I'm looking for suggestions or official rules on how to deal with players shooting shoulder or wrist mount weapons while firing other guns. I've got a player whom i've given a pair of wrist mounted bolt pistols, in addition to his pair of bolters that he carries (yes, i know its a bit reidculous, but thats pretty much the teme of my group)

Currently i've been applying an extra -10 penalty to hit on top of the dual wield penalty, bringing this player to -20 to hit, and i've been wondering what other people think about this.

how can he shoot more than one gun a turn? is there a multiple attacks for ranged?

Unless they can point to a rule that explicitly says otherwise*, they only get to make two attacks each round. Once with each arm.

At the very least, he should only be able to aim at one target with each arm. If he doesn't have Independent Targeting, then all his shots will go for the same target. And since they are all firing at once, if his first gun downs the target, he still has to expend ammo and test for jams on the other three.

*Servo arms come with one such rule.

I think this level of munchining is rediculous.

Its called two-weapon fighting first of all, not four-weapon fighting. You can fire one weapon each hand with two-weapon fighting. Arm mounting allows you to fire a weapon from your arm while keeping your hand free. I don't see anywhere this allows you to fire one weapon each hand and each arm. Especially since two-weapon ballistics requires the use of multiple attacks to fire both weapons. Multiple attacks is a full action. If your player says something along the lines of "it doesn't say I can't," then just give him a good hard slap, he deserves it. Especially if you really look at it in any kind of hard-core munchkin RAW manner, he's still not allowed. Two-weapon fighting specifically says you can use a full action to make a multiple attack action to attack with both weapons in two 'hands', not 2 hands and 2 arms, doesn't even mention arms. Therefore according to "RAW" you may only use 2 weapon fighting with weapons in your hands. I know those of us players and GMs can apply common sense and understand the technique can apply to arm mounted weapons, but then again we can also apply common sense and know shooting four weapons in your described manner is just abuse of the game system. As a GM its your duty to nip this kind of flagrant abuse in the bud.

I'm sure your player feels all kinds of pride and what-not at figuring out this particular game-breaking idea but this is just idiotic.

Whoa, some real hatred you have going on there herichimo. The player in question actually has no real desire to powergame and doesnt know enough of the rules to be a munchkin, he just thinks that shooting rediculous amounts of bolt fire at an enemy is quite fun, and since my group is more interested in fun then strictly following the rules or bending the lore a bit, i've allowed him to do this. Hell, i even made a wee equipment card for his wrist mounted bolt pistols (with a full auto option included too ). To be honest, i dont even find it too much of a stretch to allow the firing of wrist mounted weapons at the same time as single-hand wielded ones, fluffwise, common sense wise, or RAW wise, but i can see how it could imbalance things for a more serious group then mine.

And even with this hilarious amount of firepower, this player is still not dominating the kill counts within the group, since he is interested in doing more then just declaring "i shoot it" every turn (and he rolls quite badly for his left hand weapons quite often....its spooky)

Bilateralrope, i agree with the requirement to shoot the wrist mounted weapons at the same target as the one in that hand, and that hasnt been an issue yet since this player hasnt even considered doing otherwise (but if he does and comes of with some sort of incredible explaination for it i might let him shoot 4 targets in 1 turn, although thats just how i DM).

Thanks for the opinions.

On another point, i'm also curious on peoples opinions of using a servo harness to fire multiple guns in a turn, the imagery of doctor octopus with bolters instead of extending tentacles has always amused me.

jacktheinedible said:

I'd say they get:

- Two attacks during their turn. The only difference between this and a regular TWW attack is that you use the harness arms instead of the human shaped arms.

- An extra attack for each reaction they spend. Normally they would only get one reaction, but if they get a second reaction somehow, they get to use it for an attack.

Each gun only gets to fire once.

As for firing 4 weapons, since you are allowing him to do it, I'd suggest adjusting your penalties so that firing with only 3 gives a bit more accuracy. So I'd suggest -20 when firing 3, -30 when firing all 4. Or, to account for the case when the player gets a digi weapon on each finger*: If a player has ambidextrous and the appropriate two weapon weilder talent(s), and a means to use the weapons, he may attack with multiple weapons as a full action. For each weapon beyond the first he has a cumulative -10 penalty to all attacks he makes that turn.

*I had a RT player who, upon seeing that there were 4 different digi weapons, decided that he wanted one of each for each hand. As well as a pistol attached to each forearm.

Well, if he would have special cognitators one could say he has a Twin Linked Bolter and a Twin Linked Bolt Pistol....

