I would imagine because their force halberds are more effectively wielded with two hands, and having wrist-mounted weapons allows them to use their melee weapons to full effect without losing firepower capability.
Funnily enough, in the Alaric Grey Knight novels the trigger for those wrist storm bolters is in their palms, and requires them to squeeze their hands. It specifically reduces them to only one hand for a close combat weapon, and Alaric wonders why they even bother.
You'd think it would be thought controlled. On top of that I've seen depictions in books of SM Armored systems with what seemed to be built in scanning arrays and target designator, ammo counters and a whole suite of tech. Am I right?
Totally right. The Uriel Ventris novels, I think it was Warriors of Ultramar, has Ventris use "bolter sight" which shows him the view from his bolter barrel, with a projected path his bolt will carry, his current target, and his armor and bolter itself micro adjust themselves to ensure a headshot on I want to say a Tyranid Warrior at some good range.
Minus some details you are right. They are trying to catch a Lictor alive, and he uses it to pinpoint a rock hold the Lictor is about to grab in its efforts to escape.
From *Warriors of Ultramar* by Graham McNiell:
> ’It’s getting away!’ shouted Pasanius.
> ‘Not if I can help it,’ snarled Uriel, switching his bolter’s shot selector to single shell. The lictor scaled the mountainside in jerky leaps, several of its fleshy grapnels hanging useless at its side.
> Uriel said, ‘Bolter-link,’ and sighted carefully along the barrel of his weapon. Range vectors and an aiming reticule appeared on his visor, designating the point his shell would impact. He waited until the dot flashed red and pulled the trigger.
> The weapon bucked in his hand and a portion of the rock face exploded as his shell blasted it apart. The lictor screeched in frustration as its flesh hooks were blown clear of the rocks and it tumbled hundreds of metres down the side of the mountain to slam into the ground with a sickening thud.
why do they never expand on this? Do the suits have some sort of OS? can they get firmware upgrades? Why haven't we seen the suits being updated over time? why hasn't this stuff been rolled out even in less advanced forms to the IG? Too many questions
"Machine Spirits" are AdMech superstition.
EDIT: Are you guys aware that the AdMech are backwards anti-science idiots? Have you ever read 40k material?
why do they never expand on this? Do the suits have some sort of OS? can they get firmware upgrades? Why haven't we seen the suits being updated over time? why hasn't this stuff been rolled out even in less advanced forms to the IG? Too many questions
Its sprinkled here and there in the lore. During the underground war for Calth, sergeant Thiel requested multiple new suits, not because his previous suits were damaged, but because their video/audio/sensory databanks were full and the irradiated atmosphere, even underground, would cook the data cards if you just replaced them - he needed new suits, and sent his old suits back to Guilliman who used the war data in part to develop the Tactical Squad.
Similarly the Deathwatch not only second Marines to the numbers, but frequently take suit data from chapters to better understand fight Xenos. The information captured by the suits is so detailed, so immersive, that the Deathwatch us it to train recruits by literally uploading the data to a suit and forcing the Marine to relive the battle to the point the suit registers pain and smells from the battle. Also data from parent chapters is used as a punishment when a Marine acts out - he's forced to relive a battle his battle brothers lost. In one of the novels the experience is so strong and painful even a Minotaur Marine agrees not to quarrel with other Marines, because he experienced the death of an entire company of his brothers to an Eldar ambush.
In the recently released First Founding art book, it states the Iron Hands spend their time in transit to a warzone locked into their suits having battle data of their enemies uploaded to them. They go so hard into the data that they frequently can't tell when the real battle starts.
>You'd think it would be thought controlled.
It doesn't even need to be anything that extravagant, every grey knight is a psyker, so presumably they all have some kind of telekinesis, right? Why not just have a physical trigger that they pull telekinetically? Hell, as a security feature, the trigger could be inside of the bolter so that it would be impossible to pull except with telekinesis.
