Heavy bolter Vs Assault Cannon

[Sword Brother Adelard]

I think the whole bolt family needs more AP.

[Volt]

I think the whole bolt family needs more AP.

No it doesn't, because bolters are supposed to be ineffective against power armor. The problem is people vastly overestimating the lethality of many weapons in 40k versus the armor that is present. 

[Quixus]

That is why they are only wielded by terminator infantry right? A power armor cannot even pick up and wield an assault cannon.

30K BA disagree with you. To be honest, they use the more fiddly prototypes, but still.

 

I think the whole bolt family needs more AP.

I agree. To describe a projectile as a mini HEAP missile and then not giving it AP or more than S4 or more than D1 for the regular bolt round is ridiculous.

 

 

I think the whole bolt family needs more AP.

No it doesn't, because bolters are supposed to be ineffective against power armor. The problem is people vastly overestimating the lethality of many weapons in 40k versus the armor that is present.

 

Power armour maybe, but any armour is just effective against it as against the fist of a grot. That is ridiculous.

[Panzer]

If you start giving Bolter AP-1 you'll also end up with StormBolter and Boltstorm gauntlets with AP-1, Heavy Bolter, Intercessor Bolter and Inceptor Bolter with AP-2 and so on.

It gets kinda ridiculous if you buff the basic Bolter.

[Ishagu]

Maybe it's what Marines need...

[Panzer]

Maybe. Maybe not. Hard to tell without extensive playtesting such changes and I doubt we'll see them from the official side. Way too much efford for GW compared to just adjusting some points.

[Stoic Raptor]

I play an army with mostly 18“ shooting and even there I usually get into range of the targets I want to kill, 

 

Probably because your opponent's army is configured to be unable to threaten you until you're at 24" (one move away from your range) :D

If he were shooting at you from twice your range that might be a greater concern.  I don't think it's enough to build a battle plan on, but controlling the range of engagement can make it easier to deal with the fewer guys that get into range to return fire.

[bozo69pd]

This is a fun thread! Very informative (I saw some 30k astartes with asscans and was like holy smokes! That's huge in their hands!).

 

In the end GW is trying to be very careful with power creep and that is good. Power creep can and will happen, but as long as it is very slowly people can adapt.

 

In the end though I think Knight made some great points to the original argument. The heavy bolter should have perhaps 1 more str or pen, but because it is so much cheaper and more spammable is not in a bad place. Great against swarms of nids and orkz.

[Plaguecaster]

Nah Bolt weapons don't need better AP just certain armour for factions like Guard or Orks just should be ignored with certain weapons like bolt weapons as it's pretty stupid this new edition a Guardsman or anything with 5 or 6+Sv can still get a chance of ignoring it with their armour on something like a bolter which fluffwise renders guardsman armour useless

[Deathwalker]

If you start giving Bolter AP-1 you'll also end up with StormBolter and Boltstorm gauntlets with AP-1, Heavy Bolter, Intercessor Bolter and Inceptor Bolter with AP-2 and so on.

It gets kinda ridiculous if you buff the basic Bolter.

I too am very wary of messing with AP stats for weapons. D6 is a very tight framework for applying any kind of modifier. Look at units that get -1 or minus 2 to hit them and how much that drastically alters the math of the units survivability. It's not a direct comparison as forcing a miss is more impactful than forcing a worse  or no save, but as a pure dice rolling comparison, it's the same.

[Quixus]

If you start giving Bolter AP-1 you'll also end up with StormBolter and Boltstorm gauntlets with AP-1, Heavy Bolter, Intercessor Bolter and Inceptor Bolter with AP-2 and so on.

It gets kinda ridiculous if you buff the basic Bolter.

I'm not seeing a problem there. While I can see the reasons for using armour save modifiers they are generally too low, especially for the imperial weapons. PA saving against Lascannons, plasma and melta weapons when previously only an Invulnerable save would have helped is quite a change.

