavy bolter on a ten man tactical squad and I am happy. You can stick your Zylex pattern metagravwaveautocarbinette with autodominator shells somewhere I cant see them.

Other than the fact that when you fire it, nothing happens, its perfectly fine.

Just like the bolter, and storm bolter!
Its the bottom tier heavy weapon, it's the "Ill take these sponsons to protect myself from weapon destroyed". Any adjustments to the weapon will adjust the point cost, and then you wind up with another autocannon/assault cannon.

I think a bigger issue is that devs can take heavy bolters, and not autocannons. Heavy bolters are cheap anti infantry, they are for piling on wounds and taking out anything lighter than meq with ease. There are plenty of crappy weapons in 40k that fall into the odd area of useless/outshined line the heavy bolter (which is outshined by assault cannons (still never see them) and autocannons (freaking everywhere). Look at various power weapons, ever seen a power lance, what about a power maul? Aside from models that have to take power mauls, no one ever takes them, because lightning claws do it better.

Heavy bolter is the ranged power maul.

 Brennonjw wrote:
salvo 2/4 would be nice, although I think the problem is less 'the gun' and more 'a decreasing number of 4+ save infantry being taken'

I agree.

If T3-4, 4+ infantry in the open was considered a threat, The HB would get a lot more love. It has a niche. It does a good job at it. But the niche is irrelevant in today’s meta, and it doesn’t have a backup job.

Most 4+ troops hide in cover. The ones that don’t (necron warriors come to mind) have other tricks (resurrection protocols)

I’ve been playing a touch of 30k lately and some things there were nice on HBs. Suspensor Web, which gives it the option of been an assault weapon with half the range. Basically a better salvo. The other thing was fielding them on vet. tac squads, and getting the sniper rule on them. Still not sure it was worth the points, but I did get some use out of them.

I think the main problem with the HB is its price. HB are pretty much everywhere and that makes it hard to buff with out significantly buffing most units. The issue is weapon competition. Why pay points for something average when I can pay a tiny bit more for something always effective.

40k should move away from standard point costs for items and adopt a per unit upgrade cost. The different units often get different utility out of builds than others. There is no reason it should be universial and the price should be factored into the parent unit. That said, HB themselves should become free in most cases for infantry. They will never really compete with higher slots because tehy are so easy to find on other platforms. For SM it should be something like Free HB, 5 point MM, 10 point ML (auto get flak), 15 point PC, and 20 point LC.

Now every weapon fills a niche. The HB doesn't sync well with most weapons except for more HB. In a tacticals squad who should usually be advancing doesn't seem like a liability because you get the weapon for free and it adds a capability. In a Dev squad you can utilize a 4 man HB squad withoout breaking you bank. The MM is also reduced to help compete with the high tier weapons. Paired with a MG, it can be very effective while, a quad MM squad could function as great area denial. The ML being the good all arounder is reduced in price and buffed to off set the loss of its ability to instant kill vehicles as well as being one shot. Everyone can agree as well Flak upgrade now is completely worthless. The PC and the LC have always had a place at their current cost.

This is what needs to happen across the board. HB are hardly alone in the dud upgrade category and you cant just look at one item and expect to be anything more than a band aid. Every unit has to rethink its weapon costs to create situations where all the upgrades have a use while still maintaining fluff.

The thing is that changing the points per unit doesn't take into account the fact that the unit already paid points for their ballistic skill and the weapon the heavy bolter replaced.

So when you see a 10 point upgrade for both the guardsman and space marine, remember that it is really an 11 point weapon for the guardsman and a 13 point weapon for the marine. (Approximately)

Same thing holds true for pretty much every weapon upgrade in the game.

 gwarsh41 wrote:


I think a bigger issue is that devs can take heavy bolters, and not autocannons. Heavy bolters are cheap anti infantry, they are for piling on wounds and taking out anything lighter than meq with ease. There are plenty of crappy weapons in 40k that fall into the odd area of useless/outshined line the heavy bolter (which is outshined by assault cannons (still never see them) and autocannons (freaking everywhere). Look at various power weapons, ever seen a power lance, what about a power maul? Aside from models that have to take power mauls, no one ever takes them, because lightning claws do it better.

Heavy bolter is the ranged power maul.

Power Mauls are much more common than Heavy Bolters, because S6 means wounding most infantry on 2+ and threatening rear armour 10. The Power Maul is the Power Weapon of choice on most MEQ models since the only thing the Power Sword performs better against is T4 3+ armour, and even then it's not by a huge margin.

Only if they strike at the same initiative or lower, if you're slower than your enemy, you're better off taking a power axe.

 Bobthehero wrote:
Only if they strike at the same initiative or lower, if you're slower than your enemy, you're better off taking a power axe.

For BA, it's worth having a mix. Power mauls can knock HPs off AV 13 walkers on the charge, and I think that's worthwhile.

Also, mauls ID Guard/Eldar/Skitarii characters, for the most part, and that's pretty useful.

They let non-BA marines beat AV 12 to death 2-3 times faster than krak greandes.

While Mauls and HBs share the same primary job (cashing out xenos) mauls actually succeed in being decent all-around weapons. Against things outside their ideal target, they still get the extra S to spam wounds, and concussive as a little bit of gravy. S6 is pretty good against anything you need to be in CC with. Barring AV13 walkers and some of the nastier GMCs, you should be able to get some hits in. And it’s not unwieldy.

I think the two main things holding them back is the fact that people like to specialize, so avoid the jack-of-all-trades maul, and the scarcity of bits. I’d field more if I owned more.

You can make them from thunder hammers by cutting off the hammer part.

Martel732 wrote:
You can make them from thunder hammers by cutting off the hammer part.

I’ve done that, and it works OK. Ends up being more “shock baton” and not as much “Your head is an over-ripe melon” then I’d like. Putting together a few more is still on my to-do list.

Heavy Bolters make sense on certain platforms. For instance the Land Raider Prometheus is a good example of a perfect place to put HB.

two twinlinked HB per sponson. A total of 12 shots with -1 cover. As with all Land Raiders it IS still overcosted but its function is good.

I was talking about the Power Sword.

 Nevelon wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
You can make them from thunder hammers by cutting off the hammer part.

I’ve done that, and it works OK. Ends up being more “shock baton” and not as much “Your head is an over-ripe melon” then I’d like. Putting together a few more is still on my to-do list.

You could always just use the more ornate designed Thunder Hammers as Thunder Hammers, and the plain ones could be Mauls.

I'm not picky. As long as my opponent knows what's what.

I used thunderhammer heads, cut them off and then cut the two ends of the hammer head itself off of and then glued them to the end of the handles.

Worked out pretty good on my thunderwolves. (Heck yeah str7 ap4 rending at initiative!)

I've always seen Power Mauls as "Power [Blunt]. So staves, clubs, battons, maces, etc.

I want to do a Dire Avenger Exarch with 2xTonfas(/billy clubs). I doubt anyone would have issue with me considering that a Power Maul (technically, 1xPower Weapon + pistol, but as long as I include a pistol, it has the same effective rules).

Bharring wrote:
I've always seen Power Mauls as "Power [Blunt]. So staves, clubs, battons, maces, etc.

