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Most 40k weapons have a reasonable degree of passable technobabble attatched to them (how well that holds up under scrutiny is variable and not really very important imo) but I haven't seen a whole lot about volkite weapons other than that they fire some kind of... thermal beam? Which causes tremendous amounts of deflagration, I guess. Can anyone fill me in any better?

Don't get me wrong, they sound (and look) awesome, but I like technobabble and I feel like I'm missing out.

Apparently the AdMech barely understood how to make them or what they did at the outset of the great crusade.....so its anybody's best guess right now

The 40K wikia expands the info slightly with more technical arm waving

http://warhammer40k.wikia.com/wiki/Volkite_Weapon

A Volkite Weapon is an arcane term used by the Adeptus Mechanicus to refer to a class of powerful thermal ray weapons whose technology is pre-Imperial in origin and dates back to the Age of Strife. These compact weapons possessed considerable killing power, surpassing most other armaments of their size. Volkite Weapons produced a deflagrating attack, in which subsonic combustion caused by a beam of thermal energy propagated through a material by thermodynamic heat transfer, so that hot burning material heated the next layer of cold material and ignited it. A Volkite weapon's heat ray had a devastating effect on organic matter, explosively burning flesh into ash and jetting fire.

Pumped up microwave guns?

UUUUULLLLLAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!!! (dun dun dunnnnnnnnn)

So its a high power infra-red laser?

Actually, looks like it's a high powered chip-pan fire. Shoots a mist of burning... stuff.

Nice.

Huh... I always thought it was like, a lightning gun.....

So... it's kind of like a meltagun?

 TheCustomLime wrote:
So... it's kind of like a meltagun?

As far as I can tell, it's essentially the anti-personnel version of melta.

Perfect Organism wrote:

 TheCustomLime wrote:
So... it's kind of like a meltagun?

As far as I can tell, it's essentially the anti-personnel version of melta.

uuuhh, meltas are already anti-personnel. Not many things are able to take a melta shot to the face and survive. Unless this weapon has a much longer range, I don't see it being to the Melta in any way.

Its basically a heat ray. Deflagration means subsonic combustion. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deflagrate

So it pretty much uses a ray to light stuff on fire, and for some reason its especially effective against living tissue.


A melta weapon may work on a similar principal but I don't think so. The lexicanum entry for Melta weapons says they work by sub-atomic agitation. http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Melta_Weaponry#.UhuxNpxH6EE

This is more like a Microwave, while Volkite weapons seem to work by direct application of actual heat. Microwaves heat water because the waves have an effect on polar molecules causing them to vibrate which generates heat.

Melta weapons agitate all molecules in the path of the beam, causing anything hit to heat up from the inside very rapidly.


So they both work with heat. One gives a direct application of intense heat(Volkite) the other uses atomic friction(Melta) to heat up the matter.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 TheDraconicLord wrote:

Perfect Organism wrote:

 TheCustomLime wrote:
So... it's kind of like a meltagun?

As far as I can tell, it's essentially the anti-personnel version of melta.

uuuhh, meltas are already anti-personnel. Not many things are able to take a melta shot to the face and survive. Unless this weapon has a much longer range, I don't see it being to the Melta in any way.

Melta weaponry is only anti-personnel in the sense that a 105mm SABOT round is anti-personnel. If you get hit, you are totally dead.

But its an intended round for killing hard targets.


So while a Meltagun can kill a single infantry target, its not an efficient use of the shot. You are swatting a fly with a Buick so to speak.

 Grey Templar wrote:
Its basically a heat ray. Deflagration means subsonic combustion. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deflagrate

So it pretty much uses a ray to light stuff on fire, and for some reason its especially effective against living tissue.


A melta weapon may work on a similar principal but I don't think so. The lexicanum entry for Melta weapons says they work by sub-atomic agitation. http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Melta_Weaponry#.UhuxNpxH6EE

This is more like a Microwave, while Volkite weapons seem to work by direct application of actual heat. Microwaves heat water because the waves have an effect on polar molecules causing them to vibrate which generates heat.

Melta weapons agitate all molecules in the path of the beam, causing anything hit to heat up from the inside very rapidly.


So they both work with heat. One gives a direct application of intense heat(Volkite) the other uses atomic friction(Melta) to heat up the matter.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 TheDraconicLord wrote:

Perfect Organism wrote:

 TheCustomLime wrote:
So... it's kind of like a meltagun?

As far as I can tell, it's essentially the anti-personnel version of melta.

uuuhh, meltas are already anti-personnel. Not many things are able to take a melta shot to the face and survive. Unless this weapon has a much longer range, I don't see it being to the Melta in any way.

Melta weaponry is only anti-personnel in the sense that a 105mm SABOT round is anti-personnel. If you get hit, you are totally dead.

But its an intended round for killing hard targets.


So while a Meltagun can kill a single infantry target, its not an efficient use of the shot. You are swatting a fly with a Buick so to speak.

To be fair, as Jurgen showed, if your enemy is kind enough to stand in a tightly packed conga line you can kill quite a few with one shot.

True, but we aren't fighting Battle Droids in the 41st millennium

Melta weapons not having a template in regular 40k is a balance issue. If they did have a template nobody would ever take Flamers.

Sounds more like a focused microwave as stated.

