Ashiraya wrote:It's Final Fantasy, basically. You have people in advanced carbon weave armour wielding steel swords and shields.

 Grey Templar wrote:
And I wouldn't say that marines spam melee troops either. Assault marines and Assault Terminators are definitely a specialist troop. The default equipment for a marine is a bolter and a combat knife/bayonet. The default Terminator loadout is a Storm Bolter and a Power fist(which is a demolition tool that doubles as a melee weapon), so they are still ranged focused.

 kirotheavenger wrote:
I guess the only possible contrarian point is that power weapons seem to be relatively common in universe and much more effective against say an astartes than a bolter seems to be.
But are they more common than a plasmagun? Old lore suggests they are, but certainly in-game dispositions suggest they're not. The only SMs carrying powers weapons are veterans. Whereas relatively basic squads like Hellblasters all carry plasmaguns - so plasmaguns probably outnumber powerweapons like 2-1 or more in an astartes chapter.

 Haighus wrote:
Lethal ranged weapons have existed back into prehistory. Bows, javelins, slings, even the humble rock have been able to kill at range.

Yet melee didn't disappear as a common part of warfare until the end of the 19th century at the earliest, and probably the interwar period in practice.

 Ashiraya wrote:

 kirotheavenger wrote:
I guess the only possible contrarian point is that power weapons seem to be relatively common in universe and much more effective against say an astartes than a bolter seems to be.
But are they more common than a plasmagun? Old lore suggests they are, but certainly in-game dispositions suggest they're not. The only SMs carrying powers weapons are veterans. Whereas relatively basic squads like Hellblasters all carry plasmaguns - so plasmaguns probably outnumber powerweapons like 2-1 or more in an astartes chapter.

I'd argue it's not true even in old lore.

In 30k, you have entire battleline squads with plasma guns (TSS, likely the inspiration for Hellblasters both in and out of universe). And while it's true plasma was better understood back then, so were power weapons, and yet they were concentrated in the hands of sergeants and veterans, with power weapons being sprinkled into melee squads rather than being fielded en masse (exception, again, for veterans).

 JNAProductions wrote:
And that's okay! 40k is not a sensible, sober look at what war might be like in the future. It's a gonzo setting where literal daemons from another dimension are here to eat your soul. It's also a game we play for fun.

 Haighus wrote:

 kirotheavenger wrote:
You're still making the assumption that pointblank firing with a firearm is not possible - it absolutely is.

An enemy in arms reach in no way precludes you from shooting them, and parrying a rifle is harder than parrying a sword because just putting a sword in the way is enough to stop another sword reaching you, you can also block a sword swing with a rifle. Whereas to parry a rifle you have to physically push the weapon out of line. A move as simple as taking one step backwards will take you out of range of the sword and allow you full use of your rifle. The range in which a melee weapon is more useful than a potent, automatic, and high capacity firearm is really impossibly short it isn't even the norm in a building or trench network.

When I said speed what I was referring to is how an assault intercessor gets, what, 3 attacks a turn? They can swing their chainsword 3 times. A rifle intercessor gets to fire their boltrifle twice. In no real world can an astartes make more good attacks with a chainsword than they can snap off shots/bursts of a rifle.
Old rules like "if you carry a pistol you get +1 attack with your melee weapon" don't even begin to represent the reality of point blank firearms usage.

I'm pretty sure a "shot" in 40k represents a burst for most small arms. I'm not discounting this at all, but a burst from a gun is far less effective if the shots just deflect off a breastplate. CQB shooting aims at centre mass and aimed shooting into less-armoured limbs and joints is just harder and slower. Up-close, a burst into centre-mass is quicker than a melee strike, but only just, and such a burst will not reliably stop power armoured foes, nor will it be likely to constrain their actions. Melee or retreat then becomes inevitable.

 tauist wrote:
I think the Kommandos Kill Team drives the point of Ork's melee lethality home wonderfully. Big 40K only does it with the "buckets and buckets of dice", which isnt nearly as thematic feeling IMHO

As for melees' prevalence in the 40K setting, I have always felt its that "Fantasy In Space" angle GW is going for. Of course Knights In Space Have Swords, Hammers and Axes.. The archetypical swashbuckler (pistol and sword) feels very fitting for 40K, where gaming tables are small parking lots and cover is pretty meaningless in most cases

 Haighus wrote:

Firstly, helmets have traditionally been as heavily armoured as breastplates, so I'd expect a power armour suit to have very thick faceplates too, for obvious reasons of torsos and heads containing vital organs. Just switching to headshots probably isn't enough with power armour, although would make a difference with open-faced helmets such as typically seen in the likes of carapace armour.

