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Even BS2 can defeat 3+, given enough dice.

SJ

You know, actually in a setting like warhammer, melee weapons would be more useful than attempting to draw sight picture for everything, all the time, in close quarters....

- some of the races will be hard pressed to disable before they get to you. Even with some species -like grizzlies- can take awhile to bring down - depending on shot placements (yes plural, not just a single shot) as well as caliber/load. This is just my understanding of it.

-sword and pistol would be quite a viable load out in 40k

- like someone else said, the effective body armour in 40k also throws off current modern tactical doctrine. Though dang it, why the heck some models can't be posed with the finger off the trigger is a bit irritating. That and the abundance of breast/hip shooting. This is worse than the proposed melee aesthetics being stupid. I can go along with helmet targeters to answer for this... mostly.

- for those disputing the bolter: it isn't the effect or science of how the gun works that's a tad silly, I'd point to the ammo. .75 rounds (last I recall) for 16 round clip, would be rather bulky and weigh a lot. Though pwr armour solves this a bit.

Bolters are .75 cal in 30 round magazines(or 100 round drum mags)

And no, it really wouldn't be that heavy. Bolters would be quite manageable for a normal human to hold. .75 cal is very large relative to other modern calibers, but it would still be fine for a human or roughly human sized weapon to have a 30 round magazine. Even in a banana magazine format. It would just be a little wider than typical magazines, and the gun itself would be a little larger, but no more difficult than any LMG would be.

 kveldulf wrote:
You know, actually in a setting like warhammer, melee weapons would be more useful than attempting to draw sight picture for everything, all the time, in close quarters....

- some of the races will be hard pressed to disable before they get to you. Even with some species -like grizzlies- can take awhile to bring down - depending on shot placements (yes plural, not just a single shot) as well as caliber/load. This is just my understanding of it.

You go fight a grizzly with a power sword, I'll be over here with my C9, see how well it goes.

Sod a C9, I will take a 2CM quad flakveirling. Lets see any CC beast get through that.

Bit unwieldy, don't you think?

 Bobthehero wrote:
You go fight a grizzly with a power sword, I'll be over here with my C9, see how well it goes.

It's useless, Bob. WH40K is after all just WH Fantasy IN SPACE!, and in fantasy a sword-waving hero will always take out a unit of lowly musket gunners. If a 350-point hero can trump a 300-point unit by charging them and killing four guys it must be accurate. ;-)

Even if ordinary soldiers today carry a bayonet, a knife and maybe a hatchet they've usually messed up something fierce (or been totally blindsided by superior enemy forces) if they actually have to use melee instead of just shooting everyone who looks at them funny. Melee weapons for silence, or surprises, that I can see. Or tradition like the Gurkha kukri knife, but they too prefer shooting you first these days.

You guys realize that its only really marines who go hand to hand, and even then they tend to fight at range? There's only one marine unit that wants to go hand to hand, and that's an assault marine.
He has a jump pack, a suit of power armor, some grenades and a pistol that may be a flame thrower.

The main imperial fighting force, the Imperial Guard, mainly uses ranged weapons, and seldom want to get close, because unlike Marines, they don't have power armor.
The officers have swords, but I think that's more of a sign of office.

And of course there's the Tau, who tend to frown upon melee combat in general, with the exception of the Enclaves. Their attitude towards hand-to hand arose after extended bouts of conflict with orks, iirc.

The whole "everyone fights with swords" thing is a bit of a misconception, imo.
There are dedicated melee weapons, but they are for specific purposes on certain units, and the soldiers who use them tend to have the means to get close without dying.

Which is fine. I have no problem with that.
Now, if every single soldier in the game, from guardsman to Assault Marine to even Eldar snipers packed a sword, a gun and bunch of grenades, and made it their priority to use the sword then its silly.

Right now? Fairly reasonable.

Let me put this this way, in the game, what do spend the most time doing? Shooting or charging?
Doesn't shooting outclass melee this edition?

In the Fluff, how often do they shoot, and how often do they chop?
It seems to me that in the artwork, even when they are less than 10ft from each other, there will mostly be shooting.