I want to do a Dire Avenger Exarch with 2xTonfas(/billy clubs). I doubt anyone would have issue with me considering that a Power Maul (technically, 1xPower Weapon + pistol, but as long as I include a pistol, it has the same effective rules).

The DA kit has a pistol mounted on the back of the wrist arm, on a pointing hand. With a little work, the pointing hand could be made to look like it’s holding a beatstick. Sounds like a cool idea.

On topic: HBs do ugly thing to Dire Avengers.

Lythrandire Biehrellian wrote:
I used thunderhammer heads, cut them off and then cut the two ends of the hammer head itself off of and then glued them to the end of the handles.

Worked out pretty good on my thunderwolves. (Heck yeah str7 ap4 rending at initiative!)

I nabbed a bunch of the dark angel biker power mauls. They look like baseball bats, pretty awesome weapons. Every bit of theory crafting I did just put wolf claws miles ahead of power mauls though, even against ap4 or 5 targets. Shred is just so awesome. Even a 2 claw/1 naked vs 3 maul was in favor of the claws.
My plan was to have a unit of 4 or 5 with mauls and a lord with the wulfen stone, so on the charge they are all S8. The mauls do pull ahead against AV, so you could drop a dreadnought.

I throw my thunderwolves at hard targets, so I am always wanting to drop initiative on whatever I am hitting. I rarely charge something I will kill in one round, so mitigating their retaliatory capabilities is a big part of my strategy. I normally have one powerfist in the group as well, simply because I may need some str10 at some point.

How bout leave HB stats the same but make it a rapid fire weapon? 3 shots/6 shots at 1/2 max distance.

I would like to see some special rule on all bolter weapons, but a rule in line with what a bolter is expected to do.

Being bolter ammo little missiles that explode on impact, I'd like something like this:

Every units (except vehicles) hit by a bolter weapon with S equal or higher than unit's T, would be slowered down fot that and the successive turn ( representing the stopping power of bolter type ammo)

Am I the only person that likes his heavy bolters?

It's useless against all the big stompy crap that's dominating the game right now, but none of the proposed changes in here would change that anyway. Against hordes, it's a mighty fine weapon because it's crazy cheap.

I've had a lot of success with my razorback's heavy bolters when I decide to forego lascannons, as well as the two guys in my devastator squad that have them. Compliments the two guys with Gravcannons quite well when I'm playing Orks or Tyranids. Obviously I'd do more Gravcannons if I had them but might as well use the other weapons that come in the box, right?

 SRSFACE wrote:
Am I the only person that likes his heavy bolters?

It's useless against all the big stompy crap that's dominating the game right now, but none of the proposed changes in here would change that anyway. Against hordes, it's a mighty fine weapon because it's crazy cheap.

I've had a lot of success with my razorback's heavy bolters when I decide to forego lascannons, as well as the two guys in my devastator squad that have them. Compliments the two guys with Gravcannons quite well when I'm playing Orks or Tyranids. Obviously I'd do more Gravcannons if I had them but might as well use the other weapons that come in the box, right?

Don’t get me wrong, I like HBs. They just are in a bad place right now. While inexpensive, they aren’t quite cheap enough. Generally the 10 points they set you back could be spent better, elsewhere. Especially when replacing a bolter on a tac marine. Because the points you spend upgrading could almost get you another battle brother tapping out his bolter alongside his friend.

There is also the opportunity cost of not taking a different heavy. We only have a few spots in out lists to put decent guns. Will you fill one of those slots with something that fills a role we don’t really need to worry about?

I don’t think they are the pure garbage others make them out to be, but they are a little sub-par. And when talking competitively, that’s a deal breaker.

 Nevelon wrote:

 SRSFACE wrote:
Am I the only person that likes his heavy bolters?

It's useless against all the big stompy crap that's dominating the game right now, but none of the proposed changes in here would change that anyway. Against hordes, it's a mighty fine weapon because it's crazy cheap.

I've had a lot of success with my razorback's heavy bolters when I decide to forego lascannons, as well as the two guys in my devastator squad that have them. Compliments the two guys with Gravcannons quite well when I'm playing Orks or Tyranids. Obviously I'd do more Gravcannons if I had them but might as well use the other weapons that come in the box, right?

Don’t get me wrong, I like HBs. They just are in a bad place right now. While inexpensive, they aren’t quite cheap enough. Generally the 10 points they set you back could be spent better, elsewhere. Especially when replacing a bolter on a tac marine. Because the points you spend upgrading could almost get you another battle brother tapping out his bolter alongside his friend.

There is also the opportunity cost of not taking a different heavy. We only have a few spots in out lists to put decent guns. Will you fill one of those slots with something that fills a role we don’t really need to worry about?

I don’t think they are the pure garbage others make them out to be, but they are a little sub-par. And when talking competitively, that’s a deal breaker.

I agree with this. I think the HB is fine as is, but it is just drained out because of what the current state of all the competing best options are. For example.. HBs would be great against Nids.. if warriors and other 4+ MCs were fielded more often, but currently why pay for those when you could just roll a Flyrant..

I have had success with my Sentinal of Terra running HB/missle Centurians (and i have mentioned this to criticism in other threads), but they work, and they are cheap for the bubble of death they bring to infantry and light transports in their 42" effective killzone.

Putting that all aside, I think adding pinning would be a good idea.. but we need to fix pinning first... pinning right now is worthless.. What gets pinned? Maybe orks? Maybe Tau? (which literally doesn't matter w/ markerlights, assault jumps etc).. Most things that you want to pin down have high enough leadership, are fearless, or are immune to pinning..

Possibly... one solution is for pinning weapons instead of "on hit take a pinning check", to be "a unit hit by a weapon with pinning, takes a modified leadership check (L - #of wounds taken)" ... just a thought i had, but it would make pinning more viable.

** edit ** it was a mistype to be 2d6.. i meant just the units Leadership value

** edit 2 ** I meant centurians not normal marine devastators =/

 SRSFACE wrote:
Am I the only person that likes his heavy bolters?

It's useless against all the big stompy crap that's dominating the game right now, but none of the proposed changes in here would change that anyway. Against hordes, it's a mighty fine weapon because it's crazy cheap.

I've had a lot of success with my razorback's heavy bolters when I decide to forego lascannons, as well as the two guys in my devastator squad that have them. Compliments the two guys with Gravcannons quite well when I'm playing Orks or Tyranids. Obviously I'd do more Gravcannons if I had them but might as well use the other weapons that come in the box, right?

It's not even that good against hordes once you factor in cover.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Grizzyzz wrote:

 Nevelon wrote:

 SRSFACE wrote:
Am I the only person that likes his heavy bolters?

It's useless against all the big stompy crap that's dominating the game right now, but none of the proposed changes in here would change that anyway. Against hordes, it's a mighty fine weapon because it's crazy cheap.

I've had a lot of success with my razorback's heavy bolters when I decide to forego lascannons, as well as the two guys in my devastator squad that have them. Compliments the two guys with Gravcannons quite well when I'm playing Orks or Tyranids. Obviously I'd do more Gravcannons if I had them but might as well use the other weapons that come in the box, right?

