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Brother Coa wrote:

purplefood wrote:All anti-tank weapons are gonna have a good chance.

This and those .50 cal sniper rifles. Grenade launchers to. If you get the chance to shoot of course...

Everything else is just going to bounce of it's shiny Ultramarine armor.

Not .50 cal. Bolters don't pierce marine armour, and they are .75 cal diamond tipped self propelled mass reactive warhead bearing shells.

Anyways, I can see AT weapons using their immense kinetic energy and eventually causing more damage than the suit can sustain, but I can't see it being on the first or even fifth hit, because it simply doesn't have the penetrating power.

Look at it this way: how thick is marine armour? Conservative guess: 2-3" or so, liberal, closer to 4", maybe half an inch more. From the description of a Land Raider's armour we can see that ceramite-adamantium alloy is equal to 3.8 times it's thickness in steel and much better where thermal energies are involved. 3.8x3"=11.4 inches of steel is the equivalent. That means 289.56mm of steel armour would offer the protection of PA.

For comparison, the Iosif Stalin line of Heavy Tanks made by the Russian has 30-160mm of armour.

The K-wagen Super Heavy Tank had 30mm of armour.

The Landkreuzer P. 1500, which was a monster design 42m longx18m widex7m height would have had 250mm of armour.

It would take extreme ordinance (aerial bombardment, naval fire support, anti-tank artillery etc.) to pierce 289.56mm of steel. There are bunkers less well protected. That's why in fluff accounts you generally only see marines die when a PW, plasma weapon, heavy ordinance or fellow marine hits them. Or when they are hit in the eye.

BeRzErKeR wrote:The problem with bringing up the numbers for ceramite vs. steel, unfortunately, is that they're ludicrous.

We have already gone far, far beyond steel. Chobham armor, a modern reactive ceramic composite armor, is about twenty-five times as effective as a steel plate of equal weight against KEWs and HEAT rounds; or, in other words, almost seven times as effective as the armor of a Land Raider is described. An M1 Abrams tank has the equivalent of about 940mm of steel plating on the front of the turret.

If you take those numbers as accurate, the only conclusion that can be drawn is that EVERY weapon and vehicle in use in the 41st millenium, by every single race, is utterly outclassed by an Abrams. Hell, if you accept those numbers an Abrams would probably be literally unkillable; it would have something like AV21!

So there are two ways to interpret this; either 1) In the grim darkness of the far future, all weapons are Nerf guns and all armor is aluminum foil, or 2) GW knows nothing about materials science, and we can't take the numbers they give us for such things at face value.

At the same time though, land raider armour is specified as being more resistant to heat and energy based weapons, so abrams would likely crumple uselessly against lascannons, meltas and railguns.

Abrams is the equivalent of 940mm against HEAT and KEWs, but neither of those are present in 40k.

Although if they ever mount the iron curtain on Abrams they could end up being just about immune to krak rounds.

BeRzErKeR wrote:In the grim darkness of the far future, all weapons are Nerf guns and all armor is aluminum foil, or 2) GW knows nothing about materials science, and we can't take the numbers they give us for such things at face value.

Number 2. Because number one is incorrect based on the fact that lasguns blow off arms, like high caliber anti-matter rifles.

Lynata wrote:

tsz52 wrote:Are folks seriously suggesting that SMs are so awesome! that they can survive being hit by MBT main guns?

Not surprising, given how they are represented sometimes. Especially in licensed products, stuff like the recent Space Marine computer game.
(at the same time it is conveniently overlooked how quickly they die when seen from the other side and when the focus is on another race, such as in the Firewarrior game )

Well in the Fire warrior game it is because they have no skill at all. They still take a fair amount of pulse rounds to kill (remembering that pulse rounds can destroy Leman Russ tanks from behind.)

Lynata wrote:

im2randomghgh wrote:Well in the Fire warrior game it is because they have no skill at all. They still take a fair amount of pulse rounds to kill (remembering that pulse rounds can destroy Leman Russ tanks from behind.)

Pulse rounds seem to be fairly weak in that game in general, I did not expect them to take 8, 9 shots to kill a Storm Trooper. On the other hand, boltgun versus Marine looked like 3-4 shots. Guy on youtube seemed to be a lousy shot.

In any case, I do believe you missed the point of my post, which was about the issue of perception and tunnel vision - not some numbers pulled from a video game whose mechanics are focused on gameplay experience, balancing and making a single player feel good.
It should be common sense that anything whose narrative centers on seeing some hero character survive until the credits start rolling should not be taken at a straight face.
You'd still be free to form your interpretation of the setting around it, of course, but I would deem awareness that it is just one of many interpretations, and that it is not more correct than another poster's opinion, to be a rather important thing for such discussions.

No, I understood what you meant, I just posted what I posted for the sake of making every point, I'm a completionist

That isn't really true. Krak missiles appear to be HEAT munitions, and railguns work entirely by kinetic energy; they're the ultimate in KEWs.

I wasn't implying that they (Railguns) are energy based weapons, though I suppose the way I phrased that would lead one to believe I had been. I was saying that Railguns would make a mockery of an Abrams tank, with modern ones having force equivalent to a tomahawk missile while only being a small magnetized slug propelled to hyper-velocity. This force is concentrated on a smaller area than a tomahawk missile, meaning more penetration and more damage in this localized area. The disastrous effects of tau railguns are shown in this quote from Codex: Tau Empire pg. 14

One of their light walkers carried a weapon of lethal effect. It fired a form of ultra-high velocity projectile. I saw one of our tanks after having been hit by it. There was a small hole punched in either flank-one the entry point, one the exit. The tiny munition had passed through the whole vehicle with such speed that everything within the hull not welded down had passed through the vehicle with such speed that everything had been sucked out through the exit hole. Including the crew. We never identified their bodies, for all that remained of them was a red stain upon the ground, extending some twenty meters from the wreck.

