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Really? I thought Ian Watson's Inquisition War trilogy, while quite old by BL standards, was actually quite good...

Well, I guess it's all a matter of taste. That passage just felt really naff to me. To be fair, it is removed from it's context.

...Yeah, "ejaculated" in that sentence seemed a bit forced and unnecessarily lascivious, eh?

Commissar Molotov wrote:...Yeah, "ejaculated" in that sentence seemed a bit forced and unnecessarily lascivious, eh?

It's how Ian watson writes, very much his style.

Guess I'm a little late, but I'll throw in my two prayer beads here.

As much as I respect Melissia from all I've read in the past months before registering, I have to disagree about any difference between "civilian" boltguns and Astartes models as well as the canonicity of the RPG books. Whilst much in them is very well written, they remain a licensed product subject to the personal interpretation of their authors, and I have heard enough statements from Gav Thorpe, George Mann and other GW or ex-GW people that I can say I only deem GW studio material a "hard" source. I won't let an RPG book invalidate half the background of a proper Codex just because the P&P designers thought their gimped SoB had to be balanced in relation to revolver-wielding gangers and shockmaul-armed clerics instead of fighting alongside their overpowered Astartes who got their own book with different rules.

The RPG's invention of two bolter classes does not even hold up to its own assertion: A trained warrior who is perfectly able to operate a heavy bolter - a weapon with a 25% larger caliber and twice the weight/size of a Space Marine boltgun - is completely overwhelmed by the massive size and recoil of a cal 0.75 Astartes bolt pistol? Nope, sorry, don't buy it. Just like I don't buy that Space Marine flamethrowers are magically much hotter and thus more damaging than SoB ones, who pretty much have the monopoly on Cleansing Fire™ in the setting.

It may also be worth pointing out that the original designers of the P&P (Black Library) rated Astartes boltgun damage in the P&P at 2d10+0, which is pretty much the same as their "civilian" boltgun's 1d10+5. Astartes weapons and armour received a considerable power boost only as they got their own system, which is only superficially compatible with the existing ones. And said boost feels primarily necessitated by the broken Unnatural stats which enable a Marine character to throw a rock that would do as much damage as an "old" bolter, or that make a Marine invulnerable towards small arms fire.

The notion that boltguns are not gyrojets is a correct one, though. Bolt weapons are, in truth, hybrids between gyrojets and normal projectile weapons such as the caliber 0.729 fully-automatic AA-12, which (when used with Frag-12 explosive bolts) is probably the closest you could get to a bolter these days.
The AA-12 comes with a remarkable recoil compensation system that reduces its kick considerably, even allowing muscular people to fire them single-handedly, or dual-wielding them: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WOoUVeyaY_8#t=02m50s

Given that the far future of the 41st millennium may well feature even better recoil compensation, it does not strike me as that far-fetched that the recoil of boltguns is much lower than many people may assume. In the end, the kinetic energy only has to suffice to push the projectile out of the barrel and propel it to a speed where it is capable of hurting something that finds its unlucky frame in front of the business end of this gun. This kinetic energy may well be stronger than from the AA-12, but I would never suggest that it is too much for a normal human to handle, even less a human wearing power armour (note that Marine Scouts also use boltguns, and those do not wear power armour).

And that's why the fluff made no difference between boltgun and boltgun for the 20 years before this RPG came out. Even GW's Inquisitor RPG gave everyone the same guns.

Of course, there's also the theory of the happy medium, which I like best (because some recoil does have style):

"The boltgun is most commonly recognised as the standard weapon of the Adeptus Astartes and, though it is not unknown for certain high-ranking officers to bear such advanced and powerful weaponry, it is incredibly rare. Bolters are more effective weapons than the standard pattern lasguns and are able to punch through most forms of armour with little or no effort. They are, however, much more complex and are generally only ever carried by stocky individuals of great strength, given that they are incredibly heavy and generate enormous recoil when they fire what is essentially a miniature missile.
A bolter can fire a single shot, a four-round burst or fully automatic fire, though without bionic augmentation it is not recommended that anyone other than one of the Space Marines fires on anything other than the single shot setting."
- from the Imperial Munitorum Manual

Here is where the problem of "canon" breaks down:

Most of everything we consider "canon" is novels published by the Black Library, or the background information provided in the FFG RPG line. All of this is subject to artistic license by its creators, and may not jive 100% with the WH40K table-top game Codices, which may be considered the *only* source of pure-canon information.

