[40k] Relative Strengths

[Imperial Overlord]

DoW has generally the right flavor, but has standard RTS game mechanics. One bolter round to the chest will take out your standard guardsmen and Marines are accurate shots with weapons that have a high rate of fire. There won't be firing and then they fall one by one. They'll just get wiped out. Leman Russes are good tanks, but krak missiles and lascannons are good antitank weapons. A good shot with just one will take one out. And so on an so forth. It's worth noting that the table top game itself isn't supposed to be exactly accurate. Marines, for example, are merely quite good instead of uber badasses (so you can actually field an small army instead of a squad for a game).

[Cykeisme]

Ah, so basically, as expected, DoW is about as "realistic" as two footmen chopping at each other in Warcraft 3 is "realistic".

I was hoping they got the relative strengths right, because atm the RTS games are my only exposure to WH40k


I did read on Wikipedia that Space Marines in the tabletop game (and the RTS, by extension) are watered-down versions, and that Games Workshop released unofficial game rules for the way Space Marines perform in fluff.. where you field a single squad instead of a whole force.
Sounded interesting, but I do wonder why they didn't just make the tabletop game work that way officially.

[Imperial Overlord]

The relative strengths are about right. A land raider is an uber tank, guys with shuriken catapults slice and dice standard IG troopers, Dreadnoughts are badass, etcetera.

[Typhonis 1]

Money

[Keevan_Colton]

Ah, so basically, as expected, DoW is about as "realistic" as two footmen chopping at each other in Warcraft 3 is "realistic".

I was hoping they got the relative strengths right, because atm the RTS games are my only exposure to WH40k


I did read on Wikipedia that Space Marines in the tabletop game (and the RTS, by extension) are watered-down versions, and that Games Workshop released unofficial game rules for the way Space Marines perform in fluff.. where you field a single squad instead of a whole force.
Sounded interesting, but I do wonder why they didn't just make the tabletop game work that way officially.

Because they make a lot of money selling the minatures.

[white_rabbit]

Regarding the power sword punching holes in a Chaos Dreadnought..

How exactly do infantry-sized power melee weapons interact with heavy vehicle armor?

Do power weapons simply effortlessly cut through any armor? Isn't there a limit to the number of material bonds they can break per unit time, limited by the power output of its power supply?

It depends on the power weapon in part.

A human with a powerfist can basically peel a battletank apart given time, the combination of the exoskeletal glove and the powerfield make battle armour essentially thin foil.

Powerfists can also "bash" things, releasing a blast of energy, and grapple with targets while the field crackles over the target.

Blunt power weapons usually work on the principle of a rapid release of energy on impact, ripping/blasting holes in things, bladed power weapons are more like lightsabers.

Sabbat Martyr features a large powersword in use versus a Baneblade, the user slices off the main gun, then stabs the driver/commander through the frontal/topside armour.


There is probably a limit to what sort of materials can be sliced through, Banelord Titan leg armour can apparently be only penetrated a few inches by a marine swung power axe, although chaos tends to have some funky materials science, and the conducting armour tech like Thermoplas etc is possibly problematic for power weaponry.

[Jaevric]

Sabbat Martyr features a large powersword in use versus a Baneblade, the user slices off the main gun, then stabs the driver/commander through the frontal/topside armour.

It's important to note however that the character who did that in Sabbat Martyr was a reincarnated Imperial Saint wearing powered armor. Whether a "normal" human in regular armor, or even a Space Marine in standard powered armor, could have accomplished the same feat is questionable.

In The Armour of Contempt, Colonel-Commissar Gaunt--an unmodified, non-psycher human, albeit an extremely skilled one--cut a daemonically-possessed tank's turret hatch off with a powersword fairly quickly and easily so they could drop a tube charge into the interior. The base class of the tank was never mentioned, but it sounded like a Leman Russ based on the weapons mentioned. It certainly wasn't a Baneblade. Gaunt was also the person mentioned earlier as chopping through a Chaos Dreadnought's armor with the same powersword.

As I recall, however, that particular weapon has demonstrated capabilities above and beyond simply being a really good sword, such as letting Gaunt parry lasbolts and the like.

