Does each weapon have a situation where you would use it ?

The reason could be because the weapon is significantly easier to acquire. It could be because one weapon will attract much less attention than a more powerful one. Or it could be because the weapon is more effective at dealing with specific kinds of enemies.

I can at least see a purpose for switching up damage types.

I can at least see a purpose for switching up damage types.

Could you elaborate on that ?

I can't memorize enough of the wound tables to see that.

Is switching damage types worth the other costs of using a weapon with the damage type you want ?

For example, is it worth switching from an autogun to a lasgun when energy would be better than impact. Or does the higher damage of the autogun (or higher ROF if you're comparing with the lasgun overcharge shot) outweigh the disadvantage of impact damage ?

If the advantage of energy still holds, is it large enough that it's worth carrying both weapons all the time ?

Most of the conditions in this system stack.

For the most part, each given damage type has a chance of inflicting a particular condition.

Energy inflicts burning.

Impact inflicts crippled/dazed

Rending inflicts Blood Loss

Then, within each of the hit locations, those tend to test on very particular stats. FOr example, if you know a target has a poor Willpower, it might be a good idea to hit them in the arms with energy weapons. If they have a low strength value, hit them in the chest with impact weapons. If they have low toughness, aim for the head with Impact weapons.

My point is, for any damage type/location pair, it tends to inflict tests on a particular stat. I still don't have my table ready on the matter, but my point is there appears to be a fairly deep metagame here. Assuming you're accurate enough with a weapon, it might be to your advantage to deal slightly less damage, so as to maximize on the type of conditions inflicted.

But is it worth carrying both weapons around ?

How many characters even have the carrying capacity to do so ?

I can see someone carrying an Autogun and a Laspistol. But not an autogun and a lasgun.

Its more that it seems to be a good idea to plan weapon loadouts with the party. Combined energy weapon fire will increase chances of invoking a high Burning condition. Sadly, Burning is completely removed with a single Agi check.

Inflicting a high Blood Loss against a target is essentially a death sentance.

But as far as carrying different weapons? Not as much. Thats the point that you start making called shots.

But as far as a reason for each weapon? Sort of. As you point out, its a good justification to mix up damage types across sidearms at least.

I guess in reference to your previous argument: if you know you're facing an enemy with a low agility, massed lasgun fire might not be bad.

But if its a choice between a shotgun and a flamer, even if the party is using all impact weapons, I probably would still recommend the flamer (but thats more because the difference there is a bit extreme/shotguns as they are shou;d be +0 or +10 avl).

Sounds like I might need to play a bit to see how different damage types affect things. I've just played so many cRPGS where, while enemies did have resistances to some damage types, you rarely cared about them because you either didn't have the option to switch your damage type around or you stuck to one type because it's the only way to get something very useful (like AOE being only on fire damage spells).

As things stand now, I see a ROF/Damage per shot tradeoff when comparing Autogun (or hotshot lasgun)/Boltgun/Plasma Gun. Autopistol/HotShot Laspistol/Boltpistol/Plasma Pistol would have similar if the Bolt Pistols ROF was improved to 1 or the plasma pistol got knocked down to 1/3.

Meltas get a high damage, very close range niche. Flamers get lots of flame. Grenades are have AOE and lots of non-damaging effects. Low tech weapons won't raise attention on low tech worlds, plus they are pretty quiet. So they have their own niches.

In the other 40k RPGs, las weapons had less damage than SP, but also had reliability and ammo capacity to keep them firing after SP weapons stopped. Now they lost reliable (except lasgun), lost the capacity and get the overcharge ability, which adds up to them being less reliable than SP weapons while using it.

The Storm bolter just wrecks the HotShot lasgun/Boltgun tradeoff by having boltgun damage and better than autogun ROF. Plus rending sounds like the most effective of the damage types.

Can you think of any situation where you would use a Long las ?

Melee weapon niches don't seem like a problem. Low tech weapons have their uses like low tech ranged weapons. Shock weapons are used to incapacitate, not kill (well, unless the target catches fire). Force weapons are for psykers. Chain vs Power weapon is interesting. Chain weapons get the nastier damage type and tearing (higher chance of RF), while power weapons get to add SB, better pen and power field. So chain weapons look better at tearing through low quality enemies, power weapons for tough opponents.

As for the weapons within each type, that depends on the users characteristics.

Can you think of any situation where you would use a Long las ?

Actually quite a few: The Long Las is basic, so when subtlety is a problem, it fares better than the heavy sniper rifle. Without modifications, the Long Las on overcharge also deals higher average damage than the sniper rifle, and has the advantage of already being silent, as well as easier to actually acquire (you can start the game with it).

