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Is there any lore reasons as to why some plasma weapons are green and others are blue?

Artistic license I'm guessing. 40K is pretty inconsistent when it comes to the sound and visuals of several weapons.

Chaos plasma weapons are typically red.

Entirely down to rule of cool. I did my Black Legion and Night Lords with green plasma and my Sons of Horus with orange plasma, personally.

 ManSandwich wrote:
Entirely down to rule of cool.

This. Ofc, there's no reason plasma weapons couldn't be different colors - maybe the gas used or the exact process depends on available materials? I'd imagine the plasma weapons with pure stuff would be the blue-white, and others might have impuritites.

Well, in real life plasma doesn't really have a colour iirc, so the vents shouldn't really have a colour in the first place. But I suppose painting transparent objects is quite difficult (I would know!).

My personal preference is blue - somehow it visually reads as "melt-your-face-off-hot" better than green does, to my eyes.
But it's easily justified as being any colour, using the explanations above, which makes it useful if you want to add a spot colour to your plasma-armed units.

Personally I use colours that contrast with the model so it stands out more. On my nightlords I use pink, I'll use green on my skitarri against bone robes etc.

 WarbossDakka wrote:
Well, in real life plasma doesn't really have a colour iirc, so the vents shouldn't really have a colour in the first place. But I suppose painting transparent objects is quite difficult (I would know!).

Plasmas have lots of colours. Have you never seen a flame, or neon lighting, or lightning, or auroras, or the chuffing SUN!?

Blue is the easier level, like Squirtle or Luke in episode IV.
Green is the harder level, like Bulbasaur or Luke in episode VI.
Red is evil, like Charmander or all Sith.

Sci-Fi plasma weapons never make any sense since they don't act at all like real plasma weapons. And yes, there are real plasma weapons: they're called flamethrowers.

 JustALittleOrkish wrote:
Blue is the easier level, like Squirtle or Luke in episode IV.
Green is the harder level, like Bulbasaur or Luke in episode VI.
Red is evil, like Charmander or all Sith.

I loved this from the moment I read it.

When I remembered I paint my few plasma weapons purple, I loved it even more.

 Jimsolo wrote:

 JustALittleOrkish wrote:
Blue is the easier level, like Squirtle or Luke in episode IV.
Green is the harder level, like Bulbasaur or Luke in episode VI.
Red is evil, like Charmander or all Sith.

I loved this from the moment I read it.

When I remembered I paint my few plasma weapons purple, I loved it even more.

Gengar styles

The colour of a plasma really depends on the gas involved.

Hence the colours of neon lighting.

Different gasses turn different colours when heated to the levels needed to make plasma.

I think blue is most common for painting because it looks good. It's a nice colour for burning chemicals.

 TheWaspinator wrote:
Sci-Fi plasma weapons never make any sense since they don't act at all like real plasma weapons. And yes, there are real plasma weapons: they're called flamethrowers.

That is not plasma. Flames are a visible, oxydizing chemical reaction that releases heat and light. Plasma is what happens when you ionize a superheated gas. Plasma burns much brighter, is affected by magnetic fields and gives off ultraviolet rays.

This is plasma. As you can see, its much brighter and more vibrant than ordinary flames. Its also much hotter; you are looking at something like 20 000 degrees.

I've always gone for a sickly purple/pink for my Chaos plasma weapons.

 TheWaspinator wrote:
Sci-Fi plasma weapons never make any sense since they don't act at all like real plasma weapons. And yes, there are real plasma weapons: they're called flamethrowers.

Dear Emeperor, not this debate again

Ha!
My own psudo-science answer is: the more powerful the weapon, the higher frequency energy the light spectrum I go (energy weapon or not).
Makes it easy not have to look things up either (I am NOT repainting if they go through a change by revision however).
Str 4 or less = Red (Dark red for say flashlight...errr... lasgun)
Str 5 = Orange
Str 6 = Yellow (cheat a bit by applying hazard stripe on occasion)
Str 7 = Green (Bright for energy, dark for say an autocannon)
Str 8 = Light Blue
Str 9 and up = Blue

 Backspacehacker wrote:
Is there any lore reasons as to why some plasma weapons are green and others are blue?

Plasma produced with trace amounts of barium chloride will glow/burn green.

For red plasma, which is what my plasma guns, pistols, and cannons glow, there was trace amounts of strontium carbonate in the fuel.

For blue, there has to be some copper chloride.

http://earthsky.org/human-world/how-do-fireworks-get-their-vibrant-colors

Plasma color is dependant on gas you use.

CF4: blue
SF6: white blue
SiF4: light blue
SiCl4: light blue
Cl2: whitish green
CCl4: whitish green
H2: pink
O2: pale yellow
N2: red to yellow
Br2: reddish
He: red to violet
Ne: brick red
Ar: dark red

It also depends on a temperature. I tried to search for some scientificaly backed information, I haven't found anything coherent. Graph or something.
If you look at Tokamak, you will see that the plasma is pinkish/purpleish, because Hydrogen is used.


I personally use blue plasma weapons, because it looks best.

 Hawky wrote:
Plasma color is dependant on gas you use.
CF4: blue
SF6: white blue
SiF4: light blue
SiCl4: light blue
Cl2: whitish green
CCl4: whitish green
H2: pink
O2: pale yellow
N2: red to yellow
Br2: reddish
He: red to violet
Ne: brick red
Ar: dark red
It also depends on a temperature. I tried to search for some scientificaly backed information, I haven't found anything coherent. Graph or something.
If you look at Tokamak, you will see that the plasma is pinkish/purpleish, because Hydrogen is used.
I personally use blue plasma weapons, because it looks best.

I somehow see a noise marine frantically making notes.

 chromedog wrote:
The colour of a plasma really depends on the gas involved.

Hence the colours of neon lighting.

i though neon lighting depended on the coating on the inside of the tube to get excited by UV to glow a color.

or am i thinking fluorescent lighting.

 JustALittleOrkish wrote:

Red is evil, like Charmander or all Sith.

Charmander is not evil and Exar Kun used blue.

About the only thing "plasma" weapons in sci-fi have in common with real plasma is the name. Paint 'em how you like.

Personally, my plasma weapons have copper "confinement coils" with blue muzzles and vents.

^ This.
I paint the "coils" metallics - if the coils are glowing, something has gone terribly wrong (they are producing too much heat as a byproduct - instead of constricting the magnetic field and will probably roll nothing but ones).

I like to think it's kind of like Star Wars blasters/lightsabers in that the bolt/blade could be whatever color you wanted.

Personally, I paint the plasma of my weapons blue because the first artwork I saw with a plasma gun was blue. However, using a different gas as ammo would change the color.

 TheWaspinator wrote:
Sci-Fi plasma weapons never make any sense since they don't act at all like real plasma weapons. And yes, there are real plasma weapons: they're called flamethrowers.

Flamethrowers are not plasma weapons.

For my Imperial Guard I color the larger plasma weapons orange fading to red. I feel that it gives the appearance of a relatively unstable weapon. That, and personal preference on my part.

Most of the carried plasma guns I role with the traditional white fading to blue though ... guess it depends what mood I'm in that day.