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 gnome_idea_what wrote:

 Ynneadwraith wrote:

theocracity wrote:
Ork belief as a reality-altering force should only be applied to the biggest Waaagh!s, and even then should only function as a 'probability lubricant' -

'Probability lubricant' is probably the single best descriptor for the Ork's gestalt psychic field I've ever heard. Brilliant

As far as I'm concerned, it won't magic bullets out of thin air, but it will grease the wheels of probability. Say you're firing a gun with a dodgy cartridge. There's a possibility that that cartridge will get jammed, causing a misfire. If an Ork is firing it, that possibility is less than it would be if a non-Ork was firing it thanks to the gestalt field (if there are enough Orks around to generate one).

I like that because it doesn't reduce the Ork's innate mechanical genius to 'they just want it to happen so it happens because magic', which is so much less interesting than 'these creatures have an innate understanding of technology hard-coded into them, so they can instinctively construct technologies that equal or in some cases surpass those of their competitors'.

Much cooler

Exactly. Another example is that if a human jammed a bolter shell into an oversized stubbed and pulled the trigger, either nothing would happen or the gun would explode. If an ork loads a bolter shell into a shoota and presses the trigger the bolter shot will probably fire because to the orks, that's what happens when you put a bullet in a gun and pull the trigger, despite the weapon being ramshackle and the ammunition being mismatched.

Again, though, I'm personally not a fan of those 'it defies physics because Orks want it to' concepts.

In my mind, if an Ork jams a bolter shell into a shoota, it probably won't fire. The Ork will then toss it away as a piece of junk, pick up his choppa and get his kicks another way. Later, a Mek who's looting the battlefield will pick it up, say "some git put dakka whats too big in here," take it to his shop and inexpertly bore the barrel out and jack up the loading mechanism with scrap so that the gun can messily fire the bolter shell. Then he'll throw it on his pile of guns for the boyz to grab next time there's a proper fight.

Then when the Ork wielding it gets killed, a techpriest finds an oversized stubber that's somehow loaded with bolter ammo. He says "That's unpossible! Even if it could fire, this gun couldn't hit anything more than 10 feet away and is more likely to kill its user than an enemy. It's literal junk. Only Ork magic could make it fire!"

Also do remember the wonder that was Gorkamorka

The Orks there could run out of bullets just as easy as any ganger in a hive =D

I would assume such chores would be left to the Grots and Squigs and such

Ork ammo is likely nothing more than a handful of nuts and bolts and chunks of metal. Whatever they can find like the grotling blunderbuss.

Ammo Fairy. They work on video game logic.

No idea, but someone is making the ammo.

This is from Eternal Crusade:



Spare magazines, guns, and grenades in an Ork supply crate.

Looks way too neat for Orks

Orks have grots to do boring menial labor they have no interest in doing themselves. Making ammunition seems like it'd be their job while the mekboyz do more "glamorous" work like designing vehicles.

 Melissia wrote:
No idea, but someone is making the ammo.

This is from Eternal Crusade:



Spare magazines, guns, and grenades in an Ork supply crate.

Honestly, that crate looks a bit too symmetrical and clean. I always imagined that Ork supply stations are just a mess of random bullets and magazines stacked on top of each other.

It is too symmetrical and clean for Orks, but that's beside the point; I'm just proving that they do in fact stockpile guns and ammo.

Looks like a looted imperial crate. Although perhaps it was a supply crate created by xenos controlled manufactorums, which is much the same thing really.

I think it supports my view that they use ammo made by enslaved non-combatants.

Grots are more capable of finesse and care than Orks are (it's why they have BS3 after all), and I'd imagine that Grots outnumber non-greenskin slaves by a very large margin given that Grots are generally noted as outnumbering Orks by a fair deal and Orks are already the most numerous species native to the milky way. I imagine it's something like a Spartiate/Helot relationship. A lot of the reasons why the orks can devote themselves entirely to war is that they have a slave caste (grots) who are always available to take care of anything deemed boring by the orks, and as Grots are tiny and weak and aren't half as mean or as ambitious as Warhammer Fantasy Goblins the Orks have more or less nothing to fear from a Grot revolt wheras Sparta was absolutely terrified of a Helot revolt.