Jollydevil wrote:Correct me if im wrong, but doesnt a railgun utilize magnets to launch projectiles?
In real that is. One would think that the real and one in 40K are at least a bit similar.

Yes, the magnets launch the slug to hypersonic speeds.

Railguns: Difficult to know without the velocity figure but past a certain point the projectile vapes when it hits: if it's an uber-railgun then it's effectively thermal in target effect - more plasma weapon (upon impact) than solid object going fast weapon. This is in regard to your debate about the armour properties of 40k vehicles re hard vs thermal effects.

The slug doesn't break down but does form a plasma tail. Here's a stillshot of a railgun being test-fired by the US navy:

tsz52 wrote:

Jollydevil wrote:Correct me if im wrong, but doesnt a railgun utilize magnets to launch projectiles?
In real that is. One would think that the real and one in 40K are at least a bit similar.

That's more a coilgun really. A railgun passes an electrical current from one rail through the projectile's base to the other rail. Railgun's a lot more simple (though erosion of the rails is a problem - there's a lot of waste heat - as are the forces acting on the rails which can push them out of proper alignment) and lighter, though a coilgun would yield higher performance.

It'd be slick if Tau get Coilguns in their next Codex!

If you're interested, there's plenty of good info on the net about these weapons [atomicrockets always a winner! for a nice place to start]. Railgun's worth checking out if you have any interest in contemporary US Naval affairs and emerging (problematic) tech.

EDIT: Im2randomghgh: Fast enough and the slug does break down on impact - that's why Whipple Shields are more useful against extremely high velocity impacts than slabs of armour are.

Yeah, but whipple shields are useless against them. Whipple shield protects against 3-18 km/s, whereas railguns tested have achieved speeds of 20 km/s+

Also, "Utilize magnets to launch a projectile" describes coilguns and railguns in equal mesure. Railgun use two electromagnetic rails to fire a magnetically charged projectile down the length of the "barrel" (pair of rails). Coil gun uses a similar concept, but instead of the charge being lit all the way down the length of the "barrel" it is a series of "loops" that are electromagnetically charged as the projectile reaches them and shutting off as it passes them. Also, the tau are never getting coilguns ever. Do you know why? Because another name for coilgun is "gauss gun" and that is pretty thoroughly covered in 40k, even though GW seems to be unaware of what a gauss gun is.

Trust me, I know my stuff here, I had a several-dozen page arguement about what a railgun/coilgun/Mass accelerator is and what the differences are on dakka about 6 months ago and really don't want to get any further into it this time than I already have.

Cheers.

EDIT: Was thinking of something else for the speed. Anyways, they go SLOWER than the 3km/s at which the shield can help.

EDIT 2: TO clarify: I was talking about a non weaponized railgun that has been tested to launch objects at 20km/s, the weaponized ones are likely going to be 2-3.5km/s, which will, in time, likely be able to match the speeds of their orbital launcher brethren

Rented Tritium wrote:

Brother Coa wrote:Let me raise stakes here.

Let us replace Astartes with:

-an Terminator.

-an Grey Knight.

-an Custodes.

And in the end let us compare Primarchs to.

What now can kill those guys?

All armor still has soft spots for movement and they all still have dudes in them. The same basic weaknesses apply. Kinetic force from sufficiently large anti-tank rounds and explosive pressure waves close enough to the softer spots should be sufficient to damage the tissue inside the armor even without penetrating it.

Have you ever skinned your knee through your pants without tearing them? Think about that only much more upscaled and involving explosives.

Well custodes have even stronger armour than astartes, and terminators have even their joints hidden behind layers of armour, with grey knights having psychic shielding which I don't think we could penetrate. A primarch we likely would have immense trouble killing WITHOUT armour even.




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But we don't know what velocities Tau Railguns run at (?), so this might be academic but I wanted to just point that out to BeRsErKeR as a possibility (and it benefited your argument, by the way);

I remember hearing a figure in the vicinity of mach 8?

Milisim wrote:Just make a Space Marine get a wife.... Yoou'll soon see who wear the power armour pants then.... 9ft guys gibbering in the corner saying Yes Dear!

The wife is the ultimate weapon in any era for destroying a man =]


Just don't tell my wife that.

Please, haven't you realized? SM aren't interested in...women. HINT HINT HINT.

King Pariah wrote:Actually a combo of dense and flexible is best. You need the hard to prevent penetration, not shock absorption. The more flexible material absorbs and dissipates the shock. If it was just a concussive grenade with no shrapnel, I'd take the rubber, with shrapnel I'd take a steel exterior with rubber behind it. Millenia of armor has shown the combo is best, never just a steel shell, that's a terrible idea. You get a bell like affect that way which is extremely dangerous to the body.

Space marines have a ~mesh layer under their armour for just that scenario.


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Let's build stuff out of carbon nanotubes and aerogel and hit them with it!

Connor MacLeod wrote:*sigh* shot placement matters. You can kill a Space Marine with a pointy wooden stick (well okay a spear) if you aim for the right area and you hit him just right or hard enough. It even happened in First HEretic. But that doesn't mean it would always happen. Same with gunfire of any kind.

Except that marine bodies alone would be capable of blocking most/all damage from a wooden spear, and even their joints are armoured.

BaronIveagh wrote:

BeRzErKeR wrote:

BaronIveagh wrote:

I wouldn't get too happy there: that was due to plot armor more then Terminator armor. In stories that are less about how uber SM are, they get peeled open by genestealers on a regular basis. I think something that can be torn apart by chitin and brute strength can probably be penned by a anti-material rifle.

Not necessarily.

Point one; Genestealers have just as much handwavey sci-fi magic as Terminators do. They, and tyranids in general, routinely do things that should be flatly impossible for biological organisms as we understand them.

Point two; A Genestealer can dig its claws into a ridge or the lip of a plate, and if it's strong enough, tear the plate off. A bullet cannot; it has to break through the plate.