[Lost Soal]

The Sword Of Hyronimo Sondar acts like a partial force weapon at times. Gaunt comments in Necropolis the the blade detects the incoming blows from Asphodels bodyguards and urges his arm into the right place. If he still had his normal chainsword he is positive he would have been dead.

[white_rabbit]

It's important to note however that the character who did that in Sabbat Martyr was a reincarnated Imperial Saint wearing powered armor. Whether a "normal" human in regular armor, or even a Space Marine in standard powered armor, could have accomplished the same feat is questionable.

I try to avoid spoilers

Sabbats strength certainly played a role in dispatching the Baneblade, but in answering the OPs query about the limits of power weaponry I think its fairly accurate.

In The Armour of Contempt, Colonel-Commissar Gaunt--an unmodified, non-psycher human, albeit an extremely skilled one--cut a daemonically-possessed tank's turret hatch off with a powersword fairly quickly and easily so they could drop a tube charge into the interior. The base class of the tank was never mentioned, but it sounded like a Leman Russ based on the weapons mentioned.

I doubt it was a Leman Russ, the tank was described fairly distinctively, if it was originally a Russ, it was so warped as to no longer resemble such.

[Lost Soal]

A Leman Russ is not a tank I would attach with the ability to stalk or act in any way stealthily enough to quietly follow the Tanith.

AS for a standard power swords ability to cut through armour, it would have to be proportional to the users strength otherwise powerfists and chainfists would not only be reduntant but a step backwards.

[NecronLord]

I did read on Wikipedia that Space Marines in the tabletop game (and the RTS, by extension) are watered-down versions, and that Games Workshop released unofficial game rules for the way Space Marines perform in fluff.. where you field a single squad instead of a whole force.
Sounded interesting, but I do wonder why they didn't just make the tabletop game work that way officially.

As I understand it, the 'Movie Marine Rules' aren't realistic, they're just taken in the opposite direction, and make the Marines even more potent than they are. They're marines as they would be in the movies - IE, the same relationship with """real""" marines as Rambo has to a real soldier.

[Lost Soal]

Quite frankly, I think the closest to the fluff the tabletop game has been was 2nd edition. The big hero's could cause immense damage on the battlefield, which they do in the fluff, standard Marines can outgun and out fight most others, the weapons have about the right strengths and rates of fire, they even included the effects of range for both accuracy and armour penetration (not that the penetration drop off was ever used).

[Cykeisme]

Ah, so with power weapons, the amount of force applied by the wielder still plays an important role in penetrating a hard material. I guess that's appropriate for the setting, where badass heroes are fucking badass heroes.


Btw, aren't the Movie Marines rules the way it's supposed to work in-universe? Correct me if I'm wrong, but aside from variances in certain chapters, on average there are one thousand chapters of one thousand Space Marines each.. about a million Space Marines.
If they were only as powerful as we see them in other game media, one million troops can hardly make a difference in a conflict at the scale of the Imperium of Man's never-ending fight for survival.
I mean, we're being given Travissite numbers, but here, they are supposed to have insane levels of asskickingery.

What do you guys think?

[Jaevric]

I doubt it was a Leman Russ, the tank was described fairly distinctively, if it was originally a Russ, it was so warped as to no longer resemble such.

Come to think of it, you're right--the tank never used bolters as I recall, and if it'd been a Leman Russ it would have had a pair of them. My mistake.

A Leman Russ is not a tank I would attach with the ability to stalk or act in any way stealthily enough to quietly follow the Tanith.

Honestly, I'm not sure what kind of tank would qualify as "stealthy," aside from the one mentioned in Honor Guard--and even then it's purely relative. I assumed the ability to "stalk" the Tanith was the result of the daemonic powers, not the design of the original tank.

[NecronLord]

Ah, so with power weapons, the amount of force applied by the wielder still plays an important role in penetrating a hard material. I guess that's appropriate for the setting, where badass heroes are fucking badass heroes.


Btw, aren't the Movie Marines rules the way it's supposed to work in-universe? Correct me if I'm wrong, but aside from variances in certain chapters, on average there are one thousand chapters of one thousand Space Marines each.. about a million Space Marines.
If they were only as powerful as we see them in other game media, one million troops can hardly make a difference in a conflict at the scale of the Imperium of Man's never-ending fight for survival.