However, when subtlety can be ignored and you have access to modifications and custom ammo, the sniper rifle starts to outshine the Long Las - a suppressor deals with the silent problem, and dumdum ammo turns the sniper rifle into a nasty beast of a weapon, with a chance of about 65% (if my math is right) to inflict a righteous fury on any hit. The loss in accuracy is pretty minimal, as accurate only gives a mere +5 to hit currently.

For protracted engagements, the Long Las is again better, as you have more ammo capacity (if you choose not to overload it) and a way faster reload time, as well as the possibility of simply recharging the power pack instead of having to acquire new bullets all the time.

How many of those situations requiring subtlety are ones where a long-las will outperform a silenced autogun ?

The only ones I can think of involve sneaking around to find a good sniper perch. Which means you don't want to be seen. If you don't get seen, then nobody sees your heavy weapon. If nobody sees the weapon, I can't see how it would hurt your subtlety.

If you do get seen while sneaking around carrying a weapon built for sniping, that will be bad for your subtlety even with the long-las as sneaking + sniper weapon means you're planning to kill someone.

The accuracy of the weapons needs to be considered.Take a turn where you're firing once and spending the rest of your AP on aiming:

- Long-las gets two aim actions. With accurate giving +15 for each of them, that's a +30 total.

- Autogun gets three aim actions. +30, and it sends two shots into the target.

Lets say you spend one AP making a called shot:

- Long-las gets +15 from aiming.

- Autogun gets two aim actions for a +20 total.

Two AP for other tasks:

- Long-las has no aim assistance.

- Autogun gets +10 from a single aim action.

That's right. The autogun is more accurate than both weapons with the accurate quality.

dumdum ammo turns the sniper rifle into a nasty beast of a weapon, with a chance of about 65% (if my math is right) to inflict a righteous fury on any hit. The loss in accuracy is pretty minimal, as accurate only gives a mere +5 to hit currently.

Inaccurate also kills the base bonus from the aim action.

If nobody sees the weapon, I can't see how it would hurt your subtlety.

Mechanically, simply carrying around a heavy weapon imposes a -10 penalty on your group's subtlety, doesn't matter what exactly you do with it. While I'd agree that this penalty should be voided if the sniper takes care not to let his weapon be seen. RAW there's no way around it.

That's right. The autogun is more accurate than both weapons with the accurate quality.

It might be more accurate, but against enemies with high toughness/armour, a long las or sniper rifle would be preferrable due to the autoguns low damage, even if it's RoF is higher - if you can't inflict a wound in the first place, many bullets won't really help you. Also, the sniper weapons have higher range, although this is kind of unimportant in the usual DH encounters.

Inaccurate also kills the base bonus from the aim action.

RaW you're right, dumdum bullets simply add inaccurate. I'm fairly certain this will be changed to "If accurate, loses that quality, if not, gains inaccurate", since that seems to be how inaccurate/accurate are handled everywhere - they simply chancel each other out.

Most of the conditions in this system stack.

For the most part, each given damage type has a chance of inflicting a particular condition.

Energy inflicts burning.

Impact inflicts crippled/dazed

Rending inflicts Blood Loss

Then, within each of the hit locations, those tend to test on very particular stats. FOr example, if you know a target has a poor Willpower, it might be a good idea to hit them in the arms with energy weapons. If they have a low strength value, hit them in the chest with impact weapons. If they have low toughness, aim for the head with Impact weapons.

My point is, for any damage type/location pair, it tends to inflict tests on a particular stat. I still don't have my table ready on the matter, but my point is there appears to be a fairly deep metagame here. Assuming you're accurate enough with a weapon, it might be to your advantage to deal slightly less damage, so as to maximize on the type of conditions inflicted.

...I was just going to snipe them in the face with my Laspistol...

I have to note that a great advantage of the lasgun, at least according to fluff, that is not represented in the game, is ammo.

While a solid projectile weapon will carry usually something close to 30 rounds for a lot of weight, requiring many extra-clips, a lasgun can fire something close to 100 times with only one battery.

Still, I notice that the new book puts a lasgun clip with 24 shots, and nobody has addressed this fact so far.

Yeah, I find that really iffy, I'm not a fan in the slightest. They've also mostly lost reliable.

Personally, if I was to be 'fixing' las weapons, I'd return the clip sizes to what they used to be, add reliable to every one except the hotshot weapons, and restore overcharge rules to what they were in Black Crusade, that was a lot more interesting. Here it is, for anyone not familiar.

