"The fact that imperial is still being used to measure caliber" - I like how he realized halfway through that sentence what he was saying. 😅 The Emperor protects.
@@scelonferdi I mean 40k tabletop still uses inches for movement. I think its far more likely they are using Imperial also the Imperium using imperial is only fitting. Edit: Scratch that it does appear to be based on year, which is odd.
This is the first ever Warhammer game I've ever played so I don't know any lore or anything but it's been fun so far! And I loved the Helldivers content with Jonathan so when I finally had a game I actually played I had to watch!
The in-lore reason for aiming is that space marines have some thing in their head or whatnot that aims for them. Tau-looted space marine armor was easily identified by the fact they tried to aim, and were slaughtered despite wearing the same colors, because they were seen aiming properly.
Yeah, their autosenses (basically armor sensor package plus HUD) interface with the gun, giving them targeting info directly into their field of view. Considering how eager on getting rid of their helmets they appear to be, I'm not sure it's that helpful...
@@SlaveKnightGael1579 Probably part of the rationalization why bolters don't have shoulder stocks. Doesn't really work for all the Bolters used by non-Astartes though.
For the bolter: the .998 Godwyn pattern refers to the year it was brought online. Imperial dating is M40.998, so 40th millenium, year 998 in that millenium. It uses the same .75 caliber bolter shells previous patterns use.
The whole .75 caliber bolter thing always bugged me, a 12 gauge shell is around .72 caliber. Bolters used by space Marines in this game look like they shoot 40mm projectiles almost which is like an inch and a half in diameter
@@ballistic9644 "The standard bolt is set to .75 calibre, whereas Heavy Bolter rounds are larger, at 1.00 calibre. " "The current, standard-issue bolter for the Firstborn Space Marines is the .75 calibre Astartes Mark Vb Godwyn Pattern Bolter." there are also other, calibres mentioned, such as .60 and .70, for older space marine chapter boltguns. and yes, the scale doesnt make much sense.
Seems like he finally got someone pointing out to him that an RPG-7 would be a more apt comparison- Explosive charge to launch the warhead and then the rocket is just a booster to the initial explosion.
I absolutely love the idea of him putting the gyro jet underneath the desk, and then immediately pulling it out again like a new gun for like 10 minutes straight.🤣
@@DarkestVampire92 Now my vision is that he alternates between the RPG and the gyro jet for the entire video. Everytime the weapon disappears under the desk and comes back up as if it it's the first time this video.
Talking about "why does the Imperium still use bolters when plasma guns are available?" While Jonathan's thoughts are interesting, the 40K universe has its own explanation: the Imperium doesn't know how most of its tech actually works, or how to build more factories to produce more of it. So it's entirely possible that they would love to equip everyone with reliable plasma weapons. But they don't know how to refine their existing designs, and they cannot increase their supply to meet demand.
More than that, during the Great Crusade early marine units were armed with volkite weaponry. As production needs increased, they had to switch to bolters for mass recruitment because they couldn't make enough volkite ray guns to equip them, even during that period of the Imperium's history.
@@AnonymousVenator That's not as much of a concern with space marines. Cost just does not factor in when arming them, and they have menials to do the maintenance for them. If space marines are using bolters, it's because the bolter is the best weapon the Imperium is physically able to produce in large enough quantities to arm all of them.
@@screamingcactus1753it does come into account, because all their equipment has to be custom made. They can't use standard infantry sized weapons (and infantry bolters are downsized Astartes bolters). They also can't get a bunch of equipment in advance, because they don't know how many aspirants will survive the trials.
It's also that Plasma weapons in 40k have a weakness that's realistic, and most universes don't use. 40k plasma weapons have a decent chance of blowing up whenever you try to shoot it in the lore, and so they're mostly limited to specialised units (like tempestus scions). And if an Astartes gets blown up, that's not only a valuable gun, but an Astartes (which take upwards of a century to get to full combat efficiency) that you need to replace
Fun fact about the Stalker Bolter It doesn't fire the same explosive bolts as a standard boltgun, but rather a slug of the same size composed of solidified Mercury. Mercury is denser than lead, so in a solid state it would hit like a truck. It isn't propelled by a mini rocket engine, but rather a small compressed gas cylinder that silently propels the bullet after leaving the barrel. These specialized bolts are designed specifically for use in silenced boltguns, and the lack of an explosive charge and rocket fuel reduces the sound and visual report. Its kind of like the 9x39 round for the VSS rifle, which is subsonic and fires a significantly larger bullet than the 7.62 round.
@@altechelghanforever9906 Tungsten isn't excessively difficult to find or machine now. I wonder if the intended reference is to "red mercury" which is supposed to be some kind of super explosive that allows one to make a fusion explosive without a fission primary. (Which would fit with the "deuterium" mentioned in some bolt shells - red mercury to initiate fusion in the deuterium and get a really small nuclear blast?)
The main reason that Space Marine guns don't have any stocks is simply that they don't need them. You don't really need to brace a gun, or worry about recoil, when wearing power armor that has mechanical muscles capable of lifting several thousand pounds.
Muscles don't stop recoil. Larger bodies can absorb energy more, but a S&W 500ES with a stock isn't going to be any more manageable just because we are relatively big.
@@Spaced92 marines are genetically mutated to be larger and stronger (about 8' tall OUT of the armor), and have extra organs grown and implanted in them. They get into a body glove that is basically a big electro-mechanical muscle layer, THEN bolt armor over the top of that. They are powerful enough to tear metal with their hands and toss cars......I don't think a creature that strong (and heavy), would have issues with stockless weapons :D
@@elijahfoltz3755 Which is also insane when you know that they're still not strong enough to move their armor by themselves. An EMP blast once severely disabled an entire chapter, just by turning off their armor's exoskeleton
There was, once upon a time, rules on the tabletop for using full sized bolters one handed with close combat weapons, it was called "True Grit" and was the hallmark of the Space Wolves and Grey Knights chapters for at least a couple editions. Basically (to the best of my memory, it's been years) it was that normally having a bolter and a close combat weapon meant you got 1 attack in hand to hand combat, having a bolt pistol and a close combat weapon got you 2 attacks in hand to hand combat, True Grit gave you a second attack in hand to hand from a bolter. However the bolt pistol was still marginally better because a weapon classed as a "pistol" or "assault" weapon (Stormbolters were considered assault weapons) could be fired and then you could charge into hand to hand, but bolters were "rapid fire" so if you fired it first you couldn't then charge into close combat. Also, the Orks "believe it and it works" isn't quite that magical, that's the meme version. There's some variations but in most cases where it's shown in the lore the guns still have to basically function, the Ork power just means that they'll be able to dump 31 or 32 shots out of a 30 round magazine without missing a beat, whereas a non-Ork using the same gun is likely to have it jam after a handful of shots. Likewise, they can't paint a rock red and drive away on it, it still has to be a functional vehicle, the red just makes the engine a little more powerful. The best description I've seen for it is "psychic lubricant" it doesn't make things work in and of itself, but it can does them work better.
"Also, the Orks "believe it and it works" isn't quite that magical, that's the meme version" Tell that to Commisar Yarrick and his fully functioning stolen ork powerclaw...
@@The_Keeper I mean, that kind of proves it. If the Power Klaw wasn't at least basically functional it would never have worked for Yarrick, even if the Orks believed.
Yarrick's claw isn't actually the original ork weapon, it's a replica made by the mechanicus to actually be functional and be used as a prosthetic, he didn't just jam the claw he took on to his arm stump and it started working.
The meme has it's basis in actual second and third edition from what I recall. Where things really were that magical. Since then GW tried to tone them down a bit. to limited success. They do still go well beyond the concept of 'psychic lubricant" that people like to push in opposition of the game breakingly magical belief of the Orks on many occasions however. All they have done is codify a few of the "beliefs" with a sense of logic. Such as red paint on vehicle and some other things.
Agreed. I do like the fact the vengeance launcher was invented on Graia in cannon so if one turns up in Darktide or something it'll be a "Graia pattern".
12:08 If I recall correctly most Meltaguns use a super hot beam to melt through the armor BUT there is a version, in lore, that acts more like the one in Space Marine, design I think by The Salamanders chapter
yeah the melta is almost always described differently some times its super hot gas beam, sometimes molten liquid, sometimes large blast of heat. very "it just works" every time its depictred
@@ianarruda1967If we're serious though, there are basically flaming bolter rounds available as specialized ammunition, primarily used by the Deathwatch. Edit: As for conventional ones, one of Darktide's shotguns (specifically the Kantrael type) loads it as a special interaction.
I also like to see Jonathan react to the guns of Binary Domain, which is a cyberpunk game taking place in 2080 in Japan, and the weapons that the main character squad, the Rust crew, are equipped with are basically futurized version of modern guns. And the robots that you fight also have their own standard issue guns, there's also the underground Resistance, who built their own guns. The game was developed by the same people behind the Yakuza games. I would also like to see Jonathan take a look at the guns of Vanquish, a 3rd Person Shooter from Platinum Games, the weapons ranged from futuristic assault rifles, shotguns, LMGs and pistols to energy weapons that actually use the main character's suit energy to fire, too bad Vanquish didn't sell well enough to warrant a sequel, which is a huge shame since the ending is quite abrupt. For an April's Fools special, it would be nice to see Jonathan react to the guns of Plant vs Zombies: Garden Warfare 2, eventhough only the zombie characters carry guns.