Point 3; A Genestealer strikes multiple times. Terminators are not simply wtfpwnt by a single claw strike; rather, the inhumanly-fast Genestealers swarm over them, peel them open, and kill them. A bullet, by contrast, expends its energy in a single impulse and then is done. You could certainly argue that an anti-material round would do DAMAGE to Terminator armor, or even that it could slam right through if it struck a weak point, but really, Terminator armor is ludicrously tough.

I mean, take the weakest numbers for 40k armor; you know, the ones that indicate that a Land Raider is less well-armored than a modern IFV. The indication there (which, I should point out, most people seem to dismiss as ludicrously weak compared to the fluff) is that 1mm of Land Raider armor is worth 3mm of RHA, the standard for measuring modern tank armor in terms of thicknesses of steel. Terminator armor is made of ceramite, plasteel and adamantine, the same stuff Land Raiders are.

So. . . just from looking at pictures of Terminators, I would guesstimate that it's at least six or seven inches thick. That would be 150-175mm, which would (once again, according to the weakest comparison) provide protection equal to 450-525mm of RHA.

This is a good place to note that the side armor of the T-44 MBT, which was actively in service through the end of the 1970s, was 75mm thick and composed of RHA steel. That armor was completely invulnerable to the anti-tank rifles of the time. According to this highly conservative, back-of-the-envelope calculation, Terminator armor is approximately six or seven times as resilient. That would indicate that the VERY WEAKEST parts of the armor literally cannot be penetrated by anything short of an anti-tank rocket. It also, incidentally, would seem to indicate that just regular old power armor is immune to small-arms; even if you asserted that PA is only, say, one-fifth as protective as Terminator armor, it would still be the equivalent of about 90mm of RHA. Good luck finding a modern infantry rifle that can punch through five inches of steel. And once again, remember that these are the WORST numbers, the ones that make 40k tanks out to be far, far more poorly armored than modern vehicles.

I'm not seeing how this supports the assertion that modern infantry could fight Space Marines.

One, the RussianT-44 was classified as a medium tank, not an MBT. And it's unknown if it was invulnerable to anti-tank rifles of the time, as it never saw combat, and was never tested against anti-tank rifles, because it was quickly replaced by the T-54/55 (which is still used in some placed today.)

Two: In The Emperor's Finest a genestealer neatly bites through the helmet of a terminator in one nice neat crunch. Indeed, he was wtfpwned.

Three: This theory would hold together except I own a few terminators and compared them to the Mk7 armor. While there is superior protection to the chest, shoulders, and shins, the thighs are just as thin as on a regular SM Mk 7. The tac dread also has the same lack of armor in many of the joints. Also, since the mk 7 is not appreciably thicker then the mk 6...



You may notice that SM armor is not solid, but rather a thin layer of armor over a more complex layer that includes microservos and life support functions. (This is also mentioned in The Killing Ground about how complex the inner workings of a SM armor are, and how thin the armor itself really is)

Even if we take your 3 to 1 numbers into account, your SM in mk 6 and 7 is protected by...about the same as modern body armor with trauma plates installed, it just covers the whole body.

BTW: IRL Landraiders would be deathtraps for the people inside, not due to their armor being strong or weak, but because they have no spall liners to protect the troops awaiting deployment.

@the italisized part, irrelevant, as Main battle tank is a role classification, a main battle tank can be light, medium, heavy or even super heavy.

@ the bold part, they have acid saliva of undocumented strength, for all we know it could be ridiculously powerful, plus they have magical hand-waivium plot armour (if they never made termies die ever it would get silly)

@the rest, your image clearly shows that PA is very thick. we can see that the breast plate is at least two inches thick if not more. The ridiculous thickness, paired with the complex internal workings, and with the additional factor of the strength of these sci-fi materials...

You may notice that SM armor is not solid, but rather a thin layer of armor over a more complex layer that includes microservos and life support functions

...if it was solid, there wouldn't be room for a marine to wear it...


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riplikash wrote:

schadenfreude wrote:
An entire chapter of space marines would have a hard time destroying the armed forces of North Korea.

In a head on fight, certainly. That is kind of the point. They really aren't supposed to act as a front line, conventional warfare army. Obviously in a head on head confrontation they would fare poorly against any conventional military. While they are virtually immune to small arms fire (not totally obviously), against many of the heavy weaponry a conventional military can bring to bear they have little defense. Most special forces teams suffer similar weaknesses. That doesn't make the Navy SEALS, Army Rangers, or British SAS any less useful, it just means they have to be carefully applied to the correct situation.

Which is why they are a rapid strike, special forces group. Heavy weapons take a certain amount of coordination to use, and SMs meant to utilize rapid insertion and deep striking to make that impossible. When drop pods land in your base, or in the midst of your lines you can't use artillery, tanks, air support, or even most forms of anti-tank weaponry.

When they strike where and how they are meant to they will rarely have to deal with more than small arms fire. And not concentrated small arms fire, which might pose a threat, but disorganized, panicked small arms fire.

So while they would certainly lose in a head on confrontation with North Korea, that is the type of fight they wouldn't engage in. They would strike at infrastructure and leadership positions. True conquest would be performed by the IG.

So to answer the original question, for the hundredth time, What modern weapons could kill a SM? Most anti tank weaponry will have little problem. Small arms have a small chance of kill them, but not reliable. But most modern, centeralized militaries would have a difficult time dealing with their rapid insertion tactics.

I feel like it would take ridiculous amounts of small arms fire to fell a marine because we saw in the dark hunters short that a full lasgun clip (lasguns being worse at penetrating and better at unarmoured damage than regular weapons) to the torso of an unarmoured marine failed to kill him, along with the fact that they are not just standing still, along with the fact that better penetration=less damage and vice versa, and as a final point, modern military doctrine would have no ready response to such attackers would make small arms a very small factor.

Though I agree they are not invincible.

Also, tanks would have a difficult time fighting them; usually, tanks rely on their secondary, automatic weapons for dealing with infantry. Those guns would have little effect against them, and the larger guns would have a hell of a time hitting them, plus a melta gun would wreak HAVOC against tanks (even bolters would likely be able to incapacitate most tanks <45 tons à la penetrating and detonating amongst the crew).