Unfortunately, the various codices only tell a very, very small part of the 40k story. If we assume that the RPG is "fluff only", then all of the Black Library novels, which provide the *most* information about the 40K universe background and story, are also "fluff only".

This is made even more complicated in that the "canon" of the codices has changed with every new edition, to the point that very little has any solid and true continuity between one edition and the next.

So this, then, leaves us at the following: either all the "fluff" (novels, RPGs, etc) is considered "canon", until superseded by a Codex, or the only true "canon" is what is in the Codices, which removes about 90% of the background details of WH40K entirely, and when a Codex doesn't mention a topic specifically to provide a "ruling"... then it's an "anything goes" situation, and one fan's view has as much weight as any other on that particular subject, as the Codex offers no stance whatsoever.

I absolutely agree that this is not a very good situation - yet things simply stand as they do. If you do open Pandora's Box and count every single novel as canon, then you're left with backflipping Terminator-Sergeants carrying Cyclone launchers on their back, Sisters of Battle playing cards and sleeping around out of boredom, and of course Goto's multilasers. And that's not to mention the average height of a Space Marine jumping between 7 and 9 feet depending solely on author (and I'm pretty sure I've even seen 11 feet once) ... or the very issue of bolter recoil that has sparked this thread. In short: half of 40k gets rewritten every month just because of some novel. Personally, that's way too fluid for me. I value consistency in a setting.

That's not to say that I don't care what some novels write at all - there are lots of beautiful books which have truly enriched the setting with their descriptions and ideas, and much of it has found their way into my own roleplaying and army background. Yet whenever there's a contradiction, I will stick to what GW says. Because only GW knows where itself is going, and because not everyone has the right to rewrite the setting based on his personal preferences just because he managed to get a license to write something for the Black Library and because GW's editing process is rather sloppy.

In short: I do it much like GW themselves. Gav Thorpe said that the studio pretty much picks stuff they like and deem fitting from the novels to incorporate into their own books whilst simply ignoring the rest.

Here is what I think. An Asartes-pattern boltgun fires a .75 caliber (calibre) round. Because the cartridge fired is a combination of a normal one and a gyrojet one, it should have a good, if not great, kick to it. The Space Marines must be able to handle it if they can handle a LMG version that fires 1.00 caliber rounds. Both WILL have recoil.

There's a lot of talk about gyrojets here. I really just can't get past why, in the 41st millennium, when mankind is faced with extinction from a myriad of different alien races, that they would bring back a dead technology that was rejected by all of the world's armed forces 40,000 years prior.

I'm also not positive about why a designer or manufacturer would spend time making a weapon more complicated in order to reduce recoil when it will be wielded by an eight foot tall superhuman wearing powered armor that will be as affected by the recoil of the weapon as he would be a newborn baby punching him in the shin.

The nonspecific and shifting nature of Warhammer canon makes this conversation mute, I'm sure a book will get published next year that has microscopic gremlins piloting bolter rounds to their intended target and ejecting before the round detonates. There's just too many people that have artistic license over the material to have any one person explain this conclusively and without any dispute.

I'm going to stay completely clear of this forum, reading this thread gave me a headache.

scotchwiskey wrote:There's a lot of talk about gyrojets here. I really just can't get past why, in the 41st millennium, when mankind is faced with extinction from a myriad of different alien races, that they would bring back a dead technology that was rejected by all of the world's armed forces 40,000 years prior.

I'm also not positive about why a designer or manufacturer would spend time making a weapon more complicated in order to reduce recoil when it will be wielded by an eight foot tall superhuman wearing powered armor that will be as affected by the recoil of the weapon as he would be a newborn baby punching him in the shin.