 

Nah Bolt weapons don't need better AP just certain armour for factions like Guard or Orks just should be ignored with certain weapons like bolt weapons as it's pretty stupid this new edition a Guardsman or anything with 5 or 6+Sv can still get a chance of ignoring it with their armour on something like a bolter which fluffwise renders guardsman armour useless

That sounds needlessly complicated. Also why should Ork and Guardsman armour only not work against bolt rounds? Once you start adding armours that should not work against bolt weapons, you are getting very close to the same effect as an AP modifier.

[Claws and Effect]

Has it occurred to anyone that the assault cannon might be more powerful because it is firing a really dense, heavy projectile while the heavy bolter's projectile is lighter because the explosive element is less dense and carries less inertia?

 

Could also explain why the assault cannon's range is shorter. Sure, a dense projectile might penetrate better, but it will also be more affected by gravity. It is also relying only on muzzle velocity while the bolter round is rocket propelled and is continuing to accelerate through the air.

 

I'm going with the density theory. After all, a car made of solid steel will penetrate a wall better than one made of plastic and aluminum.

[The Unseen]

Has it occurred to anyone that the assault cannon might be more powerful because it is firing a really dense, heavy projectile while the heavy bolter's projectile is lighter because the explosive element is less dense and carries less inertia?

 

Could also explain why the assault cannon's range is shorter. Sure, a dense projectile might penetrate better, but it will also be more affected by gravity. It is also relying only on muzzle velocity while the bolter round is rocket propelled and is continuing to accelerate through the air.

 

I'm going with the density theory. After all, a car made of solid steel will penetrate a wall better than one made of plastic and aluminum.

 

Umm... Heavier objects fall at the same speed. Its like, how gravity works. Heavier bullets don't fall faster, they just might not have the same muzzle velocity with the same amount of initial energy, and therefore travel less distance over same time. But by that logic, heavy bolters should be doing more damage (either through higher strength or multiple damage) than the assault cannon, as a solid round fired at a lower velocity than a lighter projectile, that EXPLODES INSIDE YOU, which is significantly more damaging than any conventional bullet. (And if you get really technical, lighter but faster rounds generally has more kinetic energy than a heavier but slower round, as KE=1/2XmassXVelocity^2) Which would lead to say, a Str 6, -1 AP heavy bolter 2 Damage, and a Str5 -2 AP 1D Assault Cannon.

 

But thats taking 40k way to seriously.

Mostly, GW kinda screwed the pooch by massively buffing the assault cannons rate of fire, while not increasing its penetration or damage has led it to only really being good at killing infantry, where it used to be excellent vs light vehicles as well, and with the wound chart table changes, Heavy Bolters are now hilariously anti-MeQ weapons, and are merely ok at killing chaff thanks to their still somewhat measly 3 shots at Str5, making them perfect for killing T4 targets that rely on armor, but don't have the shot volume to kill true hordes, and their both equal vs anything tougher than T6.

 

The even better example of this is the Kheres pattern assault cannon. This thing used to be a terror to light tanks, and could even threaten medium tanks, with its 6 Str7 shots, and would tear lightly armored monstrous creatures to shreds. Now it can barely scratch the paint off a rhino (causing a whole whopping 1 wound if its firing at BS3+), and it isn't any better at killing infantry than the standard assault cannon. Even against stuff that it used to just shred, like AV 10 skimmers that became T6 4+ save, it manages a whole 2 wounds, but now that those same vehicles have at minimum 8 wounds, that's just not cutting it.

 

And to round off the Trifecta of heavy Imperial solid round weapons that currently don't do what they say on the tin, the autocannon now sucks vs flyers/tanks/monsters/chaff infantry, well, basically everything, except 2 wound infantry models, a niche so specific there are a number of factions that literally don't have any. Hence their absolute dearth this edition; I haven't seen one in a serious list yet, except the Predator one, which is half decent thanks to its much improved 3 flat Damage, and high rate of fire.

 

Heavy Bolters should've gotten the fire rate increase, the assault cannon should've gotten more pen if they were going to drop rending, and autocannons need... I'm not really sure. This edition of 40k does not like the "all-rounder" archetype of weapons very much at all. You need excessive rate of fire for infantry, 2 doesn't cut it, but you need high strength AND high damage for vehicles and monsters now, with their dozen or more wounds, and again, 2 Str7 2D just doesn't cut it, and pen is needed for both, and AP-1 is just OK. If you give a weapon all 3, its going to be exorbitantly expensive just off its statline alone, like the Grav Cannon.

