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 Tower75 wrote:
Sorry, and old-ish thread now, but I thought I'd share, as we're on the subject of las-tech.

A real "lascannon" ??

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-20944726

Post that in the off-topic section of the site

 Tower75 wrote:
Sorry, and old-ish thread now, but I thought I'd share, as we're on the subject of las-tech.

A real "lascannon" ??

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-20944726

That is awesome. The article also states that they are integrating a multiple shot system and making it mobile. Sounds like a chimera which can pick if it fires 1 shot as a lascannon or the 3 shots as a multilaser. So cool! The link at the bottom of the article is pretty sick also http://m.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-18630622 talkin about laser guided bolts of lightning (plasma).

Seems like we're closing in on some cool 40k tech, I hope some guy isn't developing some kind of Skynet software somewhere.

Regarding Hellguns and Hot-shots, how does reloading works (because you have to reload them in Only War).

Personally I am assuming that the battery is simply too big to fit in the gun, so they put in a backpack, and when you're out of energy, you put in another rather large battery (in fact, the backpack might just carry all the spares, so you just switch them out).

I'd say that is a good rationalisation - at least the "another rather large battery" bit. Personally, I would not run with the backpack carrying "all the spares" as this makes the backpack kind of redundant. If the chargepacks are not that large you could just as well carry them on your belt, after all, or slot them directly into the gun.

I'm almost tempted to presume that "reloading" means replacing the entire backpack, but at the same time I could see it holding more than just the gun battery. Did not the minis have lamp packs or vox caster antennae come out of them as well?

For what it's worth, I would assume the backpack to hold sufficient energy for much more than just 30 shots, too.

If I remember well, 200 shots, according to the Siege of Vraks.

For some reason I have ''millions of shots'' in my head, might have been from either TvTropes or 1D4chan.

Fun fact: there's a ton of Stormtroopers art piece where their guns are not linked to any backpack source, leads me to beleive its possible to have hotshot cells, maybe they hold less shots, so appropriate gear for the mission.

For lasgun patterns, Lucius produces semi-auto lasguns that pack a meaner punch than the standard ones, also, they have 20 shots per cell.

Bobthehero wrote:Fun fact: there's a ton of Stormtroopers art piece where their guns are not linked to any backpack source, leads me to beleive its possible to have hotshot cells, maybe they hold less shots, so appropriate gear for the mission.

Yeah, I think there was a switch some time, has to do with the hot-shot lasgun <-> hellgun thing, I think. I'm still not sure whether it's supposed to be two different guns or the same; the current IG 'dex uses the terms interchangeably but it could well just be a copypaste error given that the text was ripped straight out of the 2E Guard 'dex with just the title changed.

Same deal in Only War, although its hellpistol<->hotshot laspistol.

I used to have a theory where the hellgun is the weapon with the power pack and the hotshot is a hellgun with a hotshot pack, the sort they put on longlas (in Abnettverse, I think).

That doesn't make that much sense anymore tho.

Its all very complicated.

I remember hellgun once having been explained as a corruption of the term HEL-gun, which stood for High Energy Laser.

Also, I like that theory of yours, I think there was a time when I believed the same. For the moment, I'm not sure what to believe anymore. Maybe the next Guard Codex will update us.

Bobthehero wrote:a hotshot pack, the sort they put on longlas (in Abnettverse, I think)

It does exist in GW's vision as well - maybe they got the idea from Abnett tho? Sometimes they do "adopt" stuff from outsourced products.

From Necromunda:
"The Hotshot pack is an especially powerful version of the standard laser power pack. It uses a more expensive and less robust power matrix, with the advantage that it can force more power through a standard laser weapon. However, the risk of burning out the weapon or exhausting the pack itself is much greater than with the standard pack."

It's good for more than one shot, tho. I always found it a bit harsh that the DH version only lets you fire once. Did anyone actually ever use them? It's such a crap piece of gear if you go by FFG's RAW.

Bobthehero wrote:Its all very complicated.

That it is.

Best use I can see for it is a ''that one shot'' piece of gear, put it in a longlas, and you already have around +40 to ballistic skill if you take a round to aim, furthermore, going from personal experience, combat is rarely done at ranges over 50 meters, so the +10 for close range is easy to get.

Using that on my Only War Stormtrooper mean he has 100 BS (50 base right now), making it very easy to get the 4 degrees of success needed to do the 2d10 additional damage, so you're looking at a 3d10+3 AP 1 felling 4 shot with hotshot bonus.