 Ynneadwraith wrote:

 G00fySmiley wrote:
There was a bit in I believe the 4th edition codex (it might have been a different codex)about a particularly deadly shooting ork, imperium kills him and they open the "gun" and it is just a pretty box with some stuff in it and should not possibly work.

I usually put that down to the fact that the Imperium barely understand how their technology works, let alone the technology of another race.

Fits my world view better

Yup, 100%. Keep in mind that this is the same Imperium that thinks you need to pray to the Machine God for an hour to get that vox-sponder to send a message across the solar system...

Well I mean, recent novels show that machine spirits are very real and you do need to assuage them to get anything to work, they're in everything from civilian appliances to firearms (when lasguns are destroyed, Tech priests can hear them scream in pain) to the most advanced warships and one archaeotech gun was fully sapient and also incredibly snarky; though it seems machine spirits communicate in binary. In other words, chances are, if a printer in the Imperium is refusing to print for you, it's because you probably offended it somehow. Similarly, AdMech viewpoint novels have shown that the Mechanicus are actually ultracompetent scientists and engineers, they're just incredibly conservative and skeptical of the benefits of anything that doesn't fit into their religious viewpoint; much like how actual Monks and Clerics in the middle ages were actually very smart and well educated people and were the main driving force for science and learning of the time; but they had a certain viewpoint they had to fit the world into. I mean, the AdMech figured out how Gauss weapons worked not too long after meeting the Necrons, what actually baffles them is how the Necrons can miniaturize the technology or get the subatomic precision needed to not make the weapon explode when fired; something that would require something even more capable of fine manipulation than AdMech nanytes. And to be fair to the Adeptus Mechanicus, why the rush to make something new when some relic of Pre-Men of Iron rebellion humanity is inevitably going to be far better anyway? The DAoT had weapons that could destroy time across wide areas.

Do you know the joke "I'm a tank, I'm a tank, I'm a tank"?

Orks think something works so it does. The Ork psychic wave is more powerful than reality as they think their guns have ammo so they do.

 Ynneadwraith wrote:

 G00fySmiley wrote:
There was a bit in I believe the 4th edition codex (it might have been a different codex)about a particularly deadly shooting ork, imperium kills him and they open the "gun" and it is just a pretty box with some stuff in it and should not possibly work.

I usually put that down to the fact that the Imperium barely understand how their technology works, let alone the technology of another race.

Fits my world view better

In 1st edition, Orks were the undisputed masters - moreso than the Imperium or even the Eldar - of teleportation and forcefield technology. Witness the Shokk Attack Gun, which generates temporary webway tunnels, or the various mekboy speedstas with bubble chukkas, lifta-droppa rays and the like.

Gestalt field. They'll believe any ammo works as long as its "close enough."

For example, assuming the average shoota is around .50 cal, because of course an Ork wouldn't go for a puny 9mm, and he finds a bolter magazine lying on the ground. Obviously, the round is too big for his gun, because because its "big enough to be proper dakka" he slams that sucker home, racks his bolt catch and starts firing like Scarface just snorted a key of warp-dust.

Then again, he might a cache of Heavy Bolter 1.00 Cal shells. Obviously its too big for his gun, but then Da Boss comes over and says "Gis dat 'ere ya gitz!" and mashes the drum into his Mega-Armour gun until it fits. His gun only takes .70, but 'e's da biggest gun so it must fit.


Then in terms of pure manufacturing, I'm not sure Orks entirely care about purity of material, and would happily chuck a load of scrap and the odd squig leg in the press and make a load of bullets out of that.

Then you have stuff like Burna's, which use a mix of fossil fuel oil or liquidised Gretchin as fuel, Kaptain Badrukk's Orgryn Gun which fires unstable plasma canisters (which he probably loots from unsuspectin' 'umies) and of course, the Shokk Attakk Gun, which fires a squealing and terrified Snotling directly into somebody's ear canal.

 AndrewGPaul wrote:

 Ynneadwraith wrote:

 G00fySmiley wrote:
There was a bit in I believe the 4th edition codex (it might have been a different codex)about a particularly deadly shooting ork, imperium kills him and they open the "gun" and it is just a pretty box with some stuff in it and should not possibly work.

I usually put that down to the fact that the Imperium barely understand how their technology works, let alone the technology of another race.