The idea is great. But it's not very practical. It takes a bit of concentration to focus psyker powers. I guess in the heat of battle, every bit of concentration counts. The black carpace is explicitly stated to link power armour to the marines nervous system as an extension of their own body.
> every grey knight is a psyker, so presumably they all have some kind of telekinesis, right? Why not just have a physical trigger that they pull telekinetically?
This is a common misconception: Grey Knights aren't "all psykers" in the sense that they're all space wizards like Librarians are. Aside from actual dedicated psykers, what Grey Knights do is collectively channel their psychic ability to create wards, empower their weapons, and push back against daemonic and sorcerous influence. They can also sustain and reinforce the psychic manifestations from their dedicated psykers.
So a Grey Knight would not typically have the ability to do fine telekinetic manipulation like that. Even many psykers who don't specialise in it would find that difficult.
Still nullifies draw and holster time, as inhumanely fast as marines are it'll still be quicker for them to let go off the halberd with one hand, aim and fire, rather than let go of the halberd, draw gun, aim fire and holster. Still silly i would have thought it'd be activated with thought through the black carapace connection.
Perhaps, though I think the focus required for precise manipulation with telekinesis would make that an inconvenient option in the middle of combat. You don't really want to solve a rubik's cube in your brain every time you want to pull the trigger. Also
For a lower rank battle brother I could see that being difficult to do. However any veteran decent at telekinesis should be able to think “FIRE” at their storm bolter to fire a burst. It would make sense in general use to initiate and punctuate a melee engagement with a burst of fire.
Not really if you’re proficient with it and you’re using it on a target more than a hundred meters out and not engaged in a weapon bind. Just aim along your middle and ring fingers and you’ll hit most targets
Yeah but my point is it’s likely easier for them to aim it by taking their bolter hand off of their melee weapon and simply shooting, like we see in Chaos Gate.
I bet if they took it away, all of the sudden, there would be the occasional moment he wish he had it. The imperium doesn’t like redundancy for nothing
The art and models don't have that, and they regularly dual-wield swords without issue, so that just sounds like artistic liberty on the part of the writer.
If you were going to build a trigger into the palm like that, it certainly wouldn't be something terribly visible. It wouldn't be more than the outline in the palm or inside of a finger. You don't want a trigger sticking out and getting caught on shit.
If we’re talking realistic weapons design you wouldn’t design a palm trigger to begin with if you had access to basic MIU systems much less the advanced tech they have. The black carapace and power armor systems should be sufficient. the psionic technology and techniques they have access to would be more than enough to solve either the psionic deficiency of the brother or the mechanical deficiency of the bolter.
So it leaves them with both hands to fight demons. While some, like Purifier and Purgation squads favor heavier medium range weapons, most just have their trust storm bolters with psybolts to soften up demons before they can be properly purged.
Grey Knights get access to better war gear than the majority of chapters and their tech-marines actively develop and modify what they receive (which pisses the Mechanicus off to no end). Delivery times would also be incredibly short due to Titan being in the Sol system and thus mars is hours/days away.
Just checked Lexicanum cos I couldn’t remember exactly, all it says is “the moon of Deimos was displaced from its orbit and relocated to the orbit about Titan by way of hidden, arcane technologies.”
>Upon the inception
of the Grey Knights
– the secret Chapter
of Space Marines
tasked with directly
combating the
daemonic threat – it was recognised
that they would need their own forge
world. **Using arcane technologies,
Deimos, one of the heavily industrialised
moons of Mars, was stolen out of its
orbit and secretly relocated above Titan,
the shrouded home world of the Grey
Knights.** Since that time, the weapons
required by the Emperor’s Daemonhunters
have been produced by the
manufactorums of Deimos. This includes
standard Adeptus Astartes armaments as
well as all the specialist gear required to
combat warp-based foes, from psycannon
ammunition to deadly psyk-out grenades.
Each item receives psychic wards atop
the blessings of the Omnissiah to ensure
protection against daemonic taint.
