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Say it takes average 10 swings and 100 bullets to reliably penetrate the armour.

Say you start shooting 500 metres away from the swordsman, with a weapon which shoots 500 rpm in sustained fire.

The swordsman moves towards you at about 3mph, taking advantage of cover.

You with the gun get 13 minutes of shooting at him before he can be in range to hit you.

The exact chance of killing the swordsman can't be calculated without knowing the amount of cover but you get the point.

The swordsman might not even see where you are hiding, because you have smokeless ammo and are lying down in cover.

Kilkrazy wrote:

GundamMerc wrote:I'm going to ignore this thread. It grows boring trying to argue that there is no knowing how powerful a kinetic/edge weapon with monomolecular blades would be because there is no real life example. So until one of you invents such a device that can keep its edge like the ones in 40k do, stop arguing that it can't be done, as you have no proof.

That isn't my argument. I've got no problem with imaginary engineering. I just disagree that it would not be applied to both sides of the equation.

What I am saying is that if a bullet can't penetrate the armour, but a monomolecular edged sword can, then someone would invent a gun which fired monomolecular edged bullets that penetrated armour from 1 meter beyond the reach of the swordsman

Thus there would be almost no melee combat.

Yep. Once you develop simple expanding gas chemical compounds or even tanks suffiicent to hold pressurized gas, there's no where Bob the barbarian arm can project force like Bob with mechanical/gas thrower. The only instance thats not the case is a power weapon. Those are uncommon in gaming and rare as heck in fluff.

-Monofiliament (whatever). If it can be reproduced in a bullet it CAN be reproduced in an arrow/bolt.

AndrewC wrote: A sword, even a monomolecular blade has a greater area of impact and what everyoone seems to forget, is that even if the blade has a monomolecular edge, the rest of the blade doesn't, and there is greater and greater resistance as you attempt to force the rest of the blade past the armour.

Andrew has hit the nail on the head. There has been a culture on earth that has had at least some mono-molecular edged weapons and still be exterminated. Obsidian is crystalline, it fractures along planes which gives it its good cutting edge; anyone who has studied atomic crystalline structure knows how fine the edge would be if you got the right plane angle.

It doesn't tend to slice through metal armour very well.

AndrewC wrote:
I don't really understand your reference to reliability, could you expand on that please?

Now I know I am oversimplifying but understand this is the MOST BASIC of examples.

Take a friend, Paintball gun Marker, and a bat.

You have the Paintball Marker, your friend has a bat.

Both of you put on full football padding.

Stand at 10 feet.

Fight

See who wins.

What about if you try the same scenario but you have a flamethrower.

Daemon-Archon Ren wrote:

AndrewC wrote:
I don't really understand your reference to reliability, could you expand on that please?

Now I know I am oversimplifying but understand this is the MOST BASIC of examples.

Take a friend, Paintball gun Marker, and a bat.

You have the Paintball Marker, your friend has a bat.

Both of you put on full football padding.

Stand at 10 feet.

Fight

See who wins.

The problem I have with that example is how did he get to 10 feet? Your example has already slewed the results heavily in one direction. Lets try the same example with them 100 feet apart, with the rules that one hit on either side results in a loss? Who wins then?

Guns will always win over melee unless the melee weilder can approach unobserved.

Cheers

Andrew

Guns will always win over melee unless the melee weilder can approach unobserved

Or unless the gun user is unable to kill all the melee fighters before they get to them.
A basic combat weapon is a lot cheaper to build and mantain than a gun. No ammo costs, often a lot less parts that can wear out. This means you can have more of them. If you have 100 guys with guns against 500 guys with swords standing 100 metres apart with cover between them I am pretty sure that the melee weilders will win. In 40k life is cheap, generals will happily give their guys cheap weapons and just throw more soldiers at the enemy. If one guy gets 10metres closer than he started before you kill him, then another guy appears behind him when he goes down it won't take long for them to get in your face.

In 40k where wars often last 100s of years and cover multiple planets it isn't difficult to suspect that in some areas supplies will be low. Once you have no more bullets that bolter isn't really going to do much against a raging ork.


In WW2 machine guns which could fire 100s of shots a minute were used but people still managed to get into the enmy trenches.

