I was flipping through the book of judgement and I stumbled across this monster of a shotgun.

S/2/- 1d10+9 pen 0 clip 14

now looking at the description the damage seems reasonable as it's using space marine shells in a gun sized for a human however it also mentions that it has a smaller than normal ammunition capacity. As the shot gun is described as a pump model comparing clip size to the normal pump shotgun it has a clip of 14 to the normal pump's 8. The assumption I am making is it was supposed to be 4 and the 14is a typo.

If my gm finds the weapon overpowered I was going to present this to him as stated but I am wondering is there any official ruling on this weapon'a stat line? If not I would like to hear your thoughts on its balance.

Thanks.

The entry is accurate: Arbites use shotguns as their primary ranges weapons, and they are of a much higher quality, including a large capacity. The capacity notation is to draw a distinction about trade-offs; the same weapon chambered for standard shells would have a much higher capacity, and the use of a tube magazine increases reliability and ease of handling over a bulky, high-capacity drum-mag. They are still inferior to Astartes shotguns and less powerful than shotcannon, but definitely a step above what the Guard and Navy use.

Keep in mind it is still only a so-so weapon relative to the good stuff; lacking the range for a standoff firefight, rate of fire to manage hordes or adequately suppress enemies, lacking the explosive power to reliable kill tougher opponents, and lacking the penetration, even with slugs, to do appreciable damage to heavily armored targets. It is an all-rounder, made flexible with cheap, readily available ammo and specialist munitions, giving you a reasonable chance against most opponents until you can arrange for more specialized weaponry for major targets.

2 hours ago, Warior4356 said:

using space marine shells

Technically speaking, all shotgun shells are "Space Marine size". The calibre of .75 (19mm) cited for boltgun barrels (both Human or Astartes) roughly corresponds to a 12G shotgun (20mm). It's why some people hold up the AA-12 with explosive rounds as a real life bolter equivalent, as the only thing still missing would be a rocket motor for the shells.

2 hours ago, Warior4356 said:

however it also mentions that it has a smaller than normal ammunition capacity.

It does -- the Combat Shotgun, the core rulebook's king of shotguns (whose 100% identical appearance to what we see on GW's Arbites minis probably was not coincidental) which this new weapon would replace has an ammo capacity of 18, so you'd lose 4 shots when trading up.

In general, though, this particular shotgun has been criticized several times in the past (especially as BoJ was released) and, given that its damage profile is superior to even boltguns, it often gets cited as a premier example for a certain "codex creep" introduced with later books. Of course, the core rulebook was written by Black Industries, yet Book of Judgement by an FFG team, so maybe different writers just had different ideas here.

3 minutes ago, ViperMagnum357 said:

The entry is accurate: Arbites use shotguns as their primary ranges weapons, and they are of a much higher quality, including a large capacity. The capacity notation is to draw a distinction about trade-offs; the same weapon chambered for standard shells would have a much higher capacity, and the use of a tube magazine increases reliability and ease of handling over a bulky, high-capacity drum-mag. They are still inferior to Astartes shotguns and less powerful than shotcannon, but definitely a step above what the Guard and Navy use.

Keep in mind it is still only a so-so weapon relative to the good stuff; lacking the range for a standoff firefight, rate of fire to manage hordes or adequately suppress enemies, lacking the explosive power to reliable kill tougher opponents, and lacking the penetration, even with slugs, to do appreciable damage to heavily armored targets. It is an all-rounder, made flexible with cheap, readily available ammo and specialist munitions, giving you a reasonable chance against most opponents until you can arrange for more specialized weaponry for major targets.

It's arguably better than a bolt gun when filled with slugs. Is one possible argument against it.

Oh what books besides the core have specialty slugs? I was considering a shotgun specialized arbiter and having numbers on thoes would be nice.

Finally since you seem to know a lot about shotguns would a vanahiem arbites combo basicly cover all needed cases excluding heavy armour or long range? The vanahiem basicly shreds if anything that can't take its hits and the arbites dropping most things that can?

