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 Co'tor Shas wrote:

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:

 Furyou Miko wrote:
Bullets.. um, it was a little while ago, but someone did the maths and... assuming it doesn't hit anything, a bullet will circumnavigate the earth before it runs out of kinetic energy. Maximum ranges are maximum accurate ranges. Bullets don't just hit a certain distance then drop to the ground.

Did he factor in wind resistance and gravitational pull? That tends to make the bullet drop off, I believe.

Apparently not. Ignoring air resistance, objects accelerate downward at 9.81m/s^2

Yes, I believe the downward acceleration would be the gravitational pull.

It sounds like their maths was flawed...

I don't know much about guns, but wouldn't the energy of the bullet depend on the size and the firing weapon?

 Happyjew wrote:
I don't know much about guns, but wouldn't the energy of the bullet depend on the size and the firing weapon?

It would depend on the weight and the force of the gunpowder's shot, yes.
Size and shape only really matters when determining the effects of wind resistance, iirc.
Weight (or more accurately, mass) is more important.

Eh, its something I saw on a documentary when I was a child, could be wrong for all I know.

 Furyou Miko wrote:
Eh, its something I saw on a documentary when I was a child, could be wrong for all I know.

Drop a bullet from the level of the barrel at the same time you fire, and for the most part they will impact the ground (if the fired bullet doesn't hit anything) around the same time. It's why rifles are angled for long range shots, and iron sights have sliders to compensate for the angle for said shots.

And you can't claim something is an outlier unless you gather and read every W40K book and run a statistical analysis of their contents to find the mean. Anything else is simply a false argument.

Basically, every game-system that 40K has that lists ranges for weapons has the bolt-gun sitting somewhere around the range of a standard assault rifle. This is why they don't have 72" range on the tabletop.

While it's conceivable that one could point the weapon skyward at a 45 degree angle and lob a bolt round 2km, assuming being in a standard gravity well with no windage to compensate for, and with an extreme amount of luck, hit a target 2km away... this would be the very definition of an outlier.

That, and you don't need all the information to get an outlier. You need a sample set. That's why studies don't ask every single person on earth.

 Psienesis wrote:
While it's conceivable that one could point the weapon skyward at a 45 degree angle and lob a bolt round 2km, assuming being in a standard gravity well with no windage to compensate for, and with an extreme amount of luck, hit a target 2km away... this would be the very definition of an outlier.

I'm almost certain that this was actually a standard military tactic at some point (I want to say around the time of the Civil War). Since bullets were so heavy and moved so slowly they just angled their weapons at a high elevation and started firing as soon as they saw people. Evidently some tests determined a .45-70 bullet could cause lethal injuries at 3,500 yards.

Just saying, no matter how absurd it might seem, someone has probably done it at some point.

Yes, but how fast does a bolt go? With that you could find out just how far it could go.

I'm not certain that there's a source that provides the velocity of a bolt-round. "Damn fast" is probably the closest we'll get, but I'm willing to entertain sources that have that kind of information.

False Gods has a scene where Loken is musing over whether to take the "standard" bolter rounds, or supersonic rounds, with the argument presented being that the standard rounds would be better for soft targets while the supersonic rounds would be better for armor penetration but would do less damage to internals because the bullet would move through the body too fast for the explosive to detonate in the optimal spot.

So, pretty heavy implication there that standard bolt rounds are sub-sonic.

EDIT- I misremembered most of the scene. There is no mention of one round being "standard", for example. Here's the actual scene:

The thought soured his anticipation of battle as they made their
way to where Aximand and Abaddon checked the arms inventory
of their Stormbird, arguing over which munitions would be
best suited to the mission.
‘I’m telling you, the subsonic shells will be better,’ said Aximand.
‘And what if they have armour like those interex bastards?’
demanded Abaddon.
‘Then we use mass reactive. Tell him, Loken!’
Abaddon turned at Loken and Torgaddon’s approach and
nodded curtly.
‘Aximand’s right,’ Loken said. ‘Supersonic shells will pass
through a man before they have time to flatten and create a killing
exit wound. You might fire three of these through a target
and still not put him down.’
‘Just because the last few fights have been against armoured
warriors, Ezekyle wants them,’ said Aximand, ‘but I keep telling
him that this battle will be fought against men no more armoured
than our own Army soldiers.’

Which is interesting, because bolt rounds don't flatten.

Indeed. I think that's why I remembered the explanation as the charge not detonating in time, rather than the "flattening" thing.

It makes some sense, I suppose, but if hyper-penetration is the problem, the fact that its a .75 cal round should more than make up for it. Putting a three-quarter-inch hole in your chest is going to feth any human up, whether or not the bullet gets a couple inches inside you and explodes or not.

Seems to me like another BL author who has his/her own opinions on how things in the setting work. Which isn't, itself, terrible (Dan Abnett lives by it), but does complicate things when trying to come to a general consensus.

 Psienesis wrote:
It makes some sense, I suppose, but if hyper-penetration is the problem, the fact that its a .75 cal round should more than make up for it. Putting a three-quarter-inch hole in your chest is going to feth any human up, whether or not the bullet gets a couple inches inside you and explodes or not.

Seems to me like another BL author who has his/her own opinions on how things in the setting work. Which isn't, itself, terrible (Dan Abnett lives by it), but does complicate things when trying to come to a general consensus.

Assuming a general consensus is possible in the first place

 Iron_Captain wrote:
general consensus

 Iron_Captain wrote:
possible

I don't know what you guys are on, but I want some.

I also like Miko's list. Unlike Haraldus' mad fanboi issues, Miko actually did a good job of looking at it objectively. Typical Haraldus...

Pew pew, shots fired.

Yes, because everyone who disagrees with you is obviously a fanboy.