Don’t get me wrong, I like HBs. They just are in a bad place right now. While inexpensive, they aren’t quite cheap enough. Generally the 10 points they set you back could be spent better, elsewhere. Especially when replacing a bolter on a tac marine. Because the points you spend upgrading could almost get you another battle brother tapping out his bolter alongside his friend.

There is also the opportunity cost of not taking a different heavy. We only have a few spots in out lists to put decent guns. Will you fill one of those slots with something that fills a role we don’t really need to worry about?

I don’t think they are the pure garbage others make them out to be, but they are a little sub-par. And when talking competitively, that’s a deal breaker.

I agree with this. I think the HB is fine as is, but it is just drained out because of what the current state of all the competing best options are. For example.. HBs would be great against Nids.. if warriors and other 4+ MCs were fielded more often, but currently why pay for those when you could just roll a Flyrant..

I have had success with my Sentinal of Terra running HB/missle devastators (and i have mentioned this to criticism in other threads), but they work, and they are cheap for the bubble of death they bring to infantry and light transports in their 42" effective killzone.

Putting that all aside, I think adding pinning would be a good idea.. but we need to fix pinning first... pinning right now is worthless.. What gets pinned? Maybe orks? Maybe Tau? (which literally doesn't matter w/ markerlights, assault jumps etc).. Most things that you want to pin down have high enough leadership, are fearless, or are immune to pinning..

Possibly... one solution is for pinning weapons instead of "on hit take a pinning check", to be "a unit hit by a weapon with pinning, takes a modified leadership check 2d6 - #of wounds taken" ... just a thought i had, but it would make pinning more viable.

They're so fine I avoid them like the plague.

Martel732 wrote:

 SRSFACE wrote:
Am I the only person that likes his heavy bolters?

It's useless against all the big stompy crap that's dominating the game right now, but none of the proposed changes in here would change that anyway. Against hordes, it's a mighty fine weapon because it's crazy cheap.

I've had a lot of success with my razorback's heavy bolters when I decide to forego lascannons, as well as the two guys in my devastator squad that have them. Compliments the two guys with Gravcannons quite well when I'm playing Orks or Tyranids. Obviously I'd do more Gravcannons if I had them but might as well use the other weapons that come in the box, right?

It's not even that good against hordes once you factor in cover.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Grizzyzz wrote:

 Nevelon wrote:

 SRSFACE wrote:
Am I the only person that likes his heavy bolters?

It's useless against all the big stompy crap that's dominating the game right now, but none of the proposed changes in here would change that anyway. Against hordes, it's a mighty fine weapon because it's crazy cheap.

I've had a lot of success with my razorback's heavy bolters when I decide to forego lascannons, as well as the two guys in my devastator squad that have them. Compliments the two guys with Gravcannons quite well when I'm playing Orks or Tyranids. Obviously I'd do more Gravcannons if I had them but might as well use the other weapons that come in the box, right?

Don’t get me wrong, I like HBs. They just are in a bad place right now. While inexpensive, they aren’t quite cheap enough. Generally the 10 points they set you back could be spent better, elsewhere. Especially when replacing a bolter on a tac marine. Because the points you spend upgrading could almost get you another battle brother tapping out his bolter alongside his friend.

There is also the opportunity cost of not taking a different heavy. We only have a few spots in out lists to put decent guns. Will you fill one of those slots with something that fills a role we don’t really need to worry about?

I don’t think they are the pure garbage others make them out to be, but they are a little sub-par. And when talking competitively, that’s a deal breaker.

I agree with this. I think the HB is fine as is, but it is just drained out because of what the current state of all the competing best options are. For example.. HBs would be great against Nids.. if warriors and other 4+ MCs were fielded more often, but currently why pay for those when you could just roll a Flyrant..

I have had success with my Sentinal of Terra running HB/missle devastators (and i have mentioned this to criticism in other threads), but they work, and they are cheap for the bubble of death they bring to infantry and light transports in their 42" effective killzone.

Putting that all aside, I think adding pinning would be a good idea.. but we need to fix pinning first... pinning right now is worthless.. What gets pinned? Maybe orks? Maybe Tau? (which literally doesn't matter w/ markerlights, assault jumps etc).. Most things that you want to pin down have high enough leadership, are fearless, or are immune to pinning..

Possibly... one solution is for pinning weapons instead of "on hit take a pinning check", to be "a unit hit by a weapon with pinning, takes a modified leadership check 2d6 - #of wounds taken" ... just a thought i had, but it would make pinning more viable.

They're so fine I avoid them like the plague.

Which weapon choice is better for that then?

Autocannons. Oh wait, marines don't get those. Both the ML and heavy bolter are complete dumpster fires that Xenos lists like the one YOU apparently use as your main list can completely ignore and laugh at as my marines die in droves like little bitches to scatterlasers and ion accelerators. Before I get stepped on by a Stormsurge or Riptide.

Martel732 wrote:
Autocannons. Oh wait, marines don't get those. Both the ML and heavy bolter are complete dumpster fires that Xenos lists like the one YOU apparently use as your main list can completely ignore and laugh at as my marines die in droves like little bitches to scatterlasers and ion accelerators. Before I get stepped on by a Stormsurge or Riptide.

Neither of which I use, as they are both a lore change I greatly disagree with, and are not fun to use. I get that you are upset, but there is no need to be like that. If you want to make a convincing argument, attacking people is not the way to go.

I'm just trying to illustrate that Tau weapon options are so far ahead of the Imperium, that I feel like I shouldn't even show up to fight. Tau grunts get weapons as strong as heavy bolters. That's so incredibly frustrating.

Worrying about where a specific weapon stands in the meta of competitive Warhammer is stupid. It's just dumb. I am not sorry of you're hurt by my opinion.

Competitive Warhammer in general is really, really stupid. If you're playing Marines to begin with, you're not really a competitive player to begin with, for starters. Changing Heavy Bolters wouldn't make Marines more competitive, as they are not Eldar or Necron.

Unless they made it so Heavy Bolters were rending and ignored cover. And I'm not in favor of that because WH40k needs less totally stupidly broken stuff, not more of it.

It's 3 shots at 36" inches as stength 5. That's not bad. Saying "it's worse once you factor cover in" is factually untrue because it's still 3 shots at S5. It's as long distance rate-of-fire as you can get for marines. Oh NOES, people get to make saving throws against it! THE WORST THING IMAGINABLE, people being able to position their army against you in a way that actually stops your weapons from ripping them apart.

I don't bother with high AP stuff that much anymore, outside of Plasma and that's mostly because as Dark Angels, I have access to twin-linked plasma in droves which is about as high-volume high powered shooting as you can get with any Marines these days. It's just that Tau ignore cover so my entire army dies on turn 1 so it's kind of pointless.

Honestly, if they toned back all the "I ignore all your rules" crap Eldar and Tau do, the game in general would be in a pretty good spot.

The game is incredibly unbalanced, I will agree. But for TAC squads and other things that don't have access to autocannons, the HB is not a bad anti-horde weapon. It could certainly be better, the salvo 4/3 thing that's been suggested sound good. Or maybe just giving it 4 shots and give TACs a special "bracing" ability that allows them to fire as if they had not moved. It's just a pity that horde isn't a particularly strong army type, as big stompy robots have taken over the game, much to my dismay.

