Varnias Tybalt I do agree that you should allow (RAW) a reaction dodge to a flamer attack (if all the circumstances for dodge reaction attack & dodging area of effect attacks are met) in addition to the initial AGL test. [Just re-read the rules to get it straight in my head]

However when I have two PCs mass flaming a dozen or so heretics a round it is easier to condense it to one roll.

However my main issue with the RAW is that the flame "to hit roll" is based upon a characters ability to get out of the way of it as specified by an agility roll & I personally believe that dodge skill should come into it in some way (other than as a reaction test if they fail the first test).

Varnias Tybalt said:

Actually I disagree. When you make a knowledge roll, in secret or openly, you are making a test to see what you know. You arent telling the Knowledge itself to make some sort of test to avoid being known by the player. So comparing a knowledge test to an opponent making an Agility test to avoid being hit is apples and oranges. Keep in mind that a player, or opponent, that gets hit needs to make another roll to see if they are on fire. That's 3 Agility tests for one action. Overkill and broken IMO.

Also flamers are one of the only weapons that players, or opponents, can turn against the user by the fuel canister so it blows up on the user, thus incinerating them on the spot. So there should be an advantage to using a flamer considering a lucky shot could end the user's life.

The funny thing is, I agree with most of what has been said, since they follow the RAW, its just I believe the RAW for flamers is broken and makes them fairly worthless as they are. Thanks for the input, and the question originally posed, since it has cleared up a lot for me as a GM.

Jlid said:

They do have an advantage. The advantage to potentially incinerate an entire mob of people. Even a modest hand flamer with a range of 10 meters can cover a 30 degree cone, 10 meter long area with flames. Just imagine how many human sized targets that could fit into that cone, and then consider that the roll doesn't have to bottle down to a matter of a failed or successful BS test to actually work, but the damage caused is based on the agility of all the targets.

Let's say that the targets are so many that they actually fill this entire cone, statistically speaking, very few will actually be able to both succeed on their agility roll and possible dodge tests coming after that one. That means that the flamer can hit a huge chunk of targets with minimal effort. THAT is an advantage over conventional weapons, no matter how you look at it.

If you change some of the drawbacks of the flamers then chances are that the weapon will end up to become overpowered.

Remember that flamethrowers weren't really constructed to kill individual targets (i.e trying to shoot one or two guys standing within range), they are intended to be area denial weapons (almost like landmines in a sense), but rather than having to be prepared and planted in an area where the enemy is expected to approach you can take the area denial qualities to the enemy (by "flushing out" bunkers and setting areas ablaze as you go along to prevent the enemy from coming or going certain directions).

If your goal is to bring pin point accuracy and be able to cut down individuals rather than groups of people, then a flamethrower would not be the weapon of choice. You would want to pick an assault rifle for that kind of operation.

Also, this is just a house rule suggestion, but I thought I should include it anyway: I have personally done away with the "risk of explosion" for flamers for most types of attacks. Tanks with fuel for a flamethrower don't explode into an instant inferon just because they are shot at, the fuel will just leak out of a hole.

Granted some attacks might cause them to explode (this is 40K after all, where they have weapons that shoot laser beams and plasma that could very well cut through the canisters for a flame thrower and igniting the fuel inside), but in general, weapons causing Impact damage or Rending damage shouldn't be able to light the fuel for a flamer.

Varnias Tybalt said:

The risk of explosion depends on the manufacturing methods used.

• If the canisters hold the fuel under pressure and use a pilot light then a puncture of the tanks could cause the fuel to expand as a vapour and if it goes near the pilot light. ****acolyte extra crispy****
• Next instead they could use two separate liquids that combust upon mixing. But again any punctures of the tanks would only be safe if it was of a single tank.

Baldrick said:

Or they could be built like modern conventional flamethrowers. Meaning, the fuel tanks are separate from the tank holding compressed gas used to force the fuel out of the tanks and on to the pilot light. That way, if a fuel tank is hit, the fuel will just leak out. If the preassurized gas tank is hit, the non-flammable gas will just shoot out (tipping the soldier over at worst) but without any risk of igniting.

This explains why most military experts find it a bit silly when watching the introduction scenes of movies like Saving Private Ryan, where the soldier with the flamethrowers suffers a hit in one of his tanks and just burst into a raging inferno that also take out a bunch of other soldiers in the same boat.

