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Anybody know what the general rate of fire for a Lascannon in fluff is? I wouldn't want to rely strictly on the DoW description, which seems to approach something like 50 shots per minute. In most other fluff it seems to fire far more slowly.

Fire- change battery- fire- change battery.... so I would guess about 25 shots.

iirc FFG has established roundabout10 shots per minute, makes sense too

If a turn of 40k is 5 seconds, then it can fire 24 times a minute. Of course fluff can be different.

ObliviousBlueCaboose wrote:If a turn of 40k is 5 seconds, then it can fire 24 times a minute. Of course fluff can be different.

So you think that two armies can utterly demolish eachother in ~10-20 seconds? That doesn't seem right, battles in history were rarely shorter than hours.

Nitros14 wrote:

ObliviousBlueCaboose wrote:If a turn of 40k is 5 seconds, then it can fire 24 times a minute. Of course fluff can be different.

So you think that two armies can utterly demolish eachother in ~10-20 seconds? That doesn't seem right, battles in history were rarely shorter than hours.

Didnt say i agree with it. It what I heard was gws policy on how long a turn is.

Slow when compared to other Heavy Weapons, because Lascannon is build to deliver a punch.
it vary on fluff but I would agree that it;s somewhere around 25 shots in minute .

I think a round for FFG is 6 seconds, as is the standard rpg turn, so that in and of itself is unreliable, though I don't really buy the whole 5 seconds on GWs part(ill thinking on their part) I mean how many people can run the full range of a tanks main cannon in a minute or less

Nitros14 wrote:

ObliviousBlueCaboose wrote:If a turn of 40k is 5 seconds, then it can fire 24 times a minute. Of course fluff can be different.

So you think that two armies can utterly demolish eachother in ~10-20 seconds? That doesn't seem right, battles in history were rarely shorter than hours.

I always thought that for the most part, the army that you control is like the frontline portion of the army, or only a segment of the actual battle.

Let's say Basilisks have a 10 mile range. That's about the range of the 'big guns' in real armies. So 10 miles = 240 inches.

Now if a turn is 5 seconds, and a unit runs about 9 inches a turn then they can run 10-miles in about 26.67 turns.

I don't think anyone is running 10-miles in 2.2 minutes. A mile in six minutes is pretty good.

If we assume units can run a mile in six minutes, then a turn is about 136 seconds, a minute and a half.

Nitros14 wrote:Let's say Basilisks have a 10 mile range. That's about the range of the 'big guns' in real armies. So 10 miles = 240 inches.

Now if a turn is 5 seconds, and a unit runs about 9 inches a turn then they can run 10-miles in about 26.67 turns.

I don't think anyone is running 10-miles in 2.2 minutes. A mile in six minutes is pretty good.

If we assume units can run a mile in six minutes, then a turn is about 136 seconds, a minute and a half.

EDIT: I fail reading comprehension now and forever. What I SHOULD have said is that we're talking about a 5 second/turn in the RPGs by Fantasy Flight Games, not on the tabletop.

Worth remembering that some fast-moving Imperial vehicles have lascannon armament - forward turret of Marauder bombers, Thunderbolt & Lightning fighters, Vendetta's, some Vulture's. So it can't be that slow a rate of fire if it's used as primary armament so much.

I think it just depends on the mark, pattern & Forgeworld of origin as, like the lasgun, there are no doubt several different patterns & marks which fire at differing power settings with larger batteries than normal, or hit harder but use more charge for each shot, or use a lower charge but fire more often.

Sparks_Havelock wrote:Worth remembering that some fast-moving Imperial vehicles have lascannon armament - forward turret of Marauder bombers, Thunderbolt & Lightning fighters, Vendetta's, some Vulture's. So it can't be that slow a rate of fire if it's used as primary armament so much.

I think it just depends on the mark, pattern & Forgeworld of origin as, like the lasgun, there are no doubt several different patterns & marks which fire at differing power settings with larger batteries than normal, or hit harder but use more charge for each shot, or use a lower charge but fire more often.

Good point.

The lascannon is used as a primary armament on Fury Interceptors and Thunderbolts. It is also turret-mounted on marauders. This implies that the lascannon can have a fairly rapid firing rate. In addition, in the novel Double Eagle, there are multiple descriptions of thunderbolts discharging 8-10 lascannon shots at a single aircraft in a single pass, implying very fast rates of fire.