Most battlefronts never even see space marines. A normal Navy crewer is driven mad by the honour of speaking to them in Firewarrior. You can fight a hundred year war without Marines being called in, and to most people, they're Angelic figures of myth that might well be pure and simple propaganda. There may well be more Titans than there are marines.

It's also important to remember that their power also comes from their logistics. A normal regiment of guardsmen has, at best, a seconded civillian transport. A chapter of marines has three or four specialised, high-quality battleships, ten mid-level cruisers, and a sizeable flotilla of escort craft to back them up. They have integrated aircraft, rapid-forward-deployment for their armour, drop pods, teleporters, plasma-rockets, barrage bombs, vortex grenades, and cyclonic warheads. And a normal Marine company will have all but the last on immediate call in almost any situation.

A Guard colonel has some Valkiries. If he's lucky.

I mean, we're being given Travissite numbers, but here, they are supposed to have insane levels of asskickingery.

Except, of course, the IoM is not less than 1/50 the size of the Galactic Republic. Over a third of its worlds have populations under two million, and space travel is a rare thing indeed.


The thing is, the Movie Marines - note the damn name - are not the only scary things in the universe. If you have Movie Marines, then you should also have Movie Necrons, who can reliably one-shot them, Movie Genestealers, who can punch straight through their breastplates, Movie Demonettes (same again) and so on. There's a lot of horribly dangerous things in 40k, and while Marines have an exceptional record, and are better than most things, they're nowhere near that superior.

Put it this way; The Movie Marines have a special rule to represent their stunt doubles. Here is a quote, describing the 'Hero' character "This Space Marine has all of the coolest sayings in the film script and the most expensive designer purity seals. If there was ever a female lead in the film, it would be this Marine that constantly ended up saving her from situations of great danger. The actor who plays this role would be the reason your friend would accompany you to this film." Here's a special rule from the MMR list: "The script writer hates us: All special rules here apply only to the Space Marines of the Movie Marine list. Identical weapons and units on the opponents side operate according to their normal rules." They are not a 'realistic' depiction of Space Marines, they are a depiction of the Marines in the Imperial Propaganda Bureau's version of Rambo Goes to Afganistan or whatever it was called.


And if you want some Traviss-esque numbers, you should see your way to WD293, which suggests that the number of Battle Sisters on Earth and Ophelia are "many tens of thousands" - I think Codex Witch Hunters may establish each of the great orders as around ten thousand, too - though with that, at least, there are unknown numbers of lesser orders...

[andrewgpaul]

Lost Soal, even 2nd edition watered down the rules. It's worth remembering that a boltgun had the same strength as a crossbow. Jaevric, the heavy bolter sponsons on a Leman Russ are optional. Certainly, you can leave them off according to the codex, and in all 5 Imperial Armour books, there's precisely one picture of a Leman Russ with sponsons fitted.

[Stormbringer]

I doubt it was a Leman Russ, the tank was described fairly distinctively, if it was originally a Russ, it was so warped as to no longer resemble such.

Come to think of it, you're right--the tank never used bolters as I recall, and if it'd been a Leman Russ it would have had a pair of them. My mistake.

It could be a Leman Russ as they have a fair amount of variety. Not all are required to have sponson weapons after all; many in fact are do not according to fluff. In game they tend to have sponsons because of the way the game handles heavy ordinance.

[Connor MacLeod]

The Sword Of Hyronimo Sondar acts like a partial force weapon at times. Gaunt comments in Necropolis the the blade detects the incoming blows from Asphodels bodyguards and urges his arm into the right place. If he still had his normal chainsword he is positive he would have been dead.

It might be. Or it might just be a very sophisticated bit of technology and have a very good machine spirit or forcefield tech involved. God knows 40K has plenty of "super-technologicy magical weapons". Especially spears. It appears that you cannot be a Primarch without possessing at least one spear. And more often than not its not jsut a spear, its a spear-shaped WMD.

