So my group had a bit of a trip-up in the last game, where I accidentally swarmed them with a horde of gaunts before they could use their ranged weapons to thin out their numbers. The devastator was equipped with a heavy flamer, but iirc, you can't fire a ranged weapon unless it's a pistol in close combat. He was left to his bolt pistol, is that his only recourse? Grenades aren't an option, are they? Can he even throw/drop them by the rules, in melee?

Thanks!

Well, he couldn't throw a grenade, that's for sure.

Priming and then dropping one... Dunno that one would be up to you as the GM I'd guess. I's say it would still be his attack action (Half) at least.

I don't think any intelligent soldier would want to do this though, even if he was 'sure' his armour could withstand it. I'd add in something to 'encourage' my players not to do this to many times. Say: the attack hits you but goes through the armour for being literally pointblank (hit a joint or something), or the player blocks most of the blast with his body and the grenade only effects half as many enemy as normal.

He could always punch and kick. Even without special weapons Astartes are pretty strong. With all the talents making his attacks not primative and all. Your basic marine does 1d10+SB with his balled fist of death. Now if the enemy has a weapon of some type (even natural weapon) I'm unsure if the marine gets the -20 penalty for attacking an armed enemy while unarmed or if one of the talents overides this, I'll have to look into that.

First of all, every Space Marine carries his SM Combat Knife, as instructed in the Codex Asstartas, and actually isn't half bad. And second, what Space Marine forgets to take his ol' trusted chainsword with him on mission?

Like every Space Marine can shoot, every Space Marine is upon himself a wirlwind of doom when it comes to melee combat. Don't have a weapon, rip a tree from the ground or a piece of steel from the walls, and start smashing those squishy foes!

For the Devastator the Bolt Pistol might be a better choice to fight hordes in melee than the combat knife or a chainsword.

Aim and standard attack (Boltpistol) is a +10 on ballistic skill and causes in most circumstances 2 magnitude damage.

An All-out-Attack with a combat knife or chainsword is a +20 on weaponskill but to gain 2 magnitude damage you need to degrees of success.

Or use a Hand Flamer with "Cleans and Purify" and "Storm of Iron".

Dropping grenades at your feet in melee has been brought up before, there's nothing about it in the rules and you may feel that it's possible.

You might want to remind them while most enemies can't rightous fury there's nothing that says they can't rightous fury themselves if they are being that self destructive. If the Emperor says that was a very stupid thing to do who are you to argue.

Another less known thing is that you can fight with two weapons without any TWW skill:

www.fantasyflightgames.com/edge_foros_discusion.asp

They should include it in the next official errata finally. And since hordes are often huge, you'll have good chances of hitting in spite of getting -20.

Alex

I've let them drop grenades. Interesting idea about armor not applying but I can't think of a logical reason for it. Soak is soak. The dev in my group has done that and used his bolt pistol to OK effect. Don't feel bad about doing that to your players. Enemies, even gaunts, aren't complete morons and reasonably will go for targets that fling the most fire out, will ambush, etc.

Kshatriya said:

I wonder rather if the Power Armour's Machine Spirit will approve. Probably not.

Aöex

ak-73 said:

I don't think the machine spirit has any control over the molecular durability of adamantium and ceramite. Further, if it's a pure cost/benefit analysis, what's more dangerous: a frag grenade or a swarm of xenos? A machine spirit aware enough to appreciate the situation such that it might punish the marine for a bad act would theoretically be able to consider those circumstances. In the end it's not like power armor spirits have as much control as those in bigger, heavier vehicles or items.

Hm, further, that implies a level of situational awareness of the machine spirit not alluded to save in dreadnoughts, Land Raiders, and Titans.

Astartes-grade weaponry machine spirits are aware whether a mortal or Astartes operates them. They might also be aware that it is the Astartes Frag Grenade that is damaging them, who knows? My players don't.

Alex

ak-73 said:

Believe it or not, I'm the reason that Marines can do this (automatically having ambidexterity etc)

My own little claim to immortality, in that 'Special Thanks To' sidebar in the back of the core book.

Semi-autoing with his bolt pistol seemed to work the best, but my group did think "hand flamers, oooooohhhhh" in the middle of the fight.

As for the grenade option, I'll keep it in mind.

My big "d'oh" was that the techmarine had an auspex out, but somehow failed to miss the horde.

Thanks guys!

In melee, which is the situation described by the OP.

You CANNOT aim.

You CANNOT semi-auto.

Firing a pistol in melee as a standard attack is a straight BS test. With no modifiers due to range or attached scopes.

Still don't agree with the TWW thing, deffinately cheapens the Assault marine. "Hey look mr. specialist assault guy, I can do the same thing as you without any talents and I'm almost as good as you to boot!"

herichimo said:

It's just Ambidextrous, and it honestly makes sense that supersoldiers would be trained to use either hand effectively, in case one was disabled. Plus, it has to come into consideration that, with the exception of Techmarines, Librarians, and Apothecaries, every Marine in the Deathwatch has Assault Marine training, as they've all served as Assault Marines- unless you happen to be using a homebrew Scout specialty, playing a Chapter that doesn't use Assault Marines, or are playing a recently promoted Devastator.

Gaire said:

I don't think that's true. All Codex SMs were once Scouts but Scouts aren't baby AMs. IIRC it's during scout hood that Scouts are observed and the capable singled out to become Apothecaries and Techmarines. Aside from those the scouts then get classified as tac, dev, or AM.

All Space Wolves were once Assault Marines since Blood Claws (the first rank after Aspirant which every SW spends at least some time doing), are all AMs.But I don't think all Codex-chapter marines go through a period as an AM.

Unless they've changed the fluff, I believe they do. A Marine is promoted from Scout to Devastator, serves as a Dev in a few campaigns, then moves on to Assault, repeats the process, then advances to Tactical. Then they rotate every (set period of time) unless they show some particular aptitude for one of the three specialties. But I could be wrong.

That'd actually be pretty cool. I thought once you were assigned to a specialty, that was it (except for non-Codex chapters, e.g. how Space Wolves go from Assault to Tactical to Devastator and from there to Veteran).

I hadn't heard that before so I don't know if that's the current fluff, but I like it.

Yes, fifth edition SM Codex goes Scout - Devastator - Assault - Tactical. It says that those with a particular predilection for being an Assault or Devastator Marine may never make the transition to Tactical. In the DW corebook, the description for the Devastator says that it is likely that a Deathwatch Devastator has already served all the way up through Tactical Marine, and is returning to the role he most excels at.

herichimo said:

Is this accurate, you can't semi-auto with a pistol in melee?

Yes, a pistol can only fire off a single shot in Melee.

Captain Ventris said:

What page would I find this on?

Thanks!

Page 140. Pistols can only make a Standard attack.

herichimo said:

Why can't you aim? I got the part about standard attacks with pistols, but why couldn't you aim with a half action?

You just don't get any bonus for range or targeters/sights, etc. I think.

Alex

You are correct.

Aiming may be used for both melee and ranged attack, therefore it CAN be used with a pistol in melee combat. (Last line of the Aim action in the combat chapter). But you lose the bonus if you make any reaction between the time you aim and the time you make your attack. And you still may not shoot out of the combat you are currently engaged in.