 Bobthehero wrote:

 kveldulf wrote:
You know, actually in a setting like warhammer, melee weapons would be more useful than attempting to draw sight picture for everything, all the time, in close quarters....

- some of the races will be hard pressed to disable before they get to you. Even with some species -like grizzlies- can take awhile to bring down - depending on shot placements (yes plural, not just a single shot) as well as caliber/load. This is just my understanding of it.

You go fight a grizzly with a power sword, I'll be over here with my C9, see how well it goes.

I'll take a good old great sword vs a grizzly. Thats what they used in the middle ages for hunting boar and bear.

They used spears. Boar spears, in fact.

But still, feel free to go at it, I am personally gonna stick with my machine gun.

Bobthehero wrote:They used spears. Boar spears, in fact.

But still, feel free to go at it, I am personally gonna stick with my machine gun.

lolololol exalted

 Bobthehero wrote:
They used spears. Boar spears, in fact.

But still, feel free to go at it, I am personally gonna stick with my machine gun.

http://www.weapons-universe.com/Swords/Swords_of_the_Renaissance.shtml

The Falchion was actually originally a hunting weapon.

Then there were Boar Swords.

 Grey Templar wrote:

 Bobthehero wrote:
They used spears. Boar spears, in fact.

But still, feel free to go at it, I am personally gonna stick with my machine gun.

http://www.weapons-universe.com/Swords/Swords_of_the_Renaissance.shtml

The Falchion was actually originally a hunting weapon.

Then there were Boar Swords.

Spoiler:

I still like the machine gun idea better.

 Bobthehero wrote:

 kveldulf wrote:
You know, actually in a setting like warhammer, melee weapons would be more useful than attempting to draw sight picture for everything, all the time, in close quarters....

- some of the races will be hard pressed to disable before they get to you. Even with some species -like grizzlies- can take awhile to bring down - depending on shot placements (yes plural, not just a single shot) as well as caliber/load. This is just my understanding of it.

You go fight a grizzly with a power sword, I'll be over here with my C9, see how well it goes.

Errr... a 9mm or a power sword.... why exactly are we seperating the need for either? They are both tools - that's it. If you want less tools kk. If I had to choose between a power sword and pistol in a survival situation, I'd choose the power sword.

If it's purely a matter of defense vs a grizzly, I'd want both if I could. Also, though a 9mm can be effective - as with many firearms depending on shot placement - it is not a guarantee.

You do realize you can shoot a pistol one handed right - its an actual thing (more old school). My father shot competition that way. I believe some military units of old were proficient with this too, carrying both sword & pistol, eh?

Space marines, wearing thick armour & maintaining enough dexterity for some impressive speed would be much worse than a grizzly, though the effect isnt a guarantee.

You may be that guy in a squad with a specialized weapon to deal with a SM effectively, but that isn't a guarantee either.

The trade off you have for certain weapons is sometimes huge, and sometimes about the same - depending on the situation. If a SM happened to get into the midst of your squad, the real question is, how & why did you let that happen and less to do with the tools. By that point, your dealing with a 7'6" idea that has been made manifest before you, and it is designed, and actually effective in melee - in an age of advances ballistic weapons. If you think you can back pedal fast enough to shoot, okay, but I reckon the tactics, equipment he has already accounts for you trying this. I don't think your going to outpace him either.

Really, this is a matter of: there's less you can do when the opponent has you on his terms.

No one in 40k is choosing between a machine gun and a sword because they get to carry both.

 kveldulf wrote:

 Bobthehero wrote:

 kveldulf wrote:
You know, actually in a setting like warhammer, melee weapons would be more useful than attempting to draw sight picture for everything, all the time, in close quarters....

- some of the races will be hard pressed to disable before they get to you. Even with some species -like grizzlies- can take awhile to bring down - depending on shot placements (yes plural, not just a single shot) as well as caliber/load. This is just my understanding of it.

You go fight a grizzly with a power sword, I'll be over here with my C9, see how well it goes.

