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Post by kanelbullen on Oct 16, 2017 20:56:24 GMT
The nature of warfare on immoren is super weird. I mean they have access to machineguns comparable to that of ww1 or even ww2, cannons and gigantic destroyer robots, yet most of the nations around immoren almost exclusively use melee weapons and medieval style warfare tactics. Even the most shooty faction cygnar relies on mostly melee power. We all know what happens when you bring a knife to a gunfight, and theres a reason why swords and spears became obsolete.
I know its a bit silly but just can't get over the question of why the factions dont arm themselves with guns rather than archaic weaponry?
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Post by HubertJFarnsworth on Oct 16, 2017 21:09:09 GMT
Blasting Powder. Guns in the Iron Kingdoms (mostly) use blasting powder, a combination of two separate alchemical compounds held in pockets in a paper cartridge. When the firing pin pierces both pockets the powders combine and explode, but the explosion is not nearly as powerful as real-life gunpowder. In comparison, the Convergence uses exclusively spring-powered (SPRING POWERED!) guns that are of equivalent range and stopping power to most firearms in the Iron Kingdoms. Hell, Skorne has a bug that can naturally shoot venom out of it's butt that is just as effective as many guns. Consider that the most common military rifle in the Iron Kingdoms is POW 10 or 11 in-game, and they only have the range of a running man and have less than a 50% chance of piercing plate armor. Many guns are also breach-loaders, which means their rate of fire isn't much higher than a skilled bowman can achieve.
Blasting powder is also much more difficult to make and transport; any mixing of the two will immediately explode. Gunpowder in the real-world is fairly easy to mass produce and can be transported as long as it's not exposed to flame.
Of course, the real answer is "Because Matt and Jason thought it was cool to have knights fighting WWI brits" and they and Doug wrote up an excuse.
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Post by kanelbullen on Oct 16, 2017 21:24:58 GMT
Blasting Powder. Guns in the Iron Kingdoms (mostly) use blasting powder, a combination of two separate alchemical compounds held in pockets in a paper cartridge. When the firing pin pierces both pockets the powders combine and explode, but the explosion is not nearly as powerful as real-life gunpowder. In comparison, the Convergence uses exclusively spring-powered (SPRING POWERED!) guns that are of equivalent range and stopping power to most firearms in the Iron Kingdoms. Hell, Skorne has a bug that can naturally shoot venom out of it's butt that is just as effective as many guns. Consider that the most common military rifle in the Iron Kingdoms is POW 10 or 11 in-game, and they only have the range of a running man and have less than a 50% chance of piercing plate armor. Many guns are also breach-loaders, which means their rate of fire isn't much higher than a skilled bowman can achieve. Blasting powder is also much more difficult to make and transport; any mixing of the two will immediately explode. Gunpowder in the real-world is fairly easy to mass produce and can be transported as long as it's not exposed to flame. Of course, the real answer is "Because Matt and Jason thought it was cool to have knights fighting WWI brits" and they and Doug wrote up an excuse. Thanks, that cleared it up. Do they use the same stuff in machineguns that use bullet type ammunition? I guess I can imagine breech loaded guns not completely overshadowing more orthodox weaponry, for example till the napoleonic wars the bayonet was actually infantrymans main weapon. The illogical inconsistency of technology has always been the main issue with warmahordes lore to me. Well at least it's the best miniatures game out there right now.
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Post by HubertJFarnsworth on Oct 16, 2017 21:31:00 GMT
A few nations have started making metal cartridges; Cygnar uses them in their revolver weapons like Caine's pistols and the Long Gunners. I think they also use them in the Cyclone and Sentinal chain guns and well as the Trencher Chain Gun but I'm not sure. Ios presumably uses metal cartridges as well in the Invictor and Riflemen revolver rifles; it's unclear what loading mechanism the Vyre chassis warjacks use for their ammo (the Shyeel chassis don't use projectiles, they sort of lash out with their force fields). Based on the Bombard mounted on the Destroyer Khador is probably using metal cartridges as well and I'm not sure how else the automatic gun on the Grolar would work if they don't. Basically they're just more difficult to make; they don't seem to have large automated industry yet so all the ammo is hand-packed. Unfortunately, as effective as cortexes are at mimicking bipedal movement they aren't good at running assembly lines or ships so the IK is way behind on that part of the industrial revolution.
