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After reading a passage from the Novel Savage Scars I question the rate of fire in fluff and how it equates into gaming terms.

The passage reads "the flyer disintegrated in mid-air as the assault cannon rounds hollowed it out from within, the rounds now passing through the ruined frame. The flyer didn't even explode it literally was reduced to fragments before his eyes"

So that equates to a ridiculous amount of fire. For a weapon thats Assault 4 in gaming terms, now how would that equate to the Punisher with am Assault 20 Weapon?

It seems he's over done it a tad. Any explanation?

You have to remember that the ROF given by the game stats are an abstraction, affected by game balance.

What that means is that it's generally meant that for each attack a weapon has, it's not necessarily one shot. It's representing one "burst".

That burst can be anywhere from 100-200 shots to 5 shots.

Interesting.

That, and artistic license. Just like you or I, writers can only extrapolate from some rather vague descriptions of the equipment and thus invariably come up with their own idea of how stuff works in detail. It's why you could very well read this weapon being described in a totally different way in the next novel you read.

And, lets be fair, Asault/heavy 4 is one of the highest values of any gun in 40K, the lolPunisher aside, so it IS a lot.

For reference, a modern day heavy MG is pretty much a Heavy Stubber, and thats only 3.

Punisher would probably have a firing rate around 7000-8000 rounds per minute. Kinda like a Gau-8 Avenger with higher rate of fire, and crappier projectiles..

The assault cannon is roughly equivalent to a modern minigun. It used to be described as similar to the autocannon, but firing smaller rounds from a rotating barrel at extremely high rates of fire. If you played the old Space Hulk computer game, the assault cannon fired a limited number of bursts, and you could see and hear that each burst contained dozens or hundreds of rounds. So the game terms are an abstraction, each "shot" could be a burst, with the assault cannon limited to short bursts, while maybe the Punisher cannon is able to fire continuously due to superior cooling and ammunition feeds.

Like the Vuklcan heavy bolter, Heavy 15 and if you stay still you can shoot it twice.

That's a lot of Dakka.

In the fluff the thing says that in a tank (instead of a titan) it only has enough ammo for 20 seconds of shooting but in the game there is no restricted ammo rule.

What you've got to remember about the BL and fiction is that its not exact to the rules. Its written that whilst things have to be realistic, ie that 'pea-shooters' of the IG couldn't take out a Titan, or slaughter a Daemon Prince. However something like a punisher or what ever might be exaggerated if it needed to be to suite what the author wanted.

InquisitorVaron wrote:After reading a passage from the Novel Savage Scars I question the rate of fire in fluff and how it equates into gaming terms.

The passage reads "the flyer disintegrated in mid-air as the assault cannon rounds hollowed it out from within, the rounds now passing through the ruined frame. The flyer didn't even explode it literally was reduced to fragments before his eyes"

Explanation : Author played too many old 2D-shooters

Seriously its like Kan said:

Kanluwen wrote:You have to remember that the ROF given by the game stats are an abstraction , affected by game balance.

What that means is that it's generally meant that for each attack a weapon has, it's not necessarily one shot. It's representing one "burst".

That burst can be anywhere from 100-200 shots to 5 shots.

Example.



Can you imagine to roll to hit for this one?

Better try this one as "heavy stubber": (heavy 3)




Burst mode possible but heavy 3 = 3 shots? Never.


Hydra style: (twin-Heavy4)




A common multifeed medium sized weapon may get up to 700-800 RPM.

I love the Gepard. It's German craftsmanship at its finest, and the turret functionality is absurd.

An assault cannon can be expected to fire dozens or hundreds of rounds per second. If the rounds are 20-30mm (the size of most fighter-mounted cannnons) that's roughly an inch of bullet, times about three thousand, fired at a thousand feet per second, at a skimmer (read: lightly armoured and lightweight).

Imagine firing a thousand railroad spikes through a midsize sedan and then try to imagine what would be left of that sedan.

[EDIT] Also, when he says "disintegrate," that doesn't mean each atom separates from the atoms around it. It just means the thing breaks up into pieces. Look up some footage of old planes trying to break the sound barrier. That's what they mean by disintegrate (wings shear off, body breaks into chunks, everything just sorta falls off or falls apart).

Yeah, don't get confused with the word "disintegration". For possibly less confusion, it could have been written as "torn apart" or something.

Not really disintegrate just means reverse the process of integration.

If we as a group believe that disintegrate means solely "to destroy on an atomic scale" then we are plain wrong.

If you reduce something to its components it is disintegrated, if you smash it up it could be disintegrated too.

Just like decimate doesn't mean "utterly destroy" it means "reduce by 10%"