Errr... a 9mm or a power sword.... why exactly are we seperating the need for either? They are both tools - that's it. If you want less tools kk. If I had to choose between a power sword and pistol in a survival situation, I'd choose the power sword.

If it's purely a matter of defense vs a grizzly, I'd want both if I could. Also, though a 9mm can be effective - as with many firearms depending on shot placement - it is not a guarantee.

You do realize you can shoot a pistol one handed right - its an actual thing (more old school). My father shot competition that way. I believe some military units of old were proficient with this too, eh?

Yup. Really you are only two handing a pistol for accuracy, in which case why are you not using a rifle instead?

Probably because, if someone has a pistol and is firing with both hands (the way most modern training doctrine will teach you to do), their primary role is probably not involved with actual fighting or their other weapons are not able to be brought to bear for whatever reason (out of ammo, damaged, etc).

 Grey Templar wrote:

 kveldulf wrote:

 Bobthehero wrote:

 kveldulf wrote:
You know, actually in a setting like warhammer, melee weapons would be more useful than attempting to draw sight picture for everything, all the time, in close quarters....

- some of the races will be hard pressed to disable before they get to you. Even with some species -like grizzlies- can take awhile to bring down - depending on shot placements (yes plural, not just a single shot) as well as caliber/load. This is just my understanding of it.

You go fight a grizzly with a power sword, I'll be over here with my C9, see how well it goes.

Errr... a 9mm or a power sword.... why exactly are we seperating the need for either? They are both tools - that's it. If you want less tools kk. If I had to choose between a power sword and pistol in a survival situation, I'd choose the power sword.

If it's purely a matter of defense vs a grizzly, I'd want both if I could. Also, though a 9mm can be effective - as with many firearms depending on shot placement - it is not a guarantee.

You do realize you can shoot a pistol one handed right - its an actual thing (more old school). My father shot competition that way. I believe some military units of old were proficient with this too, eh?

Yup. Really you are only two handing a pistol for accuracy, in which case why are you not using a rifle instead?

Indeed. And a rifle with a bayonet would be best of both worlds I'd presume.

There does come a point where even in close quarters, you're not going to kill an angry guy with a bullet or two necessarily. It isn't like the movies - you shoot until he is simply dead.

Then you have to deal with the guy or thing who's grabbing your rifle, or already eating you. A sword/knife seems like a good alternative, especially when we are talking about things like tyranids, orks, killer robots, even cultists.... etc.

Just thinking of dealing with crazy humans of today makes me wonder:
A sword & pistol would seem real effective when dealing with a dude on pcp. /shrug

 Grey Templar wrote:

And no, it really wouldn't be that heavy. Bolters would be quite manageable for a normal human to hold. .75 cal is very large relative to other modern calibers, but it would still be fine for a human or roughly human sized weapon to have a 30 round magazine. Even in a banana magazine format. It would just be a little wider than typical magazines, and the gun itself would be a little larger, but no more difficult than any LMG would be.

Wat. You've clearly never shot anything larger than 7.62mm or you'd realize how crazy that sounds. The M2A1 Caliber 50 machine gun is a whole third smaller than the supposed .75 cal of a Bolger but pretty much impossible to fire dismounted.

And soldiers today are certified in a pseudo MMA style technique aimed at integrating the real experiences of soldiers who had found themselves in hand to hand combat with the enemy. I can tell you the Army combatives program focuses on ground game, aiming to either create enough space from an enemy to draw a pistol, or to hold them down long enough for your buddy in the next room to shoot him for you. The whole idea of swords being necessary in actual combat is ridiculous and only someone living in a fantasy world would see them as useful.

Speaking of which they are practical in 40k because of the crazy stuff that can/does happen. Like teleporting, burrowing, and dropping in that stuff does. All that said, I love close combat in 40k and its my preferred type of unit.

Edit: also during my combatives certification I found myself sitting there multiple times super confused thinking I would have just pulled out my ka-bar and killed the guy instead of wrestling and doing a series of twelve moves to get into dominant position. Take that as you will.