40k also has multiple ways of getting up close without being a target. If you are against and army with lots of guns but no cc weapons and little combat training, deep striking into their battle line with a group of melee armed guys will probably end up with the other team taking a lot of casulties.

Also the if the melee user has a good armour (say a SM in PA) then it will be easier to get through the armour when the SM is a long way away. At long range you have crack missile and massed firepower. At close range you have any kind of armour penatrating weapon (power weapons are relatively rare) and your fists/ knives. Against a better trained opponent hitting them in melee is going to be hard, which isn't good when you only have one reliable weapon. Hitting them with masses of normal attacks is less likerly to work than massed gunfire because only 2 or 3 guys can get to 1 guy at a time. When the opponent can beat you as easily in combat as in a gunfight, and is less vunerable up close it isn't good to get anywhere near him.

Once one army manages to successfully use melee other armies need to find a way to stop them from getting into combat or include melee to prevent themselves from being automatically beaten in combat.

Agreed.
40k is way more cool than it is realistic.
I think it would be a lot less fun without cc.

4M2A wrote:
Or unless the gun user is unable to kill all the melee fighters before they get to them.
A basic combat weapon is a lot cheaper to build and mantain than a gun. No ammo costs, often a lot less parts that can wear out. This means you can have more of them. If you have 100 guys with guns against 500 guys with swords standing 100 metres apart with cover between them I am pretty sure that the melee weilders will win. In 40k life is cheap, generals will happily give their guys cheap weapons and just throw more soldiers at the enemy. If one guy gets 10metres closer than he started before you kill him, then another guy appears behind him when he goes down it won't take long for them to get in your face.

In 40k where wars often last 100s of years and cover multiple planets it isn't difficult to suspect that in some areas supplies will be low. Once you have no more bullets that bolter isn't really going to do much against a raging ork.

In WW2 machine guns which could fire 100s of shots a minute were used but people still managed to get into the enmy trenches.

40k also has multiple ways of getting up close without being a target. If you are against and army with lots of guns but no cc weapons and little combat training, deep striking into their battle line with a group of melee armed guys will probably end up with the other team taking a lot of casulties.

Also the if the melee user has a good armour (say a SM in PA) then it will be easier to get through the armour when the SM is a long way away. At long range you have crack missile and massed firepower. At close range you have any kind of armour penatrating weapon (power weapons are relatively rare) and your fists/ knives. Against a better trained opponent hitting them in melee is going to be hard, which isn't good when you only have one reliable weapon. Hitting them with masses of normal attacks is less likerly to work than massed gunfire because only 2 or 3 guys can get to 1 guy at a time. When the opponent can beat you as easily in combat as in a gunfight, and is less vunerable up close it isn't good to get anywhere near him.

Once one army manages to successfully use melee other armies need to find a way to stop them from getting into combat or include melee to prevent themselves from being automatically beaten in combat.

I'm not sure whether you're agreeing with me or not.

We have a thread in which it is stated/implied that melee weapons are better than projectile weapons and thats where it all goes a bit Pete Tong. You, like the OP, are using the exception, not the rule. The comparison should be a lasgun vs a cc weapon, not a ML vs a power sword.

100 vs 500, I'll take the guns, because by the time the 500 get to the 100 they will be tired and exhausted and taken so many casualties that their will to fight will be shot, if they have not already broken and fled. Charge of the Light Brigade, melee lost. Scots at Culloden, melee lost. Japanese during their civil wars, oh melee lost to the muskets. Rourkes drift, melee lost, bugger it, it didn't and Micheal Caine died. So off the top of my head there's 3:1 in favour of ranged weapons.

I don't think that anyone has said that melee has no place in 40K, just it's importance is way overplayed in the rules.

Andrew

Andrew has hit the nail on the head. There has been a culture on earth that has had at least some mono-molecular edged weapons and still be exterminated. Obsidian is crystalline, it fractures along planes which gives it its good cutting edge; anyone who has studied atomic crystalline structure knows how fine the edge would be if you got the right plane angle.

It doesn't tend to slice through metal armour very well.

