WH40k and Art of War

[Thaluikhain]

Often they do provide fairly sound tactical decisions, the Gaunts Ghosts are a good sign of this from the Saint using herself as a massive diversion to the entire deployment of Vervunhive. The major reason they get viewed as unsound decision making is by our standards of warfare. Casualties are unacceptable while within the imperial guard they are valued as a potential for buying time. Troop numbers are so vast if a company takes 90% casualties but manages to hold a postion, thats an overwhelming success in the grand scheme of the Crusade.

I agree that casualties aren't a priority, but there still isn't any decent strategy in the majority of the fluff. To an extent, that's fair enough, the authors aren't military strategists, nor, as a rule, are the readers, and when you're writing about (say) 19th century style battles, except IN SPACE, you're going to run into such problems, you just have to work on suspension of disbelief, and that goes wrong an awful lot of the time.

Gaunt's Ghosts aren't the worst, but they are hardly the best.

In Necropolis, there is talk about who came up with the strategies, but, (wisely), not what they actually were in any great detail, concentrating on small unit actions, politicking and romance.

Spoiler: In regards to the Saint

Revealing that she was a diversion isn't really delving into the strategy (notwithstanding it was a hell of a gamble). Also, her plan for dealing with the invading chaos forces was to wait until teh enemy leader was killed and his army crumbling (which is one of the two endings Abnett seems to use for everything, alongside Deus Ex Machinas) and then tell all the ex-military pilgrims to start fighting back, which they hadn't thought of until then.

Spoiler: I'd also mention Straight Silver, the book before that

You've got a WW1 style trench war going on for 4 decades. Imperial Guard reinforcements turn up in their warp capable ships. They reach orbit, and can land troops anywhere they want on the planet. They have atmosphere and vacuum capable fighters and bombers that can target anywhere on the planet. If there is a single warship in the flotilla, it can blast any target on the planet with enough firepower to level cities. So they send troops to the front line to continue the trench fighting.

Later, it turns out that their are enemy offworlders on the planet as well, so there must be enemy ships in orbit (or were recently)...which also could have landed troops or blasted targets into oblivion anywhere on the planet. So they also send troops to fight on the existing front lines.

Admittedly, yes, there was complaining about having to work things that way, and they both tried to flank the other through the forest, but that's still totally ignoring any sort of real strategy in favour of a WW1 story (you'll note Abnett did the same thing in First and Only, but justified it by saying they were fighting over places of great value, and they coudln't damage them by extensive bombing)

 

[Comando96]

And so on... Excerpts are taken from magnum opus of Sun Tzu - "The Art of War". "Art of War" is considered one of most important war treaties even by modern standards. It seems that no matter what, some things never change.

War. War never changes.
Sound familiar

On the other hand, we have grim darkness of 41st Millenium.
Let's think... Armies capable of emerging instantly deep behind enemy lines. Means to eradicate whole planets or even solar systems. Some sides of conflict are nothing less than forces of nature attacking in swarms, not paying attention to pain and/or losses. Magic. Demons. Eye of Terror.

Is there a place for "Art of War" in the universe of WH40k ? On the field of battles - surely at least some advices should be applicable and useful. On the greater scale ? I'm not exactly sure.

What do you - generals of countless victories - think ?

All warfare is based on deception.

8
It is the rule in war, if our forces are ten to the enemy's one, to surround him; if five to one, to attack him;

if twice as numerous, to divide our army into two.

9
If equally matched, we can offer battle;
if slightly inferior in numbers, we can avoid the enemy;

if quite unequal in every way, we can flee from him.

They can happily apply to Warhammer universe. Mainly to deceive the enemy as to the strength of your forces so they appear strong when weak if you want to avoid an attack or make your forces appear sparse and chaotic when actually strong but hidden if you want to lure your enemies into a trap.

The art of war still holds a large amount of functionality if its lessons are taken to heart.

 

[JesterRaiin]

Thanks for responses guys - i need to think about your arguments more.

In the meantime (because this seems to be overlooked) i'd like to recall "Art of War" once again. Sun Tzu claimed that :

The control of a large force
is the same principle as the control of a few men:
it is merely a question of dividing up their numbers.

So, Master himself wasn't afraid of big numbers. But "how big" is "big" - that's the question.

Also, to stir things up a bit.

