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Made in dk
Bonkers Buggy Driver with Rockets




Denmark.

I just watched my first Star Wars movie. The fourth one. Decent film.

As I was watching the lightsaber-fights in the movie, I came to wonder if Power Weapons (who are basically 40K's version of the lightsabers) work in combat. Do they clash with each other with a blinding light, or do people dodge them? Do they cut, distort, destroy, or something completely different? I know that Thunder Hammers use their 'Power Bit' to explode when striking, but that's about the amount of knowledge I have. Also, how much can a Power Sword fluffwise cut? I know the current crunch is AP 3, which falls short to damage Terminator armour, but what's the effect on those, then? A large cut, but not deep enough? Do they just 'bounce off'?

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Made in us
Gore-Soaked Lunatic Witchhunter




Seattle

Both. A power weapon, in fluff, will pretty much instantly destroy any weapon that parries it that is not also equipped with a powerfield.

The powerfield itself causes matter to break apart on the molecular level, which is then backed up by a physical blade or axe-head or hammer-head or whatever to get at whatever's inside the armor plate you just molecularly destabilized.

The Sollex-pattern Power Sword does away with the metal blade entirely, and is a weapon of pure energy, the closest thing to an actual lightsaber you'll find in the setting.

As to how much they can cut is very much dependent on who is writing the fluff. It is known that they use Imperium-standard powercells to function, but how long a single cell lasts is all up to the author. Same with the cutting power... in Dark Heresy, you will find very few weapons with superior armor penetration, and those that possess it are either lascannons or attacks driven by powerful psykers.

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Made in gb
Courageous Space Marine Captain






Glasgow, Scotland

Also, bear in mind fluff can also change with new game rules. For example, older fluff has power swords shearing through Terminator Armour, but if the same story was written today it might have the sword bounce. Not that it makes a difference when half the stuff coming from BL is HH now but regardless.

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Made in us
Jealous that Horus is Warmaster




Tampa, Florida

Think of it like game terms. Power Swords slice through power armor with no problem at all, represented by AP3. They still can kill terminators, but it actually takes extra effort. After all, they can always roll a 1.

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Made in se
Glorious Lord of Chaos






The burning pits of Hades, also known as Sweden in summer

 TranSpyre wrote:
Think of it like game terms. Power Swords slice through power armor with no problem at all, represented by AP3. They still can kill terminators, but it actually takes extra effort. After all, they can always roll a 1.


Do not think of it like game terms. The game says that if someone wears TDA, you might as well punch him for all the difference a Power Sword will make.

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Made in us
Quick-fingered Warlord Moderatus




Norway

The only (normal) thing that can stop that is Tefminator Armour. And I'm sure people has made that point before me.

This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2014/12/31 23:30:13


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Made in us
Gore-Soaked Lunatic Witchhunter




Seattle

Though, in DH, a Power Sword is pretty damn handy against a Terminator. It doesn't treat the armor like paper, but it certainly gives you a fighting chance against it...

Unless you're a Space Marine, in which case you can tear TDA apart with a power weapon as if it were paper.

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Made in gb
Thermo-Optical Hac Tao





Gosport, UK

 Deadshot wrote:
Also, bear in mind fluff can also change with new game rules. For example, older fluff has power swords shearing through Terminator Armour, but if the same story was written today it might have the sword bounce. Not that it makes a difference when half the stuff coming from BL is HH now but regardless.


It does still make a difference, HH is Space Marines against Space Marines, the exact place you'd see a SM using a Powersword against a Terminator.
   
Made in gb
Is 'Eavy Metal Calling?





UK

As mentioned above, it's the power field that cuts through the armour, but the blade that then does the damage. Much like a Chainfist, where it's the Power Field that weakens the structure to the point the chainblade can cut through with ease.

As for in-game AP values for different Power Weapons, those are an abstraction; in theory, a Power Field can destabilise nearly anything, but at the same time, a greater force or a 'Cutting edge' might be needed to fully penetrate. So, for exaple, an axe might be better at cutting TDA not because it is inherently 'sharper', but because you can swing it with much more force than a sword, so force the Power Field deeper into the material. Similarly, a Mace might have an equally strong Power Field, but the force is dissipated over a wider area, so instead of cutting the armour it gives a concussive effect as everything within a certain distance of the impact is destabilised.