Yeah, good point - although that's more due to how the long las and the talent work by themselves. I guess when looking at the Hot-shot pack I only ever saw that the damage and penetration bonus were so low that I never considered to take them. I also wouldn't want to imagine my character to run around with 20 magazine-sized batteries on the belt just because I want to have 20 shots for the gun.

I guess it's alright with the talent that makes Reloads a free action, as otherwise you lose the bonus from Aim or you can't shoot that round, but I'm still sceptical.

That being said, I don't trust my dice luck in general. My last sniper in Only War (Weapons Specialist with long las) managed to land maybe 1 out of 6 shots or so. So embarassing.

I've had lots of luck with my Stormies, headshotted and finished off 2 nobs during our last combat (okay they had just taken a battlecannon round to the face, but shhhhh)

Killsteal

Actually saved the skin of the Sargeant on that one, she was stuck in melee with 2 nobs, killed one, scared a boy away in the same time.

Battlecannon's useless when there's a melee.

Be lucky you had one - our trenches were overrun by Orks about two minutes after touchdown, and I still think we could've used some heavy weapons or a vehicle there, but unfortunately all that stuff blew up together with the burning lander.
It was a bloodbath. Proper IG style!

Bah, this makes me want to play OW again...

Noone died after 6 session, a ton of Orks and a mechanical chaos spawn.

The Leman Russ helped immensly vs the Orks, and the Hydra gunner put 14 autocannon hits on the spawn, doing 152 damage at the very least. We did not roll all 14 hits.

Sargeant almost died. Carapace armor, 18 wounds and 43 toughness is awesome.

Battlecannon's useless when there's a melee.

I wish the Tech-Priest who wants to lug around an autocannon in my DH game would realize this. Half the party are Clerics (the kind that lead a melee from the front with an Eviscerator) or Assassins (Blade-bunnies, rather than Gun-Bunnies).

... and this dude wants to pour 4d10+ rounds down-range.

Get target selection and then aim a half action, you'll be fine.

Can't Aim for a weapon set to Full Auto Fire. The Tech-Priest believes that semi-auto or single shot offends the War-Spirit of the weapon.

Good one, at least with Target selection he loses penalty for shooting in melee, so that's like 30% less chances of getting hit, right?

It is... but with "Only Human" in effect, everyone is capped at 25 W, and no one wants to get hit with a 4d10+, Pen 5 weapon. It's the off chance that getting hit means burning a Fate Point that has most people leery of getting down-range.

From an IC perspective, the Tech-Priest's apprentice has accidentally shot the leading cleric twice. That cleric believes that a failure of the student is a failure of the instructor, and so assumes the TP is likewise a terrible, terrible shot.

25W

The highest wound we have is 18... xd

Going back to OP, it’s interesting to note that in one of Black Library’s newest novels: Baneblade, it’s has a reference to a sergeant, who is engaged in a firefight in a dust storm, and he states that the beams of their lasguns are being refracted by the storm’s sands, and their range was down to 50 metres or less. I smiled when I read that. Looks like BL authors are stating to take note of “science”.

Science schmience.

I don't know if this has been mentioned yet but a lasgun has significant advantage over ballistic rounds on high gravity planets. Where a ballistic round would have considerable less range than a pulse/beam of light.

I mainly skimmed over this and I am not going to read other posts, for the sake of saving time I hope this helps! In the game fluff, you need to train billions of troopers, and you also need to equipped billions, of HIGLY expendable troopers. The lasgun battery (magazine) can hold up to 120 shots. Whereas a projectile magazine, generally holds 20-30 shots. Think about what it takes to make a bullet, and how much resources it would consume, to make enough bullets to equip the Imperial Guards men. On top of all this when shipping them would it be more costly to lose billions of batteries, or billions of bullets. The guard’s men are highly expendable; I personally see it worthless giving them bullets. Considering the fact that most won’t use them, they would kick the bucket before they shoot. With all the nasty that the universe throws at the Imperium, it seems more logical to give them 120 shots, rather then 20-30. If this is not enough the lasgun is practically maintenance free. This is my option on the Lasgun, hope this helps. And the answer your question about the comparison of bullets to lasers, there will not be a section of men firing at you. There will be a whole rifle battalion shooting generally at one target, making the lasgun relatively more effective.

