Dual-Wielding Hellpistols

By jabberwoky, in Rogue Trader Rules Questions

I am led to believe that a Hellpistol is a powerful laspistol connected to a battery pack by a thick cord where it draws power, usually held in place like a backpack.

Thus, is it possible to dual-wield Hellpistols? Since each weapon has a cord and backpack to power it, would that make them too cumbersome to dual-wield?

RAW it is allowed.

It is allowed. I remeber that in one book, some badass storm trooper sarge, wielded two hellguns with pistol grips or recoil gloves.

There is nothing preventing this. You just need to keep in mind that there's two small backpacks, which might take up space, limiting your mobility or how much you can carry.

But there's realistically nothing preventing you from dual-wielding Hellpistols at all.

I would infer they get hooked to the same backpack in most cases. Would halve your ammo, but...

Well, a large backpack ammo pack holds 200 rounds...

(Although I houserule that it holds 200 heavy weapon, 300 basic weapon, and 400 pistol weapon rounds.)

But I don't see why not, honestly. It would take a bit of jury rigging, but totally doable.

Although the idea of reloading those things has alsays been weird to me. I mean, who walks around with multiple backpacks? At that point you might as well just have 1 big backpack and save yourself the trouble.

I would infer they get hooked to the same backpack in most cases. Would halve your ammo, but...

That is how I would do it.

I'm pretty sure the hellpistol battery isn't so much a backpack sized object as it's more a quart sized belt mounted object.

I'm pretty sure the hellpistol battery isn't so much a backpack sized object as it's more a quart sized belt mounted object.

Well, in The Inquisitors Handbook (it was the one closest to me) has a little dagger symbol next to the weight of both the hellgun and hellpistol, which says "not including power backpack".

Then again, it's DH. Might be changed in newer books.

I'm pretty sure the hellpistol battery isn't so much a backpack sized object as it's more a quart sized belt mounted object.

There's both kinds. For example, Stormtroopers with full Hellguns and equipment regularly have backpack-sized batteries.

Hellpistols, afaik, usually have belt-mounted batteries the size of a small car battery.

I am led to believe that a Hellpistol is a powerful laspistol connected to a battery pack by a thick cord where it draws power, usually held in place like a backpack.

Thus, is it possible to dual-wield Hellpistols? Since each weapon has a cord and backpack to power it, would that make them too cumbersome to dual-wield?

its an excellent idea; in my old campaigns the RT's PA had a pair of packs hooked to HPs he could duel weild.

There is no reason why you wouldn't be able to dual wield Hellpistols. Though if memory serves I don't think you are REQUIRED to have an external power supply for it. I remember I had an old Explorator that ran with hellguns and I was very excited when I was finally able to procure a backpack power supply.

I'd assume you were using the 10kg waist-pouch for it before.

Perhaps I was Errant, I was wearing so much stuff already with that Explorator character anything is possible...

http://warhammer40k.wikia.com/wiki/Ursarkar_E._Creed

Lord Castellan Ursakar Creed wields 2 master crafted hellpistols, this is enough reason to have my military-focused RT using these.

Out of my head but memory says that you can wield Hellgun/hellpistol with normal charge pack but halve the clip size. :unsure:

I'm looking into a similar situation. I would like to twin-link hellpistols.

I'm assuming you could use just the one 10kg powerpack, but the clip size would still be 40. So you would be using 2 shots everytime (or 4 shots with semi-auto?)

My question is how would you do a semi auto burst using twin-linked? Also does red-dot sight bonus stack with the twin-linked bonus?

Semi-auto burst states (+10 to BS, additional hit for every two degrees of success.)

twin linked states (A weapon with the Twin-linked Quality gains a +20% bonus to hit when fired and uses twice as much ammunition. In addition, the weapon may score one additional hit if the attack roll succeeds by two or more degrees of success.)

Red Dot only works with single shot, but should work with Twin-linked.