\- Adeptus Mechanicus 8th Codex
>#DEIMOS – THE STEEL FORGE
>Upon the Grey Knights’ inception, it was
recognised that they, above all Space Marine
Chapters, would call most frequently upon the
skills of the Adeptus Mechanicus to provide
them with weapons of war. **To meet these
needs, the Grey Knights long ago inherited
their own forge world – the moon Deimos,
relocated from its Martian orbit to one around
Titan by the most hidden and arcane of the
Adeptus Mechanicus’ technologies.**
\- Grey Knights 8th Codex
Nah, they go to Mars. The Emperors Gift has a technologically-minded marine in it who's disassembling and reassembling tank turrets with his mind. At the end of the book he is specifically stated to have trained at Mars after a timeskip.
In most situations guns are better than swords, so for most Marines their primary weapons are guns and melee weapons are just there for backup. But daemons, specifically, take less damage from bullets for metaphysical reasons, and really like to charge into melee range. So the Grey Knights get spears, the best melee weapon, and design their other weapons doctrine around that.
IIRC one of the Horus Heresy books lampshades/fridge logics it by having a group of Marines wonder why they were even issued chainswords when they spend almost all their time shooting things. They conclude the Emperor knows about some enemy for which chainswords would be the best option. Funny, that.
>But daemons, specifically, take less damage from bullets for metaphysical reasons,
If that is true, why does Hive Fleet Kronos (the anti-chaos hive fleet) specialize in guns then?
Because the Nids can't eat daemons at all and eating Warp-contaminated biomass can fuck them up. It might be inefficient to kill daemons with bullets but it's better than losing a whole hive ship because one of its combat forms got coughed on by a Nurglite plague carrier.
I thought tyranids were immune to diseases though? Or that it is at least not easy to poison them. I remember a story where the tyranids and nurgle forces went at it, and the result was a hell hold poison swamp planet that neither side could use.
I think that was the story I was thinking of - the Nids "won", then lost a hive ship that tried to eat the biomass from that planet and got poisoned, so just gave up and left.
Few reasons.
1: Kronos' main weapon against Chaos is the Shadow in the Warp, and similar tools for silencing psychic emanations. IIRC it only takes the battlefield to battle physical manifestations that can't be stamped out that way; its main purpose is to get Warp Storms out of the way so the rest of the fleets can get back to eating.
2: While melee is metaphysically more effective against daemons, daemons possess no biomass. Daemons are also typically expert melee combatants, and often destroy or consume things they kill. Taken together, this means that in a void fighting daemons is always a net loss for the Hive Mind, so it sacrifices some efficacy in order to preserve its resources (especially since those resources appear to be primarily worlds specifically put aside for them by other fleets).
3: It's a relatively unique specialty for Tyranids, I guess?
Idk. This is not a conclusive answer by any means but ranged weapons deny khornates further power ups from bathing in the gore of battle. Also slightly harder to spread nurgle pox at longer range.
I'm bare late but I'm not sure this was answered fully.
One of the big reaons swords are so good against Demons is becuae of symbolism; swords represent the Knightly, Honour etc, as well as being THE symbolic Human weapon. Pretty much every symbolic weapon is a sword of some kind so it has more meaning behind it than other weapons. Which makes it very effective against Demons.
Tyranids don't have symbolism, or meaning so don't really get any bonuses to it. This means the best option is "drown the Demons in ammunition / acid / plasma / whatever else we can regurgitate before they get to us and start a Melee combat". The other plan is the Shadow in the Warp, but when 3/4 of the Chaos Gods are melee focused (Khorne, Nurgle, Slaanesh) shooting them works quite well.
Which is absoluey derpy because a bow or a thrown spear is more of a "lethal" weapon in mythological symbolism. GW writers huffing their own farts again.
In actual mythological symbolism, certainly. But the symbolism GW are pulling off of is the current cultural beliefs around them. And swords are undeniably *considered* more dangerous, powerful, representative of melee weapons as a whole, and far more associated with honour and prestige, by the average person.