Fits my world view better

In 1st edition, Orks were the undisputed masters - moreso than the Imperium or even the Eldar - of teleportation and forcefield technology. Witness the Shokk Attack Gun, which generates temporary webway tunnels, or the various mekboy speedstas with bubble chukkas, lifta-droppa rays and the like.

Yeah it's this level of technical brilliant that I think should really be brought back more strongly to Orks. Their whole schtick is that they're big dumb comedic brutes that talk like football hooligans, which is utterly deceptive for just how smart and dangerous they are.

They had their knowledge of weaponry and mechanics hard-coded into their brains by the most intelligent and capable race of beings in the known galaxy. Their technical brilliance is utterly astounding, and I feel that the overplay of the whole 'gestalt field' effect just boils that down to 'they're idiots with a gimmick that they aren't even aware of themselves', which is just pants.

 Deadshot wrote:
Gestalt field. They'll believe any ammo works as long as its "close enough."

For example, assuming the average shoota is around .50 cal, because of course an Ork wouldn't go for a puny 9mm, and he finds a bolter magazine lying on the ground. Obviously, the round is too big for his gun, because because its "big enough to be proper dakka" he slams that sucker home, racks his bolt catch and starts firing like Scarface just snorted a key of warp-dust.

Then again, he might a cache of Heavy Bolter 1.00 Cal shells. Obviously its too big for his gun, but then Da Boss comes over and says "Gis dat 'ere ya gitz!" and mashes the drum into his Mega-Armour gun until it fits. His gun only takes .70, but 'e's da biggest gun so it must fit.


Then in terms of pure manufacturing, I'm not sure Orks entirely care about purity of material, and would happily chuck a load of scrap and the odd squig leg in the press and make a load of bullets out of that.

Then you have stuff like Burna's, which use a mix of fossil fuel oil or liquidised Gretchin as fuel, Kaptain Badrukk's Orgryn Gun which fires unstable plasma canisters (which he probably loots from unsuspectin' 'umies) and of course, the Shokk Attakk Gun, which fires a squealing and terrified Snotling directly into somebody's ear canal.

I think people massively overplay the effect of the Ork's gestalt field, mainly based on information they've read online.

The actual evidence of the effect of the gestalt field is fantastically limited. In Xenology (quite an outdated book) it's mentioned that the Tech Magos observed an Ork firing a gun that was later found to have its trigger disconnected. However, that's hardly strong evidence suggesting 'the Ork believed it would fire so it did'. Occam's Razor would suggest that the most likely scenario is just that the trigger mechanism broke inbetween the Ork firing and the Tech Magos looking at it, or even that the Tech Magos doesn't know what he's looking at.

Don't get me wrong, it definitely exists (as evidenced by tabletop rules like 'Da Red Wunz Go Fasta'. However, stating that it's the sole reason that Ork Technology works is a massive overegging and oversimplification.

Here's quite an interesting idea potentially explaining the Mechanicus' confusion regarding Ork tech:

The Adeptus Mechanicus has theorised that this gestalt psychic field also has a telekinetic affect, allowing Ork technology to work. This argument has been debunked, even by the Imperium itself. It is believed that the reason this argument came into existence is that the Imperium believes that a 'Machine Spirit' inhabits all technology, and that this machine spirit serves humanity. If this is the case, without a machine spirit Ork machines could not work, requiring some psychic effect to justify their often devastating effect.

On the Ork gestalt field thing, I see it as being like the "how many times did Gilles le Breton bone Lileath while serving as the green knight" question, I.E it's meaningless and doesn't actually affect anything because every author will give a different answer because Warhammer has no defined canon. :U

The notion that "Orkz iz magic" strikes me as (a) an Orky explanation that doesn't perfectly translate into human terms and/or (b) a human superstition based on the human prejudice that Orks are too stupid to "earn it" as it were, via science, and therefore the explanation for such goons actually being a major threat is that they must have magical powers. The IoM would hardly like to admit (and probably isn't even capable of admitting) that Orks are so threatening because they are really, really capable as a civilization. "They are magic" is just a larger-scale way of saying "they got lucky." No doubt, given their origins, the Orks do produce psychic static when a bunch of 'em all get riled up together. But I don't think that phenomenon is the same thing as conjuring up ammunition out of thin air. More like, Orks are smart and understand logistics - whether oomies can believe it or not.

