Wh40k 10th Edition Weapons in 10th

[Orange Knight]

My thoughts on everything so far:

 

Bolt Rifles and Intercessors:

 

Excellent. They lost some range on the bolt rifle profile, but the unit is now really flexible. They can run and shoot without penalty, allowing them to reposition and grab objectives more quickly, and once in place their accuracy increases. Tactical Marines imo, will struggle to compete with such an agile unit that doesn't sacrifice number of shots at 24" range.

 

Aggressors:

 

We don't have the full profile yet, and we don't know the profile of their fragstorm grenade launchers. The unit appears to have less shooting, but they could be pivoting them into something more distinctive. Perhaps they can run and shoot/charge. Or perhaps they are simply a cheaper alternative to Terminators, allowing you to run more toughness 5 infantry in a list.

 

Consolidated weapons:

 

Upon reflection I think this is great. They shouldn't stop here either. The heavy Intercessor rifles could be consolidated into a single weapon profile. Repulsors could also benefit from this, all their small bolter-like weapons could be consolidated into something called: "anti infantry support guns" that has a single profile you can roll for at once.

[Kallas]

8 minutes ago, KrakenBorn said:

wonder what's going to happen with normal boltguns... maybe just rapid fire 1 and assault keywords.

Just RF 1. We've seen Storm Bolters already.

 

Gotta shove Tacticals out of the way some how, might as well give them awful guns so nobody wants to run them. Will make it easier to sideline them and then phase them out.

Edited April 14, 2023 by Kallas

[Arkangilos]

1 hour ago, Blurf said:

I played marines for all of 6th and 7th and I can't think of one single time I actually used the AP4 on the bolters

Never fought guard or Orks?

[jaxom]

6 minutes ago, Kallas said:

Just RF 1. We've seen Storm Bolters already.

 

Gotta shove Tacticals out of the way some how, might as well give them awful guns so nobody wants to run them. Will make it easier to sideline them and then phase them out.

I expect MSU with weapon upgrades will be popular, particularly in a Razorback.

[Kallas]

13 minutes ago, jaxom said:

I expect MSU with weapon upgrades will be popular, particularly in a Razorback.

Possible. Depends on costs and effectiveness, but still having the Bolters being weak as hell is not a good thing.

[Inquisitor_Lensoven]

3 hours ago, Iron Father Ferrum said:

Don't forget, that's just just for the gauntlets.  Those guys also have the grenade packs, so even if they don't have a shoot-twice mechanic they will have more than 3 shots per model.

D6, so a total of 4-9 S4 shots still really disappointing, when going from 7-12 possible shots.

 

if I had to choose between the current gauntlets and these new gauntlets, I would personally choose the current.

 

im not trying to fire at T8+ targets with them, I’m targeting primarily T4 and below with them, maybe softening T5-7 with them before getting close and punching those targets into submission.

[Inquisitor_Lensoven]

1 hour ago, Orange Knight said:

My thoughts on everything so far:

 

Bolt Rifles and Intercessors:

 

Excellent. They lost some range on the bolt rifle profile, but the unit is now really flexible. They can run and shoot without penalty, allowing them to reposition and grab objectives more quickly, and once in place their accuracy increases. Tactical Marines imo, will struggle to compete with such an agile unit that doesn't sacrifice number of shots at 24" range.

 

Aggressors:

 

We don't have the full profile yet, and we don't know the profile of their fragstorm grenade launchers. The unit appears to have less shooting, but they could be pivoting them into something more distinctive. Perhaps they can run and shoot/charge. Or perhaps they are simply a cheaper alternative to Terminators, allowing you to run more toughness 5 infantry in a list.

 

Consolidated weapons:

 

Upon reflection I think this is great. They shouldn't stop here either. The heavy Intercessor rifles could be consolidated into a single weapon profile. Repulsors could also benefit from this, all their small bolter-like weapons could be consolidated into something called: "anti infantry support guns" that has a single profile you can roll for at once.

Aggressors that can advance/charge or advance/shoot would be very nice.

