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Well, I've seen A LOT of space marines pictures, and I've yet seen more than 2 extra magazines on a space marine.
One magazine seems to be able to fit less than 15 bullets only. How can they really go into war (even tactical fights) with such little ammo? Imagine the US army going to Iraq with pistols, will it be efficient for elite soldiers to reload all the time?

p/s
DOW doesn't help either, showing the SM shooting their bolters like machine guns, making it more ridiculous.

More realistic marines would have several clips on their belts/shoulder pads, as well as resupplying in Drop Pods and Rhinos and general ammo dumps. People just don't like modeling their marines covered in ammo.

I can't remember where I read this, but there is a gap between the powerplant of their power armour, their backpack, and the actual armour itself where 8 extra magazinese are stored. A system is then monitored of the battle site by their human helpers to instruct marines where to go to reload. (i.e. take a mag from another brother's pack) This is done in such a way so that no one runs out of ammo ahead of his brothers.

I figured that bolters actually have an internal magazine which gets refilled by the external magazine upon reaching a certain point, so that a Marine could continuously fire while re-loading.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v699/OwlandMoonGuy/Pre-H%20Research/LW-Sternguard-1.jpg

Sternguard appear to use a larger magazine, perhaps this new style is becoming more prevelant?

I find the answer to this question simple. Disproportionate models. Frankly, I dunno about all of you, but I've never seen a pistol bigger than my head or even close to half as wide. And yes, someone will say pistols can be long-barrelled. That's not what I mean and you know it.

The bolt pistol, when compared to an average space marine head (not helmet) is about twice as long and just as tall. The sculpters are great at doing this, but at such a small scale it's hard to get a true-scale on everything, especially weapons.

Now, this aside, on a model itself, I'd say thirty shots are in each clip. I've read where the sickle clips are twin-fed inside, so effectively the clips are double the width of a bolt. Looking at the average gun of any sort, pistol or otherwise, this clip is fit up into the gun to just under the barrel. So I agree, fifteen bullets long, two bullets wide. This help?

In the end, the models are not fluff-perfect (as proven by truescale marines and normal factory produced marines versus imperial guard models.

Hope this all helps.

too true Lorgar, but since he said pictures not just models I had to think up something

True, but the pictures, sadly, are based off of the original models and such and are made to be disproportionate as well.

If we believe hard enough in the power of imagination the Emprah will never let the marines run out of ammo?

Correction. Only when they run out of bolts will the faith in the Emprah let them pull off the victory... Don't believe me?

Let me refer you to C.S. Goto and his MULTILASER WIELDING MARINES!

Lorgar's_Blessed wrote:Correction. Only when they run out of bolts will the faith in the Emprah let them pull off the victory... Don't believe me?

Let me refer you to C.S. Goto and his MULTILASER WIELDING MARINES!

Multilazors defeat any logic and order.

What do you think the HUGE Pauldrons are for? Surely not armour.

Actually, that's exactly what they're for. The huge size of the pauldrons allows no shots to hit the head from a side view and allow protection to all but a stab to the head in close combat. They actually are there for protection, somehow. It is like most mini-lines right now to use big shoulders to represent heroes or significance, but that is merely a phase of modelling.

I think sergeant sunshine has it right... Power armor has loads of funky slots and secret compartments hidden away in it. In Ian Watson's Inquisition War novels, a Spess Mehren gets all the control cables of his armor cut by Jain Zar (she was just teasing) and his legs started filling up with excrement, because the normal internal turbonappy broke down...

The pauldrons are ablative armor that protect Marine from attacks coming in from the side and make him more difficult to hit in the head, similar to the large Tau shoulder pads. However, since Marines are ambidextrous and more likely to get into close combat than Tau, they have one for each side instead of just their "shooting side."

A simple search and you´ll get tons of info, no need to start a new thread about the same things already discussed three pages down.

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/264685.page

Here you are, knock yourself out.

Sgt.Sunshine wrote:I can't remember where I read this, but there is a gap between the powerplant of their power armour, their backpack, and the actual armour itself where 8 extra magazinese are stored. A system is then monitored of the battle site by their human helpers to instruct marines where to go to reload. (i.e. take a mag from another brother's pack) This is done in such a way so that no one runs out of ammo ahead of his brothers.

IIRC this was made up as a fluff justification by someone. It is just speculation, speculation that is not supported by art, models, or space availability between the power plant and armor.