...Space Marines.
This doesn't apply to tabletop experience, because daaaaaamn, some players seem to be perfect candidates for future generals and tacticians, still, i think that Space Marines are wasted potential. Pretty much every edition of WH40k and piece of fiction describes them as a pinnacle of human evolution, greatest warriors, tacticians and such. As i understand it, they shouldn't be only strong but also intelligent and cunning.

Then stuff like this emerges (old news, but it backs up my argument) :


I don't have problem with WH40k setting - even thought it's vision is far from being plausible in my opinion. However, i am afraid that Space Marines are drifting away from what they are supposed to be and what "Art of War" is all about. It may be good for computer game or work of fiction, but i don't think that "chaaaaaaaaaarge, glory for the first man to die" should be considered the ultimate achievement of everything "Art of War" could evolve into during +/- 40 000 of years.

 

[Thaluikhain]

...Space Marines.
This doesn't apply to tabletop experience, because daaaaaamn, some players seem to be perfect candidates for future generals and tacticians, still, i think that Space Marines are wasted potential. Pretty much every edition of WH40k and piece of fiction describes them as a pinnacle of human evolution, greatest warriors, tacticians and such. As i understand it, they shouldn't be only strong but also intelligent and cunning.

I don't have problem with WH40k setting - even thought it's vision is far from being plausible in my opinion. However, i am afraid that Space Marines are drifting away from what they are supposed to be and what "Art of War" is all about. It may be good for computer game or work of fiction, but i don't think that "chaaaaaaaaaarge, glory for the first man to die" should be considered the ultimate achievement of everything "Art of War" could evolve into during +/- 40 000 of years.

I very strongly agree with this, however I feel it's a matter of authors (and codex writers) not doing the source material justice.

William King with his Space Wolf series, Simon Spurrier with Lord of the Night and Gav Thorpe's Angels of Darkness showed what Space Marines should work like, that they can be done well when the author puts the effort in. In these stories, they recognise that marines are too valuable to be thrown away carelessly, that planning ahead is essential, and that they should work to their strengths...all good, obvious things everyone should expect of marines.

But GW realised that mindless action makes large profits, and went down the same route Michael Bay did.

 

[Slim-Shot]

There is a treatise on war in the 40K Universe - its called the Codex Astartes!

 

[kingcom]

I agree that casualties aren't a priority, but there still isn't any decent strategy in the majority of the fluff. To an extent, that's fair enough, the authors aren't military strategists, nor, as a rule, are the readers, and when you're writing about (say) 19th century style battles, except IN SPACE, you're going to run into such problems, you just have to work on suspension of disbelief, and that goes wrong an awful lot of the time.

Gaunt's Ghosts aren't the worst, but they are hardly the best.

In Necropolis, there is talk about who came up with the strategies, but, (wisely), not what they actually were in any great detail, concentrating on small unit actions, politicking and romance.

Spoiler: In regards to the Saint

Revealing that she was a diversion isn't really delving into the strategy (notwithstanding it was a hell of a gamble). Also, her plan for dealing with the invading chaos forces was to wait until teh enemy leader was killed and his army crumbling (which is one of the two endings Abnett seems to use for everything, alongside Deus Ex Machinas) and then tell all the ex-military pilgrims to start fighting back, which they hadn't thought of until then.

Spoiler: I'd also mention Straight Silver, the book before that

You've got a WW1 style trench war going on for 4 decades. Imperial Guard reinforcements turn up in their warp capable ships. They reach orbit, and can land troops anywhere they want on the planet. They have atmosphere and vacuum capable fighters and bombers that can target anywhere on the planet. If there is a single warship in the flotilla, it can blast any target on the planet with enough firepower to level cities. So they send troops to the front line to continue the trench fighting.

Later, it turns out that their are enemy offworlders on the planet as well, so there must be enemy ships in orbit (or were recently)...which also could have landed troops or blasted targets into oblivion anywhere on the planet. So they also send troops to fight on the existing front lines.

Admittedly, yes, there was complaining about having to work things that way, and they both tried to flank the other through the forest, but that's still totally ignoring any sort of real strategy in favour of a WW1 story (you'll note Abnett did the same thing in First and Only, but justified it by saying they were fighting over places of great value, and they coudln't damage them by extensive bombing)

And a single imperial warship is worth more than the entire deployment during the whole Straight Silver campaign. Not to mention you need a warship capable of actual direct and accurate firepower or your scorched earth approach cripples the planet that couple protentially provide a base of operation for the whole crusade, providing agricultural support aswell.