The amount of force North Korea would have to marshall in one place would be near total to defeat an entire chapter, though I agree that most larger nations would be a hell of a fight for a single chapter.

BaronIveagh wrote:

im2randomghgh wrote:
@the italisized part, irrelevant, as Main battle tank is a role classification, a main battle tank can be light, medium, heavy or even super heavy.

@ the bold part, they have acid saliva of undocumented strength, for all we know it could be ridiculously powerful, plus they have magical hand-waivium plot armour (if they never made termies die ever it would get silly)

@the rest, your image clearly shows that PA is very thick. we can see that the breast plate is at least two inches thick if not more. The ridiculous thickness, paired with the complex internal workings, and with the additional factor of the strength of these sci-fi materials...

@Tank classification: WRONG. You're combining the old classification system and the modern one. (Current system separates lights from MBT)

@the genestealers, yes, but acids take more then a split second to work. This thing jumps down the from the ceiling and bites right through. Even powerful acids take longer then that through regular metals.

@ The rest: Very thick and very hollow. Which seems to escape you. Oh, it's 2 inches thick! Yes, but that 2 inches is not made up of the armor, which is only a thin outer layer. Those tubes and servos are not going to provide as much protection as you seem to think...

im2randomghgh wrote:
...if it was solid, there wouldn't be room for a marine to wear it...

Technically there isn't room of them to wear it anyway.

@the tank part, so now tanks that are light enough to be light tanks cannot be MBT's regardless of their role?

@the genestealer part, this is magical 40k acid, and magical 40k stuff is magical.

@the rest, not hollow. You can clearly see on the breast plate 2+ inches of armour which is what I was referring to.

ANd yes, there is room for them to wear it. If there wasn't...they wouldn't be able to wear it.

BaronIveagh wrote:

im2randomghgh wrote:
@the tank part, so now tanks that are light enough to be light tanks cannot be MBT's regardless of their role?

@the genestealer part, this is magical 40k acid, and magical 40k stuff is magical.

@the rest, not hollow. You can clearly see on the breast plate 2+ inches of armour which is what I was referring to.

ANd yes, there is room for them to wear it. If there wasn't...they wouldn't be able to wear it.

@ irrelevant tanks business: Yes, because once you reach a certain point, it's can fulfill the all the necessity roles of an MBT.

@genestealerpart: No, because fluff even shows it's not. Your response there is composed of magical fail dust.

@ the rest. Yes, it is, if you look along the connection points with the arms on the chest piece, you'll see that the front of the chest is just as hollow as the back of the chest. Further, it has to be light, as the suit enviromental sensors are mounted in the chest. They would not work very well behind inches of super metal.


And, no, there's not. basic human anatomy would show you that. The hips and legs in particular are not arraigned in a manner matching human anatomy or even allowing bipedal walking in the human fashion, due to the excessive gap between the legs. The helmet would be impossible to put on or take off and the neck piece would prohibit them from turning their heads.

@irrelevant tank business (I agree is is irrelevant), you have no stated what area you reach a certain point in. Armour? Tonnage? Firepower? And they are fundamentally different because a light tank is designed for rapid movement and low-intensity conflicts, whereas a main battle tank functions exactly as it's name would imply: larger battles. While medium and heavy are no longer tank classifications, merely being main battle tanks of different sizes, light tanks are still a distinct thing.

@Genestealer stuff, that would indicate an inconsistency, as in the fluff helmets have deflect even bolt round before.

@the rest, we have no idea of the means used to scan the environment used by marine sensors, so that cannot be a part of your argument. It could have small barometers, it could have technology that wouldn't work at all IRL.

If you look at it, you'll note that the armoured part is white and the rest is grey. See how much white there is on the breastplate? 2+inches easily.

For the neck part, you can see that only the ring at the top and the part at the bottom that connects to the suit are solid metal, the rest is armoured rubber, or rubberized armour, whichever, meaning it would be flexible. That's the only reason why lasguns shots can hurt them at all; the negligible armour piercing abilities of lasguns means that only hits to joints and eye pieces will ever hurt a marine.

And your theory about the hips and legs sounds good...until you see how it fits together, and notice how it is obviously perfectly suitable for a human.

LORD_PANTERA wrote:I reckon a 50 calibar rifle shot could kill a space marine if you could get a shot to the eye.

Fixed.

BaronIveagh wrote:

CaptainAWESOME117 wrote:A sniper rifle with AM rounds, an assault cannon, or a tank (maybe on the tank). And running Space Marines over dosn't work. In a book, a chimera drives over a Space marine without a helmet, and he survives to rip off the hatch, kill the driver, rip out the seat and drive home.

Yes, and, again, Titans step on them and they are unharmed. It's called plot armor. I can point to another one were the SM is killed by a kid with a knife. The knife is poisoned, but it's still a kid with a knife.

Plus there was Tu'shan bench-pressing a land raider in the last Salamander book.

BaronIveagh wrote:

LORD_PANTERA wrote:I reckon a 50 calibar rifle shot could kill a space marine if you could get a shot to the head.

APDS round will go through pretty much anywhere. Regular rounds the joints in the armor would be a good shot. the way they're designed they'd be excellent shot traps.

The joints are rubberized armour, so small arms likely still could not get through.

Also, sabot round would NOT get t through anywhere, as we saw in Savage Scars that sarik's pauldron is more than capable of taking multiple direct hits from plasma weaponry, which has superior AP to sabot rounds. Also, the Space Marine game tells us that they have reactive armour.

IHateNids wrote:Yeah but a game is worse that the worlds worst fluff and statistics from the rules (i.e.dropping to the ground on your belly offeres a 1 in 6 chance of not being killed by a lascannon, Yeah right).

If you drop to your belly and it roars away over your head, then yeah.