You do have to accept a certain amount of suspension of disbelief to get the game to mesh in your head. The idea that Cygnar has chain guns but somehow Khador skipped that and went straight to double-barreled automatic rifles with the Grolar, or the fact that every colossal is carrying around advanced loading mechanisms for multiple guns (how does the Victor carry more than like, two of those mortar shells? How are the cannons on the Revelator and Vanquisher like 1 caliber and still manage to hit anything?).
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rantmo
Baby's First Wargame
Posts: 8
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Post by rantmo on Oct 16, 2017 21:40:43 GMT
The prevalence of incredibly powerful armor, some of which being enhanced by magic, combined with the weaker power of readily available firearms would also justify the ongoing presence of melee weapons. In our world, the power of ranged weapons outpaced the stopping power and utility of armor, but in the Iron Kingdoms, that's not the case, and thus we still get swords and axes and all the various hand weapons that are cooler than guns anyway.
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Post by Blargaliscious on Oct 16, 2017 23:00:37 GMT
It's the same reason why the Space Marines in WH40K will fly halfway across the galaxy, brave the fiery process of entering a planet's atmosphere to land on a planet just so they can run up to a Space Ork and punch him in the face with a power fist.
Because it looks cool.
There are a lot of things in Warmahordes that don't make sense. A lot.
The first faction to figure out:
KE = 1/2 M * V2 Steel metalurgy Interchangeable parts design Assembly line manufacturing techniques
will conquer the planet.
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Post by galrohir on Oct 16, 2017 23:16:59 GMT
It's something that's bothered me a lot too. Blasting Powder makes no sense, but even if you accept that the world still makes no sense. Single shot rifles when they know what magazines are. Maxim style machine guns being phased out in favour of gatling guns (and the gatlins do not have any sort of crank mechanism, they work with the magic of belief). People still using single shot pistols/pepperboxes as sidearms when revolvers are a thing. Equipping Gun Mages with pistols instead of rifles as standard. And those are just off the top of my head.
You gotta deal with it, really. As for why melee weapons, well, Farrow/Gatormen/Other beasties are a thing, so having your troops be trained to deal with it is ok.
Still using stuff like Iron Fang Pikemen, Sword Knights or Precursor Knights is idiotic though. But it all stems from the conceit that guns are underpowered, essentially.
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Post by HubertJFarnsworth on Oct 16, 2017 23:28:09 GMT
Breech loaders and whatnot are still in use because there is no mass production, everything is made by hand. Breech loaders are easier to make tens of thousands of to put in the hands of every Trencher and Winter Guard.
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Post by galrohir on Oct 17, 2017 1:04:43 GMT
Breech loaders and whatnot are still in use because there is no mass production, everything is made by hand. Breech loaders are easier to make tens of thousands of to put in the hands of every Trencher and Winter Guard. Except I don't buy that. Mostly because it's contradicted by the lore itself. Cygnaran Armory and the Khadoran Mechaniks Assembly are the two biggest ones. Cygnar was able to surplus so many sluggers that they sold them to the Trollkin. Or to put it more simply: if you have the industrial capacity to put out Warjacks (and their weapons) in the numbers you'd require to wage war on Western Immoren, you have the capacity to have your troops much better equipped than what the normal mook has in Warmachine. Especially Khador dudes, who still use bleepin blunderbusses for bleeps sake. I mean the New Haven Arms company managed to churn out nearly 14,000 Henry rifles between 1860 and 1866 (so about 2,300 per year) and they weren't a giant conglomerate staffed by thousands of people, let alone the premier military provider for a major nation. And I will reiterate, because this is canon, Cygnar produced so many sluggers (which are Maxim equivalents) they surplused them to the Trollkin "years ago". Now that doesn't really mesh with the whole "there is no mass production" now does it.?
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Post by Blargaliscious on Oct 17, 2017 1:31:03 GMT
Oh yeah.
The Iron Kingdoms has yet to meet:
Christian Sharps Claude-Etienne Minié Henry Ford Henry Bessemer
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Post by Blargaliscious on Oct 17, 2017 1:38:26 GMT
And another thing!