 Co'tor Shas wrote:
The game is incredibly unbalanced, I will agree. But for TAC squads and other things that don't have access to autocannons, the HB is not a bad anti-horde weapon. It could certainly be better, the salvo 4/3 thing that's been suggested sound good. Or maybe just giving it 4 shots and give TACs a special "bracing" ability that allows them to fire as if they had not moved. It's just a pity that horde isn't a particularly strong army type, as big stompy robots have taken over the game, much to my dismay.

A heavy bolter kills 1.33 Orks who are in the open. It kills 0.89 Orks in 5+ cover. That's your anti-horde weapon? It can't glance out AV 12. It's math against most MCs is awful. It literally has no role in this game. I'd be happier if they just admitted it and got rid it.

Martel732 wrote:
I'm just trying to illustrate that Tau weapon options are so far ahead of the Imperium, that I feel like I shouldn't even show up to fight. Tau grunts get weapons as strong as heavy bolters. That's so incredibly frustrating.

Thats also pretty in line to the actual fluff though, which I particularly enjoy to some extent. Quite literally Tau have picked up marine plasma weapons and basically said.. hmm s7 is nice.. but we dont like gets hot.. so ours will be s6 intead and lose the penalty.

As for effective shooting against tau... marines have grav.. the best anti MC weapon in the entire game. Not to mention every marine comes stock with a krak grenade.

If you are trying to gunline against tau.. you are going to lose, that is not how you beat them by any means.

 Grizzyzz wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
I'm just trying to illustrate that Tau weapon options are so far ahead of the Imperium, that I feel like I shouldn't even show up to fight. Tau grunts get weapons as strong as heavy bolters. That's so incredibly frustrating.

Thats also pretty in line to the actual fluff though, which I particularly enjoy to some extent. Quite literally Tau have picked up marine plasma weapons and basically said.. hmm s7 is nice.. but we dont like gets hot.. so ours will be s6 intead and lose the penalty.

As for effective shooting against tau... marines have grav.. the best anti MC weapon in the entire game. Not to mention every marine comes stock with a krak grenade.

If you are trying to gunline against tau.. you are going to lose, that is not how you beat them by any means.

Grav guns are spectacularly average. Which is what BA have. I don't see anywhere in the fluff that BA lose every battle, but yet that's basically what happens. Feth the fluff.

Martel732 wrote:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:
The game is incredibly unbalanced, I will agree. But for TAC squads and other things that don't have access to autocannons, the HB is not a bad anti-horde weapon. It could certainly be better, the salvo 4/3 thing that's been suggested sound good. Or maybe just giving it 4 shots and give TACs a special "bracing" ability that allows them to fire as if they had not moved. It's just a pity that horde isn't a particularly strong army type, as big stompy robots have taken over the game, much to my dismay.

A heavy bolter kills 1.33 Orks who are in the open. It kills 0.89 Orks in 5+ cover. That's your anti-horde weapon? It can't glance out AV 12. It's math against most MCs is awful. It literally has no role in this game. I'd be happier if they just admitted it and got rid it.

Ok. 1.33 orks at 36" where you are not getting charged, compared to in the open boltguns in rapid fire doing 0.66 wounds and getting charged...

 Grizzyzz wrote:

Martel732 wrote:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:
The game is incredibly unbalanced, I will agree. But for TAC squads and other things that don't have access to autocannons, the HB is not a bad anti-horde weapon. It could certainly be better, the salvo 4/3 thing that's been suggested sound good. Or maybe just giving it 4 shots and give TACs a special "bracing" ability that allows them to fire as if they had not moved. It's just a pity that horde isn't a particularly strong army type, as big stompy robots have taken over the game, much to my dismay.

A heavy bolter kills 1.33 Orks who are in the open. It kills 0.89 Orks in 5+ cover. That's your anti-horde weapon? It can't glance out AV 12. It's math against most MCs is awful. It literally has no role in this game. I'd be happier if they just admitted it and got rid it.

Ok. 1.33 orks at 36" where you are not getting charged, compared to in the open boltguns in rapid fire doing 0.66 wounds and getting charged...

They're both awful. If you play with as much terrain as most people on here suggest, you'll never even get off 36" shots with a weapon that can't move. The heavy bolter is even terrible on a fast tank; it's unspeakably unusable for infantry.

Martel732 wrote:

Grav guns are spectacularly average.

How so? wounding on armor save @ap2 ?

Martel732 wrote:

I don't see anywhere in the fluff that BA lose every battle, but yet that's basically what happens. Feth the fluff.

BA got canned this past release... which sucks for them, it really does. But with marines having so much building power with all their battle brother options, plus skyhammer and other formations that allow you to grab things that your missing.. you can't just say.. 'we dont have that option'

Martel732 wrote:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:
The game is incredibly unbalanced, I will agree. But for TAC squads and other things that don't have access to autocannons, the HB is not a bad anti-horde weapon. It could certainly be better, the salvo 4/3 thing that's been suggested sound good. Or maybe just giving it 4 shots and give TACs a special "bracing" ability that allows them to fire as if they had not moved. It's just a pity that horde isn't a particularly strong army type, as big stompy robots have taken over the game, much to my dismay.

A heavy bolter kills 1.33 Orks who are in the open. It kills 0.89 Orks in 5+ cover. That's your anti-horde weapon?

Better than a bolter. And that's sort of the point. Again, it could (and probably should) be better, but it's purpose is anti-horde, and that's what it does.
And orks are the thing where is has the smallest additional impact on. If you compare two bolters (at 24") and one HB (let's say at 24" because why not), the two bolters kill .666 FWs, whereas the HB kills 2.5 with no cover and 1.666 with 5+.

 Grizzyzz wrote:

Martel732 wrote:

Grav guns are spectacularly average.

How so? wounding on armor save @ap2 ?

Martel732 wrote:

I don't see anywhere in the fluff that BA lose every battle, but yet that's basically what happens. Feth the fluff.

BA got canned this past release... which sucks for them, it really does. But with marines having so much building power with all their battle brother options, plus skyhammer and other formations that allow you to grab things that your missing.. you can't just say.. 'we dont have that option'

Anyone can ally anything. That's not a valid argument to me. By the time I ally in all the marine stuff, there's no point in fielding any ba at all.

Martel732 wrote:

 Grizzyzz wrote:

Martel732 wrote:

Grav guns are spectacularly average.

How so? wounding on armor save @ap2 ?

Martel732 wrote:

I don't see anywhere in the fluff that BA lose every battle, but yet that's basically what happens. Feth the fluff.

BA got canned this past release... which sucks for them, it really does. But with marines having so much building power with all their battle brother options, plus skyhammer and other formations that allow you to grab things that your missing.. you can't just say.. 'we dont have that option'

Anyone can ally anything. That's not a valid argument to me. By the time I ally in all the marine stuff, there's no point in fielding any ba at all.