 Ignatius wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:

And no, it really wouldn't be that heavy. Bolters would be quite manageable for a normal human to hold. .75 cal is very large relative to other modern calibers, but it would still be fine for a human or roughly human sized weapon to have a 30 round magazine. Even in a banana magazine format. It would just be a little wider than typical magazines, and the gun itself would be a little larger, but no more difficult than any LMG would be.

Wat. You've clearly never shot anything larger than 7.62mm or you'd realize how crazy that sounds. The M2A1 Caliber 50 machine gun is a whole third smaller than the supposed .75 cal of a Bolger but pretty much impossible to fire dismounted.

Caliber alone can be deceiving.

I mean, a Desert Eagle in .50 AE is ostensibly the same caliber as a 50BMG, but can be fired (albeit awkawrdly) one handed by an average adult human male, because the cartridge and load is so much lighter. In the 40k universe, there absolutely are bolters that normal humans can fire, every IG squad can ostensibly have their Sgt take a bolter or bolt pistol.


At the same time, the way the bolter supposedly works doesn't make a whole lot of sense for a small arm...they're described as something of an RPG gun. Well, if they work the way an RPG works, they've made guns like that, and they can't hit the broad side of a barn because they don't reach peak acceleration until several meters after they leave the barrel, (and thus are far less stable, while a bullet is at its maximum speed as it leaves the barrel and is much less prone to stabilization issues). If they've got some sort of booster charge, as they've sometimes been described as having, then there's not a whole lot of point in them having internal motors in the first place.

Edit: also during my combatives certification I found myself sitting there multiple times super confused thinking I would have just pulled out my ka-bar and killed the guy instead of wrestling and doing a series of twelve moves to get into dominant position. Take that as you will.

A lot of military hand to hand training is often done with a different aim than the one that is initially put forth. Nobody does bayonet drill really thinking they're going to fix bayonets and use them, but rather to instill a certain mindset, attitude, and aggressiveness.. Training like the kind you describe often is intended for things like taking/dealing with prisoners, crowd control, riots, etc and the like.in addition to the aforementioned mindset drilling as opposed clearing a trench by hand.

 Vaktathi wrote:

 Ignatius wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:

And no, it really wouldn't be that heavy. Bolters would be quite manageable for a normal human to hold. .75 cal is very large relative to other modern calibers, but it would still be fine for a human or roughly human sized weapon to have a 30 round magazine. Even in a banana magazine format. It would just be a little wider than typical magazines, and the gun itself would be a little larger, but no more difficult than any LMG would be.

Wat. You've clearly never shot anything larger than 7.62mm or you'd realize how crazy that sounds. The M2A1 Caliber 50 machine gun is a whole third smaller than the supposed .75 cal of a Bolger but pretty much impossible to fire dismounted.

Caliber alone can be deceiving.

I mean, a Desert Eagle in .50 AE is ostensibly the same caliber as a 50BMG, but can be fired (albeit awkawrdly) one handed by an average adult human male, because the cartridge and load is so much lighter. In the 40k universe, there absolutely are bolters that normal humans can fire, every IG squad can ostensibly have their Sgt take a bolter or bolt pistol.


At the same time, the way the bolter supposedly works doesn't make a whole lot of sense for a small arm. They're described as something of an RPG gun. Well, if they work the way an RPG works, they've made guns like that, and they can't hit the broad side of a barn because they don't reach peak acceleration until several meters after they leave the barrel, (and thus are far less stable, while a bullet is at its maximum speed as it leaves the barrel and is much less prone to stabilization issues). If they've got some sort of booster charge, as they've sometimes been described as having, then there's not a whole lot of point in them having internal motors in the first place.

Can't argue against anything in this post but the Desert Eagle is not intended to be a weapon to be used as a primary weapon system by anyone, nor is it intended to be necessarily very capable at any range further than at most 50 m. Even soldiers today have a hard enough time using the Baretta M9 9mm at 40 m let alone a .50 cal . But the internals of a pistol allow for a slightly larger caliber to be used simply because there is less inside the weapon and because it doesn't have to account for various aspects of shooting that a larger weapon shooting a lot more rounds would like cooling, movement of sight posts, extensive electrostatic barrel pitting, maintenance of sight picture, etc.