IHateNids wrote:

Ignatius wrote:

IHateNids wrote:If lascannnons are as powerful and fast as i am lead to belive, by the time youve seen the shot coming and have decided to hit the deck, its already punched clean through your head

It's a beam of light, so essentially you would never even see it coming. As oxymoronic as that sounds. If you are close enough to be targeted by it, then you may see it charge up, but avoiding the beam would be like dodging a flashlight pointed at you as it turns on. Impossible.

My point exactly.

My point was that if you see someone pointing a lascannon at you and hear it charging up, you can throw off their aim by diving to the ground or in a crater etc.

pure sillyness though is how kroot who g2g in jungle terrain get a 2+ against lascannons. They must be pretty ninja


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BaronIveagh wrote:

im2randomghgh wrote:
Also, sabot round would NOT get t through anywhere, as we saw in Savage Scars that sarik's pauldron is more than capable of taking multiple direct hits from plasma weaponry, which has superior AP to sabot rounds. Also, the Space Marine game tells us that they have reactive armour.

Well, one, other then, again, it's bad to kill off the main character of a novel right away, so, yeah, again, miraculous plot armor protects him.

And nonexplosive reactive armor, (as explosive would kill the wearer in this case) does nothing against APDS rounds. (Actually most explosive reactive armor also does next to nothing against APDS rounds. For reactive armor to have any effect, the projectile has to be longer then the thickness of the armor.)

He is one of the main character of a novel, and this is the final push towards the end of the book. Perfect time to kill him.

Also, plot armour is like how Luke miraculously is never hit by a single shot form stormtroopers. Having sturdy armour, not so much. I grant you that from the crisis suit's PoV the story would have roasted Sarik, but then again that's from the pilot's PoV. If you had a neutral outside observer, his shoulder pad would likely still stop the first shot.


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BaronIveagh wrote:

im2randomghgh wrote:
Also, sabot round would NOT get t through anywhere, as we saw in Savage Scars that sarik's pauldron is more than capable of taking multiple direct hits from plasma weaponry, which has superior AP to sabot rounds. Also, the Space Marine game tells us that they have reactive armour.

Well, one, other then, again, it's bad to kill off the main character of a novel right away, so, yeah, again, miraculous plot armor protects him.

And nonexplosive reactive armor, (as explosive would kill the wearer in this case) does nothing against APDS rounds. (Actually most explosive reactive armor also does next to nothing against APDS rounds. For reactive armor to have any effect, the projectile has to be longer then the thickness of the armor.)

A sabot round from a tank cannon would most likely be longer than PA is thick.

A sabot round smaller would not have sufficient penetrating power.

blazinpsycho&typhooni wrote:Still don't know why this thread is still going on...

ANYTHING can kill a space marine, it's the tactics, methods, and situations that determine whether or not they will actually succeed.

A pointy stick could slice the throat of a marine if they're helmetless, don't have errant armour (with the neck guard), and being swarmed by hundreds upon thousands of savages. (read First Heretic).

There armour is no doubt impressive but they all have their faults, pretty sure non marines are told to aim for the joints when facing sphez marines.

They aren't invincible, but they're pretty close.

Slit their throat and their larraman cells are going to stop the bleeding right away. Unless you penetrate deep, which would be quite difficult considering Know No Fear states that they are "As tall as a tall man on another tall man's shoulders".

IHateNids wrote:Im under the same impression as Gorska.

And what about a chainsaw? CSM kill SM with chain swords so why cant a basketball player (same height as a SM) kill one with a chain saw?

Because Basketball players are infinitely weaker (and average basketball player ~7 foot, marines 6" taller or more), chainswords are made from sturdier metal and have a monomolecular edge, chainswords would have considerably more potent engines, and because even chainswords struggle against PA.

Brother Coa wrote:

Gorskar.da.Lost wrote:Indeed so old fruit.
However, I was under the impression that we were discussing the abilities of our professional soldiers here, or have I missed something?

I am glad that we agreed on that
If you see OP you could see that there is no mention of solder or civilian on description. Just a simple question: what our modern day weapon can kill an Astartes?
Answer is simple: many weapons can kill them. But them people started stating that even civilians could kill them easily and that just irritated me.
They wouldn't call them Angels of Death if they are that easy to kill, yeah they are Human - but superhuman at that. A living gods of war, instrument of his will, Mankind righteous fury...
And they deserve that praising very well with all the enemy they are fighting and deeds they are doing. Telling that ordinary men can kill them with a knife is kind insulting...
And I completely agree that professional solders could kill them, but not before losing a lot of troops to achieve that.

"to take a town, send a legionary, to take a city, send a squad, to take a world, send a company, to take a culture, send a chapter"

Although that would be referring to the enemies of mankind during the crusade, so inflate that a bit to account for weaker modern weapons.

You do realize that makes them taller then a land raider, right? They'd be squeezing in like a clown car. I'll stick with FW's seven foot. It seems more likely and the scale matches up better.

While Know No Fear does seem to put them at 9 feet or so which is a bit much (even tho heresy era marines are supposed to be slightly bigger) and my personal favourite height range is the most common 7'6" as average (though it could also depend on chapter, on primarch, on gravity of chapter homeworld etc.) because there are roughly 20,000 people in the world over 7 tall, and being taller than a space marine is heresy. 7'6" is a lot more rare than 7'

Gorskar.da.Lost wrote:

im2randomghgh wrote:

You do realize that makes them taller then a land raider, right? They'd be squeezing in like a clown car. I'll stick with FW's seven foot. It seems more likely and the scale matches up better.

While Know No Fear does seem to put them at 9 feet or so which is a bit much (even tho heresy era marines are supposed to be slightly bigger) and my personal favourite height range is the most common 7'6" as average (though it could also depend on chapter, on primarch, on gravity of chapter homeworld etc.) because there are roughly 20,000 people in the world over 7 tall, and being taller than a space marine is heresy. 7'6" is a lot more rare than 7'

As I recall, they're 7ft 6in without armour on, and 8ft with it.
Still, once again we've got the ol' 40K loose canon to contend with here.