From what I remember, the Boltgun rounds have 2 stages. A first that works with a propellant, like a real life round, which is supposed to shoot the Bolter round out. And then, after the round has been propelled out of the weapon, the actual minirocket is activated. So, it's not quite like a real life gyrojet gun. That explains the ejected cartridges. Also, Space Marine helmets have a targeting system, that's why they fire it from the hip.
Which also explains the tiny camera lens just above the bolter barrel, especially the newer bolt rifle, that has a targeting system connected with the battle brother's helmet.
@@alexholker1309 Or to have it more on the rockety end of things, a tiny, more recoil-y Bazooka/RPG-7/&c. -- rather a lot of "rocket launchers" are recoilless guns that fire a rocket-assisted projectile, as opposed to MANPADS like the Stinger, which are two-stage rockets (a small kick motor to get it out of the tube and the main motor away from the shooter's face) or pure recoilless rifles like the Carl Gustaf/US M3 MAAWS. Small but important difference. (Though you shouldn't fire any of them from indoors or out the back of a box van.)
8:10 Well, ackhually, two complete bolters, ie. barrels and action, attached together is called a combi-bolter, and is essentially the precursor to the storm bolter. It's still used in limited numbers by Imperial forces, but mainly used by Chaos Marines, as their kit is generally around 10,000 years old. A storm bolter is a specifically created as a twin-barreled weapon with a single firing mechanism. In game it used to be reflected, iirc, in that combi-bolters let you re-roll dice while storm bolters let you roll more dice.
Yeah, sorry, but my beloved Chaos Marines would have modern equipment looted from all the dead baby-killer-worshipping POGs they have spent 10,000 years wiping out. Not to mention, all the planetary raids where plenty of weapons would be taken as loot. Also, in the original lore, it was Chaos still had all the manufacturing capabilities lost to the False Emperor; able to churn out new Land Raiders and other vehicles as well as unique tech' like the Distortion, and my fave, Vortex Grenade (still remember the game where one Vortex grenade turned into 6 and had both sides running for the table edge). But then GW needed to sell more Space Marine stuff and they changed the lore because of all the whining from SM players, those simps. BLOOD FOR THE BLOOD GOD!
@@WanderingOldGuy Which explains why in 6e/7e, Chaos combi-bolters were actually slightly better up close (rapid-fire and twin-linked instead of Assault 2), and in 8e and later, they're statwise exactly the same beast.
Interestingly, as the Vengeance Launcher is original of the 1st Space Marine game, lore-wise it's said to be a prototype from the foregeworld Graia, the planet in which not only this game takes place but also the more recent Boltgun game, which it also features the Vengeance Launcher
It's a manual-detonating high-capacity plasma warhead grenade launcher, of course it's a prototype. My guess is that it was designed for battlefield demolition work, since firing multiple explosives from a safe distance and then being able to manually explode them sounds like a good way to knock down a small building, or make multiple breaches from different angles simultaneously into a guarded room.
The Vengeance Launcher is pretty useful in-game and I'm glad it made a return for Boltgun. I love how 40k games often feature cool weapons & gear that don't quite belong on the 40k tabletop. Big fan of the Combi Stub/Plasma pistol from Necromunda, which is typically depicted as a plasma pistol welded to a revolver. Plasma ammo is rare but bullets are plentiful, so why not a gun that uses both?
@@Ninjat126 Reminds me of the old LeMat revolver, which was a revolver mated to a 16 gauge short-barreled shotgun. (Though I have to imagine the recoil of 16 gauge buckshot in a handgun would be fearsome.)
Nobody's seeing them or he'd have told Johnathan by now bolters are only half gyrojet two-stage weapons after he had that explained by dozens or hundreds of comments each of the last times he covered 40k related games
Checkerboarding on rockets are called roll patterns and it's purpose is to make it easier for observers to see if a rocket is rolling and which direction it is rolling.
Thanks for providing that bit of knowledge! I've seen countless old videos of rocket tests and launches and never understood the checkerboard pattern 👍
The "Orks warp reality to make scrap guns work" thing is definitely exaggurated to a ridiculous extent. Some things are impossible, even if you convince an Ork otherwise. But if the WAAAGH needs something that might be possible to happen, then no matter how unlikely it is, the problem can be solved by throwing more Orks at it.
Instead of saying 'warp reality to make the impossible thing work', it's more like 'ignores plot holes in reality'. I.e. if the Ork opens up the gun and sees it has all the correct gun parts inside, he can use the gun. If he sees just a number of bolts and duct tape, the gun won't work, because the Ork knows that it can't possibly work. Unless, of course it has all the gun parts but missing one or two tiny components like, say, the firing pin, then it works anyway. However, if his gun's magazine is supposed to be 1,000 bullets, he can somehow fire 10,000 bullets instead simply because he didn't count the bullets and every other Ork around him hasn't tracked how many bullets he had fired. The moment one Ork points out that he has, in fact, fired way too many bullets, suddenly the gun stops firing as every Ork including the shooter suddenly realised that he should have ran out of ammo ages ago. If the Ork is always counting how many bullets he has fired and he is very good at tracking that detail, the gun will run dry after he fired exactly 1,000 bullets (thankfully, Orks don't tend to be fastidious with such details so there will always be discrepancies).
My headcannon is that the bolter solves the gyrojet problem of poor close range performance by having a launching charge on top of the rocket propelled ammo. So there is still a need for a cartridge case and there is still nomal recoil. So bolter ammo is basically a huge gyrojet stuck in a grenade launcher case.
That's not even headcanon. That's literally what they are, and what's been explained to Johnathan in hundreds of comments every other time he's covered 40k related games.
4:10 they're fired initially like a standard bullet, with the rocket igniting as it leaves the barrel to maximize time at peak velocity. This side-steps the Gyrojets problem of rounds not being very effective at close range because they aren't up to speed.
Da Commizah asked me' "Wuz you gotta Do, Orgryn?" I answard "What I'z Told to Do Sarge" E' said es the Smartest Answer e eva heard, so e gave me dis shiny ting on da chest.
A thing with the Melta Gun Its also depicted in a few ways In SM its like a shotgun, firing out a cone But in other times its more of a thin beam, like the Lascannon, but more concentrated Its designed to be an anti-tank weapon It does however always have a small AOE, because its REALLY hot And a human needs to close their eyes when firing it to avoid being dazzled by the light Its so hot, that you often cant use it in certain areas Like you dont use it on a spaceship or you'll put a hole through a wall And in an underground ice cave it flashes entire blocks into steam instantly
@@inthefade I'm not sure I'd wanna fire a plasma gun or a lascannon into an ice wall up close either, for exactly the same reason. Might be a good way to deal with a bunch of Tyranid gribblies though! This is the kind of hack I think of a Guardsman thinking of, though - Space Marines typically wouldn't *have* to. Sisters might, though, and they might do it trusting their faith to protect them. ("My faith protects me. My power armor helps.")
If i recall correctly, (feel free to correct me if im wrong on this) but the reason Astartes do not have to aim down sights all the time is because their helmets are linked with the Bolters kinda like modern vehicles and aircraft have their weapon systems aligned to their targeting systems, so theres no need for space marines to always ADS in order to hit precise shots when their helmet interface helps out their accuracy, same way why there is no need for buttstocks on the Bolters since the marines can handle the recoil without any issues. Unless they are wielding Storm bolters which are mostly for Terminators or Heavy bolters then accuracy doesnt matter when you are drowning enemies in hundreds of explosive bolt rounds lol. Now how do helmetless Astartes hit anything is essentially plot armor lol, an astartes without his helmet is just there for the rule of cool and in reality is a massive handicap. Also imo an Astartes with his helmet on looks way cooler then with his helmet off, but thats just me, which is why im so happy we will supposedly from what i heard be able to get a helmeted Titus in SM2 in our options.
Look up the black carapace, it explains exactly how they could still aim even if they don't have a HUD or a helmet on. Essentially the black carapace hooks directly to their nervous system and from their it hooks into their weapon so if the weapon itself still has a sight on it so they're seeing a reticle superimposed in their field of view
From what i recall according to some lore, heavily modified astartes wearing a healmet can actually hinder them since they can actually perceive or "sense" more things when they are helmetless. But i completely agree that helmeted marines looks way cooler than when they are helmet off.
@@pthsawas Ahh i think you're talking about the space wolves which have better senses then those provided by the power armor thanks to Leman's geneseed
@@Shinzon23 IIRC this is exactly right. So it's only derpy if we see a Battle Sister or Inquisitor firing a bolter helmetless. (They can have power armor, and their power armor does link into the bolter to aim it, but it requires the helmet for display since they don't have the Black Carapace.)
I love the explanation of the Orc guns - if they believe it will work - it will work - if that is not the best summary of the power and stupity of human behaviour around an insane amount of topics.
Sticking stuff on your back makes some of the most intuitive sense there is. Regardless of feasibility, I can see people reinventing the 'ammo backpack' for as long as there are people and there is ammo.
@@ongogablogian4315 it looks like it at first, but there's a method to the madness. Many of the guns are based on real life prototypes that never saw any real use, so a reaction to them would be very interesting
Oh, and since no-one else has mentioned it: there is a 2 hour video out there examining lasweapons and concluding there is absolutely zero consistency on how they're depicted.