Orbital bombardment is extremely hazardous without vessels specificly designed to do so, it mostly relies on dumb luck otherwise. Not to mention any ship trying to take up positions to provide this kind of support requires you to be in an extremely vulnerable position with very little possibility to maneover should hostile vessels approach.

Also the Gaunts Ghost series almost exclusively focuses on fighting Chaos, their entire military campaign is operated because of leaders, thats how Chaos warhosts are formed. You have champions with enough power and pull to get an army together, once thats gone it doesn't function beyond a screaming mass of khornate worshipers. In the 41st millenium cutting off the head is one of the most important goals you can have considering the two most frequent conflicts are as a result of Chaos and Orks.

 

[Thaluikhain]

And a single imperial warship is worth more than the entire deployment during the whole Straight Silver campaign. Not to mention you need a warship capable of actual direct and accurate firepower or your scorched earth approach cripples the planet that couple protentially provide a base of operation for the whole crusade, providing agricultural support aswell.

Um, orbital bombardments are repeatedly stated not to pinpoint precise (usually), yeah, but you don't destroy whole continents trying to hit cities. Ghostmaker, by the same author, had targeting specific parts of cities be difficult and risky (for people in the immediate vicinity, not impossible.

(I would argue that even if it was necesary to destroy absolutely everything in the enemy held territory if you were using orbital bombardment that it'd be worthwhile, at least once it becomes clear the statemate is going to last indefinitely anyway, but that's another issue.)

Not to mention any ship trying to take up positions to provide this kind of support requires you to be in an extremely vulnerable position with very little possibility to maneover should hostile vessels approach.

As opposed to the transport vessels? Additionally, where is the hostile ship going to magically appear from without lots of warning...though Abnett had chaos transports appearing without anyone noticing, I guess. (Dunno if being in orbit makes it hard to maneouvure in 40k, wouldn't IRL)

But, assuming that there is some pressing reason why they don't use orbital bombardments, it was explicitly stated that they had bombers capable of deploying from orbit...that sort of thing would have quite an impact on WW1 trench warfare.

Also the Gaunts Ghost series almost exclusively focuses on fighting Chaos, their entire military campaign is operated because of leaders, thats how Chaos warhosts are formed. You have champions with enough power and pull to get an army together, once thats gone it doesn't function beyond a screaming mass of khornate worshipers. In the 41st millenium cutting off the head is one of the most important goals you can have considering the two most frequent conflicts are as a result of Chaos and Orks.

GG, true, (though it gets tiresome after the umpteenth time, and rarely gets mentioned as being a deliberate policy), but I meant Abnett in general, he uses that same endings in just about all his BL stuff.

 

[kingcom]

Um, orbital bombardments are repeatedly stated not to pinpoint precise (usually), yeah, but you don't destroy whole continents trying to hit cities. Ghostmaker, by the same author, had targeting specific parts of cities be difficult and risky (for people in the immediate vicinity, not impossible.

(I would argue that even if it was necesary to destroy absolutely everything in the enemy held territory if you were using orbital bombardment that it'd be worthwhile, at least once it becomes clear the statemate is going to last indefinitely anyway, but that's another issue.)

And everything Battlefleet Gothic seems to say on the matter is that unless your ship is specificlly rigged to do so, a random macrocannon battery is going to miss everything completely, lance batteries are much better but suffer from needing to get into geosynchronous orbit which is where the super vulnerable position comes in (your primary engines would throw you into the planet and large ships just dont have the power to really get any other direction very quickly).

As opposed to the transport vessels? Additionally, where is the hostile ship going to magically appear from without lots of warning...though Abnett had chaos transports appearing without anyone noticing, I guess. (Dunno if being in orbit makes it hard to maneouvure in 40k, wouldn't IRL)

Transport vessels? You mean the ones being guarded by the warships? And yes the chaos ships do magiclly appear without any warning, its call warp travel and while Imperial vessels play it safe and try not to land in a gravity well, Chaos vessels...not so much. Those ships along with orks have a tendency to jump on top of other vessels.

But, assuming that there is some pressing reason why they don't use orbital bombardments, it was explicitly stated that they had bombers capable of deploying from orbit...that sort of thing would have quite an impact on WW1 trench warfare.