If he just wanna fire like a madman, make him do a Devastator Marine with a Heavy Bolter with a suspensor. That way, he can fire on full auto twice per turn, with 10 bolts per barrage. Add to that the motion predictor (+10BS), best quality (+10 BS) Signature Wargear (Master) (+10 BS), and the bonus for firing in full auto (+20 BS, plus a hit per each degree of success) and he only needs to buy the marksman talent (no penalties for range) and Storm of Iron (double the damage to Hordes) to see a marine with 90% or more in his BS attacks. That beats carrying 4 bolters (12 bolts per turn instead of 20 in the best case scenario of GM goodwill)

Tunnelhckrat said:

Of course there is. It has been clarified here on the forums in the meantime that DW is supposed to work exactly the same as clarified in the Dark Heresy errata.

For the OP's post itself, I would not allow more than one attack per arm. I think it's RAI too.

Alex

In the TTG of 40K, there are NO wrist mounted Bolt Pistols. There is, however, a Storm Bolter which I guess was meant to be emulated. It is wrist mounted but usually to leave the hand free to wield a two-handed melee weapon without penalty of holstering before swinging. Usually only available to those wearing TDA but with the recent release of the Grey Knights Codex, it is available to them ONLY while wearing PA. The only other exceptions are a few Independent/Special Characters. As this RPG is about the DeathWatch and they have access to the resources of the Imperiums Armories I can see how a PA mounted Stom Bolter can be arranged but I agree with the absolute ridiculousness of the individual. Be a Dev and go with a HB or go big and graduate to a Terminator with an Assault Cannon if all one wishes is to spit volleys of projectiles.

It's one thing to stretch things to have fun but they have to be based in some level or semblance of sanity. There is much in the various Codices that provide the "reality" of the 40K Universe. The Armory sections available in the them as well as the BRB lists what is available in the way of weapons. I must've missed the special velcro entry or the invent weapons section. Twin wrist mounted Bolt Pistols is gawdy and while wielding two Bolters as well is plain absurd, IMO. There is plenty of fun to be had within the rules. When they are twisted and outright disrgarded then why even play by them. Just invent our own and have fun if that is your primary focus.

Argus Van Het said:

No-one can fire a heavy bolter twice in one round. You can only do each type of action at most *once* per round. Thus even though a heavy bolter with suspensors only needs a half action to fire, it cannot be fired twice. Said devastator can move further or even aim with the other half action though.

As for the OP, I go by the book - a PC can fire two weapons a round with tww (ranged). Oh and fire a servo-harness mounted weapon as a reaction.

Thanks for the suggestion Bilateralrope, i think i will go with the -20 for 3 guns and -30 for 4 guns and see how it works from them.

Everyone else, thanks for the input, and i realize that this is stretching the rules to do this, but we are doing this for the sake of amusement, not practicality or power gaming, so i'm not too concerned about RAW. Just for reference, the player whose character is wielding a quartet of bolt weapons basically asked meto help him make a character that was "deadpool in space marine format."

Another option to consider would be to tell him that if he wants to fire his handheld gun at the same time as the wrist gun on the same arm, then he rolls once and it counts as him firing a single weapon with Storm and/or Twin-Linked.

jacktheinedible said:

Then wait for the Chaos version of the game. Deadpool has never been a hero, has never shut up, and has never needed to fire more than two guns at the same time (however, he might carry a lot of guns). He being able to regenerate damage almost quicker than the speed which it's inflicted helps a lot. And I bet he would be around 75-80 insanity.

At least to me, Deadpool strikes better as a Chaos warrior (probably Slaanesh, or even Khorne) than a Space Marine... and one thing about "cool character ideas" is that they stop being cool when you use them more than once in a row.

Argus, you make an excellent point about deadpool being more chaosy then a good guy. A group of chaos marines based off of comic book villians sounds like it could be a fun idea for the future. (and you can't tell me deadpool wouldnt use more then 2 guns at a time if he had the chance )

Good idea about using storm/twin linking for the weapon set up Bilateralrope, i'll probably start playing it as a storm bolter or bolt pistol for each hand to save on the dice rolling.

Just say 'no'. Rule 1: What the GM says, goes.

This isn't anime. How many marine minis have you seen with a shoulder mounted weapon, let alone two? How many with twin bolt guns? How many with twin bolt guns and twin wrist weapons? And Chapter Masters don't really count.

So the canon, rules, and minis all pretty much say 'no'. If you want to allow it, that's of course fine, but bear in mind: How long does this guy spend on his 'turn' compared to everyone else. If it's twice as long because he's rolling too many dice, then there's a problem.