As for the Twin-linked Burst, here's what I get:

+30 to BS (burst +10, twinlinked +20).

Degrees of succes - result

failure - nada.

Success - 1 hit

2-3 DoS - 3 hits (1 base +1 for BF +1 for TL)

4-5 DoS - 4 hits

etc, to a max of RoF+1

makes sense?

Also Motion Predictors are a scope designed to give +10 to BS on Semi/Full-Auto only which would be a better scope choice.

Incidentally, how do you/your group handle the Twin-Linked upgrade? Apart from an Orkish upgrade, I haven't found any rules that indicate how you would make a weapon Twin-Linked, so I've assumed they have to be deliberately designed that way. Am I overlooking something?

I don't think motion predictors are actually a scope.

I don't think motion predictors are actually a scope.

Depends on which version you are reading. In Rogue Trader, it doesn't count as a Sight, but in Deathwatch, it does.

When it comes to the "one sight only" rule, I would recommend going with the house rule I use myself. Rather than to restrict a weapon from having a single sight, restrict the characters from using more than one at any one time.

That way, you can have a Red-Dot Laser Sight and a Scope at the same time, but obviously, the Red-Dot Laser Sight would give no bonus bonuses when using the Scope (and vice-versa; frankly, at extreme ranges, why would the Red-Dot Laser Sight give a bonus at all?).

Similarly, the Motion Predictor would not be usable with other scopes, and consists of a small display at the side of the weapon, used for auto-targeting and tracking.

By RAW, though? If Rogue Trader only, then no, you are entirely correct. Motion Predictor is not a Sight.

Not a bad house rule, actually.

Also Motion Predictors are a scope designed to give +10 to BS on Semi/Full-Auto only which would be a better scope choice.

Incidentally, how do you/your group handle the Twin-Linked upgrade? Apart from an Orkish upgrade, I haven't found any rules that indicate how you would make a weapon Twin-Linked, so I've assumed they have to be deliberately designed that way. Am I overlooking something?

There are no specific rules anywhere for the creation of Twin-Linked weapons.

I would say that the creation of a Twin-Linked weapon or Combi-Weapons are involved processes, perhaps doubling all negative Acquisition modifiers (Very Rare -10 becoming -20) and halving all positive Acquisition modifiers.(Negligible Scale +30 becomes +15). Similarly, creating a Combi-Weapon or Twin-Linked weapon would likely require not only access to the weapons, but several hard Armourer Skill Tests.

Then I'd use the Twin-Linked Special Quality rules from Only War. I don't remember if they're identical to the Rogue Trader rules, I just remember that the rules have changed a couple of times throughout the books, and that I made the call to use the Only War rules because some of the other rules (such as Black Crusade) were utterly retarded.

But that's just me.

I'm looking into a similar situation. I would like to twin-link hellpistols.

I'm assuming you could use just the one 10kg powerpack, but the clip size would still be 40. So you would be using 2 shots everytime (or 4 shots with semi-auto?)

My question is how would you do a semi auto burst using twin-linked? Also does red-dot sight bonus stack with the twin-linked bonus?

Semi-auto burst states (+10 to BS, additional hit for every two degrees of success.)

twin linked states (A weapon with the Twin-linked Quality gains a +20% bonus to hit when fired and uses twice as much ammunition. In addition, the weapon may score one additional hit if the attack roll succeeds by two or more degrees of success.)

I also don't think that the standard 10kg Power-Pack would be enough - the Power Packs used by Hellpistols (and Hellguns) are more than just charge packs strapped together. They're capacitors and specialized equipment. If you plug two Hellpistols into a single Power Pack, I'd expect some difficulties, especially if they fire at the same time.

As for Red-Dot Laser Sight stacking with any potential bonus from Twin-Linked, that's a yes. That's only for single shots, though (brought up to two shots by being Twin-Linked).

I'm not sure if I understand what you mean with the question about Semi-Auto Burst, though. You simply do the attack as usual, applying the effects of Twin-Linked independently.