Lasgun Variable Setting:The M36 Lasgun has a variable

setting option, allowing it to fire higher-powered bursts. It

may be changed to overcharge mode, dealing +1 Damage,

but using two shots worth of ammunition per shot fired.

Further, the lasgun may be changed to overload mode,

dealing +2 Damage and gaining +2 Penetration. In this

case, the lasgun uses four shots of ammunition per shot

fired, loses Reliable, and gains Unreliable.

Can you think of any situation where you would use a Long las ?

Oh definitely. For my latest combat test (not complete yet, but I will post it up), with Rank 5 characters, I had to weigh up quite carefully whether I wanted to give the team assassin a Longlas or a Sniper rifle. And it was nothing to do with availability as I figured by Rank 5 she was perfectly entitled to have either! The issue was ammo. If you're perched on a roof top trying to kill some individual, then sniper rifle no question. But this was a scenario with multiple oppoonents and not only does the Sniper Rifle have a clip of only 3 bullets, it takes 6AP to reload! Even with the talents that let you reload faster, that still hits you hard.

Just to weigh in on the different damage types as well, they're not even and I don't consider it a virtue for them to be even. Rending for instance, tends to score results that will take a combatant out of the fight lower down the Wound tables than Energy. It's actually one of the reasons you'd say the Boltgun is a nice weapon to have - you look at the damage chart and you see that little "( R )" and you nod, pleased with yourself.

That's kind of a recurring theme with me - I don't want every weapon to be put in some special niche where it's in some way better than everything else. This is 40K where people will kill over an antique lasgun. Some weapons quite frankly are better than others. And I need that to be the case. I want my hive scum gang scrabbling around with stub revolvers and shotguns whilst the PCs have their Lasguns. And I need the PCs to go "oooh, I want that" when some noble tries to bribe them with the boltgun he inherited from his great aunt, not for them to go "well, it's a positive in this area, but I'd rather my lasgun". I get nervous when people want to balance everything with everything else. It just gives me visions of D&D 4e. (Great game, but so not 40K).

I have to note that a great advantage of the lasgun, at least according to fluff, that is not represented in the game, is ammo.

While a solid projectile weapon will carry usually something close to 30 rounds for a lot of weight, requiring many extra-clips, a lasgun can fire something close to 100 times with only one battery.

Still, I notice that the new book puts a lasgun clip with 24 shots, and nobody has addressed this fact so far.

I agree with this and I have to say it's one of those things that starts tying into how a GM runs a game. For me, this advantage of a lasgun is very solid and one which players will be aware of and mindful of. You can recharge a lasgun powerpack just by throwing it in your campfire. In fact, I love the image of a squad of Imperial Guard throwing them into the campfire whilst they cook their evening rations, and then in the morning, when the fire has burned out, collecting the little packs from the ashes and blowing them clean.

My players are well aware that on a mission they may not be able to get ammo for their bolter, so the lasgun is a big plus. But a GM who didn't pay attention to that stuff would create a different set of priorities for their players just through never enforcing / thinking about ammo.

If nobody sees the weapon, I can't see how it would hurt your subtlety.

Mechanically, simply carrying around a heavy weapon imposes a -10 penalty on your group's subtlety, doesn't matter what exactly you do with it. While I'd agree that this penalty should be voided if the sniper takes care not to let his weapon be seen. RAW there's no way around it.

I'd allow the team to find ways around this but they'd have to be very good. Okay, so you're wearing a long dark concealing trenchcoat - excellent. Suffer -10 subtlety because you look suspicious rather than sitting casually with people like a normal person would. Okay, you keep it tucked in a travelling case. Take -10 for being that person who is always walking around town with a travelling case causing people to wonder what you have in it. Oh, you leave it in a secure case in the room at your coach house? Now the maid (who is already inclined to gossip about the strangers) is telling everyone about how one of them has a mysterious case that she is forbidden to touch.... Etc. Concealing something is not sufficient. You also have to conceal that you're concealing something, otherwise that alone is suspicious and attracts attention.

It's really hard to carry a heavy weapon around all mission and not attract attention because of that.

If nobody sees the weapon, I can't see how it would hurt your subtlety.

Mechanically, simply carrying around a heavy weapon imposes a -10 penalty on your group's subtlety, doesn't matter what exactly you do with it. While I'd agree that this penalty should be voided if the sniper takes care not to let his weapon be seen. RAW there's no way around it.