That makes no sense though.. Lets take a very core part of the current 40k ruleset and just toss it out because I don't want use it ? Marine chapters each excel at something better then others do, which yeah ok maybe in fluff you won't see them working together often, but fluff doesn't always translate to the table... so we are given the opportunity to fill areas of weakness with allies and formations.

If you want to stick to a 100% BA list because you rather stay fluffy then be competitive, then I applaud you for it, I think that has a place in this game; I enjoy playing games where we focus on fluff vs competitiveness and we always have a great time. But you can't use that as a general excuse..

There is literally no reason to field anything from C:BA over C:SM. Furthermore, there's many vanilla models that BA players don't own. I never do anything for fluff reasons, because I think the fluff is gak. I'm not paying GW extra money because they decided that C:SM was going to be strictly superior in all cases.

BA entire concept, assault meqs, is invalidated by armies like Tau. You can't add racing stripes with a few allies and make it work.

Going back to the original thought, I don't think there's anything that can be done to make me take a heavy bolter voluntarily.

 Grizzyzz wrote:

Martel732 wrote:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:
The game is incredibly unbalanced, I will agree. But for TAC squads and other things that don't have access to autocannons, the HB is not a bad anti-horde weapon. It could certainly be better, the salvo 4/3 thing that's been suggested sound good. Or maybe just giving it 4 shots and give TACs a special "bracing" ability that allows them to fire as if they had not moved. It's just a pity that horde isn't a particularly strong army type, as big stompy robots have taken over the game, much to my dismay.

A heavy bolter kills 1.33 Orks who are in the open. It kills 0.89 Orks in 5+ cover. That's your anti-horde weapon? It can't glance out AV 12. It's math against most MCs is awful. It literally has no role in this game. I'd be happier if they just admitted it and got rid it.

Ok. 1.33 orks at 36" where you are not getting charged, compared to in the open boltguns in rapid fire doing 0.66 wounds and getting charged...

OR you take an Assault Squad with two Flamers and a Deathwind Launcher thingy Drop Pod. Now you kill Orks and create a speed bump instead of killing like 4 Orks a turn OUT of cover with a precious Devastator squad.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 Grizzyzz wrote:

Martel732 wrote:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:
The game is incredibly unbalanced, I will agree. But for TAC squads and other things that don't have access to autocannons, the HB is not a bad anti-horde weapon. It could certainly be better, the salvo 4/3 thing that's been suggested sound good. Or maybe just giving it 4 shots and give TACs a special "bracing" ability that allows them to fire as if they had not moved. It's just a pity that horde isn't a particularly strong army type, as big stompy robots have taken over the game, much to my dismay.

A heavy bolter kills 1.33 Orks who are in the open. It kills 0.89 Orks in 5+ cover. That's your anti-horde weapon? It can't glance out AV 12. It's math against most MCs is awful. It literally has no role in this game. I'd be happier if they just admitted it and got rid it.

Ok. 1.33 orks at 36" where you are not getting charged, compared to in the open boltguns in rapid fire doing 0.66 wounds and getting charged...

OR you take an Assault Squad with two Flamers and a Deathwind Launcher thingy Drop Pod. Now you kill Orks and create a speed bump instead of killing like 4 Orks a turn OUT of cover with a precious Devastator squad.

The heavy bolter's lack of efficacy vs vehicles and MCs is really what makes the above choice better 95% of the time. It's just not good at removing hordes compared to a flamer or blast.

I do use heavy bolters. As others have pointed out, most of the 'problems' with it come down to the opponent's army selection.

I wonder how they would play out if they were heavy 3, blast, shred...

 Tactical_Spam wrote:
I wonder how they would play out if they were heavy 3, blast, shred...

Let's not get crazy here. That fundamentally changes the entire purpose of the weapon. Just adding "shred" would be a huge game-changer. It'd also stop it from being able to overwatch, which I am not in favor of.

Let's also keep in mind that math can only give us probabilities. Something having more shots still provides, however statistically unlikely, more wounds. We're only dealing with D6s here so while probabilities are still what metes out in the end, good luck/bad luck streaks occur often enough that it matters you're getting more shots off. You know what the % chance of a bolter scoring 3 wounds is? Literally 0, against any target ever.

Statistically, Scatter Lasers only cause 1.481 wounds per shooting phase, against a T4 target with a 5+ Save. That's ANY 5+ save, by the way. A unit of Pathfinders in the open actually suffers, on average, more wounds from a heavy bolter than a scatter laser. And you've got 12" more range on the HB. Now, why they'd be in the open I'm not sure, but that's what I mean about gamestate. Recently I caused a unit to fall back and lose their cover, and my HB's ripped the remnants of the squad to shreds.

If there were more 4+ Armor units actually being fielded, more AV10 vehicles seeing play, or more T3 units in general, Heavy Bolters would be great for how cheap and ubiquitous they are. Again, I am not sure the fault is in the weapon so much as it is the current state of Warhammer 40,000.

Changing the weapon doesn't really help the problem. In almost every case of a Heavy Bolter, you can already substitute the weapon for pretty much any other heavy weapon. Making it so there's less reason to pay points to sub the weapon out doesn't really sit well with me, because if it becomes too much like the Scatterlaser, no one bothers ever taking more expensive upgrades, which actually creates a new balance issue.

Heavy bolters I think would be taken if devestators got them for free. The devestator with the heavy bolter is an iconic visual of the devestator. It's what people think of when they see a devestator combat logo. And doing so just for them would help a lot in them being taken more.

However I feel that heavy bolter is a lot like the flamer weapons of the current situation in the game, the whole game around them is such a mess that there isn't a point. Their a weapon for trashing inferior infantry to marines but because grav exists there isn't a point to any of the other items. Prior to the days of grav you brought plasmas and meltas and Flamers and yes even heavy bolters because they were all in their own little corner for tackling problems. They were in perfect harmony a gun for every job. And now there's one gun that has effectively replaced three.

If you want to see heavy bolters and Flamers more you'd need to do a serious price restructuring not only on weapon upgrade but the units that carry them. Here's an example of where I'd go:

Bolter and bp remain free

All pistol upgrades drop to 5ppm

Your flamer and SB remain at 5 ppm

Combi weapons jump up 1ppm except grav which has jumped 5ppm to 15.

In the special weapons slots, melta gun remains unchanged, and the plasma gun drops to 13ppm however grav guns are now 20ppm

In the heavy slot:
Mm is unchanged
Heavy bolters are free for devestators other units pay 8ppm like scouts do but only scouts and stern guard can get hellfires
Plasma cannon drops to 12
Missiles are 15
Lascannon stays at 20
Grav cannons are 25ppm for no amp, if you want the amp that's an extra 5ppm (makin an amp devestator 44ppm).

From there we now move to unit costs:
Devestators, scouts, tacticals, even Angel veterans and command squads go unchanged for points.

Stern guard go up 2ppm in addition kraken bolts are going up 2ppm.

Centurions are going up by 25ppm and their grav cannons no longer come with free amps you pay 5ppm for an amp.

marine bikes lose the ability to take grav weapons period (omitting the pistols).