That can be explained away with having taller or short initiates, taller or short primarchs (this trait would likely carry through the space marines) higher or lower gravity worlds etc.

BaronIveagh wrote:

Compel wrote:
I think that's a pretty fair / logical summary of what would happen, all things considered...

Except that it means that their entire military was run by morons and their leaders didn't have brain one among them. Did they also form neat lines to be shot down in long bursts on full auto?

Ok, here's what *I* would do in the event of SM invasion. ATM Nasa monitors near Earth space for objects that mass around wast a SM strike cruiser does, particularly on Earth intercept, so a sneak attack is probably out. Plus that fact that in fluff the engines have outputs across multiple frequencies when underway comparable to small stars.

On determining hostile intent, I would deploy THELs and other interception systems to counter drop pods and re-issue W48's to all artillery units. This would be followed up by taking up tactical positions both in major cities and at prepared positions away from urban areas.

All long range Nuclear weapons would be launched, along with the Brilliant Pebbles prototype, if it still exists. Based on current estimates, this should be enough firepower on it's own to wipe out several hundred strike cruisers and battle barges, but I like to make sure.

Should any Thunderhawks penetrate interceptors and ground fire from the THELs et al, in close terrain they would be engaged with maximum force. In open ground, use of W48s would be authorized, followed up with air cav recon and close air support.

Given the average chapter is one thousand space marines, each loss is a much larger chunk of their effective fighting force then a similar loss would be to ground forces. Snipers would be under orders to target officers and heavy weapons teams as priority targets.

Obviously, all important personnel would be removed to remote and undisclosed locations.

Note: I just did this with nothing but the US military. (reasoning being that the US, Russia, and China would most likely top the list of countries to recruit or disable, and all have comparable weapons systems)

Long range nuclear weapons would be nowhere near powerful enough to destroy a strike cruiser, even the few hundred capable of leaving the atmosphere. I'll have to look for it, but I had found estimates putting macro cannon rounds at several tens of thousands of times more powerful than every nuke every made by humans, put together.

RicBlasko wrote:I think what gets forgotten is, Guardsmen wear tshirts that give them saves from swords, and a few types of guns (look at all the wondrful junger fighters with the tank tops.)
Gangers, Heritics, ect kill off Marines, Tau and Ork with swords (not just chain swords) with flint lock pistols, and with "lasguns" which seem weak enough. A flamer is a flamer is a flame thrower, and it seems to work just well too.
So I am guessing knives, fire, and most small arms would still work.

Since when do tau kill marines with swords or flintlock pistols? And orks tech works because of psychic power, not any kind of actual black powder. They could forget the powder and it'll still work.


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The following are firepower estimates of the IOM Naval mounted weaponry, using information garnered from Battlefleet Gothic:

From what we can gather, a the offensive capacity of a ship is divided between light-heavy Batteries, Lancers (Laser cannons), Torpedoes and the Nova Cannon.

- – -

“the forty men pulled harder at the traversing chains, heaving the massive barrel of the macro-cannon into position amidst the clank-clank-clank of rusty gears.
When it was open, the others bent their backs to the loading winch, ,lowering the shell, which weighed several tons, into the heart of the cannon.”

- Battlefleet Gothic

Weapons batteries (Otherwise known as macro cannons), loaded with a shell that weighs “several tons.” Going with the standard established velocity of 20,000 km/s for direct fire Imperial weapons weapons. At that mass/velocity, the kinetic energy of the projectile would be 400,000 terajoules, or just under 10 gigatons.

Conservative figures point to the Battleship firing “two hundred foot” torpedoes, which would be sixty meters long. Assuming that the diameter is 1/4 to 1/5 of the length, the torpedo would yield a diameter of around fifteen meters. To be further conservative, assume a density equal to water (yeah, I’m being ultra conservative here.) The mass of the torpedo in question would be between 6,800 and 10,600 tons.

Thus the kinetic energy of a torpedo is about 12,400,000,000 petajoules (Staggering really) with a momentum (Measured by calculating the speed and weight of the torpedo) between 6.6e16 kg*m/s and 1.05e17 kg*m/s.

Giving a single Torpedo a staggering yield of 2963 teratons (Or 2.9 petatons – Wow).

“A Nova cannon is a huge weapon, normally mounted in the prow of a ship so that the recoil it generates can be compensated for by the vessel’s engines. It fires a proejctile at incredible velocity, using graviometric impellers to accelerate it to close to light speed. The projectile implodes at a preset distance after firing, unleashing a force more potent than a dozen plasma bombs.”

- Battlefleet Gothic

Take note of how the ship has to compensate engine thrust to counter recoil – in a vacuum!

I would generally assume “close to light-speed” to mean at least 80-90% of C. The size of a Nova cannon shell is never given precisely, but the diameter of the shell is given in other sources (Fifty meters in “Warriors of Ultramar”), though a 30 meter diameter nova cannon is mentioned. Mass can be derived by assuming the length is at least equal to the diameter, or (more probably) a multiple of the diameter (2-3x longer than the diameter, for example. A fifty meter diameter shell would be a hundred and fifty meters long).

Example: Going by a 50×150 meter shell made of Iron (assume 30% solid, its supposed to be packed with explosive of unknown type and density) fired at .9c yields a shell mass of around 770,000 tons and and a kinetic energy rating of 90,000,000,000 petajoules (Holy gak!).

Giving the blast of a Nova cannon (The most powerful ship mounted Imperial weapon) a staggering yield of 22 petatons. For those of you struggling to comprehend these figures, this is a yield one million times greater than the heaviest Turbolaser available to the Star Wars universe.

Or for those less fantastically inclined, two to three million times the combined explosive power of every nuclear weapon on Earth throughout history.

BaronIveagh wrote:

Except that this has been retconned (twice) and now they only hit with a few kilotons spread out over a 10-20km area when used for surface bombardments.