I'd allow the team to find ways around this but they'd have to be very good. Okay, so you're wearing a long dark concealing trenchcoat - excellent. Suffer -10 subtlety because you look suspicious rather than sitting casually with people like a normal person would. Okay, you keep it tucked in a travelling case. Take -10 for being that person who is always walking around town with a travelling case causing people to wonder what you have in it. Oh, you leave it in a secure case in the room at your coach house? Now the maid (who is already inclined to gossip about the strangers) is telling everyone about how one of them has a mysterious case that she is forbidden to touch.... Etc. Concealing something is not sufficient. You also have to conceal that you're concealing something, otherwise that alone is suspicious and attracts attention.

It's really hard to carry a heavy weapon around all mission and not attract attention because of that.

That seems a bit punitive, doesn't it? The player is eventually going to pull out the heavy guns. Once he uses it, decrease subtlety unless he covers it up. Heck, make him roll subterfuge to cover it up, and do the roll in secret. If he starts failing those rolls or using his big gun, maybe next combat the enemy has one. Don't just punish the dude without telling him, though.

If nobody sees the weapon, I can't see how it would hurt your subtlety.

Mechanically, simply carrying around a heavy weapon imposes a -10 penalty on your group's subtlety, doesn't matter what exactly you do with it. While I'd agree that this penalty should be voided if the sniper takes care not to let his weapon be seen. RAW there's no way around it.

I'd allow the team to find ways around this but they'd have to be very good. Okay, so you're wearing a long dark concealing trenchcoat - excellent. Suffer -10 subtlety because you look suspicious rather than sitting casually with people like a normal person would. Okay, you keep it tucked in a travelling case. Take -10 for being that person who is always walking around town with a travelling case causing people to wonder what you have in it. Oh, you leave it in a secure case in the room at your coach house? Now the maid (who is already inclined to gossip about the strangers) is telling everyone about how one of them has a mysterious case that she is forbidden to touch.... Etc. Concealing something is not sufficient. You also have to conceal that you're concealing something, otherwise that alone is suspicious and attracts attention.

It's really hard to carry a heavy weapon around all mission and not attract attention because of that.

That seems a bit punitive, doesn't it? The player is eventually going to pull out the heavy guns. Once he uses it, decrease subtlety unless he covers it up. Heck, make him roll subterfuge to cover it up, and do the roll in secret. If he starts failing those rolls or using his big gun, maybe next combat the enemy has one. Don't just punish the dude without telling him, though.

Hmmm. I do tend toward the punitive in my GM'ing, I grant you. Okay, maybe I oversold it slightly. I was trying to make the point that players can't just go: "oh, I'm wearing a trenchcoat so the weapon isn't visible so you can't decrease my subtlety". I'm basically illustrating how it can be a great deal more than just weapon visibility.

Though as a general point, this is the intent is it not? Eventually, PCs will get to the point where they can all have Heavy Bolters and grenade launchers, et al. Subtlety is a way of making them choose their approach for a mission. Are they going to go in heavy and prepared or do they infiltrate the planet on the quiet, posing as humble traders, their choice. It's just a pre-emptive strike against the have your cake and eat it type player who likes to argue.

It's not even necessarily the weapon itself. A 'street brawl' that leaves several dead from knives and las-fire attracts little comment in most downhive slums. No-one (short of an Arbites/Magistratum medicae who's unlikely to get involved) is going to know that a quarter of the kills came from a long-las two streets over, rather than a close-range lascarbine or heavy laspistol carried by one of the 'gangers' in the 'brawl'.

A sniper rifle bullet wound, on the other hand, is rather more noticable and is likely to result in someone coming downhive to find out who's packing freakin' precision artillery - which can cause distinct problems in a 'sub-rosa' investigation.

"The Storm bolter just wrecks the HotShot lasgun/Boltgun tradeoff by having boltgun damage and better than autogun ROF. Plus rending sounds like the most effective of the damage types."

True, but the Storm Bolter strikes me as the sort of weapon that only avoids being in the 'heavy' category by legalistic interpretation. It's a pair of the imperium's most potent heavy-weight assault rifles welded together with a massive drum mag, and is so massive that since the last codex revision only one man in the entire guard is badass enough to consider it man-portable. I have no problem with it being a truly, truly disgusting weapon - but I feel that for unaugmented humans it should be a lighter heavy weapon. Certainly, with the amount of noise, damage, ammo expenditure and resulting organic mess involved, it should certainly qualify for the subtlety penalty of a heavy weapon.

The shotgun has the niche to be the poor mans flameless flamer

Can you think of any situation where you would use a Long las ?