Basically we gut the ability to buy grav out of the biggest problem child's or we raise the price on models with grav guns or access to them. Make them a very costly weapon to wield and use so losing them really really hurts. This also is a big kick into the groin of bike armies that have grown like weeds over the past two editions and need to be culled back. and one can look at this as a buff to the land raider excelsior which basically went down 5 points as a result of these changes.

Long thread TLDR; but I like Heavy Bolters. I would simply make them have a rapid fire rule. So they double their shots inside half range. Everything else can be the same. Maybe hit on overwatch on a 5 or 6 for extra spice.

 SRSFACE wrote:

 Tactical_Spam wrote:
I wonder how they would play out if they were heavy 3, blast, shred...

Let's not get crazy here. That fundamentally changes the entire purpose of the weapon. Just adding "shred" would be a huge game-changer. It'd also stop it from being able to overwatch, which I am not in favor of.

Let's also keep in mind that math can only give us probabilities. Something having more shots still provides, however statistically unlikely, more wounds. We're only dealing with D6s here so while probabilities are still what metes out in the end, good luck/bad luck streaks occur often enough that it matters you're getting more shots off. You know what the % chance of a bolter scoring 3 wounds is? Literally 0, against any target ever.

Statistically, Scatter Lasers only cause 1.481 wounds per shooting phase, against a T4 target with a 5+ Save. That's ANY 5+ save, by the way. A unit of Pathfinders in the open actually suffers, on average, more wounds from a heavy bolter than a scatter laser. And you've got 12" more range on the HB. Now, why they'd be in the open I'm not sure, but that's what I mean about gamestate. Recently I caused a unit to fall back and lose their cover, and my HB's ripped the remnants of the squad to shreds.

If there were more 4+ Armor units actually being fielded, more AV10 vehicles seeing play, or more T3 units in general, Heavy Bolters would be great for how cheap and ubiquitous they are. Again, I am not sure the fault is in the weapon so much as it is the current state of Warhammer 40,000.

Changing the weapon doesn't really help the problem. In almost every case of a Heavy Bolter, you can already substitute the weapon for pretty much any other heavy weapon. Making it so there's less reason to pay points to sub the weapon out doesn't really sit well with me, because if it becomes too much like the Scatterlaser, no one bothers ever taking more expensive upgrades, which actually creates a new balance issue.

The scatterlaser would still dominate at anti-MC and anti-tank.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 ionusx wrote:
Heavy bolters I think would be taken if devestators got them for free. The devestator with the heavy bolter is an iconic visual of the devestator. It's what people think of when they see a devestator combat logo. And doing so just for them would help a lot in them being taken more.

However I feel that heavy bolter is a lot like the flamer weapons of the current situation in the game, the whole game around them is such a mess that there isn't a point. Their a weapon for trashing inferior infantry to marines but because grav exists there isn't a point to any of the other items. Prior to the days of grav you brought plasmas and meltas and Flamers and yes even heavy bolters because they were all in their own little corner for tackling problems. They were in perfect harmony a gun for every job. And now there's one gun that has effectively replaced three.

If you want to see heavy bolters and Flamers more you'd need to do a serious price restructuring not only on weapon upgrade but the units that carry them. Here's an example of where I'd go:

Bolter and bp remain free

All pistol upgrades drop to 5ppm

Your flamer and SB remain at 5 ppm

Combi weapons jump up 1ppm except grav which has jumped 5ppm to 15.

In the special weapons slots, melta gun remains unchanged, and the plasma gun drops to 13ppm however grav guns are now 20ppm

In the heavy slot:
Mm is unchanged
Heavy bolters are free for devestators other units pay 8ppm like scouts do but only scouts and stern guard can get hellfires
Plasma cannon drops to 12
Missiles are 15
Lascannon stays at 20
Grav cannons are 25ppm for no amp, if you want the amp that's an extra 5ppm (makin an amp devestator 44ppm).

From there we now move to unit costs:
Devestators, scouts, tacticals, even Angel veterans and command squads go unchanged for points.

Stern guard go up 2ppm in addition kraken bolts are going up 2ppm.

Centurions are going up by 25ppm and their grav cannons no longer come with free amps you pay 5ppm for an amp.

marine bikes lose the ability to take grav weapons period (omitting the pistols).

Basically we gut the ability to buy grav out of the biggest problem child's or we raise the price on models with grav guns or access to them. Make them a very costly weapon to wield and use so losing them really really hurts. This also is a big kick into the groin of bike armies that have grown like weeds over the past two editions and need to be culled back. and one can look at this as a buff to the land raider excelsior which basically went down 5 points as a result of these changes.

Still wouldn't use them. They are terrible weapons.

I think the only change needed is the one FW gave to IW heavy bolters. Make that universal in 40k.

All heavy bolters are pinning weapons. One unsuccessful save and the unit has to take a pinning check.

This change makes the heavy bolter flavorful and doesn't just change it to become like a scatter laser or assault cannon.

DarthDiggler wrote:
I think the only change needed is the one FW gave to IW heavy bolters. Make that universal in 40k.

All heavy bolters are pinning weapons. One unsuccessful save and the unit has to take a pinning check.

This change makes the heavy bolter flavorful and doesn't just change it to become like a scatter laser or assault cannon.

Still useless.

Because ro you, anything that isn't a scatter laser is useless, apprently. Here'e what I want you to do, take eldar out of the game. Eldar no longer exist. Now balencec the weapon, because you aren't going to get anywhere if you keep trying to get them to the blatently overpowered level eldar are at.

I don't think there is a fix for HB. With any given game there's always a cycle of what's "in" and whats "out". 5 short years ago, Grey Knights were the cheesy smelly suckfest. Now they just plain suck. 3.5 years ago Marines were considered a middle-of-the-road codex and now they are top-tier. Before 6th Ed Tau were bang-average. Pre-Wraithknight Eldar were bang-average. Grav-spam AdMech weren't even a thing.

The same is true for weapons. As time goes on certain weapons become useless because of the game changing. As whatever unuts were in favour began to change, certain weapons became useless, while others became viable and others broken. Its just how things go. The same is true of many games. I know Magic has a cycle of sorts (not familiar with how it works though). Yugioh, also went through a similar cycle to 40k. First it was your high-strength cards like Blue Eyes and Dark Magician, they into the GX era it was Fusions. 5Ds era it was Synchros, then Xyz into ZEXAL area and now its 4* monsters and Pendulum cards, and those 1st Ed and GX strategies suck ass.

If you look at any given game you'll find a similar cycle in progress.

 Co'tor Shas wrote:
Because ro you, anything that isn't a scatter laser is useless, apprently. Here'e what I want you to do, take eldar out of the game. Eldar no longer exist. Now balencec the weapon, because you aren't going to get anywhere if you keep trying to get them to the blatently overpowered level eldar are at.

They're still useless compared to Tau. I'm shooting S5 pop guns, you are lobbing S9 AP 2 ignore cover pie plates. No thanks. Hell, they're still useless against ORKS. The Eldar are more salt in the wound than anything else.

If everyone were Eldar, then it would be balanced.

Are you conparing a five(?) point, troop weilded special weapon, to a overcharged ordinance weapon weilded by a criminally underpriced walking tank? Because that's a bit daft.

As far as everyone being as OP as eldar, while that is technically true, it's also the least efficient way possible. It's better to bring those that are OP down to earth.