You can tell that the rifles have ~absolutely no~ punch to them, because they have no recoil to them, because if they had recoil to them...
THE RIFLES WOULD HAVE BUTT STOCKS AND NOT BLADES OR ANGLES ON THEM!!!
I understand PP wanting to have a different artistic look and flair for the Longgunners and Grim Angus, but physics is physics, and if those rifles don't have proper butt stocks on them then they don't have any recoil to them.
Gggrrrrrr...
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Post by Cryptix on Oct 17, 2017 3:09:42 GMT
...Are we seriously doing this again?
For the last time, it's because magic is bull****. (not modspeak)
It's the answer for every fantasy setting when it boils down to it unfortunately.
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Post by borderprince on Oct 17, 2017 3:58:42 GMT
Except I don't buy that. Mostly because it's contradicted by the lore itself. Cygnaran Armory and the Khadoran Mechaniks Assembly are the two biggest ones. Cygnar was able to surplus so many sluggers that they sold them to the Trollkin. Or to put it more simply: if you have the industrial capacity to put out Warjacks (and their weapons) in the numbers you'd require to wage war on Western Immoren, you have the capacity to have your troops much better equipped than what the normal mook has in Warmachine. Especially Khador dudes, who still use bleepin blunderbusses for bleeps sake. ... And I will reiterate, because this is canon, Cygnar produced so many sluggers (which are Maxim equivalents) they surplused them to the Trollkin "years ago". Now that doesn't really mesh with the whole "there is no mass production" now does it.? Capacity to do something is not the same as being able to afford to do something. Khador has to equip a large number of conscripts who are trained quite quickly and thrown into the meat grinder for a short period. We also know that Khador's finances are quite tight. So equipping your non-specialist grunts with cheap, (fairly) reliable and easy to use equipment might be the desirable thing to do. It gets them equipped and able to fight, even if they're not equipped with weapons to take them to peak performance. Saving your limited financial/physical resources to equip your more elite soliders/warjacks can make sense in that context. There is also a great unknown to all of us, which is logistics. Sluggers might be less easy to maintain than chain guns, for example, making chain guns a more desirable option for an army. This might be especially true for Trenchers who hang around with their weapons in the mud all the time (same might explain why simpler single shot rifles are preferred to more complex rifles where dirt might do more to foul the mechanism). But single shot pistols can be more powerful. In the IKRPG hand cannon are largely make bespoke, and hit harder than any other pistol. The nearest revolver equivalent is the Radcliffe Firestorm, which is POW11 (rather than 12) and is noted as an extremely rare and expensive firearm. Power of shot vs volume of fire is a legitimate concern when a standard repeating pistol is much less likely to do any damage to quite a few armoured soldiers. Gunmages with pistols can be rationalised in several ways: (i) Pistols can be used in closer confines more effectively, which fits with the spec-ops feel of gun mages; (ii) Gun mages can use magic to make their pistols at least as effective as most rifles; (iii) Mage steel is too expensive and rare to use for lots of rifles to be viable. 2 or 3 pistols might be possible for every rifle; (iv) A cultural norm - various parts of the IK have a tradition of pistol fighting/duelling, and this fed into the gun mage tradition early.
