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What unit of measurement does the Empire use in the fluff? Do they use meters, or feet, or a one that's made up?

Considering how illogical a lot of the imperium is, probably imperial

HA!

I like you.

Why thank you

In all seriousness, the Imperium is pretty archaic, so probably Imperial, or some made up units.

 ImAGeek wrote:
Why thank you

In all seriousness, the Imperium is pretty archaic, so probably Imperial, or some made up units.

They say meters all the time. They use metric.

Who says metres all the time...

People in the Imperium...

It's metric. The Valhallans even use the slang word "Kloms" instead of Kilometers

So if even the Imperium use Metric, why is 40k not in CM? Literally the only thing I use inches for is Wargaming. Metric is a much more logical system.

 ImAGeek wrote:
So if even the Imperium use Metric, why is 40k not in CM? Literally the only thing I use inches for is Wargaming. Metric is a much more logical system.

The people who first created it were probably more used to imperial than metric. But imperial does match up better with standard dice for game mechanics anyways.

Yeah I guess. It's weirder with like Infinity, in Spain they use Metric and everywhere else (or at least UK and U.S.) they use Imperial.

 Orblivion wrote:

 ImAGeek wrote:
So if even the Imperium use Metric, why is 40k not in CM? Literally the only thing I use inches for is Wargaming. Metric is a much more logical system.

The people who first created it were probably more used to imperial than metric. But imperial does match up better with standard dice for game mechanics anyways.

Pretty much this. The UK used imperial measurements until 1995, 40k being created in 1987 means that the creators were more used to Imperial and it's stuck through the editions.

Yeah, 95 was the year I was born so I forget 40k is that old and we used Imperial til that late.

Its also mor handy to use inch for a game of this size.
You dont gain any advantage when using cm in this game, where everything is pretty vague. Fighting over half a cm would be even more annoying (because it would occur more often) in a competitive game.

fluff wise there are local customs on each planet, including language and other stuff so i wouldnt be surprised if there are also other measurement systems in parallel to the standard metric system. Forgeworld gives its tank measurements/stats in metric, but the weight for imperial navy bombs is in pounds...

Sadly, none of the GW authors actually seem to know what a meter is. "The Traitor Guardsmen were only fifty meters away; scoring headshots left and right". " The wolf crossed the fifty meters in seconds and bowled over the young Fenrisian". Seriously, it's like GW thinks that a meter is the same thing as a foot.

 dusara217 wrote:
Sadly, none of the GW authors actually seem to know what a meter is. "The Traitor Guardsmen were only fifty meters away; scoring headshots left and right". " The wolf crossed the fifty meters in seconds and bowled over the young Fenrisian". Seriously, it's like GW thinks that a meter is the same thing as a foot.

The world record for 50m sprint, men, is 5.56 seconds.

 Keep wrote:

 dusara217 wrote:
Sadly, none of the GW authors actually seem to know what a meter is. "The Traitor Guardsmen were only fifty meters away; scoring headshots left and right". " The wolf crossed the fifty meters in seconds and bowled over the young Fenrisian". Seriously, it's like GW thinks that a meter is the same thing as a foot.

The world record for 50m sprint, men, is 5.56 seconds.

Right, because ordinary humans are going to be able to sprint 150 feet in 5 seconds. Or use pistols with the accuracy of a sniper. Or throw a grenade fifty meters. And Space Marine can use their Bolters like pinpoint sniper rifles at 150 feet. 50 meters is the height of a 15-story building. 50 meters is more than half the length of an American football field.

 dusara217 wrote:

 Keep wrote:

 dusara217 wrote:
Sadly, none of the GW authors actually seem to know what a meter is. "The Traitor Guardsmen were only fifty meters away; scoring headshots left and right". " The wolf crossed the fifty meters in seconds and bowled over the young Fenrisian". Seriously, it's like GW thinks that a meter is the same thing as a foot.

The world record for 50m sprint, men, is 5.56 seconds.

Right, because ordinary humans are going to be able to sprint 150 feet in 5 seconds. Or use pistols with the accuracy of a sniper. Or throw a grenade fifty meters. And Space Marine can use their Bolters like pinpoint sniper rifles at 150 feet. 50 meters is the height of a 15-story building. 50 meters is more than half the length of an American football field.

Marines are super humans, so its hardly a surprise they could do it. It only breaks the rules if a normal human does it.

 dusara217 wrote:

 Keep wrote:

 dusara217 wrote:
Sadly, none of the GW authors actually seem to know what a meter is. "The Traitor Guardsmen were only fifty meters away; scoring headshots left and right". " The wolf crossed the fifty meters in seconds and bowled over the young Fenrisian". Seriously, it's like GW thinks that a meter is the same thing as a foot.

The world record for 50m sprint, men, is 5.56 seconds.

Right, because ordinary humans are going to be able to sprint 150 feet in 5 seconds. Or use pistols with the accuracy of a sniper. Or throw a grenade fifty meters. And Space Marine can use their Bolters like pinpoint sniper rifles at 150 feet. 50 meters is the height of a 15-story building. 50 meters is more than half the length of an American football field.

-It wasn't an ordinary human in your quote
-I agree about the pistols
-50 meters is well within the possible throwing range of a grenade
-Space Marines are ridiculously accurate. Getting nothing but headshots is a stretch, but I don't doubt they could hit every target accurately at 50 meters.