However, for the IG, the lascannon is a heavy gauge AT weapon, delivering a heavy punch but slow to reload.

So, I guess lascannons, depending on patterns and settings, can either deliver a few powerful armor-piercing shots each minute (in DoW 2 Chaos Rising, lascannons have a 20shot/min rate of fire), or lay down a fairly fast firing rate to take down fast-moving targets.

Sparks_Havelock wrote:
I think it just depends on the mark, pattern & Forgeworld of origin as, like the lasgun, there are no doubt several different patterns & marks which fire at differing power settings with larger batteries than normal, or hit harder but use more charge for each shot, or use a lower charge but fire more often.

I'd say it's probably this, especially in regards to the batteries. I could see Thunderbolts and such have bigger power supplies that don't need recharging (or at least not as often) and so can fire more frequently. It could also have to do with cooling the lascannon sufficiently between shots. A Heavy Weapon Team won't have the same type of lascannon as an Lightning or Predator.

ObliviousBlueCaboose wrote:If a turn of 40k is 5 seconds, then it can fire 24 times a minute. Of course fluff can be different.

The fluff is very different from the number of shots a weapon gets in the game. An automatic weapon on rapid fire isn't going to only fire two shots at a time...

A single 'shot' in the game represents a burst of fire. It's the effectiveness of that burst that is reflected by the number of 'shots' you get, not the actual number of rounds sent down range.

The length of a game turn is irrelevant. It's an approximation used to replicate a larger scale engagement. There has to be a divorce between game rules and the fluff. The game rules exist to create a playable, fun, and profitable tabletop experience. Not to approximate real combat.

Unless the creators of the game flat come out and say, "A turn in play represents 5 seconds in real time" which is what I ve heard.

And yes it is perfectly reasonable to expect a simi auto weapon only fire once or twice in 5 seconds. Which is what rapid fire represents. FFG has the lasgun fire 3x in 6seconds on simiauto.

Actually heard? Or heard from a guy who knows a guy who heard some intern mention at a Games Day once in 2001?

Read actually. But I dont remember the source. When I get the chance Ill look it up.

ObliviousBlueCaboose wrote:And yes it is perfectly reasonable to expect a simi auto weapon only fire once or twice in 5 seconds. Which is what rapid fire represents. FFG has the lasgun fire 3x in 6seconds on simiauto.

An assault cannon, however, is going to fire a lot more than 4 times in 5 seconds...

Laodamia wrote:The lascannon is used as a primary armament on Fury Interceptors and Thunderbolts. It is also turret-mounted on marauders. This implies that the lascannon can have a fairly rapid firing rate. In addition, in the novel Double Eagle, there are multiple descriptions of thunderbolts discharging 8-10 lascannon shots at a single aircraft in a single pass, implying very fast rates of fire.

However, for the IG, the lascannon is a heavy gauge AT weapon, delivering a heavy punch but slow to reload.

So, I guess lascannons, depending on patterns and settings, can either deliver a few powerful armor-piercing shots each minute (in DoW 2 Chaos Rising, lascannons have a 20shot/min rate of fire), or lay down a fairly fast firing rate to take down fast-moving targets.

Also, the lascannons are duel mounted on Fury/Thunderbolts, so it is possible that they are synced to alternate fire to increase the rate of fire.

insaniak wrote:

ObliviousBlueCaboose wrote:And yes it is perfectly reasonable to expect a simi auto weapon only fire once or twice in 5 seconds. Which is what rapid fire represents. FFG has the lasgun fire 3x in 6seconds on simiauto.

An assault cannon, however, is going to fire a lot more than 4 times in 5 seconds...

With regard to the FFG RPGs:when you fire at a target in the FFG RPGs the action accounts for picking the target, aligning the weapon, tracking the target, firing the weapon and noting the result. The Asssault Cannon can spew out 10 shots in a single round but it needs to be pointing the right way first and to have its barrels spinning. That burst would probably be fired in less than a second given the Assault Cannons fearsome rate of fire but there is everything else a character has to do on top.

The Mad Tanker wrote:

Laodamia wrote:The lascannon is used as a primary armament on Fury Interceptors and Thunderbolts. It is also turret-mounted on marauders. This implies that the lascannon can have a fairly rapid firing rate. In addition, in the novel Double Eagle, there are multiple descriptions of thunderbolts discharging 8-10 lascannon shots at a single aircraft in a single pass, implying very fast rates of fire.