 

it would be nice if the launchers provided a frag or krak option, even only S6 krak wouldn’t be too bad as it would provide good options against heavy infantry like themselves or possessed or something similar 

[OttoVonAwesome]

A little late to the party here but did GW seriously take away all the primaris weapon variants in favor of a single profile? lol That's like thier whole thing? Thier squads Sargeants don't have bloody weapon options cuase of the space taken by those things on the sprues... This is hilarious holy crap. Why would I take any of this stuff over firstborn now? Why am I taking Intercessors over tactical marines when tanks are tougher and I need more big guns? 

Edited April 15, 2023 by OttoVonAwesome

[Emperor Ming]

Will adding all these rules onto weapons actually reduce lethality 

[Captain Idaho]

1 hour ago, The Unseen said:

I mean, irl miniguns don't so much penetrate a target as ablate it. Bolters have had a lot of individual power and some sort of super-diamond penetrator tip on them since forever; If GW can avoid giving AP-1 to every *other* factions basic troop that will cost between 1/2 and 1/4 of an intercessor, it'll be fine. Especially if Doctrines no longer hand out extra AP willy nilly, so the marine troops are just getting the 1 pip of AP. Every edition they buff the basic marine to start with because they're habitually terrible, but then give out similar increases to everyone else later on in the edition and we end up with marine bodies being given dramatic cuts in pts. And then the cycle repeats. Doing mortals on 6s to wound does a decent job of replicating what the AC has been in the past, an anti-infantry weapon that can do chip damage to vehicles, but has a chance of spiking and going BRRRT on something with rends.
 

 

Oh for sure I appreciate the rules trying to be thematic. Perhaps the example I gave was a little insufficient. The Assault cannon should have more or less penetrative power than a Shuriken Cannon? Which represents the torrent of fire with AP-1 and D2, half as many shots but the ability to proc some extra... but in essence the Assault Cannon is larger calibre.

 

Now we're saying the Shuriken Cannon is the same penetrative power of a bolt rifle, like a Heavy Bolter too, yet isn't explosive and operates in the same manner as the minigun you described - lots of shots to torrent targets to death.

 

Just seems off to me. The Bolt Rifle is a special weapon through virtue of being Primaris, but I don't think it's fair on bolter wielding other armies as bolt rifles aren't that much special in the background. 

 

Still, it's relatively minor. Balance wise, the game hinges on those big targets and big weapons, as it appears T5 Terminators will not be too fussed by Bolt Rifles.

[Lord_Ikka]

Some thoughts here (from a Primaris SM/Imperial Knights/Necrons player)- 

 

Bolt rifles-

Consolidating weapons for Intercessors into one standard bolt rifle is a good thing. You get the best of all options with the Assault and Heavy abilities, but lose the range that bolt rifles had gained over regular bolters. So staying put means better accuracy, but you're not going to be able to reach out and touch an enemy as well as you were able to with stalker bolt rifles in 9th. You are also able to fire on the move, but you have less shots than you did with auto-bolt rifles in 9th. Overall Intercessors now have a much more fluffy weapon that performs decent at all the things you want a standard Intercessor squad to do- they can hold objectives and lay down fire (with Heavy giving them better hits), and you can push up/assault held objectives (while still shooting with Assault). 

 

New Abilities-

Assault is the same as it ever was, don't ever change we love you.

Heavy is interesting. Like the other frater here have said, we will probably see a lot of heavy weapons at a lower BS than they were previously to make the Heavy ability not too OP. There are other thoughts I have about this, but I'll address them when I talk about the melta rifles.

Devastating Wounds/Sustained Hits seem to be a natural outgrowth of the  9th edition special rules that buffed up natural 6s to Hit/Wound- they are neither good nor bad in my view, but they seem to fulfill a role that is needed in the game. How mortal wounds are dealt with may impact how effective Devastating Wound weapons are and how they stack up to other weapons without it but with possible better AP/more damage.