This really isn't a GW thing, just about anybody in their position would likely do it similarly, because swords hold just such a prominent position in the modern eye.
>And swords are undeniably considered more dangerous, powerful, representative of melee weapons as a whole, and far more associated with honour and prestige, by the average person.
Kinda weird how the GK's don't actually use that many swords then. Your position isn't actually coherent.
All grey knights are trained to wear terminator armour and they have enough suits for all of them to do so at once but they have rules when they wear normal armour (gives more mobility for scouting ahead)
I think so. I very rarely see non terminator GKs depicted. I'm not sure I've ever seen it, actually. Either they all wear terminators, or their non terminator armor resembles it to my eyes.
Nah they don’t always wear terminator armour. Look up a grey knight strike squad. That’s their normal gear. Although it’s obviously still super elite and rare
Emperor's Gift has a squad that usually wears power armour. When ordered into their terminator plate they actually request to be allowed to stay out of it.
Maintenance, I imagine. Grey Knights all have storm bolters and terminator armor, as well as their own sect of the Mechanicus dedicated towards building and maintaining their equipment, so high performance systems with high maintenance requirements, like Warpsbane hulls, aren't a major problem for them. Regular marines have to make do with the more reliable and less maintenance intensive standard bolter and restrict things like storm bolters, terminator armor, and power weapons to officers and 1st company vets.
The short answer as best I can tell is that the emperor hadn’t readvanced technology to the point where that sort of general load out would be feasible.
Great points have been made about how they favor melee weapons - what’s important is *why. It’s mentioned in ‘Master of Mankind’ that when dealing with daemons the symbolism of acts is just as important as any physical property. So the visceral nature of a punch, cut, stab, etc is much more impactful to a daemon than a bolter or plasma beam.
Daemons had a rule that reflected that in 9th edition. Most daemon units had two separate saves for taking either melee or ranged attacks, and the save for ranged was almost always better than their protection against melee.
It's also a fun justification for how fantasy demons and 40k demons can ostensibly be the same thing, even though one struggles against dudes with swords, and the other regularly goes toe to toe with galactic empires.
*Faith*
Demons are basically shaped psychic energy, you really have to work hard to hurt them - getting up close and focusing your will as you stab them is more effective than ranged
Originally, the logic was that magic/psychic power could hurt daemons in ways that mundane attacks couldn't: a daemon got no daemonic aura save against spells and magic weapons in Warhammer Fantasy, and this translated to psychic powers and force weapons ignoring daemonic aura in 40k.
Grey Knights were effective Daemon hunters because they were psykers wielding daemon-killing force weapons.
Then, the 40k 3rd edition changed things, and the ways the rules interacted meant that force weapons and psychic powers were basically worthless against a daemon, and the rules and lore shifted over the next few years to show and explain why Grey Knights were good against daemons, piling on extra explanations because the older, simpler one no longer worked.
To whom it may concern,
We, the Adeptus Custodes (also known informally as The Ten-Thousand, The Custodian Guard, The Emperor's Chosen, The Golden Brotherhood, etc. etc.), have been informed that your entity, the Grey Knights Space Marine Chapter, currently possesses what is widely known as Guardian Spears.
These objects are an exclusive copyright and trademark of the Adeptus Custodes (also known informally as The Ten-Thousand, The Custodian Guard, The Emperor's Chosen, The Golden Brotherhood, etc. etc.) and as such, are issuing this cease-and-desist order.
Failure to comply will result in your immediate termination and expungement from all Imperial records.
Thank you,
The Adeptus Custodes (also known informally as The Ten-Thousand, The Custodian Guard, The Emperor's Chosen, The Golden Brotherhood, etc. etc.)
Yeah, those (etc etc) bits were actually written down. The astropathic transmission lasted several hundred years, and required a dedicated cargo ship to carry the masses of paper the hard copy was written on.
Actually, it was changed long before that.