I seem to remember the descriptions of Imperial Lightenings flying overhead, that atleast implies dogfighting going on as thats all those vessels are good at though if im mistake fair enough. Again the threat implies, how many troops outweigh the cost of provinding close air support? Even more so if the afforemented bombers are designed to hit warships it would be a strong idea to keep those in orbit. I've played enough Rogue Trader to know that the ground war is not my problem when a Chaos battlecruiser is barreling down on my ship.

GG, true, (though it gets tiresome after the umpteenth time, and rarely gets mentioned as being a deliberate policy), but I meant Abnett in general, he uses that same endings in just about all his BL stuff.

Personally I think thats a simptom of BL in general, 40K is all about named characters running the show, its why Space Marines exist in the first place, providing armies of named characters. They design their conflict around victory coming as a result of killing the named characters so you make morale and leadership the most fundamental aspects of your factions.

 

[Thaluikhain]

And everything Battlefleet Gothic seems to say on the matter is that unless your ship is specificlly rigged to do so, a random macrocannon battery is going to miss everything completely, lance batteries are much better but suffer from needing to get into geosynchronous orbit which is where the super vulnerable position comes in (your primary engines would throw you into the planet and large ships just dont have the power to really get any other direction very quickly).

Ah, ok, was going by BL and 40k, not BFG...how does geosynchronous orbit matter, though?

Transport vessels? You mean the ones being guarded by the warships?

Yeah...if they can get close enough to the planet, why can't one warship?

And yes the chaos ships do magiclly appear without any warning, its call warp travel and while Imperial vessels play it safe and try not to land in a gravity well, Chaos vessels...not so much. Those ships along with orks have a tendency to jump on top of other vessels.

No, that's flat out been said to be impossible, throughout all the fluff and novels, and most importantly, in the GG series itself. Unless they've changed that recently...in any case, that's the way it was when the book was written, and that's the way Abnett said the rules worked in his series.

I seem to remember the descriptions of Imperial Lightenings flying overhead, that atleast implies dogfighting going on as thats all those vessels are good at though if im mistake fair enough. Again the threat implies, how many troops outweigh the cost of provinding close air support? Even more so if the afforemented bombers are designed to hit warships it would be a strong idea to keep those in orbit. I've played enough Rogue Trader to know that the ground war is not my problem when a Chaos battlecruiser is barreling down on my ship.

At the end of the book, the target is destroyed by Marauder bombers, IIRC. If you've willing to use bombers to attack artillery pieces (which you apparently can't see from the air/space until you see them from the ground), there's all sorts of other targets you might want to be interested in.

If chaos battlecruisers were in the area, yes, ground missions would be unimportant. However, there weren't any...though chaos offworlders being on the ground might have implied this, it was only after they knew about them that they used the Marauders anyway.

Personally I think thats a simptom of BL in general, 40K is all about named characters running the show, its why Space Marines exist in the first place, providing armies of named characters. They design their conflict around victory coming as a result of killing the named characters so you make morale and leadership the most fundamental aspects of your factions.

Hmmm...to an extent, though Abnett seems fonder of it than most.

It's also why he has people coming from space to fight WW1 batteles, 40k is just like that. I don't have a problem with that as such, it just needs a bit of work to justify it (again, First and Only did this with a few throw away lines), and it's generally going to make it difficult to take the strategy seriously, it's something generally best avoided.

 

[Eclectic Dreck]

Often they do provide fairly sound tactical decisions, the Gaunts Ghosts are a good sign of this from the Saint using herself as a massive diversion to the entire deployment of Vervunhive. The major reason they get viewed as unsound decision making is by our standards of warfare. Casualties are unacceptable while within the imperial guard they are valued as a potential for buying time. Troop numbers are so vast if a company takes 90% casualties but manages to hold a postion, thats an overwhelming success in the grand scheme of the Crusade.

I do not disagree with the notion of acceptable losses. But the basic doctrine of the imperial guard is fundamentally flawed. The Guard tend to reinforce failure because of a single minded determination to follow some strategy long past the point where it has been proven a silly thing to do. This is largely because the Guard is an example of an army where lower echelon commanders are given absolutely no latitude when it comes to executing a task and tactical decisions are made by those too far removed from the battle to make a proper decision. The seemingly inevitable result might be success but at atrocious causality rates. And just because the troops are easily replaced is inconsequential. A bullet is readily replaced but it is still a silly thing to expend them when there is no need. The guard's lack of strategy is evident then because they'll suffer 90% casualties holding a point with no strategic value or will lose 20,000 men when their aim could have been achieved losing a mere 5,000.