Also, there's a very interesting episode of mythbusters where they try to ignite a gas tank for a car by shooting at it. The only way to light it ablaze was by using tracer rounds at a very long range (because the chemical in the tracer round simply didn't have the time to start glowing at shorter ranges), and they needed several attempts to succeed because the method was anything than guaranteed.

Also there was an episode where they managed to blow up an oil drum filled with fuel, but they had to use a gatling gun loaded with incindiary rounds to pull it off.

Suffice to say that fuel tanks in general are built to be hard to blow up by just shooting at them with guns (sometimes by intention, and sometimes as a random aspect in construction), unless you use special ammunition of some kind. But that's something that hollywood (and a fair share of game making companies I might add) don't really like to agree with.

I've not allowed a dodge against flamers in the past but the wording seems pretty clear to contrary. it did seem odd that it didn't include dodge bonuses. Especially seeing as with a talent that Ag can be at -20 and the chance to catch on fire which pretty much = death.

Of course considering the area of attack that a flamer has it's also going to be highly likely that people aren't going to have the movement to get out the way.

One huge drawback of flamers that seems to be getting ignored here. The 10-20m range. Unless you are staging all of your fight scenes in 15mx15m rooms then this is a HUGE limitation. Meanwhile I can snipe the flamer operator with a longlas, hunting rifle, Nomad or similar from 600+m without difficulty. I am a veteran and could go on for quite a while about the performance of various weapons systems in the modern world, but that is completely irrelevant for this discussion. In the 40k based fiction flamers are absolutely brutal weapons when used up close or in confined quarters such as tunnels and they are fairly risky for their operators. Flame weapons in DH likewise suffer from a low number of shots per fuel canister and run the risk of premature ammo failure due to some rather arcane "jam". It should be noted that any model hit by a flame template in tabletop 40k has NO chance at dodging, no Agility test to not be hit, nothing! If the flames touch you, you are hit! Since DH is a bit more on the individual heroics side of things the game has provided a chance to somehow miraculously roll out of the way of a solid sheet of sticky, burning promethium. That is already pretty **** cool, but allowing those that fail to avoid the flames to then roll to avoid being hit by the flames... Well that is just silly!

Also, it is not inherently a death sentence to get hit by a flamer. 1D10+4 is the same damage as a shotgun in raw numbers. Sure, it ignores some if not all of your armour, but I promise you have had acolytes live through far worse! I have set player characters on fire in my game and a day later they were fine asside from accasional grumbling about the synthetic skin-spray flaking off in annoying ways. I have likewise had villains set on fire. Some die horribly like an 80's action movie, arms windmilling and everything, while others (a rather notorious cult fanatic comes to mind) continued to fight on oblivious to being on fire for at least another 6 combat rounds.

There is one other consideration that you should keep in mind. Flamers are an iconic weapon for the Inquisition. Ordo Hereticus are famously known for zealous use of "purifying flames". Ordo Xenos and the Imperial Guard will ALWAYS take silly amounts of flame weaponry along whenever there is a chance that orks might be encountered; not just to counter the living wave tactics, but also to burn the bodies and prevent spores... Underperforming flamers are just as big a problem as the pre-eratta bolt weapons were, to say nothing of the epic-suck that are plasma weapons in DH.

To put it another way: If a totally twinked-out assassin cannot attempt to avoid the same attack twice, then neither can someone with considerably less training in cheesy wuxia dodge techniques. Don't like being on fire? Try fighting farther away, ducking behind a solid ferrocrete wall or simply shooting the guy carrying it. Or you could be like our Techpriest: Stand there and take the hit like a half-man, then punish the offenders for their offenses they have made against a consecrated tool of the blessed Omnisiah (himself).

Happy Birthday ZillaPrime.

I think the main reason people assume you don't get a dodge with a flamer is that unlike every other ranged weapon you have to make the attack roll against yourself. All other shooting assumes you are moving (+20 bonus to hit prone targets, +30 to hit surprised ones). The only difference being that with other weapons you can still miss if they aren't moving.

Yes they have a short range, they are deffiantely specialist weapons. But they aren't exactly massively expensive either and it's possible for a starting character. At which point they are murderous beasts. Much of the combat does take place at ranges where it is useful. And although it's not a death sentence being hit by one there is a fair chance that a character will be taken out of combat (for a number of turns based on their agility) even if (on the small chance) that they are pretty much immune to the burning damage.

Long and short of it, as I see it. The rules don't say you don't get to dodge. If you want to play it that you can't dodge you should really allow +dodge skill to the agility roll.