The nonspecific and shifting nature of Warhammer canon makes this conversation mute, I'm sure a book will get published next year that has microscopic gremlins piloting bolter rounds to their intended target and ejecting before the round detonates. There's just too many people that have artistic license over the material to have any one person explain this conclusively and without any dispute.

I'm going to stay completely clear of this forum, reading this thread gave me a headache.

I don't know why either, as they are not gyrojets.

forruner_mercy wrote:I don't know why either, as they are not gyrojets.

Also, the majority of all effective modern recoilless weapons exhaust gases to the rear of the weapon instead of out of the muzzle, reducing recoil. I've never seen a bolter depicted with a rear exhaust like that, which would make it impractical and dangerous to fire in close combat anyway because your squad mates would get a face full of hell every time you shot at something. As people have already stated many times in this thread, space marines are supposed to be shock troops that advance on and engage enemies in close combat, usually depicted surrounded, firing point-blank into enemies with his buddies grouped up around him. It makes zero sense for a bolter to be a recoilless weapon, because the properties of those weapons make it something you would not want to have for that purpose. I really don't think that the guys who write much 40K fiction research much, they just write down what sounds cool.

While I would love GW to tighten up their science in their science fiction, in reality 40k is space FANTASY not science fiction, and as such descriptions on how things work is pretty pointless because fantasy doesnt really care about that.

As evidenced by the very common rewrites to things like the bolter, which makes answering the question about recoil pointless as 3 sources provide 3 correct yet different answers.

scotchwiskey wrote:I really just can't get past why, in the 41st millennium, when mankind is faced with extinction from a myriad of different alien races, that they would bring back a dead technology that was rejected by all of the world's armed forces 40,000 years prior.

Probably because the idea itself is sound, 40k Earth isn't necessarily today's Real Life Earth, and because boltguns are less gyrojets but more RPGs. People just use the gyrojet term because despite being less correct it's easier to associate that one with a pistol/rifle, whereas RPGs make most people think of some huge tube.

"In the case of the RPG-7 the rocket is launched by a gunpowder booster charge, and the rocket motor ignites only after 10 metres."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rocket-propelled_grenade#Description

scotchwiskey wrote:I'm also not positive about why a designer or manufacturer would spend time making a weapon more complicated in order to reduce recoil when it will be wielded by an eight foot tall superhuman wearing powered armor that will be as affected by the recoil of the weapon as he would be a newborn baby punching him in the shin.

All of this has, in my opinion, really nothing to do with recoil. The rocket motor of a bolt simply makes the projectile fly further, more accurate, and at higher speed, thus increasing penetration.

Given that a boltgun has a two-stage firing mechanism, and the first stage employs the most basic mechanisms of a conventional firearm, the rocket motor does not play any role in terms of lessening recoil. On the other hand, a bolt is a smaller projectile and (for the first stage) requires less kinetic energy than what existing weapons such as the KS-23 already use, so I don't see why a bolter would have any more recoil. Which in turn explains why bolters can be used by non-Astartes without problem - though frail individuals will obviously still have issues with accuracy, just like they'd have firing a KS-23. Hence me believing that the Munitorum Manual got it perfectly right.

As far as any different depictions go, GW has actually been pretty consistent here. It's just the writers working on licensed products (novels, RPGs) that occasionally slip up and contradict the source material.

scotchwiskey wrote:Also, the majority of all effective modern recoilless weapons exhaust gases to the rear of the weapon instead of out of the muzzle, reducing recoil.

Actually, those exhausts are situated on the top: http://img804.imageshack.us/img804/3237/bolters.png

Not that I'm saying they are completely recoilless. I do believe, however, that they have a degree of recoil compensation - like many modern firearms do. Mere theory, though. May just as well be pattern-specific, just like all those other gadgets (palm-print sensor, autosense links, etc) on the above schematic. Depending on what exactly the buyer ordered, his influence with the AdMech, and how much he's willing to spend on it.