No. GW never gave figures for the yield of these weapons, to get solid numbers we have to use math and the size of the shells. 10 Gigatons. And this is auto-weaponry too. The starship equivalent of an autocannon.

Two problems here: Your ultra conservative numbers assume the entire object is made of a uniformly dense material, and not, say, empty space. Which, it is, since they are powered by an unstable plasma reactor, not, say, some sort of solid or liquid fuel they burn through. And, two, Like a lot of other things about 40k, they never really explain why it's 60 meters long, since it only contains two things, and both of them are fairly small. 1 two hundred kiloton warhead, and one unstable plasma reactor to move it, plus guidance system. All those things would fit in in a '72 Buick Skylark so why it takes 60 meters of torpedo to deliver it, I have no idea.

LOL You actually think assuming the density of a warhead to be the same as water is liberal? YOU are also guessing that they're using hollow-point rounds in space? That's just silly. And it's huge because everything is bigger in 40k. My figures didn't even figure in the warhead, they were just direct impact.

They also only travel something like 16km per sec, so you might want to check your math there.

#number he pulled out of his ass.

Again: retconned. A Nova Cannon is now a linear accelerator as of BFK, so the recoil thing is out, and the speed has been dropped to a small fraction of C. And, it all sounds very fancy, but a dozen plasma bombs has a blast radius around a km in fluff and crunch. The Nova cannon now has damage roughly that of a macrocannon broadside, it's simply much, much longer range. There are, however, vortex variants. As far as shell size, again, it's not mentioned, however, it's been all the way down to ten meters long, depending on who's writing.

I acknowledge the linear accelerator part, but they have NOT been dropped to a small fraction of C. They are NOT 10m (Hell Forged used several dozen metre long nova cannon shells that critically damage a space hulk in one hit) it is only comparable to a broadside if you're using BFG rules.

BTW: by Imperial law, SM are forbidden specifically anti-ship weapons such as the Nova Cannon. (Don't ask me why, it makes no sense, but it came up again and again when we did FAQ 2010 and tried to give them lances)

It doesn't make sense to me either, but I am fairly sure that the Phalanx has nova cannons, so yes, Space Marines can still blast your face off with nova cannons.

BaronIveagh wrote:

Brother Coa wrote:
Like Imperial Navy can't equip their ships with weapons that can be used to devastate entire cities in one blow.

Yes, but that blow usually also involves blowing up the entire planet. A lance strike is absolutely lethal for a half km or so, and deals minor structural damage for another km. A city takes extensive bombardment to kill, with even SM strike cruisers, which are specifically designed for planetary bombardment, only do middling damage. (both in TT rules and in fluff)


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im2randomghgh wrote:
No. GW never gave figures for the yield of these weapons, to get solid numbers we have to use math and the size of the shells. 10 Gigatons. And this is auto-weaponry too. The starship equivalent of an autocannon.

No, FFG wrote it, GW said it was canon, and if you don't like that, take it up with GW.

im2randomghgh wrote:
#number he pulled out of his ass.

Using BFG scale, an Imperial torp travels at 60,000 kmph. Divide it by 60 twice. 16.666 km per sec

im2randomghgh wrote:
I acknowledge the linear accelerator part, but they have NOT been dropped to a small fraction of C. They are NOT 10m (Hell Forged used several dozen metre long nova cannon shells that critically damage a space hulk in one hit) it is only comparable to a broadside if you're using BFG rules.

Or any other space ships game they've ever made. And, again, read the NC section in BFK. Wasn't aware that they had a meter long version, but makes sense with the Jovian pattern. Each one is a Vortex warhead.

im2randomghgh wrote:
It doesn't make sense to me either, but I am fairly sure that the Phalanx has nova cannons, so yes, Space Marines can still blast your face off with nova cannons.

Yes, but since fluff does not agree on what the Phalanx even looks like, and no place does it mention nova cannons, I'm calling BS on that as you have no evidence they do, and I have the statements in the Codex Astates that they're not supposed to. Hell, in the section on the Nova frigate in BFG:A they talk about how the navy and Inquisition don't like they have a single lance armed frigate.

1. Imperial ships are consistently described as having continent-shattering weaponry.

2. If you don't like math, take it up with someone who is willing to not use math.

3. using TT scale, railguns have a range of about 300 feet when in reality, they have range closer to 30 nautical miles. That means it is about 1:630 in terms of range. 60,000Km/h x 630 = FTL. TT scale =/= in universe.

4. Again, you're using TT mechanics to argue against physics. And no, I did not say "several dozen, meter long" rounds, I said "several dozen meter long rounds" as in rounds that are several dozen meters long.

5.

Her foredeck is so large that it can dock a dozen large cruisers and has developed its own ecosystem, complete with unique species of animal life which have had their own evolutionary history aboard the ship

I can dock a dozen large cruisers, meaning grand cruisers, which can and do have Nova cannons. Therefore, nova cannons are a part of it's arsenal.


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Gorskar.da.Lost wrote:

BlaxicanX wrote:

Gorskar.da.Lost wrote:

im2randomghgh wrote:

Long range nuclear weapons would be nowhere near powerful enough to destroy a strike cruiser, even the few hundred capable of leaving the atmosphere. I'll have to look for it, but I had found estimates putting macro cannon rounds at several tens of thousands of times more powerful than every nuke every made by humans, put together.

That seems highly unlikely, given that a single macro-cannon round would therefore be capable of wiping out all life on a planet, something all of those nukes could certainly do.

Not really.

Sorry, missed this earlier.
Does the article take into account the effects of radiation on the environment?
Nuclear blasts aren't what will deliver the deathblow, fallout will.

With a fraction of a percent of the necessary nukes, I highly doubt it would be sufficient.





Those are pictures of present day Hiroshima.

