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 Fallenbourne wrote:
Anyone remember the old rules for Deathwatch squads?

They had the ability to take a heavy bolter with suspensor field. This made turned the HB into a 18" assault 3 weapon. Str and AP stayed the same.

How about just a simple 5 point upgrade, similar to flakk missiles, to take this. Or give them the blastmaster treatment for the points? Give them 2 stat lines to choose from. So you can fire 36" at heavy 3 or 18" at assault 3.

Now you can up the amount of shots/give it pinning also. I think ignoring cover doesn't fit the fluff of the HB.

Id rather them get a super pinning.

Like suppresion mode, you hit and wound like normal but instead of wounding the unit takes a LD check for pinning = the number of wounds or something.

jade_angel wrote:
I think Salvo 3/4 is probably reasonable, with the Strength left at 5. The relatively good volume of fire on the move shouldn't be too bad, since it's short-range, while it'll offer a bit of a buff while sitting still.

+1

S4 would not be good enough.

jade_angel wrote:

Charistoph wrote:

scitech wrote:
The heavy bolster should work differently for marines or things in "powered"armor than it does for normal or non armored units. 3/3 salvo for armored and heavy 3 for not. Since the HB costs the same now regardless who's using it and their differing BS's, raise the cost 5 points for armored troops. It just doesn't make sense that a 7 foot tall marine in powered armor can only control a weapon as well as a 5'10" 185 lb unaugmented man.

So, having two different Heavy Bolters would be better? A Squad Heavy Bolter and a Crew Heavy Bolter?

The Crew Heavy Bolter would be used by Imperial Guard and Vehicles, and would retain the Heavy mechanic. Heavy 4 may work in this case.

The Squad Heavy Bolter would then be Salvo version and used by the Marine models and maybe the Sisters. Salvo 2/4 could work in this case, maybe.

Might as well just give a unique name to the "squad" version then. The SAB (Squad Assault Bolter), maybe? The fluff is that it is the "portable" heavy bolter used by the power-armoured forces of the Imperium, and can be fired on the fly, but at reduced effectiveness.

Yup, I like this. I'd be tempted to differentiate them a little more, but I'm not sure how that would balance. As a stab:

Crew-served heavy bolter: 36" S5 AP4 Heavy 5 Pinning
Squad support heavy bolter: 36" S5 AP4 Salvo 2/4

All weapons work better with power armor. Why not any other heavy weapon, you could have a squad support lascannon at salvo 1/1, you could have a squad support autocannon that is salvo 2/2. This isn't really unique to heavy bolters. It isn't even good enough to have salvo, because you can say that even a small laspistol is easier to fire with power armor. In power armor your arms don't have to get fatigued being extended in one spot for long periods, you don't have micro-movements from breathing and circulation, you are effectively a bipod except that your aim pivots at your shoulder instead of a foot in front of you, you don't have to take cover or flinch from flying debris, and you might have some kind of aiming assistance. Even a las pistol should be affected by that, it's weird that you would have two different types of heavy bolter, when the difference is in the power armor. What about a marine stealing a crew served heavy bolter on the battlefield. Is is still heavy, or do the rules come from the armor? The rules should be different for the armor, not the weapon.

pelicaniforce wrote:
All weapons work better with power armor. Why not any other heavy weapon, you could have a squad support lascannon at salvo 1/1, you could have a squad support autocannon that is salvo 2/2. This isn't really unique to heavy bolters. It isn't even good enough to have salvo, because you can say that even a small laspistol is easier to fire with power armor. In power armor your arms don't have to get fatigued being extended in one spot for long periods, you don't have micro-movements from breathing and circulation, you are effectively a bipod except that your aim pivots at your shoulder instead of a foot in front of you, you don't have to take cover or flinch from flying debris, and you might have some kind of aiming assistance. Even a las pistol should be affected by that, it's weird that you would have two different types of heavy bolter, when the difference is in the power armor. What about a marine stealing a crew served heavy bolter on the battlefield. Is is still heavy, or do the rules come from the armor? The rules should be different for the armor, not the weapon.

This is why we were looking at the direction of splitting the weapon in to two versions, one carried by those in Power Armor and one on a crew-served mount (whether a tripod or a tank's sponson).

Basically, when introducing the Squad version, the Marines and Sister's Heavy Weapon list would carry the squad version's name while the vehicles and IG Heavy Weapon Teams would carry the crew-server name.

Though, I would say, Heavy 5 would be a little too much. I'm not too worried about the Heavy Weapon Teams (though, they would start being price right that way), I'm worried about the Leman Russ Punisher with it's 20-shot main gun and then 15 shots of secondary guns. Imagine Pask with that one...

As for why not include the other weapons in that? I can't disagree, really. But hey, let's just concentrate on the Heavy Bolter in this thread, and you can think about how to change the other heavy weapons in another thread.

I quite like the Salvo idea for Heavy Bolters!

What I'll add is that it wouldn't be a problem for Guardsmen or whatever. Just remember that there's more than one handling that Heavy Weapon and that otherwise those two Guardsmen working together seem to handle them the same way a lone Marine would. Honestly it doesn't seem that illogical, basically implies that that big dude in Power Armor is as strong as two guys combined. Maybe not perfectly fluffy (a Marine would be stronger than SEVERAL guys combined, it would seem) but it's enough to excuse Salvo Heavy Bolters.
What exactly the Salvo numbers should be seems a little contentious, all I'll say is that it should probably be higher than the Grav Cannon on one or both of them. I actually don't mind Salvo 3/3, kinda marks it as the "mobile one".

Another potential buff might be having Devastator Squads come with Heavy Bolters as standard (with the prices of the replacements adjusted), gives incentive to not only use them (if nothing else than because you can't take a "bare bones" squad with anything less) and to add guys (since they won't be stuck with just Boltguns). Combine it with this Salvo stuff and a 10-man Devastator squad could be quite viable now! Either have 9 HBs and the Sergeant going nuts, or Combat Squad them so the Ladcannon/Multi-Melta/Grav Cannon guys can do their thing while the bonus guys run off to Salvo at things.