A laser also doesn't suffer the ballistics and recoil issues that projectile weapons suffer, which means its not only easier to aim and fire (And thus easier to train to be accurate with) but it means that if the rate of fire of the two weapons is comparable, the guy with the lasgun will land more hits than the guy with the projectile weapon (because of those same ballistics and recoil issues.) Which means that a lasgun can technically still do more damage (consider a sustained raking beam on full auto, you can literally slice through your target relatively easily because of that precision and control - blow off limbs, cut off heads, etc.)

Lasers also can inflict thermal effects (flash burns) alongside blowing holes in people (which may or may not inflict bleeding, depending on your source). Bullets also rely on either deformation of the slug, or tumbling (esp. in rifle bullets) or fragmentation (such as with .223 NATO rounds.) to inflict damage, and those can be somewhat more unpredictable in effect. Lasweapons generally either burn or explode holes in their target, and that is somewhat more 'reliable' as a damage mechanism (At least against the same sort of material - lasweapons will get different performance against different materials. EG lasweapons will perform differently on rock and metal than they will on flesh.)

The charge setting option also adds to the versatility, since you have two different firing 'modes' that a normal slughthrower won't have (one might think of it as being like having two or more 'calibers' in the same gun, one more powerful than the other.)

Now, all that said, slugthrowers have certain advantages over lasweapons that never really get addressed. The tech base for stub/autoweapons is alot 'lower' than lasweaponry, and thus while lasweapons might have reliability in some ways (fewer to no moving parts than a projectile weapon) you don't need as sophisticated a tech base to develop or maintain projectile weapons. Likewise, being mechcanical in nature more often than not, slugthrowers are going to be immune to EMP and related effects, which you cannot say the same for a laser.


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 Lynata wrote:
People have been and are working on stuff like this in the real world. Have you never heard of the PEP/PIKL?
http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2008/09/pulsed-laser-fi/

PEP is meant as a less lethal weapon by inflicting damage that reacts to nerves and stuff. It doesn't do any physical damage (although it might be useful in explaining pain/knockdown effects associated iwth lasweaponry at some times.)

Whether PIKL (which was a precursor to that) actually does any physical damage (There used to be a PDF on the topic on scribd but it got deleted and put behind a paywall elsewhere.) is up for debate, since there's not a great deal of information on it (assuming it went anywhere.) But hypothetical laser designers amongst the hard scifi crowd tend to expand on that rather dramatically as per [url=http://panoptesv.com/SciFi/LaserDeathRay/DeathRay.html]This site or the sidearms page of the [url=http://www.projectrho.com/public_html/rocket/sidearmenergy.php]atomic rockets site. There are a few designs by Luke Campbell on that site that closely resemble the uplifting primer/codex/rulebook depiction of laswepaons (comparable to autoweapons, 220 rpm rate of fire, etc.) Lasweapons seem to go with the 'pulsed explosive' idea, although lasweapons lack the penetration described, however (single pulses as opposed to a series of pulses, which result in greater penetration, which would probably be more in line with hellguns.)


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 Lynata wrote:
Granted, this is something I'd just leave in the "Abnettverse" ...

... lack of standardisation for charge packs kind of circumvents the whole idea of why the lasgun is the Guard's weapon of choice in the first place.

Of course it can still happen that the Munitorum won't send you any chargepacks at all... *coughValhallanscough*

there is no such thing as 'standardization' in the Imperium. They can't even exert any kind of political control over the galaxy, much less logistical. Everything is left up to 'local' devices, which is precisely why the Munitorum and Guard operate the way they do, and its the same reason they have utterly unpredictable and random quality when it comes to troops AND equipment.

Having the Guard show up at a location with the wrong kind of ammo, even for lasguns, would make perfect sense in 40K terms. The Munitorum is supposed to be that bureuacratic and inept, remember?

Its alos a bad idea to get into blaster discussions, because they are not universally 'plasma' weapons (they vary from novel to novel. Medstar for example describes them as lightspeed beams, as does the novel 'Destiny's Way', whereas in Darth Maul shadow hunter they were particle beams, as well as PBs in the EGW&T and the NEGW&T. West end game definitions were even more bizarre, as they ranged from coherent light 'laser bullets' to running on chemical energy.) And don't even get into the movies, where you had them ejecting casings (CF TESB when Han is firing on Vader at Cloud City. also notable in that he closes his eyes before shooting and the bolt zips out of his gun when it's not evne aiming at Vader. Blasters apparently are self-aiming.)