Vaktathi wrote:Realistically? If the marine wasn't in armor, any modern weapon could kill a marine. He may have a greater chance of surviving wounds and whatnot, but a rifle round to the skull would likely do him in just as much as a lascannon would. Astartes have highly enhanced bone structures, and healing mechanisms, but a bullet that would turn a human head into spaghetti sauce spread over a room would likely still kill a Space Marine even if it didn't totally annihilate the skull in the same way. Anything heavier likely wouldn't have much more difficulty either. If it'll kill an elephant or a gorilla, it'll likely kill a Space Marine as well.

In armor? well, that's different, because that varies highly depending on author and protagonist/antogonist standing. In some fluff lasgun blasts can crack the ceramite plate of an SM's chestguard and work their way through, in other fluff, it might as well literally be a flashlight.

A 40mm grenade likely wouldn't leave a Space Marine the happiest of campers on a direct hit, there's a good possiblity that he may sustain internal injuries or even death through the armor from kinetic shock even if it doesn't penetrate the armor (same reason you can still break ribs and rupture organs if hit by a buller while wearing a bullet proof vest), though a near miss or mere shrapnel probably wouldn't bother him much.

Realistically autocannon fire would probably kill him inside the armor even assuming it didn't penetrate (I tend to see SM armor saves against autocannons in game as saving against near hits from explosive rounds, and the failures as sustaining direct hits from autocannon shells). Many modern autocannons can pulp an Elephant with a direct hit through half a meter of concrete, an SM surviving a direct hit would be unlikely, though they may have little or nothing to fear from blast/shrapnel from near misses that would otherwise annihilate normal infantry.

Dedicated anti-tank weaponry of any sort would likely leave *very* dead (read: likely non-existent) unless his ceramite armor really is providing the functional equivalent of more than 260mm of hardened steel in the case of a 50 year old soviet RPG-7 or over a full meter (1000mm+) of hardened steel in the case of many modern 120mm anti-tank rounds, which I doubt.


One must remember that SM's quite often are written with a large amount of plot armor or not depending on author and circumstance, and the game is really much more Fantasy in Space than Science Fiction.


Too many people underestimate just how ridiculously capable modern day weaponry really is, especially when compared with 40k units/weapons. A modern MBT could put a shell capable of penetrating a meter of armor-grade steel through a 2.5m tall space marine (in armor) at 2,000m downrange while moving at highway speeds with a ~90% success rate about 10 times a minute.

Assuming he is standing still, and not running at 30 km/s.

And as I see it, plot armour is as inherent a part of marine as anything else, and needs to be taken into account as much as is possible. IRL lasguns would be a real threat to vehicles but in 40k they barely do anything to marines. Boltguns would be tank-slayers, lascannons would work like bloodlances etc. this means that their armour is stronger than we could logically deduce. In the fluff, non-armoured marines are harder to kill than zombies are in most fiction, taking entire clips to their gut and not slowing (clips from a lasgun, which blow off human arms) and armour that only sci-fi anti-tank can kill.

Vaktathi wrote:

im2randomghgh wrote:

Assuming he is standing still, and not running at 30 km/s.

Not a problem for modern MBT's. Modern MBT's like Leopard 2's and Abrams tanks can hit moving 2Mx2M targets while themselves moving at highway speeds at very long ranges with very high success rates.

And as I see it, plot armour is as inherent a part of marine as anything else, and needs to be taken into account as much as is possible. IRL lasguns would be a real threat to vehicles but in 40k they barely do anything to marines.

Lasguns probably would do stuff to unarmored vehicles, just like modern rifles do. Civilan cars, transport trucks, etc don't like rifle fire and I imagine wouldn't like lasgun fire. To armored vehicles? Probably not, nothing in 40k lore suggests that they would be a threat to such vehicles.

Boltguns would be tank-slayers, lascannons would work like bloodlances etc.

That's getting more than a wee bit silly here, there is absolutely nothing in any 40k lore, depiction or representation to support that. Especially not Bolters slaying battle tanks. Quite often mere walls and the like provide cover from bolter fire in fluff.

this means that their armour is stronger than we could logically deduce.

The bigger issue is consistency as I noted. In some fluff, their armor can be damaged and defeated by lasguns fairly easily, in other fluff it's basically invulnerable even to anything but lascannons.

In the fluff, non-armoured marines are harder to kill than zombies are in most fiction

Zombies are an entirely different thing and depends on entirely what kind of zombie we are talking about., that said, even the hardiest zombies are rendered relatively impotent, even if not "dead" relatively easily as their bodies can be dismembered/exploded/crushed/etc. I'm not recalling much on unarmored marines being unstoppable, merely very hardy.

taking entire clips to their gut and not slowing (clips from a lasgun, which blow off human arms)

Um, can you find an example of a marine taking entire magazines worth of fire to their unarmored gut? Because I certainly can't recall such an example.

1. Again, you are imagining a target such as a vehicle. Marines are not going to run in a straight line. They can duck, weave, reverse on a dime, zigzag etc. do thing normal 2x2 targets (like motorcycles or ultra-compact vehicles) could never hope to do.

2. Well being able to blow off limbs suggest power similar to a .50cal on the standard setting, and .50cal are a serious threat to vehicles. Also, they can be cranked up powerful enough to make an exit hole too on most lightly-medium light armoured vehicles. When you overcharge you could damage a tank (since overcharge can crack dreadnoughts)

3. I admit bolts wouldn't do much to heavy armour, but really any vehicle <45tons would be boned. These are rapid firing, .75 cal armour piercing warheads, which would detonate inside the vehicle after having pierced the outside. Even the Space Marine game let's you demolish most greenskin cover with bolts.

4. Well the general standard seems to be that not much outside of heavy weapons can damage the main parts of the plate, but have very limited rubber armour they need to penetrate with a direct hit to the joints. Unless it happens to be a sword in which case it will someone do more damage than lasers and shotguns #40kproblems.

5. Not unstoppable unarmoured, but more than capable of taking out 1-4 armed and trained humans, unless they're sororitas/ST.

6. The Last Detail, a Dark Hunters short story, has a space marine sans armour get hit with a full fusillade of lasguns fire and then get angry and charge the humans who fired at him, and murder their asses.