 Co'tor Shas wrote:
Are you conparing a five(?) point, troop weilded special weapon, to a overcharged ordinance weapon weilded by a criminally underpriced walking tank? Because that's a bit daft.

As far as everyone being as OP as eldar, while that is technically true, it's also the least efficient way possible. It's better to bring those that are OP down to earth.

That's not GW's game plan. So there's only one way to go: up.

You call it daft, but that's my reality. With the Tau working they way they work, there's no place for the heavy bolter against them, either. The short answer to the OP is simply "nothing". That's where the game is at right now.

But here's the thing, this is the "Proposed Rules Forum" not the "Best Case Scenario That GW Will Do Forum". This is about what our ideal solutions are.

 Co'tor Shas wrote:
But here's the thing, this is the "Proposed Rules Forum" not the "Best Case Scenario That GW Will Do Forum". This is about what our ideal solutions are.

No one wants another scatterlaser in the game, yet that's exactly what this kind of weapon needs to be like to get voluntarily selected in 7th ed. And that doesn't even address the issue of the piss poor Imperium platforms.

Ideally, MCs with 2+ armor would become T5 so they get doubled out by S10 or lose 2+ armor and go to 3+ armor. But this is never happening, so we might as well all be Eldar. As long as T6 2+ exists, and AV 11/12 exists, heavy bolters will be garbage.

Martel732 wrote:

 SRSFACE wrote:

 Tactical_Spam wrote:
I wonder how they would play out if they were heavy 3, blast, shred...

Let's not get crazy here. That fundamentally changes the entire purpose of the weapon. Just adding "shred" would be a huge game-changer. It'd also stop it from being able to overwatch, which I am not in favor of.

Let's also keep in mind that math can only give us probabilities. Something having more shots still provides, however statistically unlikely, more wounds. We're only dealing with D6s here so while probabilities are still what metes out in the end, good luck/bad luck streaks occur often enough that it matters you're getting more shots off. You know what the % chance of a bolter scoring 3 wounds is? Literally 0, against any target ever.

Statistically, Scatter Lasers only cause 1.481 wounds per shooting phase, against a T4 target with a 5+ Save. That's ANY 5+ save, by the way. A unit of Pathfinders in the open actually suffers, on average, more wounds from a heavy bolter than a scatter laser. And you've got 12" more range on the HB. Now, why they'd be in the open I'm not sure, but that's what I mean about gamestate. Recently I caused a unit to fall back and lose their cover, and my HB's ripped the remnants of the squad to shreds.

If there were more 4+ Armor units actually being fielded, more AV10 vehicles seeing play, or more T3 units in general, Heavy Bolters would be great for how cheap and ubiquitous they are. Again, I am not sure the fault is in the weapon so much as it is the current state of Warhammer 40,000.

Changing the weapon doesn't really help the problem. In almost every case of a Heavy Bolter, you can already substitute the weapon for pretty much any other heavy weapon. Making it so there's less reason to pay points to sub the weapon out doesn't really sit well with me, because if it becomes too much like the Scatterlaser, no one bothers ever taking more expensive upgrades, which actually creates a new balance issue.

The scatterlaser would still dominate at anti-MC and anti-tank.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 ionusx wrote:
Heavy bolters I think would be taken if devestators got them for free. The devestator with the heavy bolter is an iconic visual of the devestator. It's what people think of when they see a devestator combat logo. And doing so just for them would help a lot in them being taken more.

However I feel that heavy bolter is a lot like the flamer weapons of the current situation in the game, the whole game around them is such a mess that there isn't a point. Their a weapon for trashing inferior infantry to marines but because grav exists there isn't a point to any of the other items. Prior to the days of grav you brought plasmas and meltas and Flamers and yes even heavy bolters because they were all in their own little corner for tackling problems. They were in perfect harmony a gun for every job. And now there's one gun that has effectively replaced three.

If you want to see heavy bolters and Flamers more you'd need to do a serious price restructuring not only on weapon upgrade but the units that carry them. Here's an example of where I'd go:

Bolter and bp remain free

All pistol upgrades drop to 5ppm

Your flamer and SB remain at 5 ppm

Combi weapons jump up 1ppm except grav which has jumped 5ppm to 15.

In the special weapons slots, melta gun remains unchanged, and the plasma gun drops to 13ppm however grav guns are now 20ppm

In the heavy slot:
Mm is unchanged
Heavy bolters are free for devestators other units pay 8ppm like scouts do but only scouts and stern guard can get hellfires
Plasma cannon drops to 12
Missiles are 15
Lascannon stays at 20
Grav cannons are 25ppm for no amp, if you want the amp that's an extra 5ppm (makin an amp devestator 44ppm).

From there we now move to unit costs:
Devestators, scouts, tacticals, even Angel veterans and command squads go unchanged for points.

Stern guard go up 2ppm in addition kraken bolts are going up 2ppm.

Centurions are going up by 25ppm and their grav cannons no longer come with free amps you pay 5ppm for an amp.

marine bikes lose the ability to take grav weapons period (omitting the pistols).

Basically we gut the ability to buy grav out of the biggest problem child's or we raise the price on models with grav guns or access to them. Make them a very costly weapon to wield and use so losing them really really hurts. This also is a big kick into the groin of bike armies that have grown like weeds over the past two editions and need to be culled back. and one can look at this as a buff to the land raider excelsior which basically went down 5 points as a result of these changes.

Still wouldn't use them. They are terrible weapons.

at 27ppm + 5 for the amp that makes a single gravestator cost more then a single terminator, heck with the costy jump on centurions cents alone are going up to cost almost as much as a single predator tank per model and the loss of bike grav combo means you have to go back to the drawing board on when to use them and on who

Still wouldn't tempt me to use heavy bolters. Without access to grav bikes, I'd probably just quit at that point. I'd have zero answers to 2+ MCs, even as feeble as regular grav guns are.

BA don't have much of a drawing board anymore and you just took the one we had and trashed it.

So no, making my list unplayable would not make me use heavy bolters.

How on earth are grav guns feeble against anything with a 2+? They wound on a 2+ and ignore armour. They are as good as you can get against them damage-wise.

 Co'tor Shas wrote:
How on earth are grav guns feeble against anything with a 2+? They wound on a 2+ and ignore armour. They are as good as you can get against them damage-wise.

24" range and salvo 2/3. You aren't guaranteed a wound on 2+ Armour if you are moving (and don't have relentless) and you only get 1.6~ wounds if you stand still when you don't calculate in another save.

And how is that bad against something that anti-tank weapons struggle to wound?

Because it's still not nearly enough. And the utility from a single cast of perfect timing on a squad of grav cannons gets you so much further than casting it on grav guns. Without ignore cover, you are spitting into the wind vs MCs.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:
And how is that bad against something that anti-tank weapons struggle to wound?

There should be no units like this in the game to begin with.

Martel732 wrote:
Because it's still not nearly enough. And the utility from a single cast of perfect timing on a squad of grav cannons gets you so much further than casting it on grav guns. Without ignore cover, you are spitting into the wind vs MCs.