Sigh.

Yeah, I'm gonna keep my nose out of this one. *backs out of thread*

 Farseer Faenyin wrote:
I also like Miko's list. Unlike Haraldus' mad fanboi issues, Miko actually did a good job of looking at it objectively. Typical Haraldus...

Except that the Bolter has feats that outstrip the Pulse Rifle, thus making it better in every area save logistics, although the nature of Astartes chapter neutralizes this downside.

Keep it polite, people, or I'll take your toy away. No production conversation comes out of tossing around labels like "fanboi"; it just jeopardizes your posting privileges.

 Wyzilla wrote:

 Farseer Faenyin wrote:
I also like Miko's list. Unlike Haraldus' mad fanboi issues, Miko actually did a good job of looking at it objectively. Typical Haraldus...

Except that the Bolter has feats that outstrip the Pulse Rifle, thus making it better in every area save logistics, although the nature of Astartes chapter neutralizes this downside.

Pulse weapons also have better ammunition (both more plentiful and a much greater clip size). Pulse rifles have consistently have better range. All pulse weapons all have built in scopes.

Pulse Rifles are also far less prone to jamming.

My appologies. I'll remove fanboi and insert 'person who obviously loves Space Marines so much that they insist that their capabilities are godlike, act like they do in the Space Marine video game (with exclusion to any fluff that states otherwise), and certainly would be better than anything else 'just because' and with no logic behind the arguement'. Is that okay? P.S - Fanboi is not an insult, mods...it is an observation.

I'm a fanboi to Eldar. But I can also think logically when comparing them to others, something others have troubles with due to 'reasons'. Politically correct enough? I don't take a single context of their power and explode it's meaning to the point that I ignore all other fluff. Shuriken Catapults can make it as if Artificer Armor, a relic used by Space Marines...doesn't even exist. But they also bounce off of Tau armor regularly. See? Both sides of a story.

Miko's list takes into account items and actually states how they came to the conclusion with facts stated. Facts that are pretty well known.

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:

 Happyjew wrote:
I don't know much about guns, but wouldn't the energy of the bullet depend on the size and the firing weapon?

It would depend on the weight and the force of the gunpowder's shot, yes.
Size and shape only really matters when determining the effects of wind resistance, iirc.
Weight (or more accurately, mass) is more important.

For conventional arms, barrel length is as important (or moreso) than even the weight of the bullet or amount of gunpowder.

 Farseer Faenyin wrote:
My appologies. I'll remove fanboi and insert 'person who obviously loves Space Marines so much that they insist that their capabilities are godlike, act like they do in the Space Marine video game (with exclusion to any fluff that states otherwise), and certainly would be better than anything else 'just because' and with no logic behind the arguement'. Is that okay?

You and I may have different definitions of 'godlike', but in a setting like 40K, even my actual headcanon (Which I do not actually use as arguments) does not put them at godlike levels of might.

 Farseer Faenyin wrote:
P.S - Fanboi is not an insult, mods...it is an observation.

I don't see what you are trying to say here. Damage control?

 Farseer Faenyin wrote:

I'm a fanboi to Eldar. But I can also think logically when comparing them to others, something others have troubles with due to 'reasons'. Politically correct enough? I don't take a single context of their power and explode it's meaning to the point that I ignore all other fluff. Shuriken Catapults can make it as if Artificer Armor, a relic used by Space Marines...doesn't even exist. But they also bounce off of Tau armor regularly. See? Both sides of a story.

One should look at all sides of a story, but all sides are equally canon/noncanon. There is nothing 'fanboi' by preferring one side. The idea that there is an 'average' that is to be used as arguments is contrived and commonly just as much a choice of headcanon as what these arguments want to disprove. Trying to belittle the opposition does not help one's arguments.

 Farseer Faenyin wrote:

Miko's list takes into account items and actually states how they came to the conclusion with facts stated. Facts that are pretty well known.

And they are facts that are exactly as valid as anything Wyzilla says, no matter how much you might prefer that it would be otherwise.

 Daba wrote:

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:

 Happyjew wrote:
I don't know much about guns, but wouldn't the energy of the bullet depend on the size and the firing weapon?

It would depend on the weight and the force of the gunpowder's shot, yes.
Size and shape only really matters when determining the effects of wind resistance, iirc.
Weight (or more accurately, mass) is more important.

For conventional arms, barrel length is as important (or moreso) than even the weight of the bullet or amount of gunpowder.

Ideally you want a round which travels fast but doesn't pass through the target. Kinetic energy is half mass times velocity-squared. So an increase in velocity of the round increases the kinetic energy of the round much more than an increase in the mass of the round itself. So having an efficient, high-energy low-explosive to generate lots of gas to push the bullet out of the barrel is vital.

You then want a way of ensuring that all or most of that kinetic energy is transferred to the target, most commonly by using hollow point rounds which compress upon impacting the target, increasing surface area and therefore increasing their deceleration upon entering the target to prevent the round from exiting.

 Wyzilla wrote:

 Farseer Faenyin wrote:
I also like Miko's list. Unlike Haraldus' mad fanboi issues, Miko actually did a good job of looking at it objectively. Typical Haraldus...

Except that the Bolter has feats that outstrip the Pulse Rifle, thus making it better in every area save logistics, although the nature of Astartes chapter neutralizes this downside.

And if we had more books about pulse rifles, we'd get to see how awesome they really are.

My list was based off their performance in the game as much as their fluff. I know, rules=\fluff, but since the rules are supposed to at least be representative, I choose to use them.

I'm not a Tau fangirl. I'm a Sisters fangirl. If I say I think that pulse rifles are superior weapons to bolters, it's because I genuinely think that, based on the information I have available.