Executioner shells are in Ascension, though most of the best varieties were released in later lines, like Rogue Trader and Deathwatch. You can find a good grouping in the fan-collated Macharian Handbook. And keep in mind there is a vast gulf between the 'civilian' bolters available for humans and the huge weapons used by the Astartes-a difference as large between the same in shotguns, and even a civilian bolter is something I would take over an Arbites shotgun in most cases. What it loses in direct damage it gains in AP, and then tearing means its damage is superior against anyone wearing at least 2 points of armor-plus doubling the chance of righteous fury for massive damage.

Also, are you asking to create a double shotgun weapon, or to carry 2 different ones?

Just carrying two shotguns.

Also so can you explain the math difference between a boltgun and a abities shotgun loaded with slugs? I thought the shotgun was more reliable damage in that senario.

11 hours ago, Lynata said:

Technically speaking, all shotgun shells are "Space Marine size". The calibre of .75 (19mm) cited for boltgun barrels (both Human or Astartes) roughly corresponds to a 12G shotgun (20mm). It's why some people hold up the AA-12 with explosive rounds as a real life bolter equivalent, as the only thing still missing would be a rocket motor for the shells.

12ga is 18.5 mm, and for real life bolter and reasons why it will not work it's better to read about Gyrojet.

11 hours ago, Warior4356 said:

would a vanahiem arbites combo basicly cover all needed cases

The first problem will be to get your hands on forge-world Scitarii weapon...

31 minutes ago, Warior4356 said:

Also so can you explain the math difference between a boltgun and a abities shotgun loaded with slugs? I thought the shotgun was more reliable damage in that senario.

DH Boltgun = S/2/-, 1d10+5 X, Pen 4, Tearing . BoJ Shotgun = S/2/-, 1d10+9 I, Pen 0

Even for unarmored target I would not exchange Tearing quality and Explosive critical chart for only 4 additional damage.

What about the scatter quality? If the bolt gun gets 2 hits the shotgun gets a third. Also I had not considered the difference in critical chart, is there a tier list of crit charts?

You lose Scatter for +1 dmg, +2 Pen with solid slugs, and anyway Scatter work only at Point-blank. Critical charts are in the Corebook.

On the other hand, bolt shells are EXPENSIVE, and bolter as weapon catches the eye much more...

42 minutes ago, Jargal said:

You lose Scatter for +1 dmg, +2 Pen with solid slugs, and anyway Scatter work only at Point-blank. Critical charts are in the Corebook.

Okay fair, so buckshot vs bolt shells. With 2 degrees of success you have 1d10+4 pen 4 tearing twice. Rolling 2d10 and dropping lowest will produce an average of 7.15. So against an unarmored target you have a total of 2x11.15= 22.3 total damage on average, against an armored target you will not lose damage if it has 4 or less. Lets use guards man flak as an example for the math, as well lets say the target has a TB of 4. With 4 armor you have a a total damage of 22.3, then losing 4 damage per hit to toughness you have a total damage of 14.3.

On the other hand, the shotgun, its 1d10+9 pen 0, so a single d10 averages to 5.5, meaning each shot does 14.5 damage, with no penetration and 4 armor and 4 toughness your damage per hit reduces to 6.5 on average. You get three hits at 6.5 on average, finishing at a total of 19.5 average against a tough guardsman. With less armor or toughness the difference widens even more. At this range bracket and number of successes, there is no way for the bolt to do more damage unless the target has enough armor/toughness to reduce the shotgun to less than one wound.

Now all this math was at point blank. If we pull out to short range the weapons are inflicting the same number of hits. At this point the boltgun does more damage if the target has 4 or more points of armor, otherwise the shotgun is still the superior weapon for raw damage points.

Now I have not compared the crit tables for the two weapons so I don't know if that difference is enough to justify the loss in flat wounds. Also do let me know if I made any mistakes in my math.

EDIT: A quick look at the crit tables seems to me that explosive is about 2 wound levels superior, so I would conclude that against unarmored targets at short range the shotgun is still better, however with one level of armor they are effectively equally lethal, and any more than that and the boltgun is better. However at point blank the shotgun is easily the better weapon.

21 minutes ago, Warior4356 said:

Also do let me know if I made any mistakes in my math.

Don't see any mistakes, but you forget about Righteous Fury. With Tearing bolter has a 19% chance for RF check for every shot, while shotgun only 10%.