So to make a weapon that truly functions as an all rounder, you'd be looking at something like 36" Heavy 3, Str 7, -1 AP 3 Damage, and oops, you've reinvented whats basically a plasma cannon that doesn't overheat, and its going to cost upwards of 40 pts, and suddenly your still better off bringing 1 lascannon and 2 heavy bolters for better results.

[SickSix]

Oh boy, these conversations are always fun. Have we not learned to stop comparing reality with 40k yet?

 

The Heavy Bolter (IMO) is more of a Mk19 Grenade Launcher analouge than a M2 .50 cal.

 

An Assault Cannon is probably closer to a 20mm Vulcan. And in that comparison a 20mm Vulcan would be more powerful at close range to hard targets.

 

Yes, on the table I do feel like the HB is a little underwhelming but then when you take 4 in a dev squad, weight of dice is king.

[Quixus]

The Heavy Bolter (IMO) is more of a Mk19 Grenade Launcher analouge than a M2 .50 cal.

Would a grenade that can penetrate 51 mm (ca. 2") of steel really care about infantry armour? I get that we cannot easily deduce how power armour would react, but carapace armour is pretty much a bullet resistant vest and trauma plates.

 

Yes, on the table I do feel like the HB is a little underwhelming but then when you take 4 in a dev squad, weight of dice is king.

Now how would you think about being able to take 5+ assault cannons in a squad, as BA are allowed to do in HH? Those are quite a few more dice.

[Panzer]

 

Yes, on the table I do feel like the HB is a little underwhelming but then when you take 4 in a dev squad, weight of dice is king.

Now how would you think about being able to take 5+ assault cannons in a squad, as BA are allowed to do in HH? Those are quite a few more dice.

 

 

Well ... but you can't. Different game, different balancing.

[totgeboren]

 

I am not sure that should be the way it works.

 

 

I think the problem is that you see the assault cannon, and assume it is a different weapon than the the designers intend it to be.

 

There are gatling guns in in 40k that are exactly what you are after, the Rotor cannons from FW! They have a higher fire rate than heavy bolters, but a lower strength. They are basically miniguns, and as such it is fitting that the self-propelled grenade of the heavy bolter does pack a bigger punch than the hail of bullets from the rotor cannon.

 

But as many have pointed out, the Assault Cannon is something else entirely. A weapon that is stupidly expensive to use due to needing crazy amounts of maintenance, huge amounts of ammo, and the ammo it uses probably has a cost-per-bullet equal to a whole shipping crate of heavy bolter bullets.

 

It's a sci-fi gun, not simply a gatling gun in space.

[Volt]

Oh boy, these conversations are always fun. Have we not learned to stop comparing reality with 40k yet?

 

The Heavy Bolter (IMO) is more of a Mk19 Grenade Launcher analouge than a M2 .50 cal.

 

An Assault Cannon is probably closer to a 20mm Vulcan. And in that comparison a 20mm Vulcan would be more powerful at close range to hard targets.

 

Yes, on the table I do feel like the HB is a little underwhelming but then when you take 4 in a dev squad, weight of dice is king.

Bolters are nothing like a 40mm grenade launcher. They're APHE rounds that have insane armor penetration and focus being relatively slow-firing, precise munitions meant to gut a single target, they don't have much of a blast radius. 40k also actually has grenade launchers that are basically a MK-19 on 'roids, the Deathwatch carry it.

[Stoic Raptor]

The Heavy Bolter (IMO) is more of a Mk19 Grenade Launcher analouge than a M2 .50 cal.

 

An Assault Cannon is probably closer to a 20mm Vulcan. And in that comparison a 20mm Vulcan would be more powerful at close range to hard targets.

 

Have you ever actually used any of those things?  A boltgun fires .75 caliber gyrojet ammunition - so about 18-19mm, equivalent to a heavy machine gun.  It might be close to chain gun ammunition, which indicates that assault cannon or perhaps even heavy bolter ammo is more like 30mm.