Well I mean, a Wyrdboy can use their psychic gestalt field to make a giant foot squash your army like it's a monty python sketch.

And?

 Ynneadwraith wrote:


Yeah it's this level of technical brilliant that I think should really be brought back more strongly to Orks. Their whole schtick is that they're big dumb comedic brutes that talk like football hooligans, which is utterly deceptive

I think people massively overplay the effect of the Ork's gestalt field, mainly based on information they've read online.

The actual evidence of the effect of the gestalt field is fantastically limited. In Xenology (quite an outdated book) it's mentioned that the Tech Magos observed an Ork firing a gun that was later found to have its trigger disconnected. However, that's hardly strong evidence suggesting 'the Ork believed it would fire so it did'. Occam's Razor would suggest that the most likely scenario is just that the trigger mechanism broke inbetween the Ork firing and the Tech Magos looking at it, or even that the Tech Magos doesn't know what he's looking at.

Don't get me wrong, it definitely exists (as evidenced by tabletop rules like 'Da Red Wunz Go Fasta'. However, stating that it's the sole reason that Ork Technology works is a massive overegging and oversimplification.

I'm personally of the opinion that even that doesn't necessarily have a 'magic' explanation. Perhaps Orks use their instinctive knowledge of technology to get a gut feeling of a vehicle's capabilities, and have the cultural habit of painting good un's red.

Here's quite an interesting idea potentially explaining the Mechanicus' confusion regarding Ork tech:

The Adeptus Mechanicus has theorised that this gestalt psychic field also has a telekinetic affect, allowing Ork technology to work. This argument has been debunked, even by the Imperium itself. It is believed that the reason this argument came into existence is that the Imperium believes that a 'Machine Spirit' inhabits all technology, and that this machine spirit serves humanity. If this is the case, without a machine spirit Ork machines could not work, requiring some psychic effect to justify their often devastating effect.

I like that a lot. There's a lot of overlap between the concepts of Machine Spirits and the Ork Gestalt Field as flexibly-defined explanations for how ludicrously complicated 40k technology actually runs - the exception being that there's a sensible in-universe explanation for machine spirits as fragments of AI and / or religiously doctrinized user manuals, rather than the pure hand-waving silliness of all Orks being wizards.

Manchu wrote:
And?

40k is very much a "belief and emotion makes it real" setting for just about every faction. It primarily comes up with humans, eldar, and orks, but to believe that Orks can affect reality by making impossible things happen because they don't really care about the already very loose laws of physics in the setting is no more a stretch than believing that the collective anger of humanity and a bunch of other xenos sits on a throne of skulls and wears blackened armor and spits out red skinned demons who cut people open with swords and axes.

By that logic, the IG could also source ammo via psychic magic.

 Kain wrote:
Well I mean, a Wyrdboy can use their psychic gestalt field to make a giant foot squash your army like it's a monty python sketch.

But that's a definable psychic power that follows the rules of the setting. It's no different from a Librarian conjuring lightning - it's an individual with a special power, who suffers from the psychic consequences of his actions, creating a dramatic visible effect.

It's not just some random boy jamming a load of screws into his gun and then magically shooting bullets as if they were replaced with a slight of hand trick.

Manchu wrote:
By that logic, the IG could also source ammo via psychic magic.

Orks are repeatedly referred to as having greater psychic sensitivity than humanity on average. All orks contribute to the WAAAGH field which does exist. Humans are not only less psychically sensitive but more of their psychic feedback into the warp is fed into Chaos than anything else. Of course, Orks are a purposefully engineered soldier race (albeit a degenerate remnant of thereof) while humans are naturally evolved, so humans having less ability to direct their weaker psychic contributions to the warp is perfectly congruous with what is known about the setting. Through the mechanics explained of both species, humans not being able to affect reality through their emotional-psychological contributions to the warp to the same degree the Orks are makes perfect sense.