Twin-linked comes back, with re-rolls to Wound rather than Hit like it was before- ok, that seems fine, though we'll see if GW keeps the doubled shots of 8th/9th's version of twin-linked. If they do, twin-linked becomes quite a bit more powerful than it was, as it will have both the doubled shots and the re-rolls of previous editions, with no downsides apparent at the moment. Melee twin-linked is also interesting, it gets rid of older rules that gave weapons like Lightning Claws their unique abilities but makes the new USR more streamlined as you don't have a melee rule for re-rolling Wounds and a ranged rule for the same thing.

Melta simply gives an extra amount of damage (Melta X) at half range. Good wording and an easy way to give weapons a boost, I see no downsides here. 

 

Melta rifles-

Melta rifles gain a point in strength, going up to 9, but lost 6 inches in range. They're now Heavy, so hitting on 2s if they don't move, but the 18" range is pretty handicapping as far as board control and threat is concerned- my thought is that you won't see the Heavy ability come into play much; the first turn or two melta users are going to be trying get into range and/or getting blown away by worried opponents. The Strength of melta rifles is interesting (especially if all melta weapons follow suit)- formerly the premier anti-tank weapon of SM, now its only wounding Rhinos/Stormspeeders on 4s and anything tougher on 5s. If heavy las weapons like lascannon/las-talons are similarly limited in strength, my belief is that GW is going to use a vehicle's Toughness as a major factor in durability- SM heavy weapons hitting on 2s but wounding on 5s with limited access to re-rolls is going to give enemy vehicles a lot better chance to survive a turn or two of shooting and still be useful afterwards. Looks like anti-vehicle ability weapons like chainfists that are wounding on 3s might become the new best option for taking out enemy tanks. 

 

We've been given a bit more of a look into the new rules, and I'm cautiously optimistic. While it does seem at first that the rules on the weapons are becoming a little bit more bloated, in actuality it will be easier for opponents to know what a unit does with the new USRs. Instead of having to explain that weapon X's special ability is Y, you can just say my squad here is armed with X weapon that has Heavy and Melta 2, with S9 and AP-4 weapons. I like where this is headed so far, we'll see how it goes when people can do some demo games at Warhammer Fest.

[SkimaskMohawk]

2 hours ago, Blurf said:

That's incredibly reductionist.

It wasn't just about 'having the best gun be super obvious', it was the fact that only 2 AP values were even SLIGHTLY relevant. If your weapon wasn't at least AP-3, it functionally didn't have AP. If the weapon was better than AP-2, it only mattered for Penetrating hits on vehicles.

The old system was stupid because out 8 total possible AP values, 6 of them were completely irrelevant. I played marines for all of 6th and 7th and I can't think of one single time I actually used the AP4 on the bolters. If they didn't have 3+ armor, they had an invul. If they didn't have an Invul, they had cover, if they didn't have any of that, I forgot about the AP and killed the whole unit anyway.

 

I could tell from that first sentence you never played earlier than 6th. I know I called out "especially after" 6th, but that era was 6 years, compared to the....12 of 3rd to 5th? Kinda ironic you call me reductionist when you don't even have any experience with the majority of that ap era. And that you dunked on how convoluted 5ths rules were in the other thread.

 

The most notorious ranged weapon of 5th was the manticore. A STR 10 ap 4 multiple large blast unit. It was great because you killed vehicles on a 4+ after you pen'd them, you carpet bombed the armies that brought horde like orks, nids, and other guard, and you instant death'd through one of the best, most aggressive units in the game; nob bikers. Some other meta staples were the Loota with d3 STR 7 shots a gun, the burna wagon putting 15 STR 5 ap 5 templates down, and the psyfleman dread with four STR 8 ap 4 shots. 

 

Ranged shooting absolutely didn't rely on ap2 during those editions; strength and ordnance was enough to kill vehicles and weight of fire was enough to kill models. Plasma was able to get volume, but melta was preferred as the marine special weapon since it cooked vehicles and allowed assaults; only guard spammed plasma in those editions. Idk really know how to educate you on multiple editions ranged weapon nuances and applications. 