 

[kingcom]

Ah, ok, was going by BL and 40k, not BFG...how does geosynchronous orbit matter, though?

Well basiclly: a planet is rotating so if you want to fire directly at a point on a planet the ship needs to moving at the exact same speed and trajectory as the planet along the axis the weapon is firing otherwise the rotation will throw off the accuracy by enough that when you put thousands and thousands of km or miles between the ship and the target, you cease to have any viable accuracy with a pinpoint weapon (like a lance battery).

Yeah...if they can get close enough to the planet, why can't one warship?

Other than those smaller transport ships actually designed to enter an atmosphere? As opposed to the 4km giant warship that would basiclly collapse structurally if it ever tried to perform the same? Not to mention that if an attack should take place, the warships are there to survey the situation and cover them if needed as opposed to the warships are entering the atmosphere and being caught when the sensors go down and having the enemies ships free to bombard them safe up in high orbit.

No, that's flat out been said to be impossible, throughout all the fluff and novels, and most importantly, in the GG series itself. Unless they've changed that recently...in any case, that's the way it was when the book was written, and that's the way Abnett said the rules worked in his series.

Absolutely not, the Warp breaks every rule possible to reasonable physics, the Immaterium is flowing on every aspect of the Materium, a regular human certain cant plot something like that but a being made of the Immaterium itself (i.e. a demon), thats no problem.

If you say thats what Abnett ruled then I cant say no to that but the Damaris Campaign books by FFG make it a major point of the ork invasion force jumping directly next to the imperial fleet in orbit, maintaining RAMMING SPEED, all the while.

At the end of the book, the target is destroyed by Marauder bombers, IIRC. If you've willing to use bombers to attack artillery pieces (which you apparently can't see from the air/space until you see them from the ground), there's all sorts of other targets you might want to be interested in.

If chaos battlecruisers were in the area, yes, ground missions would be unimportant. However, there weren't any...though chaos offworlders being on the ground might have implied this, it was only after they knew about them that they used the Marauders anyway.

Marauders are the jack of all trades bombers so it doesn't really give a clue what they could have been doing. So sure, I got no idea what they we're doing. They could have been running different objects off the screen, supporting fleet actions or trying to find the script they lost.

Hmmm...to an extent, though Abnett seems fonder of it than most.

It's also why he has people coming from space to fight WW1 batteles, 40k is just like that. I don't have a problem with that as such, it just needs a bit of work to justify it (again, First and Only did this with a few throw away lines), and it's generally going to make it difficult to take the strategy seriously, it's something generally best avoided.

Fair enough. Though throw away lines (first and only is the forge world one yes?) seems a bit less important than a 40K fan automatically identifying the overwhelming importance of keeping a forge world intact enough so that explanation wasnt even required.

I do not disagree with the notion of acceptable losses. But the basic doctrine of the imperial guard is fundamentally flawed. The Guard tend to reinforce failure because of a single minded determination to follow some strategy long past the point where it has been proven a silly thing to do. This is largely because the Guard is an example of an army where lower echelon commanders are given absolutely no latitude when it comes to executing a task and tactical decisions are made by those too far removed from the battle to make a proper decision.

I can accept that existing as a the nature of poor quality commanders but that ultimately is limited to the kind of regiment that is employed (usually those of the extremely low quality-to-man ratio). Many units give great offering of personal command to the lower echelon of officers. Take the idenpendent nature of the Catachens, Gaunts Ghosts as mentioned not to mention the uncanny ability (coming mostly from need) of Cadia to produce regiment after regiment of strong troopers and well trained and experienced officers.

The seemingly inevitable result might be success but at atrocious causality rates. And just because the troops are easily replaced is inconsequential. A bullet is readily replaced but it is still a silly thing to expend them when there is no need. The guard's lack of strategy is evident then because they'll suffer 90% casualties holding a point with no strategic value or will lose 20,000 men when their aim could have been achieved losing a mere 5,000.

Firstly, their weapons are designed to minimalise expenditure and loss. That is literally the only advantage a lasgun has over other weapons. Its cheap, mass producable, the ammunition has some self-sustainability etc. It goes as long as the guardsman goes.