Connor MacLeod wrote:Whether PIKL (which was a precursor to that) actually does any physical damage (There used to be a PDF on the topic on scribd but it got deleted and put behind a paywall elsewhere.) is up for debate, since there's not a great deal of information on it (assuming it went anywhere.)

Well, the PIKL was meant as a drone killer (if I remember correctly), so physical damage would've been a must-have. Of course it could just as well be that they didn't manage to get it done, which may be why they opted for the "lesser" version and rebranded it as a stunner.

But ultimately, it's just a matter of how much energy you put through, isn't it? The more juice, the faster the target area heats up. Sooo, at some point, when you crank it up high enough using sci-fi spacetech, it would be just about instantaneous ...?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DHnaNctJ7r0

Connor MacLeod wrote:there is no such thing as 'standardization' in the Imperium

Of course there is. Standard Template Construct, anyone?
Of course this standardisation is extremely limited ... but not totally absent.

I mean, the Imperium has standardised Rhinos but not lasgun chargepacks? Nah, I won't buy that - not just because a single freelance author thought it'd make for a cool minor plot element in some random novel.

Connor MacLeod wrote:Having the Guard show up at a location with the wrong kind of ammo, even for lasguns, would make perfect sense in 40K terms. The Munitorum is supposed to be that bureuacratic and inept, remember?

That's why the Guard can show up without ammo, as referenced in the IG 'dex - but one doesn't have to create additional logistical issues where they are unlikely to exist. I mean, for incompatible types of chargepacks to be in existence, somebody must have made a conscious decision to make them incompatible before coming up with a pattern, and then suceeding in pitching this to the Munitorum. And then the Munitorum has to decide that, yes, they actually will try running several different yet incompatible components alongside each other.
Sure it'd be possible to come up with some sort of backstory to it (industrial bribery?), but it'd be a stretch that - personally - I don't feel a need to bother with. The idea isn't cool enough to warrant an excuse, imho.

"A laser power pack will last for many shots and can be recharged from a standard power source or by exposing its thermal cells to heat or light."
- GW Necromunda

"Las weapons are the most common type of weaponry found in the Imperium, as they are cheap to manufacture and easy to maintain. They also benefit from being easy to recharge, and ammunition shortage is rarely a problem."
- GW Inquisitor RPG

This is 40k, though, so of course it's anyone's own business what they adopt and what they dismiss for their interpretation of the setting. Lots of sources contradict, which means we have to cherrypick from time to time. So if you like it ... no reason not to roll with it!

Connor MacLeod wrote:Its alos a bad idea to get into blaster discussions, because they are not universally 'plasma' weapons (they vary from novel to novel. Medstar for example describes them as lightspeed beams, as does the novel 'Destiny's Way', whereas in Darth Maul shadow hunter they were particle beams, as well as PBs in the EGW&T and the NEGW&T. West end game definitions were even more bizarre, as they ranged from coherent light 'laser bullets' to running on chemical energy.) And don't even get into the movies, where you had them ejecting casings (CF TESB when Han is firing on Vader at Cloud City. also notable in that he closes his eyes before shooting and the bolt zips out of his gun when it's not evne aiming at Vader. Blasters apparently are self-aiming.)

Some of those are probably just continuity issues where SW's canon policy elevates one source over another, whereas the TESB bits (what's "CF"?) sound like typical out-of-universe movie FX issues. I did not even notice those!

 Lynata wrote:


I mean, the Imperium has standardised Rhinos but not lasgun chargepacks? Nah, I won't buy that - not just because a single freelance author thought it'd make for a cool minor plot element in some random novel.

somebody must have made a conscious decision to make them incompatible before coming up with a pattern, and then suceeding in pitching this to the Munitorum. And then the Munitorum has to decide that, yes, they actually will try running several different yet incompatible components alongside each other.

So if you like it ... no reason not to roll with it!

Well, let's think of it this way - Most planets in the Imperium evolved separately for at least a few thousands years during the Age of Strife. During that time, they had lasguns on many worlds, rhinos on many worlds. They also had local variations on such designs. When the Imperium reintegrated these worlds together, they found an STC for Rhinos, and started mass-producing these on forgeworlds for the Adeptus Astartes. Thus all Rhinos are standard. However, each world equips it's own infantry, up to a light-infantry standard, and certainly Tanith's lasguns were made on Tanith.