And humans do make impossible things happen through mere thought and emotion. It's called Chaos. All those Daemons exist for no reason beyond that humanity (and most other species) is a bunch of dicks as part of Warhammer 40,000's initial premise as a setting to show just what kind of awful crapsack world you'd need to live in for the arguments of fascism to become justified; and so the warp is filled with a bunch of dicks who want to murder you in imaginative and nasty ways. All those Lords of Change are drawing from power that originally came through innocuous enough seeming ambition and scheming that fed into the warp and formed Tzeentch.

theocracity wrote:

 Ynneadwraith wrote:


Yeah it's this level of technical brilliant that I think should really be brought back more strongly to Orks. Their whole schtick is that they're big dumb comedic brutes that talk like football hooligans, which is utterly deceptive

I think people massively overplay the effect of the Ork's gestalt field, mainly based on information they've read online.

The actual evidence of the effect of the gestalt field is fantastically limited. In Xenology (quite an outdated book) it's mentioned that the Tech Magos observed an Ork firing a gun that was later found to have its trigger disconnected. However, that's hardly strong evidence suggesting 'the Ork believed it would fire so it did'. Occam's Razor would suggest that the most likely scenario is just that the trigger mechanism broke inbetween the Ork firing and the Tech Magos looking at it, or even that the Tech Magos doesn't know what he's looking at.

Don't get me wrong, it definitely exists (as evidenced by tabletop rules like 'Da Red Wunz Go Fasta'. However, stating that it's the sole reason that Ork Technology works is a massive overegging and oversimplification.

I'm personally of the opinion that even that doesn't necessarily have a 'magic' explanation. Perhaps Orks use their instinctive knowledge of technology to get a gut feeling of a vehicle's capabilities, and have the cultural habit of painting good un's red.

Here's quite an interesting idea potentially explaining the Mechanicus' confusion regarding Ork tech:

The Adeptus Mechanicus has theorised that this gestalt psychic field also has a telekinetic affect, allowing Ork technology to work. This argument has been debunked, even by the Imperium itself. It is believed that the reason this argument came into existence is that the Imperium believes that a 'Machine Spirit' inhabits all technology, and that this machine spirit serves humanity. If this is the case, without a machine spirit Ork machines could not work, requiring some psychic effect to justify their often devastating effect.

I like that a lot. There's a lot of overlap between the concepts of Machine Spirits and the Ork Gestalt Field as flexibly-defined explanations for how ludicrously complicated 40k technology actually runs - the exception being that there's a sensible in-universe explanation for machine spirits as fragments of AI and / or religiously doctrinized user manuals, rather than the pure hand-waving silliness of all Orks being wizards.

And yet all living creatures in the 40k galaxy except Blanks are connected to an alternate dimension approximate of Hell that allows powerful individuals to say "Lol what laws of physics." The gestalt field is the only explanantion to explain why a V16 with a bugcatcher, 4 wheels and a driving seat (steering wheel costs extra teef), with no suspension, brakes or anything even connected to each other, can drive like a Charger on steroids. Or how their Stompas just don't collapse in on themselves. Or how anything they make actually works because the laws of physics say it shouldn't.

@Kain

But none of that is in dispute and none of it supports the theory that ork ammo = psyker power. You seem to be on the verge of arguing that all orks are psykers and firing their weapons is a psychic power equivalent to something like a Grey Knight using Smite.

 Deadshot wrote:
Or how anything they make actually works because the laws of physics say it shouldn't.

You could say the same of Necron tech. Except the Necrons aren't meant to be jokey (or at least Oldcrons weren't) so we just accept it as super science. Same with the Imperium.

Manchu wrote:
@Kain

But none of that is in dispute and none of it supports the theory that ork ammo = psyker power. You seem to be on the verge of arguing that all orks are psykers and firing their weapons is a psychic power equivalent to something like a Grey Knight using Smite.

I'm not actually arguing it, I'm simply arguing that it's one of the less crazy and out there things warp power has done in the setting.

A setting where people can be power bombed from orbit, solar systems can be cast into black holes with the flick of a c'tan's wrist, where a flaming headed cocaine addict's talking head is in the possession of a bunch of space mongols, and where space elves can interbreed with a species that developed 60 million years after they did.

Finding the possibility that Ork guns probably don't work entirely under normal laws of physics to be ridiculous by the standards of a setting that operates entirely on rule of cool is in my opinion, a tad silly when the setting has about the same level of respect for the laws of reality as a superhero comic book where the Flash can run so fast that he'd be able to punch everyone in the entire star wars galaxy to death in a microsecond and yet somehow the entire earth doesn't explode the second he takes a step at 321 quintillion times the speed of light or whatever.