What defines a point of no strategic value and when does this come up? The only ones that come close are those of religious significance and between the morale loss and the possibility of actual physical protection they provide its usually worth it to hold those sites. Losing 20,000 men versus 5,000 is completely situation, and given the Imperial Guard's recruiting numbers, thats like someone using 2 staples instead of 1. Its ultimately irrelevent. Particularly if those losses prevented the need of a naval engagement which would have costed millions of lives and infinitely more resources.

 

[Thaluikhain]

Ah, ok, was going by BL and 40k, not BFG...how does geosynchronous orbit matter, though?

Well basiclly: a planet is rotating so if you want to fire directly at a point on a planet the ship needs to moving at the exact same speed and trajectory as the planet along the axis the weapon is firing otherwise the rotation will throw off the accuracy by enough that when you put thousands and thousands of km or miles between the ship and the target, you cease to have any viable accuracy with a pinpoint weapon (like a lance battery).

Ah, that's geostationary orbit. Geosynchronous orbit is when the thing is above the same point every day, geostationary is a special case of that when it's above the same point every other time as well.

It's a bad idea to fire weapons from there, you have to be pretty far out, I don't remember anything saying you couldn't fire from low orbit and take rotation into account (or not, in the case of lances, you just need the timing to be right). Mind you, self guided weapons like torpedoes should be able to be fired just fine either way (ok, technically you should be able to hit selected areas fairly accurately from orbit of another planet in the system, same way that modern space programs can get a Mars probe to land more or less where they want it to, but 40k overlooks that sorta thing).

Yeah...if they can get close enough to the planet, why can't one warship?

Other than those smaller transport ships actually designed to enter an atmosphere? As opposed to the 4km giant warship that would basiclly collapse structurally if it ever tried to perform the same? Not to mention that if an attack should take place, the warships are there to survey the situation and cover them if needed as opposed to the warships are entering the atmosphere and being caught when the sensors go down and having the enemies ships free to bombard them safe up in high orbit.

Oh, landing craft you mean? I thought you meant the warp-capable ships those travel in.

Absolutely not, the Warp breaks every rule possible to reasonable physics, the Immaterium is flowing on every aspect of the Materium, a regular human certain cant plot something like that but a being made of the Immaterium itself (i.e. a demon), thats no problem.

If you say thats what Abnett ruled then I cant say no to that but the Damaris Campaign books by FFG make it a major point of the ork invasion force jumping directly next to the imperial fleet in orbit, maintaining RAMMING SPEED, all the while.

It's been flat out stated that it's impossible, even chaos ships can't, though many 40k authors aren't too worried by canon, yeah.

Abaddon's invasion of the Cadian system (also various Gothic Sector worlds), Ghazghkulls invasions of Armageddon (and Piscina, I think) specifically stated that you had to re-enter realspace way out in the system fringes, they built defenses out there for this very reason.

(Excepting certain pre-established warp routes which can be further inside systems, but they are rare and tend to be well-known...was that the case in Damaris?)

Fair enough. Though throw away lines (first and only is the forge world one yes?) seems a bit less important than a 40K fan automatically identifying the overwhelming importance of keeping a forge world intact enough so that explanation wasnt even required.

Yeah, it was on a forge world, IIRC, on the last valuable place to be retaken. I think orbital bombardments were used, though, just not on the really important bits, you can't literally cover the surface with factories, despite what they say...even if you could, bits would have been destroyed in earlier fighting anyway.

The line is important, because not everyone reading the book would know what a forgeworld is.[footnote]including some of the authors. BL published a short story in one of their anthologies by...think it was Mike Lee and someone else, about a handful of ork raiders (less than a hundred) landing in the forest wilderness of a forge world, which was a serious military threat to the whole planet...um? Also, the story referenced Ghazghkull and, IIRC Nazdreg, but didn't say who they were. So you had to be enough of a fan to know about them, but not about forge worlds.[/footnote] It has to be accessible to people coming into the hobby, and then again, there'd be times when there's reasons for being heavy handed with otherwise valuable worlds, and if it wasn't specified, you wouldn't know it wasn't one of those times.

Firstly, their weapons are designed to minimalise expenditure and loss. That is literally the only advantage a lasgun has over other weapons. Its cheap, mass producable, the ammunition has some self-sustainability etc. It goes as long as the guardsman goes.

Er...they are stated as being very reliable as well.