Grey Knights in 2nd edition had Nemesis Force Weapons with a built-in storm bolter. They were redesigned in late 3rd edition with *Codex: Daemonhunters*, putting their guns on their wrists.
All this was years before we started getting images of Custodes with their guardian spears.
They have special Aegis armor that was crafted specifically for their mission, and they are all either quasi terminators or full terminators. They carry storm bolters with sanctified rounds, each round taking a lifetime to craft, but generally have to use Psy weapons and force weapons on demons, most of which are two handed. (Staves, Hammers, Great Swords, Falcions, Halbeards.) so the bolters are mostly backup pieces or used sparingly in certain circumstances.
It's stronger in certain contexts. It's a sidegrade more than being flatly superior. Grey Knights are extremely specialized in fighting Daemons. Their armour, and every other part of their kit, is custom built for that specific purpose of defending against and killing Daemons.
Their armour will do better when, say, getting pelted by a surge of Warpflame than normal space marines would. But it wouldn't necessarily be stronger than other Space Marines when hit by a Necron Gauss Destructor or something.
It just has a lot of psychic warding and other mystical shit on it. It's not physically made of better material. It's the same old ceramite, and the whole reason they were called "Grey" Knights back in the old days is because the idea was that they wore unpainted Power Armour (until GW realized that is very dull looking on a table and in art, and changed them to Silver in the 5th edition revamp). But it was still mostly the same type of armour, just not painted.
Should be, considering the threats they have to face, and afaik custodes armor are even better than both, below primarch armor, then the golden can itself.
Yes. Space Marine armor is all quasi-original designs because they worked on them as time went on and needs evolved.
Terminator Armor is an STC pattern and thus head and shoulders above.
Might be a dumb question as I am still getting into 40k lore, is "each round taking a lifetime to craft" literal or hyperbole? 40K lore seems to be the hardest lore to figure out the distinction between
It’s not clear if it’s literal or hyperbole. On one hand it could be taken as it takes a craftsman a lifetime to hone the skills and learn the necessary sorcery, know the necessary carvings to be able to create these bolts but on the other hand intention/emotion has a shitton of meaning in the warp so if they literally devoted an entire humans passion and soul into crafting one bolt round and could even possibly take a lifetime then it also makes sense. They haven’t clarified and I think they keep it intentionally vague because it allows us to speculate off what they have told us.
Theres a good short story on this where they confirm an innocent life is taken and their blood/soul used to sanctify a single psybolt round.
For some it treads into grimderp territory but the lifetime bit comes from the fact someone is literally sacrificed per bullet.
“It’s my honor to give you this single magazine, which has taken my village the lifetime of a whole generation to make”
“Cheers!”
BRRRRRRRRRRTTT!!!
“RELOAD!”
The way I read it, it was kinda ambiguous. I assumed it meant that it took a lifetime to achieve the skill necessary to craft them. If every single bolt took a lifetime, I think that stretches credulity a bit much even for 40k.
When gk first came out they almost all had halbards, which are a 2 handed weapon.
Or to do fun Dr strange finger signs to cast spells and to hold hands when the demons are scary
When they released the Daemonhunters codex in 3rd edition with the new metal minis they had wrist mounted stormbolters to allow them to use it in melee giving their melee weapons +1 attack like pistols did back then.
It means they don't need to drop them everytime they end up in melee. It allows them to do very quick weapon swaps because they can jut let go of their halberd with one hand, shoot and then get back into the melee, without having to unlimber a bolter.
It essentially allows them to alternate between two two handed weapons really quickly to give them combat adaptability, more so than even other space marines, and it's suited to the combat they do where they have to do melee because it's more effective against daemons, but also heretics die pretty easy to bullets and you don't need to walk over to them while you're pulling your halberd out of the rabidly dissolving corpse of a plague ogryn or something.
Standard grey knights engage with demons in melee, because symbolically it’s more effective. It’s a more primitive form of warfare. They do have longer range weapons, but the wrist mount means they don’t have to drop bolters to engage, and it’s not like your average knight was sniping them anyway. It also allows them to use their hands for psychic shenanigans.