Interestingly meltaguns used to basically be fiery power washers but the concentrated beam made them better at anti-armour. So much so that multi-meltas on vehicles could fire as a flamer by 'dispersing the flame'

 Grey Templar wrote:
True, but we aren't fighting Battle Droids in the 41st millennium

Melta weapons not having a template in regular 40k is a balance issue. If they did have a template nobody would ever take Flamers.

In a zone mortalis setting using a melta gun should realistically result in much amusement for all sides involved.. While using a missile launcher would be all kinds of hilarious on your team mates if the point man's got it.

And by hilarious I mean they'll be coughing out their kidneys.

 Flinty wrote:
UUUUULLLLLAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!!! (dun dun dunnnnnnnnn)

So its a high power infra-red laser?

haha... nice!

Gotta give you props for the War of the worlds Reference

Near as I can tell they're sort of like meltas in the sense they have a thermal effect (burn/melt stuff.) But rather than relying on the energy coming from the melta's power source, they cause the target (if its organic at least) to combust.

Think of it as a sci fi disintegrator ray that causes spontaneous combustion in the target, and that probably would be accurate lol. Sort of like what would happen if your organic being happened to be made entirely of gunpowder (at least modern powder, which deflagrates IIRC.)

Why it's meant to be something fancy, new, and expensive for Forgeworld to sell you.

To be fair they are 30K weapons and really cool looking. As far as I can tell they were replace by bolt guns in the legios astartes. They are also not that more expensive than buying bolters, so it could be a cool idea for a conversion...

I always thought that the melta weapons were closer to fission weapons that caused the target to experience fission. Their "radiation" that caused such appears to be narrow beam and only affect the surface of any given target (until it melta through). They would therefore not have a template and require some focusing time to cause an effect (this would explain why they loose punch with distance as the distance reduced the radiation intensity).

Volkite weapons appear to closer to microwave weapons or spontaneous combustion radiation weapons. Something that resonates with organic matter causing it to absorb energy and deflagrate.

Yeah, but essentially everything is a 30K weapon, if you think about it.

Much like a chinese or korean knockoff of a AK47 is the same as a russian AK47...

BTW I personally purchase FW 30K special weapons rather than the GW ones. If you order them in bulk (with others or order all your stuff at the end of the year) they are cheaper than GW; FW = 17 usd for 10 vs GW = 10 usd for 5. That and I prefer the look of them (and FW stuff tends to be better quality in my experience).

I wish they had all the 30K stuff into the 40K game. Have you seen the admech stuff?

 OrlandotheTechnicoloured wrote:
The 40K wikia expands the info slightly with more technical arm waving

http://warhammer40k.wikia.com/wiki/Volkite_Weapon

A Volkite Weapon is an arcane term used by the Adeptus Mechanicus to refer to a class of powerful thermal ray weapons whose technology is pre-Imperial in origin and dates back to the Age of Strife. These compact weapons possessed considerable killing power, surpassing most other armaments of their size. Volkite Weapons produced a deflagrating attack, in which subsonic combustion caused by a beam of thermal energy propagated through a material by thermodynamic heat transfer, so that hot burning material heated the next layer of cold material and ignited it. A Volkite weapon's heat ray had a devastating effect on organic matter, explosively burning flesh into ash and jetting fire.

I've looked around in the HH Betrayal book and a lot of this information is just made up by 40k wiki. Lexicanum's article is more accurate as to the actual information presented. 40k wiki tends to add a lot of stuff to make the articles sound better.

ansacs wrote:
I am currently trying to figure out how to make a counts as admech army just so I have an excuse to make an army with these models.
[/spoiler]

I've already suggested with some conversion those robots might make excellent Counts As for those awful new Centurions in the SM codex.

 Veteran Sergeant wrote:

ansacs wrote:
I am currently trying to figure out how to make a counts as admech army just so I have an excuse to make an army with these models.
[/spoiler]

I've already suggested with some conversion those robots might make excellent Counts As for those awful new Centurions in the SM codex.

I think so as well. Now the real question is what is the size of the new centurion?

 ansacs wrote:

 Veteran Sergeant wrote:

ansacs wrote:
I am currently trying to figure out how to make a counts as admech army just so I have an excuse to make an army with these models.
[/spoiler]

I've already suggested with some conversion those robots might make excellent Counts As for those awful new Centurions in the SM codex.

I think so as well. Now the real question is what is the size of the new centurion?

Slightly bigger than a terminator (somebody did a comparisson based on the head size.

Volkite seems to be along the same lines as the Star Wars/Trek disruptor.

You know where they shoot them and they burn form the inside out and it's a really cool and completely cheesy effect?

As for the means from what I've heard its basically a laser...ish...thing that sets of a chain reaction of burning to death horrifically.

Also as far as a military weapon it doesn't seem efficient but definitely seems cool. And doesn't 40k run on the rule of cool anyway?

 ansacs wrote:

 Veteran Sergeant wrote:

ansacs wrote:
I am currently trying to figure out how to make a counts as admech army just so I have an excuse to make an army with these models.
[/spoiler]

I've already suggested with some conversion those robots might make excellent Counts As for those awful new Centurions in the SM codex.

I think so as well. Now the real question is what is the size of the new centurion?

The rumor right now is it is the first 40K model on a 50mm base. So it really has no size equivalent. Looks to be be about halfway between Terminators and Dreadnoughts in terms of height.