I have...oh and chrystallography sucks by the way

Obsidian is one of the very weakest natural geological materials known to man so no winder it cant cut jack, lol.
There goes all the fun in reading about fantasy or sci fi heroes toting gigantic obsidian swords of doom, its utter bs.

And it cant slice through metal, NO mono edged blade will EVER be able to slice through metals like steel, even if the blade so is made of some super titanium-thingy alloy and not obsidian.

Why? The thicker blade following the edge will have to push apart the steel it is trying to slice through and thus affecting the steel by a tensile force and steel has an INCREDIBLY strong tensile envelope (contrary to shear strength which is non existent relatively speaking).

Kilkrazy wrote:What about if you try the same scenario but you have a flamethrower.

Who was the guy who first thought "I really really want to set you on fire, but I am too lazy to walk over there and do it myself." -some other guy/

Kilkrazy wrote:What about if you try the same scenario but you have a flamethrower.

Instead of flamethrower, it would be supersoaker with 100degree (F) water and go ahead and redo the test, I would still rather be the spacemarine in poweramor with the chainsword.

I said ten feet because the max range of a bolter is 24 inches, a person can walk 6 inches, and charge another 6inches to hit the bolter guy with his chainsword.... thus half the range of the baseball can be covered by the bat swinger. So if 20 feet would be more understandable, so be it, I was basing it off of average human walking speed.

Also, neither is a 1shot kill, with a 2/3 chance that the bullet after hitting (50% chance of missing, then 50% chance of doing something after it hit) the bat is more reliable as the demonstration will show, the bat person is more likely to cause more damage.


Now magnify the example, make the Bat a chainsword in the hands of a chaos space marine, turn the ball into a lasgun (standard and most commonly issued weapon of the imperium) in the hands of a guardsman. The Marine has the superior weapon in vastly superior armor, the guardsman can be as far away as 2x the distance the scary CSM will be from him and not as accurate with his gun as that marine is with his sword... The guardsman will most likely be pissing himself by the time the scary marine starts wailing on him.... <- Is why there is melee in 40k. Also if not for melee we would all be fish.

Your example is basically a translation into real life terms of the rules in 40K. Naturally it justifies the rules.

This thread is about whether real life (with a bit of Handwavium) translates into 40K rules.

Real life experience does not justify the rules. People are having trouble coming up with bits of Handwavium which justify the rules.

The best Handwavium thing is the shields in Dune. 40K shields do not work like them.

I think CC is common on 40k because armies like orks or tyranids are designed for CC, so the other armies need to answer to that type of combat. And, of course, sometimes it's better to quickly kill the enemy by your own hand. Also remember that many armies want to scar their enemies (like Space Marines, Eldar or Necrons) or are blood-thirsty (like Chaos Space Marines), so close-combat is a good way of acommplish these objectives. That's my opinion. Good thread!

Reason there is melee in 40k.

Teleporters.

/thread

Why not use teleporter to send a bomb into enemy army?

Kilkrazy wrote:Why not use teleporter to send a bomb into enemy army?

because teleporting armored warriors with chainsaws is way more cool than teleporting a bomb.

and that about sums up 40k, what would be most awesome, not what would be most realistic.

Kilkrazy wrote:Why not use teleporter to send a bomb into enemy army?

Because that would explode the teleportation device/homer which is likely to be a lost tech.

The just teleport the bomb ABOVE the enemy.

Whistling sound, chainsaw wielding maniacs look up, are introduced to the joy of fusion.

better idea, teleport explosive men weilding chainsaws.

once they teleport into a crowd, hack apart a few limbs, and die, they explode!

Frazzled wrote:The just teleport the bomb ABOVE the enemy.

Whistling sound, chainsaw wielding maniacs look up, are introduced to the joy of fusion.

Then you would have to position an aircraft carrying a homing device or teleport gizmo above the enemy, which would be pointless as you could just use conventional bombing techniques if you had to do that anyway.

Just nuke it from orbit...

THIS

The one problem that everyone forgets with guns... you need to reload sometime. Plus, even the modern day soldier carries a close combat weapon (knife anyone). The 40k ones are just bigger to get through the armour.

Daemon-Archon Ren wrote:
Instead of flamethrower, it would be supersoaker with 100degree (F) water and go ahead and redo the test, I would still rather be the spacemarine in poweramor with the chainsword.