Well, I'd assume so, but that's like complaining plasma guns aren't as good as plasma cannons.

Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:
And how is that bad against something that anti-tank weapons struggle to wound?

There should be no units like this in the game to begin with.

Out side of apoc, I agree.

Plasma guns are actually better than plasma cannons. But the point still stands that grav guns are quite good against units that I didn't need them to be good against. Even at ROF 3, after to-hit, wounding, cover, and FNP, they don't generate enough wounds quickly enough to save my lists from the units I REALLY need saved from.

So, what, you want a point and click MC eraser?

 eskimo wrote:
Nids have 5 MCs with 4+ btw
- helps the argument a little.

I like HBs, and from being a Nid player the HB feels fine. I have a whole Dev squad with them. I do however like the idea of salvo, but still i feel they are "okay" as they are.

2 are Flyers.
1 never saw the light of day in the first place.
And the last no longer sees the light of day since they changed WKs into Gargantuan creatures.

So....you have 2 that are only hit on 6s and can jink.
Or 2 you never see on tables at all.

The 'nids have MCs with a 4+ is the equivalent of stating that Tyranids have access to a flamer template in the form of a pyrovore.

You've mentioned something that no one will ever see because it's just so terribly bad.

The reason the Heavy bolter suffers is, well, the meta is more orientated to things it generally cannot kill - it doesn't cope well against vehicles in general and it doesn't cope well against power armour, GCs or the majority of MCs that enter the table. And as has been said - the Assault Cannon exists - it sits in the S6 sweet spot, has more shots, is available on the majority of the platforms the heavy bolter comes on (Land Speeders, Razorbacks, Land Raiders) and has rending to boot so CAN deal with armour, GCs or the like.

Now if the meta suddenly favoured footsloggers again and swarms? The Heavy Bolter might pick up....

Oh who am I kidding. The Assault Cannon will still trump.

 DarkStarSabre wrote:


The reason the Heavy bolter suffers is, well, the meta is more orientated to things it generally cannot kill - it doesn't cope well against vehicles in general and it doesn't cope well against power armour, GCs or the majority of MCs that enter the table. And as has been said - the Assault Cannon exists - it sits in the S6 sweet spot, has more shots, is available on the majority of the platforms the heavy bolter comes on (Land Speeders, Razorbacks, Land Raiders) and has rending to boot so CAN deal with armour, GCs or the like.

Now if the meta suddenly favoured footsloggers again and swarms? The Heavy Bolter might pick up....

Oh who am I kidding. The Assault Cannon will still trump.

Let's be real here: It wouldn't (like you said).

If the global (or even local) meta suddenly shifted into what is the HB's best case scenario - Horde's of Guardsmen, Guardians, Ork Boyz, and Gaunts.. heavy bolters would still be garbage. They simply cast way too much where-ever you could get them, and if your objective becomes mowing down hordes you're better off just investing in more guys with basic guns (you get 3+ guardsmen with lasguns for the cost of equipping a single HWT with a Heavy Bolter; that's better for termagaunt killin') . This is pretty universal across every army that has them; even for MEQ it's going to be better to grab that single extra marine over a HB in 9 out of 10 scenarios.

Really, someone earlier in the thread made the (imo) best suggestion for how to change it. Simply making them function similar to DoW in that they have an improved version of concussive / strike down / pinning - one which doesn't care if you're fearless and only cares if you're a monstrous creature or greater - would immediately give the weapon a much needed niche. It might not become a mainstay, but there would be a reason for bringing it. Further improvements could probably be piled on, but I feel that's the most important one.

Even if swarms became a thing again, the math for the Heavy Bolter is still pretty damn pathetic. Was the Heavy Bolter EVER good? It wasn't in 4th that's for damn sure.

Just a thought, but what if on certain platforms they were free or reduced. Heavy weapons teams and Devastator squads get heavy bolters as standard wargear, as an example.

It was good in 2nd ed.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:
So, what, you want a point and click MC eraser?

Eldar have them. Why can't everyone else? They actually have several.

 morganfreeman wrote:

 DarkStarSabre wrote:


The reason the Heavy bolter suffers is, well, the meta is more orientated to things it generally cannot kill - it doesn't cope well against vehicles in general and it doesn't cope well against power armour, GCs or the majority of MCs that enter the table. And as has been said - the Assault Cannon exists - it sits in the S6 sweet spot, has more shots, is available on the majority of the platforms the heavy bolter comes on (Land Speeders, Razorbacks, Land Raiders) and has rending to boot so CAN deal with armour, GCs or the like.

Now if the meta suddenly favoured footsloggers again and swarms? The Heavy Bolter might pick up....

Oh who am I kidding. The Assault Cannon will still trump.

Let's be real here: It wouldn't (like you said).

If the global (or even local) meta suddenly shifted into what is the HB's best case scenario - Horde's of Guardsmen, Guardians, Ork Boyz, and Gaunts.. heavy bolters would still be garbage. They simply cast way too much where-ever you could get them, and if your objective becomes mowing down hordes you're better off just investing in more guys with basic guns (you get 3+ guardsmen with lasguns for the cost of equipping a single HWT with a Heavy Bolter; that's better for termagaunt killin') . This is pretty universal across every army that has them; even for MEQ it's going to be better to grab that single extra marine over a HB in 9 out of 10 scenarios.

Really, someone earlier in the thread made the (imo) best suggestion for how to change it. Simply making them function similar to DoW in that they have an improved version of concussive / strike down / pinning - one which doesn't care if you're fearless and only cares if you're a monstrous creature or greater - would immediately give the weapon a much needed niche. It might not become a mainstay, but there would be a reason for bringing it. Further improvements could probably be piled on, but I feel that's the most important one.

Yep. The Heavy Bolter's Problem is that the armies you find it in....better options exist with the possible exception of Sisters of Battle.

Space Marines? They have Assault Cannons and Autocannons - both will kill hordes just as much but also fair better against big monsters, heavier armour and vehicles too. (Higher strength forces more wounds, better rate of fire, available on all the same platforms too).

Chaos Space Marines? Autocannons exist again.

Imp. Guard? Multilasers and Autocannons exist there too.

In every case where you could consider a heavy bolter viable there's something better which also happens to have MORE utility. I think the only army that had this sort of problem (similar weapons competing with eachother) was Eldar with Scat-Lasers and Shuricannons which have been tweaked back and forth to try and make them equally utility.

Martel732 wrote:Because it's still not nearly enough. And the utility from a single cast of perfect timing on a squad of grav cannons gets you so much further than casting it on grav guns. Without ignore cover, you are spitting into the wind vs MCs.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:
And how is that bad against something that anti-tank weapons struggle to wound?

There should be no units like this in the game to begin with.

MCs are fine, the issue is with GMC in typical sized games of <2000 points. Super heavies aren't even a big deal for most armies because AV is fairly weak in the current meta.

Martel732 wrote:
Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:
So, what, you want a point and click MC eraser?

Eldar have them. Why can't everyone else? They actually have several.

You can't possibly sit there and say marines have a 'hard' time taking down MCs. At range, they have easily the second best anti MC weapon in the game that now comes on multiple platforms (grav). D weapons only win over it because they have that chance to delete the target.