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Post by shortsleeve on Oct 17, 2017 8:26:51 GMT
dont forget ww1 have tank, plane, etc and cavalrie yep, even at ww2 panzer were attack by cavalrie charge. or the british empire with their gun again the zulu and their spear... history prove not because some have technologie then everybody have it
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Post by galrohir on Oct 17, 2017 11:20:35 GMT
Except I don't buy that. Mostly because it's contradicted by the lore itself. Cygnaran Armory and the Khadoran Mechaniks Assembly are the two biggest ones. Cygnar was able to surplus so many sluggers that they sold them to the Trollkin. Or to put it more simply: if you have the industrial capacity to put out Warjacks (and their weapons) in the numbers you'd require to wage war on Western Immoren, you have the capacity to have your troops much better equipped than what the normal mook has in Warmachine. Especially Khador dudes, who still use bleepin blunderbusses for bleeps sake. ... And I will reiterate, because this is canon, Cygnar produced so many sluggers (which are Maxim equivalents) they surplused them to the Trollkin "years ago". Now that doesn't really mesh with the whole "there is no mass production" now does it.? Capacity to do something is not the same as being able to afford to do something. Khador has to equip a large number of conscripts who are trained quite quickly and thrown into the meat grinder for a short period. We also know that Khador's finances are quite tight. So equipping your non-specialist grunts with cheap, (fairly) reliable and easy to use equipment might be the desirable thing to do. It gets them equipped and able to fight, even if they're not equipped with weapons to take them to peak performance. Saving your limited financial/physical resources to equip your more elite soliders/warjacks can make sense in that context. There is also a great unknown to all of us, which is logistics. Sluggers might be less easy to maintain than chain guns, for example, making chain guns a more desirable option for an army. This might be especially true for Trenchers who hang around with their weapons in the mud all the time (same might explain why simpler single shot rifles are preferred to more complex rifles where dirt might do more to foul the mechanism). But single shot pistols can be more powerful. In the IKRPG hand cannon are largely make bespoke, and hit harder than any other pistol. The nearest revolver equivalent is the Radcliffe Firestorm, which is POW11 (rather than 12) and is noted as an extremely rare and expensive firearm. Power of shot vs volume of fire is a legitimate concern when a standard repeating pistol is much less likely to do any damage to quite a few armoured soldiers. Gunmages with pistols can be rationalised in several ways: (i) Pistols can be used in closer confines more effectively, which fits with the spec-ops feel of gun mages; (ii) Gun mages can use magic to make their pistols at least as effective as most rifles; (iii) Mage steel is too expensive and rare to use for lots of rifles to be viable. 2 or 3 pistols might be possible for every rifle; (iv) A cultural norm - various parts of the IK have a tradition of pistol fighting/duelling, and this fed into the gun mage tradition early. Regarding cost: I get what you're saying, and it probably is the easiest explanation to hand wave everything away, but there's still clashes. For example, regarding the revolver/hand cannon thing: not only are there stock, common revolvers (they're called repeating pistols, and they're of the "change the cylinder" variety) but they cost 35 gc to a Hand Cannon's 100 gc. Now, obviously, its POW 10 vs POW 12, but I'd much rather me and my buddies have 5 POW 10s with 5 more per reload than single loading POW 12s when the bad guys are charging me. And this is to say nothing of the money sink that is stuff like Colossals, although I will readily admit Colossals and Warjacks are integral to the setting, so lets not go into that rabbit hole. As for the Gun Mages: I) Gun Mages aren't part of the CRS. They aren't any more Spec Ops than Trencher Commandos, they are just rare troops due to the Gift. Besides everyone knows WW1 Spec Ops used Carbines! II) They can also use their magic to make a magelock rifle the equivalent of Warjack weapons. This one is really a wash because a rifle is more effective than a pistol in every single possible way (except close combat) to begin with, and Gun Mage spells work equally with both. Therefore, Gun Mage with Rifle>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>Gun Mage with Pistol. III) This one has merit but is again also a wash because: literally every Gun Mage model out there (except I think the Officer) has two pistols. So if we're equipping all the chucklefaces with two pistols we can equip them with a rifle. Particularly when you consider two magelock pistols cost 300 gc but a single rifle costs 200 gc. Food for thought, and it ties back to the cost argument. IV) The Militant Order of the Arcane Tempest was founded during Vitner IV's reign specifically to harness Gun Magic for wartime use. While I won't discount the possibility of what you suggest, it isn't actually hinted at anywhere (and Cygnar doesn't have a strong duelling tradition. Or if it does it hasn't been mentioned, unlike with Llael) shortsleeve (sorry, I don't know how to quote multiple people in one post): 1) Not only did the poles at Krojanty not charge Panzers (they charged an infantry battalion), they were actually succesful in dispersing them before having to retreat due to german armor. They still managed to delay them, though as we all know it did little in the grand scheme of things. 2) Yes, the British had a great technological advantage over the Zulus. That's not really relevant here because I'm not comparing Cygnar to the Trollkin Kriels, I'm comparing them to Khador, another heavily industrialised nation.
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