 

There's a word for a weapon in 40K which functions like a Mk19... it's called a grenade launcher.  

[Volt]

 

The Heavy Bolter (IMO) is more of a Mk19 Grenade Launcher analouge than a M2 .50 cal.

 

An Assault Cannon is probably closer to a 20mm Vulcan. And in that comparison a 20mm Vulcan would be more powerful at close range to hard targets.

 

Have you ever actually used any of those things?  A boltgun fires .75 caliber gyrojet ammunition - so about 18-19mm, equivalent to a heavy machine gun.  It might be close to chain gun ammunition, which indicates that assault cannon or perhaps even heavy bolter ammo is more like 30mm.

 

There's a word for a weapon in 40K which functions like a Mk19... it's called a grenade launcher.  

 

Not to mention that if you're using a bolter to kill light infantry, somebody, somewhere, gakked up hard because it's just a waste to use such excessive firepower against such a vulnerable target. Bolters are ideal for precisely firing at a specific target such as heavy infantry or light vehicles, and definitely not something you're use like a typical machine gun unless you want to waste some fairly expensive ammo pointlessly. And they are basically autocannons. Looking at the videogame Deathwing's bolt shells and the space marine artwork by Jes Goodwin, and going by his height charge and scaling off the bolter the marine is holding in the image, what I got was this. Not the weird snub-nosed round GW throws about (which doesn't actually make sense at that scale for reasons), but anyway the result is a 19.05x167mm projectile. This image is life-sized btw, the pixels are exactly as big as the "real deal".

 

 

So it's pretty similar in appearances at least to what you find in modern chainguns, only it has its weird two-stage gryojet thing going on. 

(Also it has a division near the center as I just assumed that's where the two-stage separation is, and was going off the models from Deathwing as mentioned)

[SickSix]

LOL oh man y'all take this so serious lol. Have you seen the size of a heavy bolter? 18-20mm rounds? I think not lol.

[Skaorn]

So, if we're doing boosts to bolter AP, can Tau Pulse weapons get a -2 for being plasma weapons?

 

Actually applying how made up weapons are supposed to work in a fantasy setting to abstract dice mechanics works as well as the actual game system does. It's like saying my Rifts laser pistol that does 1d6 mega-damage is better than your lascannon because 40K is clearly an SDC setting as a normal IG troop could conceivably kill a SM with his rifle butt and clearly no supernatural strength. My laser pistol vaporizes your tank and my plastic man armor makes me immune to all your SDC attacks because they can't damage an MDC structure because even doing 100 points of SD that makes up 1 MDC does nothing to it. My Rogue Scholar kills all your Custodes.

 

Some other things to look at are that Bolters are reliable and accurate gyrojet weapons, two things gyrojets aren't known for. If IG armor was the equivalent of modern day anti-ballistic vests then it wouldn't be terribly useful in a big 40K melee fight as they wouldn't protect well against knives or bft. If you've had experience with a chainsaw, you will know that chainsaw swords are a dumb idea (not as bad as the DnD dire flail though.

[Deathwalker]

*Shoots Skaorn with a Boom gun*

 

:D :D

[Finkmilkana]

Something I haven’t seen mentioned in the discussion about giving bolters ap in order to make them more ‚realistic‘ is that it would make them relatively even better against PA than guardsmen. While a -1 AP increases the damage against flak armor only by 25% it increases the damage against power armor by 50%. This is pretty much the opposite of lorefull. With the current mechanics of the game there simply is no way to completely ignore cheap armor without (realitvely) becoming much better against power armor.

[Claws and Effect]

If you've had experience with a chainsaw, you will know that chainsaw swords are a dumb idea (not as bad as the DnD dire flail though.

Sure, if you assume it works exactly like a real world chainsaw.

 

Get a set of teeth with monomolecular edges spinning fast enough and it would practically be a solid edge.

 

That's the thing about sci-fi weapons. We have only the vaguest idea whether they would actually work simply because we don't have technology capable of emulating it.