I've no doubt people have mentioned this before but I had a quick look and couldn't see anything.

Does anybody else think that melta weapons are underpowered in the main rules are in the inquisition handbook. Sure the basic damage looks good, but by the time you factor in heavy bolters and multilasers let alone Atartes style bolt weapons they really do start to look weak. Definately have trouble with the vehicles in the Apocrypha. Except the multimelta, but thats a multimelta it's supposed to do ridiculous damage.

As a very simple solution, I was thinking of adding a new weapon trait:

Melta

Weapons with this trait add an additional 1D10 damage to targets that are hit by the weapon when within the weapons short range.

I don't think that wouldbe too bad, it's not far at all for most weapons, the cheap Melta torch from the IHB doesn't have range categories so it wouldn't be effected.

I think that in general plasma and melta weapons suck in the rules.

Add 1D10 to plasma and melta weapons (the non heavy ones) and I think they are fine. The idea that a ball of plasma is 1D10+6 pen6 is ridiculous.

Hellebore

Hellebore said:

Ditto

Hellebore said:

Agreed. That's what I've been doing for months now.

There's currently no reason why anyone sane would take a plasma weapon.

Add me to the "add another d10 damage and it's fine" list.

I'm joining that list now.

Yeah, I'm totally on the bandwagon for an extra d10 at short range. In the TT, it gets extra dice for penetrating armor at short range, too.

Ripper.McGuirl said:

I just give them a flat +1d10 bonus - no short range qualifier. Meltaguns have an extremely short range anyway (short range for a Meltagun is 10m, and 5m for an Inferno Pistol). At most, I'd halve their Pen value at long and extreme range (down to a still-respectable 6)...

What's wrong with giving a character a figthing chance to survive an enemy with a plasma or melta weapon?

-K

kjakan said:

That's what the dodge skill is for. Meltaguns in particular are anti-tank weapons... the best way to survive one is to not be hit by it.

I'm going to concur... the additional d10 is needed. And to survive having such weapons shot at you, consider the drawbacks of the weapons themselves that justify the extra damage. For plasma, try to return fire on 'cooldown' rounds. For melta, try to get your foe to expend their extremely limited ammo on hard to hit targets or engage at a greater range. Failing that.... well... there is always fate points!

My main problem with the melta weaponry is not so much the low stats but the enemies. The stuff that a certain commissarial aide likes to unleash his melta on often have more toughness bonus than armour - which isn't affected by penetration, making both plasma and melta weapons less effective as the "big guns" you bring out for the bug/daemon/mutant hunt.

I'd consider using left-over penetration of these weapons on the Unnatural portions of Toughness bonuses.

An additional D10 can't hurt, of course...

I haven´t made up my mind about melta weapons right now, but when it comes to "Plasma Weapons" I ruled that their penetration does not count against the TB as well.

This way, I wanted to give that plasma weapons an extra edge against "living tissue". In the TT, they were a real good choice against any infantry (armoured or not) but no good against any thing that was better armoured then an apc. While it is "weaker" that the "+1d10" solution, it gives a more "stable" result, still ensuring that a human hit by plasma is going to suffer from it.

Talking melta, I currently think about +1d10 on short range only: most of my player are forma WH40K-TT-Players, so it will give them the feeling "of the old days" back. ("Melta...need to get close...to that tank...")

Gregorius21778 said:

Be careful with that ruling - short range might seem appropriate, but remember that the short range of a meltagun is only 10m (about 1/8th of the weapon's maximum range), which is an extremely small distance compared to every other gun in the game. If you wanted to directly port the "extra damage at half the range or less" from 40k, you'd be better off giving the extra d10 at short and normal range (and thus removing it at Long and Extreme range), so that there's at least the more manageable effective range of 40m rather than 10m. The alternatives might be a flat +1d10 damage and (because in 40k, it's not the damage that improves, but the ability to penetrate vehicle armour) to halve the Pen value at Long and Extreme range, or scaling the damage more directly to range (start at 3d10+4, gain or lose 1d10 damage for every +/- 10 modifier for range, so it becomes 4d10+4 at short range, 2d10+4 at long range, a flat 4 at Extreme Range, and a massive 6d10+4 - about the same as a Meltabomb - at point blank range), though the latter is obviously more complicated.

Or you could say half the unspent pentration reduceses the TB armour of the target, that may do it insted of the +1d10.

Does RAW say Pen doesn't apply vs TB or is that a house rule?

By RAW, penetration applies to armour and armour alone.

Add me to the bandwagon of melta's and plamsa guns been too weak and also add me to the "extra D10 Dmg" due to been a plasma/melta weapon bandwagon too!

One side-question:

more dice means a better chance for "rigthous fury", right?

More dice does mean a greater chance of righteous fury. Also, how about las weapons only count half toughness bonus, rounded up, and plasma weapons ignore toughness

kjakan said:

What's wrong with giving a character a figthing chance to survive an enemy with a plasma or melta weapon?

-K

That's what the dodge skill is for. Meltaguns in particular are anti-tank weapons... the best way to survive one is to not be hit by it.

Well, yes, but it does seem the write ups were designed with "being survivable for players" in mind. Pen 12 was redundant at the time the book came out (highest AP being 8 at the time), so it looks like they were intending that the weapons be funnelled towards "this is for vehicle killing" in mind, and not just flat out make them better than the more normal weapons (specially with many players tendency to try and find the "best" weapon and use it all the time, especially if they come from what I see as a D&D mindset). Now, truthfully the weapon does have various problems otherwise, but it's short range doesn't matter too much, as most combats are at short range in DH (ok, you don't get the same bonus to hit as everyone else), and if your weapon incinerates enemies in one hit its low ammo capacity won't be too galling.

Ok, it would have problems with some of the tougher vehicles, but how often would a PC party need to kill heavy tanks? With the apocrypha vehicle rules you only needed to just penetrate the armour to get to roll on the random table of vehicle explosion, so 2d10+16 against a vehicle's armour meant most light vehicles could be penetrated fairly reliably. It is only really with the increasingly inflated damage and armour values and the fact that vehicles now have hit points that mean this is now measly against anything short of battle tanks.

Meltas are anti-tank weapons and have no place in the kinds of missions acolytes are supposed to be doing.

If you must just port over the Only War stats.

Meltas are anti-tank weapons and have no place in the kinds of missions acolytes are supposed to be doing.

If you must just port over the Only War stats.

Then why are they listed in the Dark Heresy core rulebook? They are in there, they have a profile, range, and everything.

The point of this thread is that it's actually not that impressive, and it's actually pretty feasible an Acolyte could survive a direct hit from a Melta-gun or two. The weapon is literally more threatening to a tank than it is to an unarmored Acolyte.

Which I think was kind of the point. Melta weapons shouldn't really be considered practical anti-personnel weapons. Deadly, yes, but awkward, slow firing, and rather inaccurate for the purpose. However, the system doesn't model that well. In the tabletop they fire one short ranged shot, which makes them more than sub-par against infantry. Dark Heresy? They have a low ammo limit, slow reload and short range, yes, but the range is not so hampering in most Dark Heresy gun fights, and the way that many players play, if the damage against human targets was accurate then they would take it regardless of it not being designed for that purpose. If you could

I think something like making the Melta have the Recharge rule, and a penalty to hit targets smaller than a certain size, while upping the damage, might make them more "accurate" in their use and mechanics. If you go far back enough Meltaguns couldn't even move and fire...