Obviously soldiers can be trained to shoot at more vulnerable spots instead of centre mass, but centre mass is used because it is quick and reliable (especially for a moving foe). Forces like marines, stormtroopers etc with higher levels of general marksmanship are going to be better placed to do so, but from what we know of the likes of power armour and even carapace armour it is just unlikely to incapacitate an armoured opponent in such a way as to prevent them fighting. Also, those techniques are mostly used by special forces, and typically against poorly-trained insurgents in clearing operations in most cases. In the peer combat we are seeing in Ukraine those kinds of techniques are not common despite widespread body armour and instead much more cautious approaches with pre-firing, pieing etc. that rely on volume of fire and minimal exposure are the norm. Neither really maps to an ork or marine counter-charging round the corner instead of a human hiding round the corner, but assuming the enemy is waiting I don't think we'd see much of the rapid-entry clearing style against skilled opponents except by armoured/tough soldiers like marines or orks who can take some accurate return fire and probably keep going.

I agree melee attacks also struggle to hit vulnerable spots, but a huge part of that is that the opponent gets a vote. It is actually quite easy to train a typical human to reliably strike very small fixed targets with a tool (including weapons), easier than it is to teach them to shoot them unless you try to jam the barrel into the target (at which point it can be parried etc and is not functionally different from a melee attack in delivery except needing less strength to injure). For direct comparison, I'd wager it would take less time to get the average untrained person accurately stabbing a face with a pike at 3m than hitting the face with a rifle from the same range in a snapshot scenario (say, the human shape pops up for a brief period to simulate a sudden, close encounter).

Again, this is the best case scenario for melee- an extremely close ranged environment where two enemies encounter each other within range for a single lunge into melee. Things like room clearing. Even today, this is very dangerous for the soldier with the rifle even against enemies without firearms. But with good armour? Melee can be forced and therefore purpose-built melee weapons will enter limited use.

The further out the ranges get, the less melee becomes viable. But we have obvious adaptations for this- Land Raiders, jump packs and so on. But outside of the Black Templars and maybe the Space Wolves, every marine chapter recognises melee is more situational and has a predominence of units armed with ranged primary weapons, and the majority of melee units have either side arms or extra thick armour (and sometimes a massive shield).

Adressing side points:

I'd also hold that attack dice also can represent a flurry of attacks in the same way a single "shot" is probably a burst for small arms. Turns in 40k are obviously quite abstract and there has never been a firm explanation of how long one lasts (except Rogue Trader?) nor is it really desirable. But given how far basic infantry move, I think the idea a single attack actually represents just one strike for most melee attacks is... unlikely. The abstraction is a balance mechanic that give flavour as much as anything. Actual human melee combat can include multiple strikes per second, to say nothing of astartes or eldar and so on.

I'm also not really sure why plasma is relevant. Sure, it can be used up close and will take out most things it hits. But it is also a support weapon in the same vein as a grenade launcher or MG, and is clearly much more bulky than equivalent rifles. I'd expect them to be unwieldy and not suited to snap-shooting, and the likes of marine chapters choose to only dispense them sparingly even though a marine chapter typically has the resources to give every marine a plasma gun if they wished. The logical conclusion being they are quite limited in their battlefield role compared to a rifle and are a specialist tool instead of a general-purpose one. In game, they have always been a straight upgrade to basic rifles aside from overheating, but the game is a small snapshot of the overall campaign with abstracted rules. As such, comparing plasma guns to chainswords isn't particularly helpful, they just aren't fulfilling the same roles on the battlefield and there is probably a reason only some soldiers are equipped with plasma guns beyond general rarity.

I don't think shotguns change much. They don't offer much over a modern intermediate-cartridge carbine in close quarters, besides being better at breaching doors. Special forces today rarely use them as primary weapons, although I believe some US marines found shotguns more helpful in Iraq than carbines. It is pretty marginal though. A marine can comfortably wield a boltgun as a carbine and even bolt rifles seem to be fine, so shotguns are probably only a marginal improvement up close. Probably a bigger deal for, say, a Chaos cultist if their autogun is firing massive 8mm bullets to switch to a shotgun for cqb though... Autoguns seem to be closer to automatic battle rifles than assault rifles.