And yeah, I agree about the suspected "rule of cool". I still appreciate that the guys at GW made an effort to make it sound somewhat believable. Most of the time, anyways.

Lynata wrote:Actually, those exhausts are situated on the top: http://img804.imageshack.us/img804/3237/bolters.png

Is that diagram from an earlier rulebook or something? I remember seeing it before, but I'm just getting back into the game after a dozen or so years away. At any rate, that's an interesting diagram that clears up a little bit of my issues with the fiction of the bolter.

I guess what I'm trying to get across in my posts is that anything that isn't published by GW is a mire of differing ideas that are just going to conflict. I personally can't consider anything not actually published in a codex or rulebook as canon.

scotchwiskey wrote:Is that diagram from an earlier rulebook or something? I remember seeing it before, but I'm just getting back into the game after a dozen or so years away. At any rate, that's an interesting diagram that clears up a little bit of my issues with the fiction of the bolter.

Aye, that's still from the 90s! I'm glad I found it, I really dig those detailed descriptions. And all those little gadgets there are a neat explanation for why bolt weapons are so incredibly huge despite being "only" caliber .75

scotchwiskey wrote:I guess what I'm trying to get across in my posts is that anything that isn't published by GW is a mire of differing ideas that are just going to conflict. I personally can't consider anything not actually published in a codex or rulebook as canon.

Exactly. I used to think different for a long time, but that changed the more I've seen licensed products deviate from established norms ... and after digging up a few statements from GW officials or novel authors who pretty much confirm your point of view.

Lynata wrote:

scotchwiskey wrote:Is that diagram from an earlier rulebook or something? I remember seeing it before, but I'm just getting back into the game after a dozen or so years away. At any rate, that's an interesting diagram that clears up a little bit of my issues with the fiction of the bolter.

Aye, that's still from the 90s! I'm glad I found it, I really dig those detailed descriptions. And all those little gadgets there are a neat explanation for why bolt weapons are so incredibly huge despite being "only" caliber .75

I went digging and found that rulebook, I'm not sure what edition it was but I got it in the late 90's. Pretty good condition too, despite missing the back cover.

I guess what I'm trying to get across in my posts is that anything that isn't published by GW is a mire of differing ideas that are just going to conflict. I personally can't consider anything not actually published in a codex or rulebook as canon.

Excepting that Black Library is GW's publishing arm... so all their fluff novels are, technically, published by GW.

Now, I am (for the sake of argument) inclined to accept rulebook/codex over novel... but the rulebooks and codices don't include 90% of the background information, and even when they do, it often changes from one edition to the next (if not more frequently).

This is the one scenario where the Star Wars fandom is better than the 40K fandom. Lucasarts has a team of people who have categorized every SW-related publication on a level of canonicity, so that it heads off debates on what is true and what isn't for the SW universe.

I'd like to see something like that for 40K, but the problem remains that the bulk of our background information for the setting exists in sources that would be deemed "non-canon".

Another thing about this argument is, a lot of people that play Space Marines design their own chapters, color schemes, background fluff, etc, etc. Why not take that as far as this as well, if you've got a problem with the fiction there's nothing stopping you from doing some research on firearms and coming to your own conclusions. Pretty much everybody in the hobby and certainly the people that post here are extremely creative, there's no reason to hang on the words of a bunch of authors that can't keep consistent.

Psienesis wrote:Lucasarts has a team of people who have categorized every SW-related publication on a level of canonicity, so that it heads off debates on what is true and what isn't for the SW universe.

GW officials and novel authors have made some statements regarding this, but they're usually hard to find and not circulated very often (which is why these debates still exist). I'm very much a fan of consistent canonicity myself, so I'd prefer a "Star Wars" approach myself. Which is why I feel inclined to shy away from introducing too many new ideas.