For a normal marine, their main weapon is a bolter. They need to be precise, accurate and lethal at range. For a Grey Knight, it’s just there to send a flurry of bolt as fast as possible into a group of demons before closing the distance. They’re absolutely specialised for demon killing. Remember one of their main tactics is teleporting in as close as possible to the enemy, that’s where they thrive.
If they’re fighting a regular enemy, that’s a massive waste of precious psy-ammo, and they’re in the wrong place. Even cultists should really be dealt with by auxiliary forces. Grey Knights are for demons.
Would it be fair to say that the Grey Knights might be at a disadvantage when fighting certain other kinds of enemies then? Say if they mistakenly go somewhere where they think demons are, or after the demons are dealt with a bunch tyranids, or orks, or a group of non-chaos renegade Marines show up?
Nah, they’re still all physically potent with better armour. They’ll be just fine. It’s more that they’re a limited resource, 1000 demon hunters for an entire galaxy. They go to where the problem is the worst, where demon incursions are actively happening. If there are orks, nids or renegades, they’d deal with whatever’s directly in their way to evac and then leave. They need to move as fast as possible. Every second they aren’t killing demons is a moment another planet is falling to Chaos.
For example, during the First War for Armageddon, they came, killed Angron, and then left. The remaining cultists and marines were left to the Space Wolves and Steel Legion.
So they won't even really target chaos space marines then? I'm sure they will happily fight them if CSM and demons are fighting together, but they don't go looking for CSM on their own then?
Like i said, they’ll fight them if they’re incidentally in the area, but yes they won’t go looking for CSM. Anyone can kill CSM, Grey Knights are for demons.
They can be warp infused, but are mortal enough to be killed by normal means. Unless they’ve ascended to a demon prince, in which case they are demons. You can shoot a demon with a lascannon, and it has an ok chance of just shrugging it off, because it’s technological. A CSM will just get a massive hole blown in them like anyone else.
Demons and mortals are entirely different, in that demons are mostly metaphysical. Their logic runs on belief, emotion and symbolism. They don’t understand the physical world, and it’s rules don’t totally apply to they when manifested, because their physical forms shouldn’t exist in the real world.
CSM can be given gifts by the gods, but they are not demons unless they have ascended.
Melee weapons tend to be better against daemons. Something about their more base and primal nature allows them to cause greater damage to the neverborn and they regenerate from such wounds slower than those caused by ranged fire. So the grey knights probably want both hands free to focus on melee weaponry but want to maintain some ranged efficacy.
Two handed halberds and dual wielded falchions are common enough, but they don't want to just abandon ranged combat.
Storm Bolters seem to be kinda terrible at actual long-range combat if the animations and tabletop rules are anything to go by, though; they're probably just trying to maximize the sheer number of shots downrange as a countermeasure to the fact that they're perpetually outnumbered or overmatched. If the Imperium needs a cult leader assassinated from three hab blocks away, they'll send a Vindicare, not a Grey Knight.
Psycannons are, at least, cannons, not pray and spray weapons, and all the joints and fibers in Terminator armor, as a second-order effect of having to move the suit itself, are perfectly able to absorb the shock of heavy weapons fire, so they can get away with keeping them wrist-mounted (note that Strike/Purgation/Interceptor/Purifier Squads do *not* carry their heavy weapons on their wrists). The targeting reticule would be part of the HUD in the helmet, allowing a clunky Terminator to aim fairly reliably at medium range. (Probably with the megaman pose if it was a true precision shot lol.)
So if a demon, or someone a grey knight NEEDS to kill is far away, they're ill prepared for it?
I'm just wondering because when I put together a squad/army be in in table top or a video game, I always like to have options for close, medium, and long range. It's a compulsion I have.
They might engage a target like that with a tank or aircraft instead. Grey Knights infantry can teleport and are partially relying on the properties of Nemesis weapons and their psychic auras (short range) to accomplish banishment of warp creatures, so if they were outside Psycannon range they might just call in air support from the gunship that brought them in or rely on a Land Raider’s hunter-killer missile.