However, for the IG, the lascannon is a heavy gauge AT weapon, delivering a heavy punch but slow to reload.

So, I guess lascannons, depending on patterns and settings, can either deliver a few powerful armor-piercing shots each minute (in DoW 2 Chaos Rising, lascannons have a 20shot/min rate of fire), or lay down a fairly fast firing rate to take down fast-moving targets.

Also, the lascannons are duel mounted on Fury/Thunderbolts, so it is possible that they are synced to alternate fire to increase the rate of fire.

Good point. I guess a single lascannon hit would be powerful enough to take down most aircraft anyway.

ObliviousBlueCaboose wrote:If a turn of 40k is 5 seconds, then it can fire 24 times a minute. Of course fluff can be different.

Would love to see your "source" on that bit of brilliant info. 40k is not a literal game. You just can't say that one turn is X time or that 1" is X yards etc.

Even if you really want to, 5 second turns is incredibly silly. Every engagement in the 41st millenia is over in under a minute? Shouldn't the black library books be shorter?

"The traitor legions arrived at the gates of the imperial palace, after three seconds, a breach was made, but sanguinius killed a bunch of bloodthristers in the next seven seconds. The fighting continued for another seventeen seconds before Horus sensed that the loyalists were getting the upper hand. He lowered his shields, killed sanguinius in a second and got killed by the emperor after another two"

IIRC firing full auto is a full action, i've only recenlty started playing Dark Heresey but our GM did say a turn is 5 seconds.

So aiming being a half action is 2.5 seconds and firing semi auto being a half action is 2.5 seconds as well.

Saying that my brand new heavy stubber has a fire rate of 10 at full auto, so what 200 rounds a min and takes two turn to reload, 10 seconds. Not sure how this compares with modern machine guns. Not as good as submachine guns but if IIRC they have a stupidly high rate of fre (p90 somethink like 900 rounds)

However I think this

The length of a game turn is irrelevant. It's an approximation used to replicate a larger scale engagement. There has to be a divorce between game rules and the fluff. The game rules exist to create a playable, fun, and profitable tabletop experience. Not to approximate real combat.

is probably the truest comment, glad someone else recognises fluff, real life and game mechanics are all seperate.

GW systems are hardly meant to be the most realistic. Its not like we're playing old school Napoleonics or other historical systems, where you have recorded stats of how far a dragoon can march in a minute.

Maybe ive got ffg and tt mixed up. Either way, if you go by ffg its about 24 shots a turn.

@illumini, well if the turns are not short, it means your marines, xenos, whatever are too stupid to fire a machine gun more then 3 shots every few minutes.

SpankHammer III wrote:Saying that my brand new heavy stubber has a fire rate of 10 at full auto, so what 200 rounds a min and takes two turn to reload, 10 seconds. Not sure how this compares with modern machine guns. Not as good as submachine guns but if IIRC they have a stupidly high rate of fre (p90 somethink like 900 rounds)

My post above addresses this. Your character has to move the weapon around, mentally pick the target, line the weapon to the target, fire and then look to see what devestation you've caused - no point wasting more ammunition if your burst of fire has killed the enemy. Also trigger discipline comes into play - you won't hold the trigger down for long periods of time as a human because of the recoil of your weapon bucking and shaking in your hands - it will also burn through your ammunition in no time at all. Short bursts of fire on target for maximum effect. The aim action is just extra time spent aligning the weapon and your character settling their body to take the shot.

What may also influence the bursts of fire may be distractions such as allies being hit or grenades going off, bullets/shots passing close by the character. They might take their finger off the trigger for a moment as cover obsscures the target - any number of reasons.

Number of shots =/= length of action

There aren't any proper scales in 40K rules.

Plus, rules aren't fluff.

I never really think of lascannons having a rate of fire per se (though that is how I imagine lasguns and laspistols), I imagine them more as firing a continuous beam that bores through the target as long as the trigger's held (same goes for melta guns).

Saying nothing about the subject, 40K rules, fluff and models are all ENTIRELY DIFFERENT things. They only overlap superficially to make the tabletop game more enjoyable. If you wanted to you could play a game of 40k with just basses and it would work just fine.
Case point compare what a marine can do and his size in the fluff and the game rules and miniatures, not the same at all.