What I often like to do, however, is look for potential explanations for why something from the official sources that may, on the first glance, appear silly might actually make sense. Such as the recoil of a lasgun, or how the Storm Troopers and SoB can have fewer numbers than the Space Marines. I find this much better than outright "retconning" it with something I'd deem more appropriate based solely on my personal preferences - because explanations mean that I'm still preserving this "common ground" that connects my perception of the setting to the studio material - and with that, hopefully a lot of other fans of the franchise. As opposed to creating my own little bubble of the universe, such as what Cassern S. Goto likes to do. From reading an interview, he actually seems like a nice guy, and I can see where he's coming from, but I still prefer to keep the established aspects of the setting "sacrosanct" rather than "playing with established convictions", as he put it.

It's also a bit more difficult for GW to establish a "canon" when so much of the setting is drawn from novels, written by authors given artistic license to kinda-sorta make it up as they go, as it's based on a table-top miniatures game with a fairly limited scope... whereas the SW canon is based on a universe created by a series of beloved films plus three others of varying quality, several comic book lines and enough novels to fill a library.

The SW canon is coming from a place that already established a significant portion of its background, and didn't go through several "editions" that, officially, completely changed how some things worked, didn't work, or existed at all (poor Squats).

For the record, since my WH40K stuff these days is all entirely Dark Heresy and related RPGs in focus... the boltguns in my game all have significant recoil, because that, to me, establishes a better-looking "scene", and tells a better story. Lasweapons? Negligible recoil, akin to a M16A2 (which myself and another member of my group have shared military experience in operating), with the lascannon having the slight push of an AT4 anti-tank weapon. Noticeable, but not all that bad.

I think GW just needs something like the Holocron continuity database that firmly keeps track of how things are supposed to work like, and then just force everyone to adhere to it.

The true "problem" is likely that GW doesn't feel a need to have consistency in the overall franchise. I recall having read an interview where it was said that GW values creativity, purposely letting some things in their background obscured so that both TT players as well as novel authors may toy around with them and come up with their own ideas. It's an extension of the freedom that lets us create things like our own Marine Chapters, IG Regiments or Sororitas Orders - and even though they won't become canon just because of this, there's also nothing in the setting saying "no".

Of course, this gets problematic as soon as you have fluff nerds like me who would rather wish for a slightly more uniform basis instead of obvious contradictions even throughout the licensed material, in turn leading to much debate about what information is the correct one.

In short, GW just seems to have a way more "laid back" attitude towards the whole canon thing than some of the fans.

As for Star Wars - that franchise actually went through another "edition" as well. It's just that Lucasfilm had the balls to have numerous years worth of licensed material (mostly those really old Marvel comics - and boy did they include some weird stuff) officially declared non-canon. The aforementioned Holocron database and its canonicity rules did not come into existence until about a dozen years ago, and up until that point of time, everything was working like it still does for Star Trek or the Black Library.

Yeah, though in SW, the comics have always been considered "C-Canon", iirc, and so were superseded by pretty much everything else.

Belexar wrote:As far as I know, Bolters are a bit like mini RPGs. I asume they'd have a similar recoil, though with the armor Marines shouldn't realy feel it. Also have iin mind that Bolters are semi-auto (rapid fire) for a reason. If they didn't had a big recoild, why not make them automatic (assault)?

RPG-7s don't have recoils.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-BNAoOaYyEg

The recoil is mostly Hollywood, like how silencers make guns reaaaaally silent and shooting a car would make it go boom.

Also, bolters may be Rapid Fire, but they're not semi-auto. The description of this characteristic is a generalization, and does mention the word "usually", which automatically confirms the existence of full-auto Rapid Fire weapons.

It's just that bolters are not used on full auto "pray-and-spray" but rather full auto bursts - as is mentioned in the schematic. This conserves ammunition, but comes with the same recoil: there's no difference between the 4th shot of a "pray-and-spray" salvo and the 4th shot of a short burst.

Also, they actually did make Assault bolters - they're called storm bolters, and nobody seems to have a problem using them. Heck, just look at the heavy bolters, which have an even larger caliber and actually do employ "pray-and-spray" tactics for suppression fire. And still the problem with them doesn't seem to be the recoil so much as their pure weight.