As for duelling, I can't think of any examples, but I very much doubt they'd be used in the same manner as Lightsabers. Especially considering that the defining thing with lightsaber combat is that any part of the blade is equally strong and sharp, whereas Power Swords still require force and a bladed edge to actually penetrate anything. If anything, I imagine it would be more akin to traditional swordplay with a healthy dose of physical combat throw in (assuming we're talking SM here, a punch thrown by them can shatter bone and pulp flesh, so they would likely mix very physical moves in with the swordplay). I also have a feeling that I've read that stronger Power Fields will break weaker ones, so unless you know the exact strength of your enemy's power weapon, you may well try to avoid rather than actually parry/catch/block their blade, much as you would with a real sword (with which the edge will become chipped if you keep bashing it on another).

 
   
Made in us
Nasty Nob




Cary, NC

 The Wise Dane wrote:
I just watched my first Star Wars movie. The fourth one. Decent film.

As I was watching the lightsaber-fights in the movie, I came to wonder if Power Weapons (who are basically 40K's version of the lightsabers) work in combat. Do they clash with each other with a blinding light, or do people dodge them? Do they cut, distort, destroy, or something completely different? I know that Thunder Hammers use their 'Power Bit' to explode when striking, but that's about the amount of knowledge I have. Also, how much can a Power Sword fluffwise cut? I know the current crunch is AP 3, which falls short to damage Terminator armour, but what's the effect on those, then? A large cut, but not deep enough? Do they just 'bounce off'?


In regards to Terminator armor, it's really important to take the TT stats as a statistical abstraction and not a good description of what a 'real' power sword does.

It's not that the powerfield of a power sword doesn't do anything to Terminator Armor. It's that, in a single brief engagement, a power sword is going to have to incapacitate a Terminator in the same way a chainsword will have to: by targeting vulnerable chinks and linkages (joints, cables, etc) rather than being able to attempt a single, risky (also known as going last) strike that pierces armor and takes out your opponent (like a power fist or power axe might be able to do).

However, like lightsabers, power swords force the user to forfeit a lot of the moves of standard swordplay. You can't grasp the ricasso for power or accuracy, nor can you reverse your grip for a murder stroke (aka as a pommel bash). You can't grip the blade for a cross parry, either. Of course, being able to slice through damn near anything has some upsides too.

If you ever find yourself thinking that the TT game does a good job of representing power swords, ask yourself why they are singularly useless vs. vehicles. I mean, slicing through power armor shouldn't be that much easier than cutting through a tank tread or hatch, should it?

 
   
Made in us
Decrepit Dakkanaut





Vallejo, CA

Power weapons are decidedly not light sabres, though, and not just for fluff, but also in that grey-zone between fluff and mechanics.

Remember that a power weapon uses the weilder's strength, unaugmented. That means that anything you couldn't do with a regular sword, you more or less can't do with a power sword. A lightsabre will cut through a blast door, or the side armor of a tank, and cut through bone and metal limbs as if they weren't there. They GREATLY augment the user's destructive capability.

Power weapons give a user better armor penetration, but that's about it. The difference between a power sword and a regular sword is about the same difference between regular bullets and FMJ rounds. Same killing power, but one just ignores body armor a lot better.

As for descriptions, I recall reading somewhere that the field can emit sparks and puffs of ozone when it bonks into other stuff, especially other energy-field-based stuff. In my own fluff writing, I've just one with that.


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 Ailaros wrote:
Power weapons are decidedly not light sabres, though, and not just for fluff, but also in that grey-zone between fluff and mechanics.

Remember that a power weapon uses the weilder's strength, unaugmented. That means that anything you couldn't do with a regular sword, you more or less can't do with a power sword. A lightsabre will cut through a blast door, or the side armor of a tank, and cut through bone and metal limbs as if they weren't there. They GREATLY augment the user's destructive capability.

Power weapons give a user better armor penetration, but that's about it. The difference between a power sword and a regular sword is about the same difference between regular bullets and FMJ rounds. Same killing power, but one just ignores body armor a lot better.

As for descriptions, I recall reading somewhere that the field can emit sparks and puffs of ozone when it bonks into other stuff, especially other energy-field-based stuff. In my own fluff writing, I've just one with that.



Power swords can actually cut clean through blast doors without much effort (from a marine). Lightsabers however can't cut through blast doors in any useful amount of time as shown in TPM.

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Made in il
Troubled By Non-Compliant Worlds





Power weapons cut through bulkheads as if they are cheese, While Lightsabers have a hard time cutting through tanks and such and that's why they usually lift them up and crush them with force power thingies.

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