The most sensible explanation I've heard is that 'las' is the imperium's generic term for energy weapons based on energy output and battlefield role. So lasguns that shoot pulsed beams, continuous beams, or starwars-style energy bolts can just be handwaved away as different patterns that more or less accomplish the same thing
Also to note is that actually the armory in 40k except for a few rare occurrences is repurposed stuff from long before from the age of strive. So technology hasn’t actually really progressed for thousands of years for humanity.
One of the problems that a lot of early rockets had was yawing around the vertical axis, which was very difficult to visually track due to their rotational symmetry. The checkerboard pattern was used to give observers a clear indicator of that rotation.
16:06 I believe that checkerboard pattern originated with the V2 rockets test-fired at Peenemuende in 1942, which used it as a high-visibility pattern to make them easier to track for taking measurements. Subsequent "war shots" fired at Allied targets were more often painted in army-green or camouflage patterns, but the checkerboard testing livery stuck in the popular recollection.
The "Black and White" chequer pattern starts with the V2 development by Von Braun so they could see if the missile was behaving during launches in WWII, because the casing had very few surface features you could see on film. When he is recruited by the US he persuades NASA to continue the practice.....even if it eventually adds over 10t to the weight of a Saturn V for the moon launches, which is reality the last time they use it for anything other than testing.
I mean there is the Gyrojet i think he showed once in a fallout 4 mod video, which is p close in function, though a fuckton more slim and light than any form of bolter
@@popeofsimps2924 Well, similar-ish. Gyrojet fires pure rockets. A bolt shell features a normal cartridge shooting out a rocket with an explosive tip the conventional way (propellant). So it's sort of a 3 stage system.
5:30 I believe the reason stabilizing oneself increases the rate of fire is that the heavy bolter could always fire faster, but you need to stabilize in order to compensate for the additional recoil.
Orcs are just brilliant engineers and weapon smiths without realizing it, they are born with the knowledge, inherited from when they were Kork, like how a tiny jumping spider has tactics to hunt built into its DNA, they can build anything, just don't ask them how. As an expert said "it's more likely they just paint the fastest cars red, just dont ask them how they know that specific one is the fastest". The lore that some weapons etc don't seem to work when tested by the mechanicus has more to do with their lack of/or long forgotten knowledge.
No, most ork tech is actually just jumbled together scrap with a very loose interpretation of proper functional order. Humans can use ork tech as long as it's unmodified, but if a techpriest say takes apart an ork gun and puts it back together exactly the same, it won't work anymore.
the argument is that they just paint the fastest cars red. But they have been known to repaint vehicles and factually make them faster. GW tried to reign in the insanity that is the Ork beliefs from early editions to limited success by jamming some logic onto it that some people have expounded upon. But even to this day it is still broken quite regularly. It goes well beyond some innate genetic knowledge or skill. And no amount of logic has ever been explained why purple makes things invisible when Orks are involved.
It's a mixture of both, they have innate knowledge about fancy technology like teleporters but they also emit a psychic field ("Waaagh") that, if enough orks are involved, can bend reality. Presumably they have to get close enough to something workable to make the Waaagh field do the rest of the job.
Nice write up, but literally half false rofl. You're trying to rationalize a world that explicitly has stated warp magic literally can turn ordinary weapons into living daemons simply because they commit a uniquely horrible act.
i would love to see Jonathan Ferguson, Keeper of Firearms & Artillery at the Royal Armouries in the UK, break down the guns and weaponry form Generation Zero, both the guns and dlc look ggod imo and i'd love to hear his opionion on them. the robots as well look good and they have artillery too. also i'd love to see The Risistance trilogy as well
Johnathan, you're completely correct on the pistol front! If a model in 40k has a pistol, it's probably intended to be used in-tandem with a knife, sword or other close-combat weapon. The exceptions are usually "support" troops like Enginseers, who just carry sidearms & don't expect to ever use them.
I recently learned the in-universe reason why the bolter drops casings: the bolt is initially ejected like a bullet and the rocket part only kicks in after it leaves the barrel in order to reduce barrel warping
I just sent the Royal Armories a 5'er, for Jonathan's amazing work here on the channel. And since I'm Danish, it only seems fair to give a little back to the U.K., for all the Viking Raids 🤣😎
The black and white coloring of rockets is indeed used for tracking them in flight. Similar purpose is also seen in automotive, where engineers put black and white circles as reference points on car parts, whether for test drives or crash tests
Melta guns in lore fire plasma but unlike a 40k plasma gun that contains the plasma into a glob and fires it out, the melta gun essentially fires a directed explosion.
@@batteredwarriorI thought it was like a fusion rocket. If you've ever seen fusion experiments you'll see a purple jet vaguely similar to the purple melta effect.
I have not seen anything that refers to melta guns using microwaves. All of the literature says that melta guns agitate a liquid/ gas based fuel source into a high energy state and fires out an intense blast of heat.
Please Jonathan Ferguson, the keeper of Firearms & Artillery at the Royal Armouries museum in the UK, deconstruct & analyze the weapons of *METAL GEAR SOLID 3* before the remake comes out. So many weapons in MGS3 to react and comment on like;- - The Patriot's infinite ammo and drum magazine resembling an (∞) symbol as well as the tumbling bullets. - The EZ tranq gun based off a Liberator pistol. - Snake's customized officer M1911A1 and him whittling the pistol grip to use a knife for CQC. - Ocelot's dual Single Action Army and his revolver juggling skills. - The End's custom paratrooper Mosin Nagant with tranquilizer rounds. - The Davey Crockett recoil-less nuclear launcher. - Eva's chinese Type 17 mauser clone with her "bandit shooting" technique. - Tatyana's single shot lipstick pistol. - Volgin using his electricity to ignite and fire off 7.62mm bullets from his hands. - The Boss's quick ability to disarm and disassemble Snake's pistols. These are a few examples and there are so many more other interesting trivias and weapons in MGS3 so please Dave and Jonathan, please consider making a video for MGS3.
Also worth pointing out the Space Marine armour has a built in range finding system, their armour will sync with their gun and display targeting reticules and range information in their helmet visors and their armour has a form of aim assist where the servo motors that assist their movement will help gun lay their arm and lock in place to minimise recoil when firing a heavy weapon.
If I remember the lore behind the Storm Bolter correctly, it's effectively two boltguns connected to a single trigger which share a common magazine. If one barrel becomes inoperable, you can still fire its share of the ammo out of the other barrel (at the rate of a normal boltgun). It also happens to come from after the Horus Heresy, as the Chaos Space Marines don't have them. Their equivalent (identical rules, IIRC) is two full boltguns stuck together. Though that has the problems of two triggers and two separate magazines. It's also worth noting that the tabletop rules for the Storm Bolter classify it as an "Assault" weapon, meaning you could still fire it and move. So the tabletop rules suggest it was meant to be used to suppress (or eliminate) enemy targets as you closed to melee range. Though a normal boltgun could fire precision shots and a Storm Bolter couldn't, given that the Storm Bolter seemed to operate on the rule of "If you need more range than this, you're not closing on the enemy quickly enough." And when I say "in the lore," I'm pretty sure I remember reading that in one version of the Space Marine Codex (and Chaos Space Marine Codex, for their version). Though I can't remember which version it was.
Ork powers of belief are not enough - without aid of BIG MOBS, Weirdboys (the "mages") and/or generators (No seriously, they can turn their collective make-belief energy into renewable energy) - to make impossible things possible. It can nudge cosmic laws a little but their tech works on all fundemental levels even without the make-belief AKA Waagh energy. It's just that the people who often take apart Ork creations are ad mech and they cannot just understand Lvl 99 Bubba gunsmithing and jerry rigging.
Fun piece of Trivia about the Orks' beliefs: it very much works against them as well. If I remember correctly, there has been some instances in Novels where Guardsmen who ran out of ammo, pointed their guns at the orks they were facing shouting basically *bang bang bang* or *dakkadakkadakka*(apparently that's what guns sound like to orks) and they died despite not actually being shot at.
acording to one source, the melta is a plasma weapon. it converts a stream of gas into plasma, but it used a flammable fuel source in the form of high pressure pyrum-petrol fuel mix.
Slight correction on the orc gestalt thing: It doesn't actually make something actually impossible happen. It still needs to function as a gun or a zappa or a choppa or whatever. Their vehicles can't run without functioning engines and drivetrains, their guns still need to feed ammo and so on. It just makes them work a bit better than they should. An Ork Shootah will jam a lot less than it would in the hands of a human, the war rig will drive a bit fastah, the rokkit will be a bit more explodey etc etc, but it has to be able to do the thing to begin with. The community memes in 40k circles tend to overstate some of the 40k 'features' a little.
@@DonAs-f3m This has largely been confirmed to be an artifact of Geedubs' "Everything is canon, but few narrators are reliable." thing, which they had to incorporate because of having a hundred writers with different takes on things. The set-in-stone lore of the orc gestalt is that it isn't reality breaking, but just like with a whole lot of other lore inconsistencies, it comes down a bit to the individual writer and the story in question being more or less reliable.
Hence why, for example, Armageddeon Ork Hunters can use looted shootas and they work, even if they're inaccurate and clunky (represented by the guard soldiers using them using ork BS scores)
The reason for the shell is that the initial charge is a conventional charge, the rocket charge only ignites after it leaves the barrel to prevent over pressurisation
Some schematics of Bolters indicate that the round nub sticking out of the housing above the barrel contains a camera that links up to the Space Marine's armor (which itself includes a direct neural link).