But hey, that's what power armour is for.

Melissia wrote:

Kasrkai wrote:Agreed. Not to mention the small initial charge would make negligible recoil, even for a normal human, somewhat like an RPG on auto, which isn't to bad from my experience. Must be including the rate of fire.

There's a HUGE initial charge, not a small one. If it had a small initial charge you could block it by putting a hand up against the exit to the barrel. As it is, the weapon is very powerful at close range AND long range, so having a weak initial charge doesn't make sense.

And it isn't just a grenade. It's closer to a HEAT round with a secondary rocket propulsion. Penetrate THEN explode.

40mm grenade launchers have minimal kick, much less than a shotgun. Well much less than a 10 or 12 gauge. Similar to a 20. I sure as heck wouldn't try blocking it with a body part.

I've shot a full auto 12 gauge and its neigh uncontrollable, I'd say IRL a bolter would be similar to shooting a full auto 10/12 gauge.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

starsdawn wrote:

Belexar wrote:As far as I know, Bolters are a bit like mini RPGs. I asume they'd have a similar recoil, though with the armor Marines shouldn't realy feel it. Also have iin mind that Bolters are semi-auto (rapid fire) for a reason. If they didn't had a big recoild, why not make them automatic (assault)?

RPG-7s don't have recoils.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-BNAoOaYyEg

The recoil is mostly Hollywood, like how silencers make guns reaaaaally silent and shooting a car would make it go boom.

Um, I have a few NFA items including silencers... and yeah if you use subsonic ammo, they are darn quiet...

My wife can't hear me shooting my ar-15 it in the back yard. Then again its chambered in 9mm but I use subsonic ammo and a big can.
My .22 on the other hand is dead silent, all you hear is the slide moving back and forth. It makes less sound than a cap gun with no caps.

But yeah, cars don't explode when you shoot them and grenade launchers and RPG's don't really have much/any kick.

CageUF wrote:I've shot a full auto 12 gauge and its neigh uncontrollable, I'd say IRL a bolter would be similar to shooting a full auto 10/12 gauge.

Aye, good comparison. There are some full auto 12Gs that have a pretty good recoil compensation, though.
Check this out: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WOoUVeyaY_8#t=04m43s

Now you only need to load 'em with these babies and you're all set.

Has anyone mention the points of a buffer spring? I wouldn't imagine a automatic weapon not having one, a bolter being one of those. Whether it's a burst or full in doesn't matter, both of those rate of fires are considered "automatic weapons" Depending on the buffer spring in a weapon will determine how much recoil the weapon has. Obviously there's canon out there that say Space Marines have no issues using them, regular people don't even try! You have to take in the fact that Space Marines are super-human, have powered armor and their body mass is much larger than the typical persons. Space Marine recoil, I would say probably next to nothing. For us regular guys and gals, you had better be prepare for one heck of a kick!

Even then, fully automatic weapons are going to have recoil.

Before they replaced it with the M249 SAW, I carried an M60D for my squad. Got to the point where I could fire it from the hip, or the shoulder if I had to but... I don't recommend it if you weigh under 200 pounds.

Psienesis wrote:Even then, fully automatic weapons are going to have recoil.

Before they replaced it with the M249 SAW, I carried an M60D for my squad. Got to the point where I could fire it from the hip, or the shoulder if I had to but... I don't recommend it if you weigh under 200 pounds.

Yes even with buffer springs in fully automatic they still have a lot of recoil. I personally am a .50 cal gunner, M2 is no joke and with a tripod and T&E it still has recoil. If I could imagine a shortened rifle version of the .50 cal would be impractical for troops using the ole leather express to get around! Let alone a .75 (or.70?) cal weapon like 3rd ed says "bolts" are!

Yeah, the M2 is... impressive. Hell, the old .30cal M14s were pretty punishing. A round half again as big as a .50? Yeah, no thanks! I'll carry the lascannon...