Also, they shouldn't have noticeable recoil, or have wind affect their aim (though Abnett says otehrwise). You shouldn't be able to see the beam or hear a discharge noise (at point of firing, that is, ionised air and effects on the target might be audible).

You'd also get no shot drop due to gravity to speak of, it travels in a straight line, which isn't bad either.

 

[kingcom]

Ah, that's geostationary orbit. Geosynchronous orbit is when the thing is above the same point every day, geostationary is a special case of that when it's above the same point every other time as well.

It's a bad idea to fire weapons from there, you have to be pretty far out, I don't remember anything saying you couldn't fire from low orbit and take rotation into account (or not, in the case of lances, you just need the timing to be right). Mind you, self guided weapons like torpedoes should be able to be fired just fine either way (ok, technically you should be able to hit selected areas fairly accurately from orbit of another planet in the system, same way that modern space programs can get a Mars probe to land more or less where they want it to, but 40k overlooks that sorta thing).

Oh my bad used the wrong terminology, firing a lance battery at anything other than that kind of position is your only real hope of hitting something.

Torpedos are something pretty specialised in 40k, considering the average torpedo is the equivent of a 6 story building, again a special bombardment capable vessel would be carrying things like this, not your average flotilla escort (which would be fitted with macro cannons/plasma cannons, lance batteries and fighter launch bays).

From what I know about torpedos they dont have the flight time to fire from a whole other planet away though if your in relative orbit you should be fine.

Oh, landing craft you mean? I thought you meant the warp-capable ships those travel in.

Yea, the big space vessels just need to get close enough so the small craft can deposit, getting too close too a gravity well is just not worth the trouble of maneovering I figure.

Abaddon's invasion of the Cadian system (also various Gothic Sector worlds), Ghazghkulls invasions of Armageddon (and Piscina, I think) specifically stated that you had to re-enter realspace way out in the system fringes, they built defenses out there for this very reason.

What exactly stops a ship from exiting the warp where ever you wanted? I only thought that it was near impossible to accurately calculate when to desposit as the gravity well could shoot you all over the place. Any kind of organised fleet has to do this or risk splitting apart.

So if you have a being wanting to re-enter closer to the planet only needed extremely powerful computation processing systems or needed to know when the future would allow this. Say...a demon of Tzeentch possessing a navigator.

Damaris is a world in the Koronos expanse, a region of space in the ass end of nowhere without even imperial control. Ork Warboss on his way and the ork fleet wanted to be closer, so the wierdboyz made it so, though admittedly they were already in system and simply jumped even closer.

The line is important, because not everyone reading the book would know what a forgeworld is.[footnote]including some of the authors. BL published a short story in one of their anthologies by...think it was Mike Lee and someone else, about a handful of ork raiders (less than a hundred) landing in the forest wilderness of a forge world, which was a serious military threat to the whole planet...um? Also, the story referenced Ghazghkull and, IIRC Nazdreg, but didn't say who they were. So you had to be enough of a fan to know about them, but not about forge worlds.[/footnote] It has to be accessible to people coming into the hobby, and then again, there'd be times when there's reasons for being heavy handed with otherwise valuable worlds, and if it wasn't specified, you wouldn't know it wasn't one of those times.

Fair enough, though a landing party of any orks is an extreme threat, given that if a single spore gets away, you risk long term ork activities and its often just better to burn it all out. Its the only way to be sure.


EDIT: I forgot how much fun arguing over 40k is

 

[Thaluikhain]

Oh my bad used the wrong terminology, firing a lance battery at anything other than that kind of position is your only real hope of hitting something.

Torpedos are something pretty specialised in 40k, considering the average torpedo is the equivent of a 6 story building, again a special bombardment capable vessel would be carrying things like this, not your average flotilla escort (which would be fitted with macro cannons/plasma cannons, lance batteries and fighter launch bays).

From what I know about torpedos they dont have the flight time to fire from a whole other planet away though if your in relative orbit you should be fine.

Is it Sword or Cobra class frigates (or was it destroyers, and chaos has frigates nowdays?) that are armed with torpedoes? Barring armed merchantmen, those are the smallest, least powerful ships the Imperial Navy has.

And, flight time is infinite. Until it hits something, a projectile is going to keep moving (well, unless it falls into orbit, in which case it's moving, just not going anywhere, if you see what I mean). Well, IRL, not so much 40k.