Main problem is that PB range is difficult to mantain. Even AB1 enemy with torn off leg can run into melee distance with one action, effectively transforming your shotgun to club, or disengage to Short Range.

3 minutes ago, Jargal said:

Don't see any mistakes, but you forget about Righteous Fury. With Tearing bolter has a 19% chance for RF check for every shot, while shotgun only 10%.

Main problem is that PB range is difficult to mantain. Even AB1 enemy with torn off leg can run into melee distance with one action, effectively transforming your shotgun to club, or disengage to Short Range.

Why is it 19% not 20%?

17 minutes ago, Warior4356 said:

Why is it 19% not 20%?

Because with 10d10 it would be 65%, not 100% P robability does not just stack.

13 minutes ago, Jargal said:

Because with 10d10 it would be 65%, not 100% P robability does not just stack.

Hmmmm I know you are right, I just don't remember why you are right. Can you give the math justification for why the odds of a single number on X dice is that way?

On single d10 dice you have "0.9 against 0.1" chance for any single number. With two dices you have 0.9*0.9=0.81 probability to NOT ROLL this number on both dices, 0.01 of ROLL on both dices and 0.18 for ROLL on any one of two dices (with 3 dices base is 0.9^3=0.729, etc). For RF you need at least one "10" and additional "10" don't give you any additional benefits, so you can don't bother with perfect calculation of number of "10" and they probability and stop at "1-0.9^X" for X dices.

3 minutes ago, Jargal said:

On single d10 dice you have "0.9 against 0.1" chance for any single number. With two dices you have 0.9*0.9=0.81 probability to NOT ROLL this number on both dices, 0.01 of ROLL on both dices and 0.18 for ROLL on any one of two dices (with 3 dices base is 0.9^3=0.729, etc). For RF you need at least one "10" and additional "10" don't give you any additional benefits, so you can don't bother with perfect calculation of number of "10" and they probability and stop at "1-0.81=0.19"

Oh alright thanks. So to adjust the calcs, we can look at Righteous fury as adding 5.5 damage 19% of the time. so it also can be looked at as adding 1.045 damage all the time. this is for a tearing weapon. on a non tearing weapon you add .55 damage all the time. So, the shotgun on two hits gains about 1 damage, and the bolter gains about 2. Meaning they become equal weapons statistically on no armor at short range. Point blank the shot gun still wins out by a decent amount however.

Now there is still the point of that a shot gun which is 20 rounds per throne does the same damage at normal range as a bolter which is 16 thrones a round.

8 minutes ago, Warior4356 said:

So to adjust the calcs, we can look at Righteous fury as adding 5.5 damage 19% of the time. so it also can be looked at as adding 1.045 damage all the time. this is for a tearing weapon. on a non tearing weapon you add .55 damage all the time. So, the shotgun on two hits gains about 1 damage, and the bolter gains about 2.

Slightly more complicated, because RF must be confirmed by additional BS test, so in your example of 2DoS shot bolter checks twice for 19% and shotgun thrice for 10%. And we don't take into account the BS of shooter at all.

8 minutes ago, Warior4356 said:

Now there is still the point of that a shot gun which is 20 rounds per throne does the same damage at normal range as a bolter which is 16 thrones a round.

And the problem of distance maintenance . You can't rely on surprise attack from Point Blank any time.

But if the weapons are equal at anything shorter than long range. Whats the downside of the shotgun?

Also if you load slugs. The math changes and they are better than a bolt gun for damage at all ranges if the armor is 2 or less. Ties at 3.

It's slightly more complicated - you double AP against Scatter weapon at Long or Extreme range.

All in all bolters have more versatility. Shotguns are cheaper and more inconspicuous.

3 hours ago, Jargal said:

It's slightly more complicated - you double AP against Scatter weapon at Long or Extreme range.

All in all bolters have more versatility. Shotguns are cheaper and more inconspicuous.

Plus no one looks twice at an arbiter with a shotgun. A bolt gun draws looks. A justice not law arbites sounds like they could be fun.