Oh definitely. For my latest combat test (not complete yet, but I will post it up), with Rank 5 characters, I had to weigh up quite carefully whether I wanted to give the team assassin a Longlas or a Sniper rifle. And it was nothing to do with availability as I figured by Rank 5 she was perfectly entitled to have either! The issue was ammo. If you're perched on a roof top trying to kill some individual, then sniper rifle no question. But this was a scenario with multiple oppoonents and not only does the Sniper Rifle have a clip of only 3 bullets, it takes 6AP to reload! Even with the talents that let you reload faster, that still hits you hard.

Just to weigh in on the different damage types as well, they're not even and I don't consider it a virtue for them to be even. Rending for instance, tends to score results that will take a combatant out of the fight lower down the Wound tables than Energy. It's actually one of the reasons you'd say the Boltgun is a nice weapon to have - you look at the damage chart and you see that little "( R )" and you nod, pleased with yourself.

That's kind of a recurring theme with me - I don't want every weapon to be put in some special niche where it's in some way better than everything else. This is 40K where people will kill over an antique lasgun. Some weapons quite frankly are better than others. And I need that to be the case. I want my hive scum gang scrabbling around with stub revolvers and shotguns whilst the PCs have their Lasguns. And I need the PCs to go "oooh, I want that" when some noble tries to bribe them with the boltgun he inherited from his great aunt, not for them to go "well, it's a positive in this area, but I'd rather my lasgun". I get nervous when people want to balance everything with everything else. It just gives me visions of D&D 4e. (Great game, but so not 40K).

I agree. Elite wargear should be exciting and differentiated. At the same time, I do not know that the difference needs to be so apparent when comparing similar qualities of weapons. Bolters certainly may have an edge on autopistols in many cases, but jsut as your example was an antigue lasgun, I think there is plenty of room to take the conventional weapon stats and get players excited about something that is better because it is antique, not because it happens to be a different weapon type alone.

One of my players recently got an inferno pistol that used to be a nobleman's and which he used to vanquish said nobleman's apparition a short conversation later. The pistol was finely wrought and had the accurate quality. This was exciting because it was different from simply requisitioning such a weapon, both in flavour and in mechanics. Its also an inferno pistol of course, but for a rank 5, now 6, acolyte that is not an unreachable weapon.

Should an autopistol be more desirable than an inferno pistol? Certainly not. But the Arbitrator in my campaign certainly will turn to his autopistols before drawing a plasma gun when gunning down unarmoured targets. The ammunition capacity is greater, the rate of fire higher, the ammunition cheaper, the subtlety better, etc. I like that this is the case. Are the autopistols perfectly balanced with other weapons? No. Might they have some place even in a mid level game? I think its nice they do.

All of which is to say that I think I am violently agreeing with you. I am certainly not advocating DnD4.0 style perfect niche role balancing for all things. In the grim dark future relics, antiques, archeotech, or even simply higher quality or more difficult to manufacture items that are just plain superior should totally be a thing.

I think bumping shotgun damage to 2d10+2. I think this thematically fits the "spread" of the shotgun in that you run the gamut from getting grazed by some of the spread to taking it all full on. What about frag grenades? Give them tearing or make them 3d10 (I prefer the damage curve for tearing). Shotguns suddenly become the go-to for heavy damage in the basic SP weapons, but do suffer against armor. This may be a case where adding the point blank rule or spread rules or spray rules aren't necessary when the damage can thematically represent how the weapon works (I feel the same way about the plasma weapons, being that they are also such tricky weapons to use in the fluff).

I think bumping shotgun damage to 2d10+2. I think this thematically fits the "spread" of the shotgun in that you run the gamut from getting grazed by some of the spread to taking it all full on. What about frag grenades? Give them tearing or make them 3d10 (I prefer the damage curve for tearing). Shotguns suddenly become the go-to for heavy damage in the basic SP weapons, but do suffer against armor. This may be a case where adding the point blank rule or spread rules or spray rules aren't necessary when the damage can thematically represent how the weapon works (I feel the same way about the plasma weapons, being that they are also such tricky weapons to use in the fluff).

I really like the idea of letting the damage roll be part of the hit roll.

I was already considering it that for most damage effects (such as explaining why a Plasma hit doesn't kill everything ), but I hadn't thought for a moment that the same could apply to shotguns. Good call, Nimsim.

Why not bring back the DH1 scatter rule ?

It gives extra hits, which are a big deal. But because the damage per hit is low, armor that shrugs off bullets will shrug off shotguns.

I also liked the old rule - more DoS, more hits - plus bonus damage on close ranges.