What exactly stops a ship from exiting the warp where ever you wanted? I only thought that it was near impossible to accurately calculate when to desposit as the gravity well could shoot you all over the place. Any kind of organised fleet has to do this or risk splitting apart.

So if you have a being wanting to re-enter closer to the planet only needed extremely powerful computation processing systems or needed to know when the future would allow this. Say...a demon of Tzeentch possessing a navigator.

Damaris is a world in the Koronos expanse, a region of space in the ass end of nowhere without even imperial control. Ork Warboss on his way and the ork fleet wanted to be closer, so the wierdboyz made it so, though admittedly they were already in system and simply jumped even closer.

Nah, your warp engines just don't work, you can't enter/exit warpspace close to a gravity well (William King has it as the ship wants to re-enter realspace when it gets close to a large mass in of itself). You can't use warp engines to travel inside a system, from planet to planet, say, because of this.

Well, there is mention of being able to enter the warp (sorta) from in system by using the warp engines, just not intact. That was used to take a chunk out of the nids at Macragge, for example. Everything nearby is flung into the warp and torn apart. BFG mentioned daemonships that didn't enter or exit the warp like ships, they worked just like very big daemons, though I don't know how canon that is.

Fair enough, though a landing party of any orks is an extreme threat, given that if a single spore gets away, you risk long term ork activities and its often just better to burn it all out. Its the only way to be sure.

True, but that's not what they meant. And...if any place has the resources to do that, it's a forge world (and, of course, ork raiders don't get make it to the surface of forge worlds, it'd take a massive invasion force)...in this story they had to call for marines for help.

EDIT: I forgot how much fun arguing over 40k is

Was better when the fluff was more consistent...the "we don't need continuity editors, and everything is fluff, even when it isn't" stuff is so annoying. Part of the general dumbing down and laziness which drove me away from the newer stuff.

 

[kingcom]

Is it Sword or Cobra class frigates (or was it destroyers, and chaos has frigates nowdays?) that are armed with torpedoes? Barring armed merchantmen, those are the smallest, least powerful ships the Imperial Navy has.

And, flight time is infinite. Until it hits something, a projectile is going to keep moving (well, unless it falls into orbit, in which case it's moving, just not going anywhere, if you see what I mean). Well, IRL, not so much 40k.

I know the Falcion class frigate are the dedicated torpedo boats dont remember others off by heart. As to flight time I meant fuel time, beyond the point where has actual correction capabilities (given that the machine spirits on these things are not particularly advanced and get at best minimal corrections based off launch data, since i really doubt they're putting auger arrays into these things). Perhaps, only knowledge of torpedos are BFG and Rogue Trader and they simply cease to exist after a few rounds. I guess its possible, if your techpriest is up to it...

Nah, your warp engines just don't work, you can't enter/exit warpspace close to a gravity well (William King has it as the ship wants to re-enter realspace when it gets close to a large mass in of itself). You can't use warp engines to travel inside a system, from planet to planet, say, because of this.

Well, there is mention of being able to enter the warp (sorta) from in system by using the warp engines, just not intact. That was used to take a chunk out of the nids at Macragge, for example. Everything nearby is flung into the warp and torn apart. BFG mentioned daemonships that didn't enter or exit the warp like ships, they worked just like very big daemons, though I don't know how canon that is.

Huh, I've always gone off the rule that they can do so but its a really really bad idea. I mean the warp is the definition of removing all laws of reality, if warp needs it to happen it happens, i mean now they released fluff about Void shields shunting weapons fire into the warp...I don't think it matters anymore.

True, but that's not what they meant. And...if any place has the resources to do that, it's a forge world (and, of course, ork raiders don't get make it to the surface of forge worlds, it'd take a massive invasion force)...in this story they had to call for marines for help.

Oh really? Wow....alright that seems a tad overkill but whatever, you would assume a detachment of a couple thousand skitarii should be able to deal with the issue.

Was better when the fluff was more consistent...the "we don't need continuity editors, and everything is fluff, even when it isn't" stuff is so annoying. Part of the general dumbing down and laziness which drove me away from the newer stuff.

I go with the rule 50% of everything that comes out is propoganda from one side or another. What you choose to believe is going to be different depending on the person and ultimately you pick and choose what you like about the universe because at one point or another, it was canon.

Anyway its midnight, nice arguing with you. Made me relook some things.