 Orblivion wrote:

 dusara217 wrote:

 Keep wrote:

 dusara217 wrote:
Sadly, none of the GW authors actually seem to know what a meter is. "The Traitor Guardsmen were only fifty meters away; scoring headshots left and right". " The wolf crossed the fifty meters in seconds and bowled over the young Fenrisian". Seriously, it's like GW thinks that a meter is the same thing as a foot.

The world record for 50m sprint, men, is 5.56 seconds.

Right, because ordinary humans are going to be able to sprint 150 feet in 5 seconds. Or use pistols with the accuracy of a sniper. Or throw a grenade fifty meters. And Space Marine can use their Bolters like pinpoint sniper rifles at 150 feet. 50 meters is the height of a 15-story building. 50 meters is more than half the length of an American football field.

-It wasn't an ordinary human in your quote
-I agree about the pistols
-50 meters is well within the possible throwing range of a grenade
-Space Marines are ridiculously accurate. Getting nothing but headshots is a stretch, but I don't doubt they could hit every target accurately at 50 meters.

In American Football, they have some of the strongest men in the US. Those bigass football players can barely throw a football, which is designed to be thrown far, 50 meters.

But, anyways, my point was that authors treat meters like feet. It annoys the crap outta me. Bad quotes, though, I'll admit

i grew up with the metric system, you don't have to tell me what 50m are.
Range of handgrenades depends on your physical ability. If you are fit you should manage 40m. If its a stick hand grenade up to 50m.
50m is very close for ranged combat...

 Orblivion wrote:

-50 meters is well within the possible throwing range of a grenade

Pretty sure its not.

A Space Marine, sure. A regular human, not a chance.

The Mk 2 "Pineapple" grenade weighs 595 grams(1lb 5oz). No human is going to toss something that heavy that far with just their arm.

 dusara217 wrote:

 Orblivion wrote:

 dusara217 wrote:

 Keep wrote:

 dusara217 wrote:
Sadly, none of the GW authors actually seem to know what a meter is. "The Traitor Guardsmen were only fifty meters away; scoring headshots left and right". " The wolf crossed the fifty meters in seconds and bowled over the young Fenrisian". Seriously, it's like GW thinks that a meter is the same thing as a foot.

The world record for 50m sprint, men, is 5.56 seconds.

Right, because ordinary humans are going to be able to sprint 150 feet in 5 seconds. Or use pistols with the accuracy of a sniper. Or throw a grenade fifty meters. And Space Marine can use their Bolters like pinpoint sniper rifles at 150 feet. 50 meters is the height of a 15-story building. 50 meters is more than half the length of an American football field.

-It wasn't an ordinary human in your quote
-I agree about the pistols
-50 meters is well within the possible throwing range of a grenade
-Space Marines are ridiculously accurate. Getting nothing but headshots is a stretch, but I don't doubt they could hit every target accurately at 50 meters.

In American Football, they have some of the strongest men in the US. Those bigass football players can barely throw a football, which is designed to be thrown far, 50 meters.

But, anyways, my point was that authors treat meters like feet. It annoys the crap outta me. Bad quotes, though, I'll admit

A baseball is a much better comparison for a grenade than a football. Reportedly, an adult male should be able to throw a baseball an average of 180-200 feet, that is 55-60 meters. The record is 445 feet, or 136 meters.

grenades come in various forms and sizes

A grenade is way heavier than a baseball.

 Grey Templar wrote:
A grenade is way heavier than a baseball.

They don't do studies on grenade throwing range, so its all guess work. What I posted was an average, meaning not every male that was tested was physically fit. Guardsmen are going to be physically fit, and we know nothing about the characteristics of a 40k grenade, maybe they are lighter than modern grenades. It just doesn't seem unreasonable to me that they are throwing them 50 meters.

50m is really not all that far for ranged weapons. I do quite a bit of shooting at 50m with both rifles and hanguns, so 40k in the future it shouldn't be too much of a longshot for their weapons to perform well at that range.

Sure, but a grenade is still, unless its super light weight or there is below earth gravity, not going to be able to be thrown 50m by a human with just his arm.

On a perfect day in perfect condition, you might be able to get 100 feet on a grenade. While soldiers might be in good condition, they're not going to be in perfect condition. especially if they've been in active combat for any length of time.

50 meters is very close for ranged combat. Modern assault rifles (comparable to lasguns according to 40Ks fluff) have an accurate range out to about 300m and a suppressive range out to about 600m (depending on the specific weapon system). I haven't encountered any instances in 40K novels where the distances in ranged combat didn't add up. (though I've only read Gaunt's Ghosts and Ciaphus Cain stuff)
50 meters is definitely close enough to lob a hand grenade, given you know how to throw.
Running 50 meters in a matter of seconds is super-athletic, if not entirely superhuman.

 Grey Templar wrote:
Sure, but a grenade is still, unless its super light weight or there is below earth gravity, not going to be able to be thrown 50m by a human with just his arm.

On a perfect day in perfect condition, you might be able to get 100 feet on a grenade. While soldiers might be in good condition, they're not going to be in perfect condition. especially if they've been in active combat for any length of time.

But what if you are a Space Marine?