Depiction of the Melta gun in video games has been wildly inconsistent. In the Dawn of War games, it's a medium range beam weapon, In the mobile game where you're a Knight, it's kind of a weird flickery thing, and in Inquisitor: Martyr it's a big chunky laser thing. The way it's supposed to work is by projecting a magnetic confinement beam, then releasing a nuclear explosion inside it, and the resulting blast of superhot matter "melts" through vehicle armor (or flesh).
0:23 well considering most ork tech only works cause they believe it works and is useless if someone from another faction tries to use it. Yeah that’s spot on
That is wrong and a common misconception. Ork tech works. Not as good as imperial tech but it does in fact work. Their tech works better in the hands of an ork because of their belief. Think of it more like a psychic lubricant making the workings work better
Yeah, I really like that Orks are completely unaware that they have collective psychic powers that can redefine the world around them. If they ever became aware of it, they would rule the galaxy.
The checkerboard pattern was used on rockets to make it obvious whether the rocket is spinning. Sometimes that’s good sometimes that’s bad but the pattern makes it easier to tell.
Being that the bolters are described to shoot "small explosive missiles" - But they also make a conventional "boom" when fired.. I propose that bolters are hand-held howitzers
I think the .998 is the year, not the calibre. Typical Marine size bolters fire .75 rounds, but it's left up to writers usually. A key thing about Space Marine weapons and their armour as well, they have what's called "Auto Senses" that among other things include a direct point of impact indicator for their weapons allowing marines to hip fire much more accurately than they otherwise would. And regarding "why use ballistic weapons when you have energy weapons?", simple state of the Imperium is why. Innovation and invention are seen as taboo and sinful, and overall humanity has slid backwards technologically. There are worlds that are stone age in tech level, usually used as Marine recruiting grounds, all the way up to the most advanced forge world. So combine the lack of knowledge on how any of the tech actually works with a dogma forbidding creating new technology and a decaying inductrial infrastructure, that's why you still have ballistics.
I like to think of the bolter round being like an artillery round with a sustainer. Mostly powder launched, but the projectile lights a slow burn rocket motor to hold its velocity out to greater range similar to a 152/155mm long range round.
If the bolt projectile is very heavy and the initial propellant charge (before rocket-assist takes over) and assuming the mechanism is tough enough to take it, then a really short barrel should work well enough. And the recoil would, yes, be brutal.
I think the reasoning for the increased rate of fire on bracing, is since he's bracing, he can just hold the trigger down and doesn't have to worry about the recoil combined with his own movement. He can just hold it down and let 'er rip.
The checkerboard pattern on rockets was standard size, so you could always tell how fast the rockets were moving in high speed photography (yes they had high speed photography in the 1940s. eg MUCH film used per second). Used in high speed car crash tests in the 1960s and 1970s too.
The bolters are connected to their suit/helmet targeting system which the armor can actually take over to some extent and aim the gun for them as it tracks the target (no buttstock needed). So when they aim down sights it's just to look cool. They could actually just point their gun around a corner without exposing their body, but that wouldn't look very macho...
Melta and the larger brother the Multimelta are used as very close range anti heavy/anti vehicle weapon by pretty much cooking the crew inside but could melt through the outer plating with a few shots if you really wanted to make sure the foe isnt going to be able to reuse said vehicle ever again XD
Fun fact, there have been real world experiments in what could be considered a “bolter”. The most practical seeming one was a .50 cal 360 grain round, muzzle velocity was 1800 FPS with boat barrel acceleration from the rocket. It was about sustaining velocity down range. From what I understand the rounds were averaging 1700 FPS 200 yards down range. Incidentally, a bolter is nothing like an AR15. The whole point behind the AR design is to minimize weight and recoil. Hence the direct blowback action as opposed to an over mounted gas piston.
i just love the idea of a black templar screaming at the top of their lungs while swinging a 10 foot power hammer around in one hand and slinging soda can sized bullets from a bolter in the other
This is the first ever Warhammer game I've ever played so I don't know any lore or anything but it's been fun so far! And I loved the Helldivers content with Jonathan so when I finally had a game I actually played I had to watch!
Dawn of war is old but fun. There's the sprite based fps if you want more spess mehreen. I forget the name Space hill has it's problem but it's fun Darktide is a very fun coop shooter with some good melee if you don't mind playing 'normal' people. Rogue trader is a good rpg with lots of info on the universe
In 40k lore Bolters are basically like a low powered railgun mixed with a Gyrojet gun. The rail part gets the "bolt" to leave the barrel in which then the bolt ignites like a rocket and goes towards the target. The second edition 40k wargear book has a detailed explnation (in lore) on how Bolt guns work.
![BLACK BAG - Official Trailer [HD] - Only in Theaters March 14](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/Du0Xp8WX_7I/mqdefault.jpg)
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"The fact that imperial is still being used to measure caliber" - I like how he realized halfway through that sentence what he was saying. 😅
The Emperor protects.
Tbf, in 40k .998 could also refer to a date.
@@scelonferdi I mean 40k tabletop still uses inches for movement. I think its far more likely they are using Imperial also the Imperium using imperial is only fitting.
Edit: Scratch that it does appear to be based on year, which is odd.
However, much like everyone being confusing during the second world war, they use mm for measuring the primary weapons on tanks.
This is the first ever Warhammer game I've ever played so I don't know any lore or anything but it's been fun so far! And I loved the Helldivers content with Jonathan so when I finally had a game I actually played I had to watch!
It’s called the Imperium of Man, not the Metric of Man
The in-lore reason for aiming is that space marines have some thing in their head or whatnot that aims for them. Tau-looted space marine armor was easily identified by the fact they tried to aim, and were slaughtered despite wearing the same colors, because they were seen aiming properly.
Plus the sheer bulk of space marine armor would make it hard to shoulder a weapon
Space Marine helmet have aimbots ... Ish, or close to it
Huh does that mean Chaos marine does too ?
@@silverwolf5643 Yes, but now its a demon with opinions on slaughter (there isn't enough)
Yeah, their autosenses (basically armor sensor package plus HUD) interface with the gun, giving them targeting info directly into their field of view. Considering how eager on getting rid of their helmets they appear to be, I'm not sure it's that helpful...
@@SlaveKnightGael1579 Probably part of the rationalization why bolters don't have shoulder stocks. Doesn't really work for all the Bolters used by non-Astartes though.
For the bolter: the .998 Godwyn pattern refers to the year it was brought online. Imperial dating is M40.998, so 40th millenium, year 998 in that millenium. It uses the same .75 caliber bolter shells previous patterns use.
Reminds me of the fact that the Land Raider is named after the Tech Priest Arkhan Land and not the fact that it raids land.
@@ianarruda1967 from where?
The whole .75 caliber bolter thing always bugged me, a 12 gauge shell is around .72 caliber. Bolters used by space Marines in this game look like they shoot 40mm projectiles almost which is like an inch and a half in diameter
.75 cal bolts are used exclusively by humans, space marine bolters are more like 1 to 2 inches (heavy bolters would be closer to 2 inch)
@@ballistic9644 "The standard bolt is set to .75 calibre, whereas Heavy Bolter rounds are larger, at 1.00 calibre. "
"The current, standard-issue bolter for the Firstborn Space Marines is the .75 calibre Astartes Mark Vb Godwyn Pattern Bolter."
there are also other, calibres mentioned, such as .60 and .70, for older space marine chapter boltguns.
and yes, the scale doesnt make much sense.
I was fully expecting a 20 minute long video of Jon just pulling out the Gyrojet over and over again.
Thats the First of April version of the video.
Seems like he finally got someone pointing out to him that an RPG-7 would be a more apt comparison- Explosive charge to launch the warhead and then the rocket is just a booster to the initial explosion.
I absolutely love the idea of him putting the gyro jet underneath the desk, and then immediately pulling it out again like a new gun for like 10 minutes straight.🤣
@@DarkestVampire92 Now my vision is that he alternates between the RPG and the gyro jet for the entire video.
Everytime the weapon disappears under the desk and comes back up as if it it's the first time this video.
let's hope Spacemarine 2 is out by april then huh?
The last time I was this early, Ferrus Manus still had a head.
skost
He went Fulgrim. You never go Fulgrim.
Had you been even earlier the video would've still been called "Thunder Warriors".
Is that the Ferrus Manus with the ferrus manus of the Ferrus Manus?
But what if he never had a head to begin with ?
Talking about "why does the Imperium still use bolters when plasma guns are available?" While Jonathan's thoughts are interesting, the 40K universe has its own explanation: the Imperium doesn't know how most of its tech actually works, or how to build more factories to produce more of it. So it's entirely possible that they would love to equip everyone with reliable plasma weapons. But they don't know how to refine their existing designs, and they cannot increase their supply to meet demand.
More than that, during the Great Crusade early marine units were armed with volkite weaponry. As production needs increased, they had to switch to bolters for mass recruitment because they couldn't make enough volkite ray guns to equip them, even during that period of the Imperium's history.
Very simple, cost and maintenance
@@AnonymousVenator That's not as much of a concern with space marines. Cost just does not factor in when arming them, and they have menials to do the maintenance for them. If space marines are using bolters, it's because the bolter is the best weapon the Imperium is physically able to produce in large enough quantities to arm all of them.