[Connor MacLeod]

As I understand it, the 'Movie Marine Rules' aren't realistic, they're just taken in the opposite direction, and make the Marines even more potent than they are. They're marines as they would be in the movies - IE, the same relationship with """real""" marines as Rambo has to a real soldier.

My general policy is that alot of the "game-related" stuff, including the fluff, ought to be taken with a huge grain of salt because it tends to be the most obvious bits of propoganda/hyperbole/ignorance/myth-"based information - especialyl drawings and such. The novels tend to be more of an "in-universe" look IMHO and thus more erliable of the two.

The whole "uber-space marines who can take entire systems" definitely falls under the category of "propoganda/hyperbole/myth" - indeed, many of the novels (particularily Ben Counters as I just finished reading) tend to point out that alot of the feats surrounding Space Marines are exaggerated.

[Lone_Prodigy]

One final question: after reading some fluff involving rosarius's (rosariii?), converter fields, and titan/ship shields, their mechanics still seem a bit unclear to me.

Do all of a titan's/ship's shields need to be brought down to damage it?
How powerful are such shields, relative to the armor? Would a titan's shields going down be no big deal or something major?
According to some commentary, a powerful enough weapon can punch through a rosarius's field. Assuming the Chaplain survived, would the shield stay down or would it recharge if the rosarius itself was undamaged?

[Imperial Overlord]

Do all of a titan's/ship's shields need to be brought down to damage it?

Void shields regenerate quickly and block most weapons. There are a some weapons (torpedoes and small craft, collectively referred to as ordinance in Battlefleet Gothic as well as at least one gargant weapon [basically an exploding giant bowling ball]) that can bipass shields.

How powerful are such shields, relative to the armor? Would a titan's shields going down be no big deal or something major?

The armour is extremely tough, but the shields are both powerful and quick to regenerate. The usual process is that you overload the shields and then do some damage to the titan or ship before shields regenerate and then knocked down the shields again in the next big exchange of fire. Losing shields is a bad thing, but not instant death. Starships and titans take a lot of killing

According to some commentary, a powerful enough weapon can punch through a rosarius's field. Assuming the Chaplain survived, would the shield stay down or would it recharge if the rosarius itself was undamaged?

Probably. A rosarius is sacred relic that contains a conversion field. A conversion field operates by converting a lot of the incoming energy of an attack into harmless light. Hit it with more energy that it converts (and they aren't a hundred percent reliable and they do have limits) and the rest gets through. If the conversion field is still operational it will still work with the next attack.

[Cykeisme]

How large exactly is a Titan? Are the scalings for Titans in DoW correct?

In particular, is the half-buried fallen Titan shown at the end of Winter Assault accurate size-wise? That thing is huge!
The Hellstorm cannon in Dark Crusade is similarly omfgpwn in size.

Let me know if a knew thread should be started for this instead..

[Azazal]

How large exactly is a Titan? Are the scalings for Titans in DoW correct?

In particular, is the half-buried fallen Titan shown at the end of Winter Assault accurate size-wise? That thing is huge!
The Hellstorm cannon in Dark Crusade is similarly omfgpwn in size.

Let me know if a knew thread should be started for this instead..

Unfortunately GW has been really good at changing the size of titans. I started a thread on it a while back - Titans, could GW get the story straight?

[white_rabbit]

How large exactly is a Titan? Are the scalings for Titans in DoW correct?

In particular, is the half-buried fallen Titan shown at the end of Winter Assault accurate size-wise? That thing is huge!
The Hellstorm cannon in Dark Crusade is similarly omfgpwn in size.

Let me know if a knew thread should be started for this instead..

Until we get an actual reference to some sort of Dark Age DeBigulator being attached to current titan designs.

Fuck knows.

[Lone_Prodigy]

Couldn't the varying sizes be attributed to differing variants on the same models? The titans could all have different sizes depending on where they were forged. The AM get a hard-on for standardization, but I'm sure they make an exception for their walking statues of the Emperor.

On a side-note, in the fluff have there been any examples of creatures surviving a blow from a force weapon? In Grey Knights a nemesis force sword slays a skyscraper-sized daemon, so it seems like surviving a hit would be somewhat difficult.