On 2/8/2017 at 9:49 PM, Warior4356 said:

you seem to know a lot about shotguns would a vanahiem arbites combo basicly cover all needed cases excluding heavy armour or long range? The vanahiem basicly shreds if anything that can't take its hits and the arbites dropping most things that can?

Ouphh, I'm afraid I can't be of much help there. I kinda stopped playing the newer supplements after BoM as I wasn't satisfied with the process I just criticized. I just continue to treat the core rulebook's Combat Shotgun as the Arbites shotgun in my games, though by now I've switched to Dark Heresy 2nd Edition. For better or worse, FFG losing the license at least means that DH2 can be considered a "complete game" before supplements were able to wreck its balance.

I just know the Vanaheim as it was the subject of much discussion when BoJ came out, but I can't claim to have a perfect overview about all shotguns in the game as my DH1 collection is incomplete. But like I said, I certainly wouldn't regard this weapon as "necessary".

22 hours ago, ViperMagnum357 said:

And keep in mind there is a vast gulf between the 'civilian' bolters available for humans and the huge weapons used by the Astartes

In the world of Fantasy Flight Games, anyways, explicitly contradicting GW codex fluff.

Miraculously, Space Marine bolt shells lose 3 points of damage as soon as you load them into a Human weapon like the Angelus bolt carbine from the DH Inquisitor's Handbook, even though it's still the exact same projectile. It's quite astounding!

13 hours ago, Jargal said:

12ga is 18.5 mm, and for real life bolter and reasons why it will not work it's better to read about Gyrojet.

Hmm, are you sure about the 12G ?

And boltguns aren't gyrojets. The way they're described in 99% of the fluff including Dark Heresy is with the bolts having a two-stage launch mechanism, fired like a conventional weapon and leaving the barrel at low velocity before a rocket motor kicks in. This is why you often see spent shells flying out of the weapon's ejector port in official art. Like I said, it's pretty much an automatic shotgun, you just have to add a rocket motor to the bolts. The conventional firing mechanism also deals with the downside that a pure gyrojet would have in terms of lacking penetration at short range.

3 hours ago, Lynata said:

Ouphh, I'm afraid I can't be of much help there. I kinda stopped playing the newer supplements after BoM as I wasn't satisfied with the process I just criticized. I just continue to treat the core rulebook's Combat Shotgun as the Arbites shotgun in my games, though by now I've switched to Dark Heresy 2nd Edition. For better or worse, FFG losing the license at least means that DH2 can be considered a "complete game" before supplements were able to wreck its balance.

I just know the Vanaheim as it was the subject of much discussion when BoJ came out, but I can't claim to have a perfect overview about all shotguns in the game as my DH1 collection is incomplete. But like I said, I certainly wouldn't regard this weapon as "necessary".

The stat line on the vanaheim makes it good room clearing gun. 40m s/3/6 1d10+4 I pen 0 clip 15 scatter. So going full auto at point blank means on something unarmored its probably going to die. Plus when firing full auto extra hits can be allocated to neighbors which means it can slaughter rooms wholesale. The weapons is 400 thrones, and only average rarity. However this comes with a catch as its mostly used by skitari, so unless your know a tech priest average might as well be very rare.

The other neat part, it comes standard with a extendable saw bladed bayonet, and a red dot laser. I believe the bayonet counts as mono, but don't quote me on that. All in all a brutal weapon for eliminating revolts on forge worlds.

EDIT: No its not mono but 40 thrones more is not much for a weapon that pricey.

Oh, silly me. The Vanaheim was a different weapon; I was assuming this was about the Arbites shotgun! Now that you mention it, however, I seem to recall the pattern had a different name...

It's been a long time since we last had a discussion about it, so my memory on such details is hazy. But the Vanaheim is probably from the Lathe Forgeworlds supplement? I don't have that one either, so my claim to lack of expertise still stands.

50 minutes ago, Warior4356 said:

EDIT: No its not mono but 40 thrones more is not much for a weapon that pricey.

Indeed, I'm sure any GM worth their salt would allow subsequent mono-ing even if the bayonet comes as part of the gun.

The Vanaheim is from the Inquisitors handbook in the forgeworld section.

The arbites gun is from the Book of Judgment, its name is the Vox Legi