@@screamingcactus1753it does come into account, because all their equipment has to be custom made. They can't use standard infantry sized weapons (and infantry bolters are downsized Astartes bolters). They also can't get a bunch of equipment in advance, because they don't know how many aspirants will survive the trials.
It's also that Plasma weapons in 40k have a weakness that's realistic, and most universes don't use. 40k plasma weapons have a decent chance of blowing up whenever you try to shoot it in the lore, and so they're mostly limited to specialised units (like tempestus scions). And if an Astartes gets blown up, that's not only a valuable gun, but an Astartes (which take upwards of a century to get to full combat efficiency) that you need to replace
Fun fact about the Stalker Bolter
It doesn't fire the same explosive bolts as a standard boltgun, but rather a slug of the same size composed of solidified Mercury. Mercury is denser than lead, so in a solid state it would hit like a truck.
It isn't propelled by a mini rocket engine, but rather a small compressed gas cylinder that silently propels the bullet after leaving the barrel.
These specialized bolts are designed specifically for use in silenced boltguns, and the lack of an explosive charge and rocket fuel reduces the sound and visual report. Its kind of like the 9x39 round for the VSS rifle, which is subsonic and fires a significantly larger bullet than the 7.62 round.
Mercury has an SG of 13.6 lead is 11.3.... not a massive difference... I always wondered if they fired little shaped charges
Using tungsten would make more sense, but I reckon the Imperium doesn't have access to that material tech.
@@altechelghanforever9906 Tungsten isn't excessively difficult to find or machine now. I wonder if the intended reference is to "red mercury" which is supposed to be some kind of super explosive that allows one to make a fusion explosive without a fission primary. (Which would fit with the "deuterium" mentioned in some bolt shells - red mercury to initiate fusion in the deuterium and get a really small nuclear blast?)
The main reason that Space Marine guns don't have any stocks is simply that they don't need them. You don't really need to brace a gun, or worry about recoil, when wearing power armor that has mechanical muscles capable of lifting several thousand pounds.
It also helps that Space Marines are genetically augmented superhumans with absurd amounts of physical strength.
Muscles don't stop recoil. Larger bodies can absorb energy more, but a S&W 500ES with a stock isn't going to be any more manageable just because we are relatively big.
@@Spaced92 marines are genetically mutated to be larger and stronger (about 8' tall OUT of the armor), and have extra organs grown and implanted in them. They get into a body glove that is basically a big electro-mechanical muscle layer, THEN bolt armor over the top of that. They are powerful enough to tear metal with their hands and toss cars......I don't think a creature that strong (and heavy), would have issues with stockless weapons :D
@@elijahfoltz3755 Which is also insane when you know that they're still not strong enough to move their armor by themselves. An EMP blast once severely disabled an entire chapter, just by turning off their armor's exoskeleton
Older miniature sculpts also had stocks, and they looked a little goofy.
There was, once upon a time, rules on the tabletop for using full sized bolters one handed with close combat weapons, it was called "True Grit" and was the hallmark of the Space Wolves and Grey Knights chapters for at least a couple editions. Basically (to the best of my memory, it's been years) it was that normally having a bolter and a close combat weapon meant you got 1 attack in hand to hand combat, having a bolt pistol and a close combat weapon got you 2 attacks in hand to hand combat, True Grit gave you a second attack in hand to hand from a bolter. However the bolt pistol was still marginally better because a weapon classed as a "pistol" or "assault" weapon (Stormbolters were considered assault weapons) could be fired and then you could charge into hand to hand, but bolters were "rapid fire" so if you fired it first you couldn't then charge into close combat.
Also, the Orks "believe it and it works" isn't quite that magical, that's the meme version. There's some variations but in most cases where it's shown in the lore the guns still have to basically function, the Ork power just means that they'll be able to dump 31 or 32 shots out of a 30 round magazine without missing a beat, whereas a non-Ork using the same gun is likely to have it jam after a handful of shots. Likewise, they can't paint a rock red and drive away on it, it still has to be a functional vehicle, the red just makes the engine a little more powerful. The best description I've seen for it is "psychic lubricant" it doesn't make things work in and of itself, but it can does them work better.
"Also, the Orks "believe it and it works" isn't quite that magical, that's the meme version"
Tell that to Commisar Yarrick and his fully functioning stolen ork powerclaw...
@@The_Keeper I mean, that kind of proves it. If the Power Klaw wasn't at least basically functional it would never have worked for Yarrick, even if the Orks believed.
Yarrick's claw isn't actually the original ork weapon, it's a replica made by the mechanicus to actually be functional and be used as a prosthetic, he didn't just jam the claw he took on to his arm stump and it started working.
I'm pretty sure that in early editions, it was that magical. GW has retconned it since, though.
The meme has it's basis in actual second and third edition from what I recall. Where things really were that magical. Since then GW tried to tone them down a bit. to limited success.
They do still go well beyond the concept of 'psychic lubricant" that people like to push in opposition of the game breakingly magical belief of the Orks on many occasions however. All they have done is codify a few of the "beliefs" with a sense of logic. Such as red paint on vehicle and some other things.
"how does one weaponise vengeance?" - somebody needs to tell Jonathan about Konrad Curze
Agreed.
I do like the fact the vengeance launcher was invented on Graia in cannon so if one turns up in Darktide or something it'll be a "Graia pattern".
I thought Corvus Corax was weaponized vengeance.
There is an SSBN Vengeance, that is pretty vengeanencey.
LOL at Jonathan posing with no gun at the start! I love that you guys just have fun with this stuff :D
I don't think he even pulled out a single gun throughout the whole video. That first part was foreshadowing
12:08 If I recall correctly most Meltaguns use a super hot beam to melt through the armor BUT there is a version, in lore, that acts more like the one in Space Marine, design I think by The Salamanders chapter
yeah the melta is almost always described differently some times its super hot gas beam, sometimes molten liquid, sometimes large blast of heat. very "it just works" every time its depictred
@@ianarruda1967 Because innovation is the worst form of Tech heresy, and to have that sort of argument with Adeptus Mechanicus is just not worth it
@@ianarruda1967 In the 42th milenium, certainly
@@ianarruda1967If we're serious though, there are basically flaming bolter rounds available as specialized ammunition, primarily used by the Deathwatch.
Edit: As for conventional ones, one of Darktide's shotguns (specifically the Kantrael type) loads it as a special interaction.
@@maotisjan hehe, forty tooth
I also like to see Jonathan react to the guns of Binary Domain, which is a cyberpunk game taking place in 2080 in Japan, and the weapons that the main character squad, the Rust crew, are equipped with are basically futurized version of modern guns. And the robots that you fight also have their own standard issue guns, there's also the underground Resistance, who built their own guns. The game was developed by the same people behind the Yakuza games.
I would also like to see Jonathan take a look at the guns of Vanquish, a 3rd Person Shooter from Platinum Games, the weapons ranged from futuristic assault rifles, shotguns, LMGs and pistols to energy weapons that actually use the main character's suit energy to fire, too bad Vanquish didn't sell well enough to warrant a sequel, which is a huge shame since the ending is quite abrupt.
For an April's Fools special, it would be nice to see Jonathan react to the guns of Plant vs Zombies: Garden Warfare 2, eventhough only the zombie characters carry guns.
Sorry who is this Jonathan you speak off? Do you mean Jonathan Ferguson Keeper of Firearms & Artillery at the royal armouries?
@@nomadstudios9564 who else could it be, it's Jonathan Ferguson Keeper of Firearms & Artillery at the royal armouries.
A travesty both those games never had sequels.
@@Atrahasis7it’s actually better they didn’t. Not everything needs a sequel or to be continued.
@@SomaCruz500 While that is true, games do very usually benefit from iteration. And both games were very decent.
From what I remember, the Boltgun rounds have 2 stages. A first that works with a propellant, like a real life round, which is supposed to shoot the Bolter round out.
And then, after the round has been propelled out of the weapon, the actual minirocket is activated.
So, it's not quite like a real life gyrojet gun.
That explains the ejected cartridges.
Also, Space Marine helmets have a targeting system, that's why they fire it from the hip.
Every third comment the last time he covered a 40k game already explained that to him, but I guess nobody bothered conveying that information.
Rocket assisted artillery rounds are my preferred reference.
Which also explains the tiny camera lens just above the bolter barrel, especially the newer bolt rifle, that has a targeting system connected with the battle brother's helmet.
@@alexholker1309 Or to have it more on the rockety end of things, a tiny, more recoil-y Bazooka/RPG-7/&c. -- rather a lot of "rocket launchers" are recoilless guns that fire a rocket-assisted projectile, as opposed to MANPADS like the Stinger, which are two-stage rockets (a small kick motor to get it out of the tube and the main motor away from the shooter's face) or pure recoilless rifles like the Carl Gustaf/US M3 MAAWS. Small but important difference. (Though you shouldn't fire any of them from indoors or out the back of a box van.)
Bolter ammo is basically massive cartridge with a gyrojet round in place of a bullet.
8:10 Well, ackhually, two complete bolters, ie. barrels and action, attached together is called a combi-bolter, and is essentially the precursor to the storm bolter. It's still used in limited numbers by Imperial forces, but mainly used by Chaos Marines, as their kit is generally around 10,000 years old. A storm bolter is a specifically created as a twin-barreled weapon with a single firing mechanism. In game it used to be reflected, iirc, in that combi-bolters let you re-roll dice while storm bolters let you roll more dice.