How can you compare the lethality of melee vs ranged when you give one person a nonlethal weapon?

Daemon-Archon Ren wrote:
I said ten feet because the max range of a bolter is 24 inches, a person can walk 6 inches, and charge another 6inches to hit the bolter guy with his chainsword.... thus half the range of the baseball can be covered by the bat swinger. So if 20 feet would be more understandable, so be it, I was basing it off of average human walking speed.

The notional lethal range for a modern assault rifle is app 300 meters, so using your calcs an autogun would/should have a range of 450"

Daemon-Archon Ren wrote:
Also, neither is a 1shot kill, with a 2/3 chance that the bullet after hitting (50% chance of missing, then 50% chance of doing something after it hit) the bat is more reliable as the demonstration will show, the bat person is more likely to cause more damage.

Apples to oranges, lets use identical stats. WS3 vs BS3 LG Str 3 vs St3 and T3 on each. And Sv4+
Both have a 50% chance to hit, wound and save.
Which one is better? the gun. Why because I can hit you, at range, without you hitting me.

Daemon-Archon Ren wrote:
Now magnify the example, make the Bat a chainsword in the hands of a chaos space marine, turn the ball into a lasgun (standard and most commonly issued weapon of the imperium) in the hands of a guardsman. The Marine has the superior weapon in vastly superior armor, the guardsman can be as far away as 2x the distance the scary CSM will be from him and not as accurate with his gun as that marine is with his sword... The guardsman will most likely be pissing himself by the time the scary marine starts wailing on him.... <- Is why there is melee in 40k. Also if not for melee we would all be fish.

Still apples to oranges, the CSM is what 3 times the PV of the IG so to make it a level playing field the CSM is taking three times as many shots. Lets face it the CSM could die to the very first shot, or even die in h2h with one grot?

As has been said many times, melee works in 40K because the rules work that way, what it is not is a realistic depiction of melee weapons.

GundamMerc wrote:
Plus, even the modern day soldier carries a close combat weapon (knife anyone).

No, the modern day soldier carries a utility knife which can also be used as a weapon. They are also taught that if they ever have to use it to defend themselves then they have already lost their best and primary weapon, ie their rifle. The modern day soldier is taught to kill their enemy with as little risk to themselves. ie hurt them before they can hurt you. How do you do that? shoot them at a distance.

Cheers

Andrew

While everyone up to this point has been reasonable in their postings of their point of view, are we likely to change them?

These are just made of awesome sauce.

GundamMerc wrote:The one problem that everyone forgets with guns... you need to reload sometime. Plus, even the modern day soldier carries a close combat weapon (knife anyone). The 40k ones are just bigger to get through the armour.

Yes, yes, yes, and swords need to be sharpened, or chainswords need to be refuelled, and soldiers' arms get tired.

All weapons have advantages and disadvantages.

Kilkrazy wrote:
All weapons have advantages and disadvantages.

Nid/Daemon/Beast claws?

Nid/Daemon/Beast claws?

Beasts? lol Shoot them.

Deamon weapons often screw with the wielders mind, taking them over, making irrational decisions etc.

I´d take a man portable lascannon over a deamon weapon or beast claws any given day.

The only realistic was melee weapons would fit into the 40k universe are boarding actions or very close quarters blitz fighting.

But then again, why teleport board a hive ship when you can teleport over a nuke, its idiotic.

Or why launch pods in boarding actions when you can have nukes inside the pods instead of marines, upon impact when the pod breeches the hull just have it go of and problem solved.

And even when launching marine manned pods in boarding actions I always wonder why the hell they dont launch like 10 decoy pods for every manned one so that AAA fire will most probably down empty pods instead of having marines suffer casualties due to point defense fire.

I meant Chaos Daemon claws, not Daemon weapons. Ironically, my Daemon weapon of choice is that of tzeentch (giving you D6 Str4ap3 shots)

Daemon-Archon Ren wrote:

Kilkrazy wrote:
All weapons have advantages and disadvantages.

Nid/Daemon/Beast claws?

If you look at real life large creatures such as bears or lions, their claws need sharpening and can suffer from injuries and infections.