 

If you want want to only talk about 6th-7th exclusively, then sure, but that was caused by pairing high impact ranged weapons on 2+ armour/very durable units and changing the vehicle damage chart. Riptides, podsides, grav Centurions, wraithknights, knights, transcendent ctan. All the stuff was dropped in 6th and snowballed into a race to the bottom of both unit design and list construction. 

 

 

Edited April 15, 2023 by SkimaskMohawk

[Marshal Valkenhayn]

My prediction is that Multi-Meltas will go up in strength and probably get a chunkier Melta bonus, be 24" and Twin Linked. This will allow them to be A1 and do greater work against vehicles without spiraling out of control like they started to when they went to A2.

 

The change to lethality seems to be a 3 step process. Lower AP, lower volume of fire, and increase toughness. We haven't seen enough yet to really gauge how much of a difference these will make when taken together, but I'm still not hating it. 10th didn't abandon all of the things I was hoping for, but it hasn't shown me anything awful quite yet.

[OttoVonAwesome]

1 hour ago, jaxom said:

I expect MSU with weapon upgrades will be popular, particularly in a Razorback.

With the changes to vehicles who's gonna care about Bolt Rifles when you are gonna need all the Anti Tank you can get especially as Marines. Long live the Tactical Marines best sellers forever lol.

[Inquisitor_Lensoven]

3 minutes ago, OttoVonAwesome said:

With the changes to vehicles who's gonna care about Bolt Rifles when you are gonna need all the Anti Tank you can get especially as Marines. Long live the Tactical Marines best sellers forever lol.

Sounds like desolators, eradicators, and hellblasters would be better options than tactical squads…

[jaxom]

32 minutes ago, OttoVonAwesome said:

With the changes to vehicles who's gonna care about Bolt Rifles when you are gonna need all the Anti Tank you can get especially as Marines. Long live the Tactical Marines best sellers forever lol.

To clarify what I was saying as it seems there was confusion. MSU Tactical Squads in Razorbacks provide are a possible option for using Tactical Squads if bolters are indeed crap-tastic (as @Kallas was saying they probably will be). Five or six Marine bodies, one with a meltagun and one (Sergeant) with a combi-melta, and a Razorback with twin-linked lascannons would fulfill the role you describe. Though, again as Kallas said, it will depend on points cost for all those things.

[Large and Moving Torb]

11 hours ago, AceofCase said:

Real cool that bolt rifles can do everything under the sun and bolt guns are still stuck on the same profile they've had since what, 3rd edition? Going to guess that heavy weapons on things like Tactical Squads and Legionary Squads are going to be 4+ to hit base or something. 

 

You know, I can live with the bolt gun being kinda scrubby. I'm fine with the whole bolt rifle consolidation change. Seems like it's yet another way to get folks to move away from Tacs/First Born models; obsoleting them continues apace. Fine, I can deal. But *THAT IS ASSUMING* CSM (and their related factions) are wielding "Chaos" bolters or "Tainted" bolters or some such that makes them close to (or mirror) the stat line of the bolt rifle. It will not be cool to see GW say CSM are stuck with regular scrub bolters because, ya know, reasons. CSM are not being obsoleted and so shouldn't be treated as such.

 

Yeah, yeah, I know, I know - not holding my breath.

[jaxom]

7 minutes ago, Large and Moving Torb said:

 *THAT IS ASSUMING* CSM (and their related factions) are wielding "Chaos" bolters or "Tainted" bolters or some such that makes them close to (or mirror) the stat line of the bolt rifle. It will not be cool to see GW say CSM are stuck with regular scrub bolters because, ya know, reasons. CSM are not being obsoleted and so shouldn't be treated as such.

 

The flipside is that CSM can get a heavy chain weapon and a balefire tome in their basic squad, along with chaff in the form of cultists. 

[Tokugawa]

Twin linked weapons don't deliver twice attacks. The game becoming less lethal, that is good.

 

But, would models with multiple twin-linked weapons receive awkward rules? e.g. a Land Raider have 3 attacks on twin-linked heavy bolters, and 1 shots on each twin-linked lascannon?