Yeah, sorry, but my beloved Chaos Marines would have modern equipment looted from all the dead baby-killer-worshipping POGs they have spent 10,000 years wiping out. Not to mention, all the planetary raids where plenty of weapons would be taken as loot. Also, in the original lore, it was Chaos still had all the manufacturing capabilities lost to the False Emperor; able to churn out new Land Raiders and other vehicles as well as unique tech' like the Distortion, and my fave, Vortex Grenade (still remember the game where one Vortex grenade turned into 6 and had both sides running for the table edge).
But then GW needed to sell more Space Marine stuff and they changed the lore because of all the whining from SM players, those simps. BLOOD FOR THE BLOOD GOD!
@@WanderingOldGuy Which explains why in 6e/7e, Chaos combi-bolters were actually slightly better up close (rapid-fire and twin-linked instead of Assault 2), and in 8e and later, they're statwise exactly the same beast.
Ah... I miss the yelling of the Orkz. "SPHAACE MAHRINE!" Tyranids don't yell in excitement like that.
The meltagun in one sentence: "Everything has a melting point."
"Metric may have lost the battle there". Well, it is a dystopia.
"in the grim darkness of the 41st millenium, Imperial units of measurement are the standard"
Throne . . .
Metric is heresy.
The secrets of metricum are jealously guarded by the Adeptus Mechanicus.
@@captaincole4511 Just when you thought it couldn't get any grimdarker.
Interestingly, as the Vengeance Launcher is original of the 1st Space Marine game, lore-wise it's said to be a prototype from the foregeworld Graia, the planet in which not only this game takes place but also the more recent Boltgun game, which it also features the Vengeance Launcher
It's a manual-detonating high-capacity plasma warhead grenade launcher, of course it's a prototype. My guess is that it was designed for battlefield demolition work, since firing multiple explosives from a safe distance and then being able to manually explode them sounds like a good way to knock down a small building, or make multiple breaches from different angles simultaneously into a guarded room.
The Vengeance Launcher is pretty useful in-game and I'm glad it made a return for Boltgun. I love how 40k games often feature cool weapons & gear that don't quite belong on the 40k tabletop.
Big fan of the Combi Stub/Plasma pistol from Necromunda, which is typically depicted as a plasma pistol welded to a revolver. Plasma ammo is rare but bullets are plentiful, so why not a gun that uses both?
@@Ninjat126 Reminds me of the old LeMat revolver, which was a revolver mated to a 16 gauge short-barreled shotgun. (Though I have to imagine the recoil of 16 gauge buckshot in a handgun would be fearsome.)
I would like to ask once again for a video on the Valkyria Chronicles series. I know you’re seeing these, Dave. Give the people what they want!
YES
Yes, please.
Yes! This! So much this! I wanna see how he reacts to the Lances. Gallian Lance: Its an RPG. Federation Lance: Its a giant gun. lol
100% on board with that!
Nobody's seeing them or he'd have told Johnathan by now bolters are only half gyrojet two-stage weapons after he had that explained by dozens or hundreds of comments each of the last times he covered 40k related games
7:38 tech priest: hey guys what happened when we put two bolters together?
(A very Effective rapid fire Assault weapon)
But with poor accuracy
@@Sabatonfan3.4m who needs accuracy when you can mow down 10k gaunts in seconds
The techpriest was also executed for being a heretic.
Checkerboarding on rockets are called roll patterns and it's purpose is to make it easier for observers to see if a rocket is rolling and which direction it is rolling.
Thanks for providing that bit of knowledge! I've seen countless old videos of rocket tests and launches and never understood the checkerboard pattern 👍
and as possible speed messurments back in the 1940
The "Orks warp reality to make scrap guns work" thing is definitely exaggurated to a ridiculous extent. Some things are impossible, even if you convince an Ork otherwise. But if the WAAAGH needs something that might be possible to happen, then no matter how unlikely it is, the problem can be solved by throwing more Orks at it.
@@ianarruda1967
Your first mistake is assuming GW cares about their lore or canon.
@@ianarruda1967 "How does Ork physics work?"
WAAAAAGHHHHHH
Instead of saying 'warp reality to make the impossible thing work', it's more like 'ignores plot holes in reality'. I.e. if the Ork opens up the gun and sees it has all the correct gun parts inside, he can use the gun. If he sees just a number of bolts and duct tape, the gun won't work, because the Ork knows that it can't possibly work. Unless, of course it has all the gun parts but missing one or two tiny components like, say, the firing pin, then it works anyway.
However, if his gun's magazine is supposed to be 1,000 bullets, he can somehow fire 10,000 bullets instead simply because he didn't count the bullets and every other Ork around him hasn't tracked how many bullets he had fired. The moment one Ork points out that he has, in fact, fired way too many bullets, suddenly the gun stops firing as every Ork including the shooter suddenly realised that he should have ran out of ammo ages ago.
If the Ork is always counting how many bullets he has fired and he is very good at tracking that detail, the gun will run dry after he fired exactly 1,000 bullets (thankfully, Orks don't tend to be fastidious with such details so there will always be discrepancies).
@@ianarruda1967 the warg effect scales with numbers and builds over time. its also effected by what tech level an enemy has.
The US Marines work in a very similar fashion
I kinda want to see how Jonathan would react to more Ork weapons in the 40k universe
My headcannon is that the bolter solves the gyrojet problem of poor close range performance by having a launching charge on top of the rocket propelled ammo.
So there is still a need for a cartridge case and there is still nomal recoil.
So bolter ammo is basically a huge gyrojet stuck in a grenade launcher case.
That's actually straight up canon.
That's not even headcanon. That's literally what they are, and what's been explained to Johnathan in hundreds of comments every other time he's covered 40k related games.
@@DIEGhostfish to be fair this isn't the Royal Armouries channel and i doubt Jonathan reads the comments on these much.
I think he's a big nerd like us and is all over these comments sections. This is where all the fun is.
@@inthefade If he was, he qould already know thr twonstage bolter thing
4:10 they're fired initially like a standard bullet, with the rocket igniting as it leaves the barrel to maximize time at peak velocity. This side-steps the Gyrojets problem of rounds not being very effective at close range because they aren't up to speed.
For the Space Marine II video, I hope there’s a couple of heavy stubbers, so Jonathan can see how the Ma Deuce has survived into the 41st millennium
he technically already knows. when they looked at darktide, he mentioned the M2 when looking at the twin heavy stubber.
Dakka dakka dakka
"In the grim darkness of the 41st millennium, Imperial units of measurement are the standard"
Throne . . .
Da Commizah asked me' "Wuz you gotta Do, Orgryn?"
I answard "What I'z Told to Do Sarge"
E' said es the Smartest Answer e eva heard, so e gave me dis shiny ting on da chest.
A thing with the Melta Gun
Its also depicted in a few ways
In SM its like a shotgun, firing out a cone
But in other times its more of a thin beam, like the Lascannon, but more concentrated
Its designed to be an anti-tank weapon
It does however always have a small AOE, because its REALLY hot
And a human needs to close their eyes when firing it to avoid being dazzled by the light
Its so hot, that you often cant use it in certain areas
Like you dont use it on a spaceship or you'll put a hole through a wall
And in an underground ice cave it flashes entire blocks into steam instantly
Sublimating that much ice would literally cause an explosion. Maybe a
@@inthefade I'm not sure I'd wanna fire a plasma gun or a lascannon into an ice wall up close either, for exactly the same reason. Might be a good way to deal with a bunch of Tyranid gribblies though! This is the kind of hack I think of a Guardsman thinking of, though - Space Marines typically wouldn't *have* to. Sisters might, though, and they might do it trusting their faith to protect them. ("My faith protects me. My power armor helps.")
If i recall correctly, (feel free to correct me if im wrong on this) but the reason Astartes do not have to aim down sights all the time is because their helmets are linked with the Bolters kinda like modern vehicles and aircraft have their weapon systems aligned to their targeting systems, so theres no need for space marines to always ADS in order to hit precise shots when their helmet interface helps out their accuracy, same way why there is no need for buttstocks on the Bolters since the marines can handle the recoil without any issues. Unless they are wielding Storm bolters which are mostly for Terminators or Heavy bolters then accuracy doesnt matter when you are drowning enemies in hundreds of explosive bolt rounds lol.
Now how do helmetless Astartes hit anything is essentially plot armor lol, an astartes without his helmet is just there for the rule of cool and in reality is a massive handicap.
Also imo an Astartes with his helmet on looks way cooler then with his helmet off, but thats just me, which is why im so happy we will supposedly from what i heard be able to get a helmeted Titus in SM2 in our options.
Look up the black carapace, it explains exactly how they could still aim even if they don't have a HUD or a helmet on.
Essentially the black carapace hooks directly to their nervous system and from their it hooks into their weapon so if the weapon itself still has a sight on it so they're seeing a reticle superimposed in their field of view
Never a fan of the helmetless design in anything personally
From what i recall according to some lore, heavily modified astartes wearing a healmet can actually hinder them since they can actually perceive or "sense" more things when they are helmetless. But i completely agree that helmeted marines looks way cooler than when they are helmet off.
@@pthsawas Ahh i think you're talking about the space wolves which have better senses then those provided by the power armor thanks to Leman's geneseed
@@Shinzon23 IIRC this is exactly right. So it's only derpy if we see a Battle Sister or Inquisitor firing a bolter helmetless. (They can have power armor, and their power armor does link into the bolter to aim it, but it requires the helmet for display since they don't have the Black Carapace.)