All Guard regiments are shipped away from their own sector for warfare, and certainly in the case of a Crusade, they're going to come from all over. So whoever made the Tanith guns, well as far as they knew, size X ammo ports for your lasguns are standard, right? Every planet in our subsector uses them, and they're just better. No reason why anyone would make a different size, that defeats the point.

Meanwhile, as the crusade gathers, it turns out most people are using size Y ammo ports, and the Tanith are the exception. Someone high-up in the Munitorum team responsible for supplying the Phantine liberation force doesn't get the memo that the Tanith have size X ammo ports on their weapons. Or doesn't care. So the Tanith can't get their ammo.


Mind you, thinking about this, a much more likely outcome would be the munitorum clerk just saying 'oops, sorry, we've only got size Y charge packs, here's 5,000 Lasguns size Y that we had in storage. We've got 100 million in storage because these things last, and people keep losing the damn things anyway.'

I often wonder what happens to all the discarded lasguns and wargear left behind on battlefields. I was going to write a short story about it once actually, since the Lasgun is meant to be damn hardy, and the sheer volume of them lying around the galaxy must be obscene.



Anyway, of course YMMV in 40K, but I hope that helps that scene in The Guns of Tanith seem a bit more reasonable to you now

Cap'n R

 Captain Roderick wrote:


Well, let's think of it this way - Most planets in the Imperium evolved separately for at least a few thousands years during the Age of Strife. During that time, they had lasguns on many worlds, rhinos on many worlds. They also had local variations on such designs. When the Imperium reintegrated these worlds together, they found an STC for Rhinos, and started mass-producing these on forgeworlds for the Adeptus Astartes. Thus all Rhinos are standard. However, each world equips it's own infantry, up to a light-infantry standard, and certainly Tanith's lasguns were made on Tanith.

All Guard regiments are shipped away from their own sector for warfare, and certainly in the case of a Crusade, they're going to come from all over. So whoever made the Tanith guns, well as far as they knew, size X ammo ports for your lasguns are standard, right? Every planet in our subsector uses them, and they're just better. No reason why anyone would make a different size, that defeats the point.

Meanwhile, as the crusade gathers, it turns out most people are using size Y ammo ports, and the Tanith are the exception. Someone high-up in the Munitorum team responsible for supplying the Phantine liberation force doesn't get the memo that the Tanith have size X ammo ports on their weapons. Or doesn't care. So the Tanith can't get their ammo.


Mind you, thinking about this, a much more likely outcome would be the munitorum clerk just saying 'oops, sorry, we've only got size Y charge packs, here's 5,000 Lasguns size Y that we had in storage. We've got 100 million in storage because these things last, and people keep losing the damn things anyway.'

I often wonder what happens to all the discarded lasguns and wargear left behind on battlefields. I was going to write a short story about it once actually, since the Lasgun is meant to be damn hardy, and the sheer volume of them lying around the galaxy must be obscene.



Anyway, of course YMMV in 40K, but I hope that helps that scene in The Guns of Tanith seem a bit more reasonable to you now

Cap'n R

I thought that the lasgun wasn't adopted by the Guard until M32, two thousand years after the Horus Heresy, or "War between the Planets", as our American Cousins may say

Wasn't the Imperial Army pre, and during the HH armed ballistic/hard-round weaponry?

 Tower75 wrote:

I thought that the lasgun wasn't adopted by the Guard until M32, two thousand years after the Horus Heresy, or "War between the Planets", as our American Cousins may say

Wasn't the Imperial Army pre, and during the HH armed ballistic/hard-round weaponry?

I was trying to find a reference for this, where did you find it? The only reference I can find to standardisation in the Imperial Army was that there wasn't any, which was a massive ballache for all involved. So it's not to say that plenty of regiments didn't have Lasguns before, but not everyone did, and they sure as hell weren't standardised. So maybe the Departmento Munitorum came to be in M32, and they said 'all you bitches, switch to lasguns'.

I understand this is somewhat undermining my position on Tanith having a different standard for its lasweaponry however. Still, although the sizes may be standardised (perhaps 1 through 10?) it still doesn't mean you're going to have the right size all the time. So maybe everyone else on Phantine uses standard size 5's, and nobody realised to get the size 3's put on the right drogue for the Tanith...