[Lemondish]

Huge fan of the Bolt Rifle change. Takes a weapon platform that was basically three specific but separate tools for different situations and turns it into a versatile badass gun. Exactly what Marines should be using.

 

I love the weapon abilities design. We now have a shared set of rules that everybody will know, get familiar with, and key off of. Sure, we may not actually end up with fewer special effects on weapons, but where they lack in simplicity they make up for it in being...aerodynamic? Streamlined. Whatever.

 

As long as nobody gets some super special effect that's unique to their faction, everything will be okay. Excited to see if interacting with these new weapon abilities will be how Special Issue Ammunition behaves...

 

[OttoVonAwesome]

3 hours ago, Inquisitor_Lensoven said:

Sounds like desolators, eradicators, and hellblasters would be better options than tactical squads…

Wich brings up another point with troops only providing a measly 2 to 1 obsec ratio why take them over desolators or hellblasters at all or whatever the flamer guys are called even. Kill power will easily outwiegh obsec especially considering marines don't get cheap enough troops to make it worth it so simply wiping the enemy from objectives will likely still be more effecient.

 

Anyway my point was if you are taking troops for obsec why take Intercessors who can only engage with other troops in an edition where tanks are actually tough. Having a lascannon on your backfield objective or whatever seems like a smarter move. Bolt rifles aren't so much better than Bolters that they will result in better infantry killing power considering the heavy, special and combi weapons available to Tactical marines either. Thanks to thier new consolidated profile as well they are only really good at footslogging towards the enemy cuase if I want to take an objective with infantry I'm willing to bet Assualt intercessors in a rhino are also a better choice. So you've removed the concept of best bolt rifle variant and in doing so killed the Intercessor alltogether by removing the dedicated assault and backfield options.

[Lemondish]

Interesting comments and analysis @OttoVonAwesome, but I also think we're lacking way too much context to make that many conclusions. We haven't actually seen the entire data sheet for Intercessors yet, so we don't even know if this unit will regain its shoot twice stratagem in the form of a unit ability since they've been pretty upfront that this is the outcome of many unit specific stratagems already.

[OttoVonAwesome]

11 minutes ago, Lemondish said:

Interesting comments and analysis @OttoVonAwesome, but I also think we're lacking way too much context to make that many conclusions. We haven't actually seen the entire data sheet for Intercessors yet, so we don't even know if this unit will regain its shoot twice stratagem in the form of a unit ability since they've been pretty upfront that this is the outcome of many unit specific stratagems already.

True and I'm hoping I'm not totally right and unit abilities set the choices further apart. I'm also hoping that the codex brings back Stalkers and Auto bolters and the other options for the rest of the primaris range and that were just getting hype for the index cuase they just wanted to save playtesting time.

[Lemondish]

28 minutes ago, OttoVonAwesome said:

True and I'm hoping I'm not totally right and unit abilities set the choices further apart. I'm also hoping that the codex brings back Stalkers and Auto bolters and the other options for the rest of the primaris range and that were just getting hype for the index cuase they just wanted to save playtesting time.

I really don't think that last part will happen. For one, the separate profiles are kind of unnecessary imo. I also don't think they'd outright make a change like this just for the Index and then reverse it so you again have to care which option you glue on your Marines. For me, this is a good example of streamlining for the better.

 

I also would love if they got pretty aggressive with this concept. Like a Repulsor equipped with its main armaments and a single profile for 'Defensive weapons' that gathers together all the incidental anti-infantry junk in one place.

 

Or Incursors, Infiltrators, and Reivers using the same baseline tactical bolt carbine. It could be a 2 shot Assault weapon with Lethal Hits that Ignores Cover, as an example. Would be so much better for streamlining than the neat but wholly unnecessary variance in their weaponry we have today. Common where possible, custom where it counts, and having a different profile for the all the lil bits on what amounts to the same exact gun doesn't really count for all that much.

Edited April 15, 2023 by Lemondish

[Arkangilos]

7 minutes ago, Lemondish said:

baseline tactical bolt carbine

Honestly, regular bolters should just be bolt carbines, so FB marines would have bolt carbines (the exact same size) as the other guys that have them.