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Considering that bolt pistols/bolters are supposed to be rare and limited to only the Imperium's best troops, why is it that any IG Sergeant can have one. An alternative could be the considerably more ubiquitous autopistols/guns, which are Str4, AP6/-, and ranges 12'' and 24'' accordingly as well as rapid fire/ pistol depending. A second idea is that infantry squads.etc can take a heavy stubber as a special weapon, in a similar way that support rifles are taken in the contemporary military.

That can hardly be considered. Autopistols are like modern day Mac-10's which are MUCH weaker than the ubiquitous lazgun. Stubbers are just ww2 era machine guns as well.

I can't quite remember the 3rd edition guard codex, but Iam fairly sure that autoguns had the same stas as lasguns. Same in necromunda except for the malfunction. You could use hand cannons from Dark Heresy (really big bullets) to represent a weapon with those sort of stats.

Not so keen on the Auto weapon alternatives, however i agree with the heavystubber special weapon

Actually, for an infantry special weapon, theres a bit in the first last chancers book where Kage uses a mini multi laser rambo style.

The imperium has the technology to mass produce all bolt weapons with little trouble

Heavy Bolters are failry common overall, as they are tank weapons, so them being mounted on tripods as infantry support is logical.

Bolters are mostly used as a sign of status and so high ranking officers again, logical to have.

A large part of why they arent distributed so is logistics anyway, slug-guns like bolters need ammunition, and lots of it.
A trench / long term warfare force is going to need resupplying and things like food, medical supplies, etc for troops as well as the already considerable amount of ammunition, fuel and parts required for the mech.

So consider each guardsman with a boltgun is going to need around 3-6 magazines, per an engagement (or day) then try and imagine just how many magazines it'll require to keep a regiment with shots...

That is the bulk of the reason bolters are primarily for shock-troops that engage in fast-strikes and raids as opposed to prolonged battles, and a status symbol.

Ovion has it. Bolters are not issued to IG because of the large-scale logistics involved.

Now, given that Autoguns and Lasguns are of roughly equal performance, let's look at the ammo requirement.

We'll assume that the Guardsman's expected ammunition expenditure and issue is about 360 rounds per day (as that is the combat load of many contemporary armies). Furthermore, let us assume that an Autogun fires a round of equal weight to the NATO standard 7.62x51 round, which weighs, according to wikipedia (*shudder*) 9.7 grams.

So, for a full combat load, we have a Guardsman carrying 3,492 grams (or about 7.7 pounds) for one day. His 10 man squad, therefore, requires about 77 pounds of ammo for a day. The 40-man platoon requires about 308 pounds per day. A 130-man company (rough) requires half a ton (1,000 pounds) per day. A 1,000 man regiment (which is kinda small, IMO) requires more than three and a half tons of ammo. Per day.

We aren't even factoring in the greater weight of bolter shells. But, simply put, moving that degree of ammunition on a daily basis is hard enough for contemporary forces, let alone ones that (should be) are many times the size, and operating at distances inconceivably more estranged from their supply lines.

edit: Oh, but those lasguns? Well, you just plug the expanded powercells into a recharging slot in a Chimera, or in a generator. So, all that weight that was devoted to small arms ammo can be used for fuel, instead, resulting in more ammunition (due to recharge) and mobility than otherwise.

I see the lasgun as a fire and forget kind of weapon. I.E. in the sence that you give a guardsman his lasgun, a few powercells, and about ten minutes coatching for the prayers for the lasgun all in all this will take 11 mins and you should never hear from that guardsman again. (as the lasgun is highly reliable). the lasgun also (i expect) takes a no more than 2 mins to manufacture from scratch.

so your looking at a maximum time of 12-13 mins spent by the Munitorum per guards man

however the bolter will take much longer to build the prays will be more complex and the constant resupplying would mean that the Munitorum could not cope with the sheer number of guardsmen

You are right I suppose but your numbers are a bit off.
Sure you can count on a soldier in a modern army having about 360 rounds of 5.56 but those 360 rounds will do one of two things.
1. Last a 6 month tour un-fired.
or
2. Get burned up in as little as 12 minutes in a firefight, that's what they call rapid fire. Deliberate fire will make your ammo last an hour in the same fire fight.

That's a rifleman, in the UK at least the support gunners are supposed to fire the same number of rounds but in less frequent bursts of auto fire.

That's the theory but I've seen people burn through more ammo than that in a hurry.

Given that most of the blurb goes on about apocalyptic battles of unimaginable scale I think that it will average out between guys hammering through all their ammo in one engagement and other guys being killed before they can even pull the trigger.


That's a bit off topic but the basic point is this:

Yes Bolters are relatively rare but that is relative.
The Guard is the biggest fighting force in the galaxy, of course they are going to have bolters.

As I recall (and I don't know the source) there is fluff somewhere about exactly these calculations taking place, and this being the reason that Autoguns were retconned out of the IG armory (in 2nd Ed they were an option, because everything was an option in 2nd Ed).

I think they were identical to Lasguns, or almost so? Maybe?

rob-or-ross wrote:You are right I suppose but your numbers are a bit off.

Ok, where?

Sure you can count on a soldier in a modern army having about 360 rounds of 5.56 but those 360 rounds will do one of two things.
1. Last a 6 month tour un-fired.
or
2. Get burned up in as little as 12 minutes in a firefight, that's what they call rapid fire. Deliberate fire will make your ammo last an hour in the same fire fight.

Could also be used for training, but that's neither here nor there. However, yes, it is possible to go through a combat load quite quickly, but, that's why there's resupply, and "units of fire." I'm really not getting what you're trying to argue.

Yes Bolters are relatively rare but that is relative.
The Guard is the biggest fighting force in the galaxy, of course they are going to have bolters.

Emphasis mine.

Please, make your argument. Prove your point. Right now, everything else weighs in against your position.