Someone once compared the Melta weapons to hand held shaped charges blasing super heated jets of particles from metal or some other material.
I love the explanation of the Orc guns - if they believe it will work - it will work - if that is not the best summary of the power and stupity of human behaviour around an insane amount of topics.
It's the Orks psychic gestalt field
Johnathan has seen more time the Boltgun than I my own parents at this point😂
"How does one weaponize vengeance?" Is maybe the best thing Johnathan has ever said
The Space Marines obviously use imperial measurements. They represent the Imperium of Man!
Sticking stuff on your back makes some of the most intuitive sense there is. Regardless of feasibility, I can see people reinventing the 'ammo backpack' for as long as there are people and there is ammo.
CRUELTY SQUAD RRAAAAHHHH
Scrungo pfp spotted
Really...Is this a joke request? No clue what crueIty squad is, had to look it up and the game just looks like brainrot puke 🤷♂
This is just like Gorbino’s Quest. This is the Gorbino’s Quest of gun experts
ceo mindset detected
@@ongogablogian4315 it looks like it at first, but there's a method to the madness. Many of the guns are based on real life prototypes that never saw any real use, so a reaction to them would be very interesting
Oh, and since no-one else has mentioned it: there is a 2 hour video out there examining lasweapons and concluding there is absolutely zero consistency on how they're depicted.
The most sensible explanation I've heard is that 'las' is the imperium's generic term for energy weapons based on energy output and battlefield role. So lasguns that shoot pulsed beams, continuous beams, or starwars-style energy bolts can just be handwaved away as different patterns that more or less accomplish the same thing
That orc gun at the end calls to mind the "Zorg ZF-1" from The Fifth Element.
My favourite 😏
Also to note is that actually the armory in 40k except for a few rare occurrences is repurposed stuff from long before from the age of strive. So technology hasn’t actually really progressed for thousands of years for humanity.
I'd love to see Jonathan react to the xeno side of weapons, see what he thinks of shuriken catapults and gauss flayers
or tyranids
Definitely
One of the problems that a lot of early rockets had was yawing around the vertical axis, which was very difficult to visually track due to their rotational symmetry. The checkerboard pattern was used to give observers a clear indicator of that rotation.
This is Dave Jewitt, the keeper of Jonathan Ferguson and Warhammer fanboi, who houses multiple 40k armies in the UK.
Most unpainted
@@IrregularDave As it should be..
16:06 I believe that checkerboard pattern originated with the V2 rockets test-fired at Peenemuende in 1942, which used it as a high-visibility pattern to make them easier to track for taking measurements. Subsequent "war shots" fired at Allied targets were more often painted in army-green or camouflage patterns, but the checkerboard testing livery stuck in the popular recollection.
2:24 : .998 more likely refer to the year of introduction of this model of bolter in the idiosyncratic Imperium calendar.
The "Black and White" chequer pattern starts with the V2 development by Von Braun so they could see if the missile was behaving during launches in WWII, because the casing had very few surface features you could see on film. When he is recruited by the US he persuades NASA to continue the practice.....even if it eventually adds over 10t to the weight of a Saturn V for the moon launches, which is reality the last time they use it for anything other than testing.
I actually thought Jonathan Ferguson obtained a Bolt Gun for the collection 😔
I mean there is the Gyrojet i think he showed once in a fallout 4 mod video, which is p close in function, though a fuckton more slim and light than any form of bolter
@@popeofsimps2924 Well, similar-ish. Gyrojet fires pure rockets. A bolt shell features a normal cartridge shooting out a rocket with an explosive tip the conventional way (propellant). So it's sort of a 3 stage system.
i hope GW will gift him a replica someday
I sense a Kickstarter!!!
This was remarkably entertaining! I really like the team of Dave with Jonathan as well.
Lascannons are basically just massively upscaled lasguns, that's why they fire in pulses instead of continuously.
Pulse lasers are a thing though IRL they tend to pulse like 500 times per second. Games just use that as an excuse to make a laser shoot like a gun.
5:30 I believe the reason stabilizing oneself increases the rate of fire is that the heavy bolter could always fire faster, but you need to stabilize in order to compensate for the additional recoil.
Orcs are just brilliant engineers and weapon smiths without realizing it, they are born with the knowledge, inherited from when they were Kork, like how a tiny jumping spider has tactics to hunt built into its DNA, they can build anything, just don't ask them how. As an expert said "it's more likely they just paint the fastest cars red, just dont ask them how they know that specific one is the fastest". The lore that some weapons etc don't seem to work when tested by the mechanicus has more to do with their lack of/or long forgotten knowledge.
*Orks *Krork
No, most ork tech is actually just jumbled together scrap with a very loose interpretation of proper functional order. Humans can use ork tech as long as it's unmodified, but if a techpriest say takes apart an ork gun and puts it back together exactly the same, it won't work anymore.
the argument is that they just paint the fastest cars red. But they have been known to repaint vehicles and factually make them faster. GW tried to reign in the insanity that is the Ork beliefs from early editions to limited success by jamming some logic onto it that some people have expounded upon. But even to this day it is still broken quite regularly. It goes well beyond some innate genetic knowledge or skill.
And no amount of logic has ever been explained why purple makes things invisible when Orks are involved.
It's a mixture of both, they have innate knowledge about fancy technology like teleporters but they also emit a psychic field ("Waaagh") that, if enough orks are involved, can bend reality. Presumably they have to get close enough to something workable to make the Waaagh field do the rest of the job.
Nice write up, but literally half false rofl. You're trying to rationalize a world that explicitly has stated warp magic literally can turn ordinary weapons into living daemons simply because they commit a uniquely horrible act.
Jonathan Ferguson single handedly keeping gamespot alive and relevant
2:50 it kinda makes sense. Humanity has degraded a lot in 40k so that's can be the reason that metric system was lost
😂
Across trillions of worlds they probably use a lot of measurement systems
I love how Jonathan's background is a stack of gun & ammo crates. He is such a legend.
"Rail thing on top ..just meant to look interesting..."
EVERYTHING in Warhammer 40k is there just to look interesting.
9:10 that's a nice historical counterpart, good job Jonathan. Nice explanation, it is very relevant to the conversation
i would love to see Jonathan Ferguson, Keeper of Firearms & Artillery at the Royal Armouries in the UK, break down the guns and weaponry form Generation Zero, both the guns and dlc look ggod imo and i'd love to hear his opionion on them. the robots as well look good and they have artillery too.
also i'd love to see The Risistance trilogy as well
Johnathan, you're completely correct on the pistol front! If a model in 40k has a pistol, it's probably intended to be used in-tandem with a knife, sword or other close-combat weapon.
The exceptions are usually "support" troops like Enginseers, who just carry sidearms & don't expect to ever use them.
Good ol' Bolter
I recently learned the in-universe reason why the bolter drops casings: the bolt is initially ejected like a bullet and the rocket part only kicks in after it leaves the barrel in order to reduce barrel warping
I just sent the Royal Armories a 5'er, for Jonathan's amazing work here on the channel. And since I'm Danish, it only seems fair to give a little back to the U.K., for all the Viking Raids 🤣😎
Haha classic. Kudos, my savage friend 😊
I knew reparations were due!
Was waiting for him to go, “and here we actually have a few Bolter variants in the museum.”
Remember the film Showtime (2005) the bad guys had de holly bolter
The black and white coloring of rockets is indeed used for tracking them in flight. Similar purpose is also seen in automotive, where engineers put black and white circles as reference points on car parts, whether for test drives or crash tests
Melta guns in lore fire plasma but unlike a 40k plasma gun that contains the plasma into a glob and fires it out, the melta gun essentially fires a directed explosion.
Nope...meltaguns in the lore use directed microwave radiation.
Plasma guns fire plasma.
@@batteredwarriorI thought it was like a fusion rocket. If you've ever seen fusion experiments you'll see a purple jet vaguely similar to the purple melta effect.
I have not seen anything that refers to melta guns using microwaves. All of the literature says that melta guns agitate a liquid/ gas based fuel source into a high energy state and fires out an intense blast of heat.
@@mr.international2778 So basically infrared chemical laser. With energy output high enough to melt tanks.
Please Jonathan Ferguson, the keeper of Firearms & Artillery at the Royal Armouries museum in the UK, deconstruct & analyze the weapons of *METAL GEAR SOLID 3* before the remake comes out.
So many weapons in MGS3 to react and comment on like;-
- The Patriot's infinite ammo and drum magazine resembling an (∞) symbol as well as the tumbling bullets.
- The EZ tranq gun based off a Liberator pistol.
- Snake's customized officer M1911A1 and him whittling the pistol grip to use a knife for CQC.
- Ocelot's dual Single Action Army and his revolver juggling skills.
- The End's custom paratrooper Mosin Nagant with tranquilizer rounds.
- The Davey Crockett recoil-less nuclear launcher.
- Eva's chinese Type 17 mauser clone with her "bandit shooting" technique.
- Tatyana's single shot lipstick pistol.
- Volgin using his electricity to ignite and fire off 7.62mm bullets from his hands.
- The Boss's quick ability to disarm and disassemble Snake's pistols.
These are a few examples and there are so many more other interesting trivias and weapons in MGS3 so please Dave and Jonathan, please consider making a video for MGS3.
Hey dude, how was your week?