All that said, I always default to "space magic" whenever a personal experience biases me towards things in 40k.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Ignatius wrote:

Edit: also during my combatives certification I found myself sitting there multiple times super confused thinking I would have just pulled out my ka-bar and killed the guy instead of wrestling and doing a series of twelve moves to get into dominant position. Take that as you will.

A lot of military hand to hand training is often done with a different aim than the one that is initially put forth. Nobody does bayonet drill really thinking they're going to fix bayonets and use them, but rather to instill a certain mindset, attitude, and aggressiveness.. Training like the kind you describe often is intended for things like taking/dealing with prisoners, crowd control, riots, etc and the like.in addition to the aforementioned mindset drilling as opposed clearing a trench by hand.

Having not only been going through that training for the better part of four yerpars but actively designing training for my soldiers to do I get all that too. We got rid of bayonets in the 90s and haven't done anything at all with them since then. I don't know for sure but the Marines may still use it in their basic training but in that case you're spot on about the mindset game. But our combatives program is designed specifically for the real world engagement. I brought up my thoughts about the ka-bar because I found it funny I was arguing against the thought of using a direct combat weapon in real life, but could recall an instance where it was my first thought about iPhone to handle an engagement. Not because it was the answer and defeated the purpose of my training.

Yeah, I mean, I don't think anyone would ever really think the Desert Eagle would be a real battlefield weapon, I certainly wouldn't want to carry one

 Vaktathi wrote:
Yeah, I mean, I don't think anyone would ever really think the Desert Eagle would be a real battlefield weapon, I certainly wouldn't want to carry one

Neither would I. There's a reason the Army uses 9mm

Or a sword, for that matter, where the hell do put it? Our bayonet goes on our tac vest, but it's small, a sword is too heavy but the fact that it's another meter or so of metal to carry makes me wonder

Well taking the priming aspect of an rpg to the bolter is sorta missing any tech leaps for this setting. I'm sure we can all come up with a fill in the blank here to make it work.

Furthermore, yea combat in todays view is done with a certain conventional view point - that can and will change as long as warfare exists. Melee may just resurface in the future, and oversized electrical super gloves may just be flung around.... with no unwieldy rule lol I sat that not being so serious, but heck, advancements can make you eat your own words.

Uh, if power armor is the major reason for melee combat being a thing in 40k, why not just incorporate the power weapon's energy disruption field tech into a special-issue projectile weapon of some sort? Or maybe make munitions capable of creating a plasma stream on impact, like how anti-tank shells work?

 Pouncey wrote:
Uh, if power armor is the major reason for melee combat being a thing in 40k, why not just incorporate the power weapon's energy disruption field tech into a special-issue projectile weapon of some sort? Or maybe make munitions capable of creating a plasma stream on impact, like how anti-tank shells work?

Or cover the plate in a power field to deflect power weapons, plasma, and explosive ordnance.

SJ

 jeffersonian000 wrote:

 Pouncey wrote:
Uh, if power armor is the major reason for melee combat being a thing in 40k, why not just incorporate the power weapon's energy disruption field tech into a special-issue projectile weapon of some sort? Or maybe make munitions capable of creating a plasma stream on impact, like how anti-tank shells work?

Or cover the plate in a power field to deflect power weapons, plasma, and explosive ordnance.

SJ

I always thought that's what Iron Halos and the like were - literal energy fields, in a similar vein to power fields but intended for defense.

 Pouncey wrote:
Uh, if power armor is the major reason for melee combat being a thing in 40k, why not just incorporate the power weapon's energy disruption field tech into a special-issue projectile weapon of some sort? Or maybe make munitions capable of creating a plasma stream on impact, like how anti-tank shells work?

Why don't we just cure cancer. You know, just take cancer cells and kill them all and everything would be fine. Science!

Except armor piercing ranged weapons are available.