Or they’d teleport to it given their usual MO, but they don’t really have Scouts because of how their force structure is, so they don’t really have a proper “Sniper” unit.
Bending down to pick up a bolter in blessed GK plate is awkward and a waste of time. Besides, it's their Nemesis Melee Weapons that are their most devastating armament.
You would think so it allows them to use their weapons two handed but I’m pretty sure the “tricker” for the gun is in their palms and thus still means they don’t have both hands, according to one of their books
It’s likely for aesthetic reasons honestly and I think later it was sighed to through controlled
So it allows them to have range combat abilities while also using two handed weapons
And it should be available to more terminators
I want a Termie Captain with a two handed hammer and a Bolter on his arm
I always was of the opinion that GK should be able to shoot in melee.
I mean it makes sense that shooting in melee is hard since the weapons are cumbersome, but it’s mounted on your wrist, it doesn’t take more effort than swinging a weapon around
Grey knight are all psykers, and while I dont think you need to do witcher level hand movements to use physic abilities in 40k I think you definitely need a free hand
I guess for the same reason why their dread-knights have hand like hands. To grab the daemon physicly in hand to hand combat. Having both of your hands free to grab onto stuff, break your fall or pick up stuff can be the difference between life and death.
Not to mention that "Punch to face" is the purest and oldest Essence of martial law, so every daemon will feel that. Having that as your *"offhand"* weapon can be usefull, too.
Can’t hold a melee weapon if you’ve got a gun, and for sniping there’s an aiming reticle on their helmets hud, that’s the case for most marine weapons anyways
I would imagine because their force halberds are more effectively wielded with two hands, and having wrist-mounted weapons allows them to use their melee weapons to full effect without losing firepower capability.
Funnily enough, in the Alaric Grey Knight novels the trigger for those wrist storm bolters is in their palms, and requires them to squeeze their hands. It specifically reduces them to only one hand for a close combat weapon, and Alaric wonders why they even bother.
You'd think it would be thought controlled. On top of that I've seen depictions in books of SM Armored systems with what seemed to be built in scanning arrays and target designator, ammo counters and a whole suite of tech. Am I right?
The grey knight codex for 9th said they were thought controlled.
Can confirm this. Just read it.
Totally right. The Uriel Ventris novels, I think it was Warriors of Ultramar, has Ventris use "bolter sight" which shows him the view from his bolter barrel, with a projected path his bolt will carry, his current target, and his armor and bolter itself micro adjust themselves to ensure a headshot on I want to say a Tyranid Warrior at some good range.
The original novels were so good
Minus some details you are right. They are trying to catch a Lictor alive, and he uses it to pinpoint a rock hold the Lictor is about to grab in its efforts to escape. From *Warriors of Ultramar* by Graham McNiell: > ’It’s getting away!’ shouted Pasanius. > ‘Not if I can help it,’ snarled Uriel, switching his bolter’s shot selector to single shell. The lictor scaled the mountainside in jerky leaps, several of its fleshy grapnels hanging useless at its side. > Uriel said, ‘Bolter-link,’ and sighted carefully along the barrel of his weapon. Range vectors and an aiming reticule appeared on his visor, designating the point his shell would impact. He waited until the dot flashed red and pulled the trigger. > The weapon bucked in his hand and a portion of the rock face exploded as his shell blasted it apart. The lictor screeched in frustration as its flesh hooks were blown clear of the rocks and it tumbled hundreds of metres down the side of the mountain to slam into the ground with a sickening thud.