Also worth pointing out the Space Marine armour has a built in range finding system, their armour will sync with their gun and display targeting reticules and range information in their helmet visors and their armour has a form of aim assist where the servo motors that assist their movement will help gun lay their arm and lock in place to minimise recoil when firing a heavy weapon.
Please can jonathan take a look at the guns from the division 1&2 particularly the exotics many thanks 😊
If I remember the lore behind the Storm Bolter correctly, it's effectively two boltguns connected to a single trigger which share a common magazine. If one barrel becomes inoperable, you can still fire its share of the ammo out of the other barrel (at the rate of a normal boltgun). It also happens to come from after the Horus Heresy, as the Chaos Space Marines don't have them. Their equivalent (identical rules, IIRC) is two full boltguns stuck together. Though that has the problems of two triggers and two separate magazines. It's also worth noting that the tabletop rules for the Storm Bolter classify it as an "Assault" weapon, meaning you could still fire it and move. So the tabletop rules suggest it was meant to be used to suppress (or eliminate) enemy targets as you closed to melee range. Though a normal boltgun could fire precision shots and a Storm Bolter couldn't, given that the Storm Bolter seemed to operate on the rule of "If you need more range than this, you're not closing on the enemy quickly enough."
And when I say "in the lore," I'm pretty sure I remember reading that in one version of the Space Marine Codex (and Chaos Space Marine Codex, for their version). Though I can't remember which version it was.
Ork powers of belief are not enough - without aid of BIG MOBS, Weirdboys (the "mages") and/or generators (No seriously, they can turn their collective make-belief energy into renewable energy) - to make impossible things possible. It can nudge cosmic laws a little but their tech works on all fundemental levels even without the make-belief AKA Waagh energy.
It's just that the people who often take apart Ork creations are ad mech and they cannot just understand Lvl 99 Bubba gunsmithing and jerry rigging.
Fun piece of Trivia about the Orks' beliefs: it very much works against them as well.
If I remember correctly, there has been some instances in Novels where Guardsmen who ran out of ammo, pointed their guns at the orks they were facing shouting basically *bang bang bang* or *dakkadakkadakka*(apparently that's what guns sound like to orks) and they died despite not actually being shot at.
Woo, finally! A real favourite of mine.
Star Wars Republic Commando perhaps?
acording to one source, the melta is a plasma weapon. it converts a stream of gas into plasma, but it used a flammable fuel source in the form of high pressure pyrum-petrol fuel mix.
Slight correction on the orc gestalt thing: It doesn't actually make something actually impossible happen. It still needs to function as a gun or a zappa or a choppa or whatever. Their vehicles can't run without functioning engines and drivetrains, their guns still need to feed ammo and so on. It just makes them work a bit better than they should. An Ork Shootah will jam a lot less than it would in the hands of a human, the war rig will drive a bit fastah, the rokkit will be a bit more explodey etc etc, but it has to be able to do the thing to begin with.
The community memes in 40k circles tend to overstate some of the 40k 'features' a little.
There's some cases of impossible feats happining because if the ork gestalt.
@@DonAs-f3m This has largely been confirmed to be an artifact of Geedubs' "Everything is canon, but few narrators are reliable." thing, which they had to incorporate because of having a hundred writers with different takes on things. The set-in-stone lore of the orc gestalt is that it isn't reality breaking, but just like with a whole lot of other lore inconsistencies, it comes down a bit to the individual writer and the story in question being more or less reliable.
Well, community overblowing some things in memes is very much expeted.
Hence why, for example, Armageddeon Ork Hunters can use looted shootas and they work, even if they're inaccurate and clunky (represented by the guard soldiers using them using ork BS scores)
The reason for the shell is that the initial charge is a conventional charge, the rocket charge only ignites after it leaves the barrel to prevent over pressurisation
Dear Jonathan the keeper of fire arms and art literally @ the Royale with cheese, break down the weapons of da-da-da-duuuum! *SQUIRREL WITH A GUN* 🤡
This has got to be a joke...
I get the reference. Well done sir
Some schematics of Bolters indicate that the round nub sticking out of the housing above the barrel contains a camera that links up to the Space Marine's armor (which itself includes a direct neural link).
Jonathan should have a look at the guns of SAO Fatal Bullet and COD Advanced Warfare.
Depiction of the Melta gun in video games has been wildly inconsistent. In the Dawn of War games, it's a medium range beam weapon, In the mobile game where you're a Knight, it's kind of a weird flickery thing, and in Inquisitor: Martyr it's a big chunky laser thing. The way it's supposed to work is by projecting a magnetic confinement beam, then releasing a nuclear explosion inside it, and the resulting blast of superhot matter "melts" through vehicle armor (or flesh).
0:23 well considering most ork tech only works cause they believe it works and is useless if someone from another faction tries to use it. Yeah that’s spot on
That is wrong and a common misconception. Ork tech works. Not as good as imperial tech but it does in fact work. Their tech works better in the hands of an ork because of their belief. Think of it more like a psychic lubricant making the workings work better
Yeah, I really like that Orks are completely unaware that they have collective psychic powers that can redefine the world around them. If they ever became aware of it, they would rule the galaxy.
The checkerboard pattern was used on rockets to make it obvious whether the rocket is spinning.
Sometimes that’s good sometimes that’s bad but the pattern makes it easier to tell.
any universe where the metric system lost to imperial is truly grim dark
Well, it is the IMPERIum of Man, after all. 😉
Being that the bolters are described to shoot "small explosive missiles" - But they also make a conventional "boom" when fired.. I propose that bolters are hand-held howitzers
I think the .998 is the year, not the calibre. Typical Marine size bolters fire .75 rounds, but it's left up to writers usually. A key thing about Space Marine weapons and their armour as well, they have what's called "Auto Senses" that among other things include a direct point of impact indicator for their weapons allowing marines to hip fire much more accurately than they otherwise would.
And regarding "why use ballistic weapons when you have energy weapons?", simple state of the Imperium is why. Innovation and invention are seen as taboo and sinful, and overall humanity has slid backwards technologically. There are worlds that are stone age in tech level, usually used as Marine recruiting grounds, all the way up to the most advanced forge world. So combine the lack of knowledge on how any of the tech actually works with a dogma forbidding creating new technology and a decaying inductrial infrastructure, that's why you still have ballistics.
Thankfully though some of that's been ignored with Guilliman back. Baby steps, but it's something
I like to think of the bolter round being like an artillery round with a sustainer. Mostly powder launched, but the projectile lights a slow burn rocket motor to hold its velocity out to greater range similar to a 152/155mm long range round.
please review the weapons front COD INFINITE WARFARE
If the bolt projectile is very heavy and the initial propellant charge (before rocket-assist takes over) and assuming the mechanism is tough enough to take it, then a really short barrel should work well enough. And the recoil would, yes, be brutal.
I think the reasoning for the increased rate of fire on bracing, is since he's bracing, he can just hold the trigger down and doesn't have to worry about the recoil combined with his own movement. He can just hold it down and let 'er rip.
the checkerboards on rockets and missiles are used in the test phase to see if they spin during flight.They allow the fine tuning of the boosters.
You've been eyeing me all day and waiting for your move like a lion stalking a gazelle in a savannah.
The checkerboard pattern on rockets was standard size, so you could always tell how fast the rockets were moving in high speed photography (yes they had high speed photography in the 1940s. eg MUCH film used per second). Used in high speed car crash tests in the 1960s and 1970s too.
The bolters are connected to their suit/helmet targeting system which the armor can actually take over to some extent and aim the gun for them as it tracks the target (no buttstock needed). So when they aim down sights it's just to look cool. They could actually just point their gun around a corner without exposing their body, but that wouldn't look very macho...
Melta and the larger brother the Multimelta are used as very close range anti heavy/anti vehicle weapon by pretty much cooking the crew inside but could melt through the outer plating with a few shots if you really wanted to make sure the foe isnt going to be able to reuse said vehicle ever again XD
About time, your the first armsexpert that did this vid in all the time 40k existed
Fun fact, there have been real world experiments in what could be considered a “bolter”. The most practical seeming one was a .50 cal 360 grain round, muzzle velocity was 1800 FPS with boat barrel acceleration from the rocket. It was about sustaining velocity down range. From what I understand the rounds were averaging 1700 FPS 200 yards down range.
Incidentally, a bolter is nothing like an AR15. The whole point behind the AR design is to minimize weight and recoil. Hence the direct blowback action as opposed to an over mounted gas piston.
5:35 it is implied that without stabilisation the marine shoots slower so he is capable of compensating for recoil while "on the move".
i just love the idea of a black templar screaming at the top of their lungs while swinging a 10 foot power hammer around in one hand and slinging soda can sized bullets from a bolter in the other
This is the first ever Warhammer game I've ever played so I don't know any lore or anything but it's been fun so far! And I loved the Helldivers content with Jonathan so when I finally had a game I actually played I had to watch!
Dawn of war is old but fun.
There's the sprite based fps if you want more spess mehreen. I forget the name
Space hill has it's problem but it's fun
Darktide is a very fun coop shooter with some good melee if you don't mind playing 'normal' people.
Rogue trader is a good rpg with lots of info on the universe
In 40k lore Bolters are basically like a low powered railgun mixed with a Gyrojet gun. The rail part gets the "bolt" to leave the barrel in which then the bolt ignites like a rocket and goes towards the target. The second edition 40k wargear book has a detailed explnation (in lore) on how Bolt guns work.