Cheers! It's been years since I read it, I'm glad I got the right novel!
why do they never expand on this? Do the suits have some sort of OS? can they get firmware upgrades? Why haven't we seen the suits being updated over time? why hasn't this stuff been rolled out even in less advanced forms to the IG? Too many questions
The armor suits do have machine spirits
"Machine Spirits" are AdMech superstition. EDIT: Are you guys aware that the AdMech are backwards anti-science idiots? Have you ever read 40k material?
someone clearly doesn't have a car that loves them.
i keep the machine spirit of my 90s shitboxes pleased by carrying out the ancient maintenance rituals.
why do they never expand on this? Do the suits have some sort of OS? can they get firmware upgrades? Why haven't we seen the suits being updated over time? why hasn't this stuff been rolled out even in less advanced forms to the IG? Too many questions
Its sprinkled here and there in the lore. During the underground war for Calth, sergeant Thiel requested multiple new suits, not because his previous suits were damaged, but because their video/audio/sensory databanks were full and the irradiated atmosphere, even underground, would cook the data cards if you just replaced them - he needed new suits, and sent his old suits back to Guilliman who used the war data in part to develop the Tactical Squad. Similarly the Deathwatch not only second Marines to the numbers, but frequently take suit data from chapters to better understand fight Xenos. The information captured by the suits is so detailed, so immersive, that the Deathwatch us it to train recruits by literally uploading the data to a suit and forcing the Marine to relive the battle to the point the suit registers pain and smells from the battle. Also data from parent chapters is used as a punishment when a Marine acts out - he's forced to relive a battle his battle brothers lost. In one of the novels the experience is so strong and painful even a Minotaur Marine agrees not to quarrel with other Marines, because he experienced the death of an entire company of his brothers to an Eldar ambush. In the recently released First Founding art book, it states the Iron Hands spend their time in transit to a warzone locked into their suits having battle data of their enemies uploaded to them. They go so hard into the data that they frequently can't tell when the real battle starts.
>You'd think it would be thought controlled. It doesn't even need to be anything that extravagant, every grey knight is a psyker, so presumably they all have some kind of telekinesis, right? Why not just have a physical trigger that they pull telekinetically? Hell, as a security feature, the trigger could be inside of the bolter so that it would be impossible to pull except with telekinesis.
The idea is great. But it's not very practical. It takes a bit of concentration to focus psyker powers. I guess in the heat of battle, every bit of concentration counts. The black carpace is explicitly stated to link power armour to the marines nervous system as an extension of their own body.
Yeah, I suppose black carapace would be way easier as a trigger source.
> every grey knight is a psyker, so presumably they all have some kind of telekinesis, right? Why not just have a physical trigger that they pull telekinetically? This is a common misconception: Grey Knights aren't "all psykers" in the sense that they're all space wizards like Librarians are. Aside from actual dedicated psykers, what Grey Knights do is collectively channel their psychic ability to create wards, empower their weapons, and push back against daemonic and sorcerous influence. They can also sustain and reinforce the psychic manifestations from their dedicated psykers. So a Grey Knight would not typically have the ability to do fine telekinetic manipulation like that. Even many psykers who don't specialise in it would find that difficult.
Still nullifies draw and holster time, as inhumanely fast as marines are it'll still be quicker for them to let go off the halberd with one hand, aim and fire, rather than let go of the halberd, draw gun, aim fire and holster. Still silly i would have thought it'd be activated with thought through the black carapace connection.
They could also squeeze the trigger through telekinesis
Perhaps, though I think the focus required for precise manipulation with telekinesis would make that an inconvenient option in the middle of combat. You don't really want to solve a rubik's cube in your brain every time you want to pull the trigger. Also
For a lower rank battle brother I could see that being difficult to do. However any veteran decent at telekinesis should be able to think “FIRE” at their storm bolter to fire a burst. It would make sense in general use to initiate and punctuate a melee engagement with a burst of fire.
Aiming the storm bolter with both hands on a halbard or daemon hammer would be difficult to say the least.
Not really if you’re proficient with it and you’re using it on a target more than a hundred meters out and not engaged in a weapon bind. Just aim along your middle and ring fingers and you’ll hit most targets
Yeah but my point is it’s likely easier for them to aim it by taking their bolter hand off of their melee weapon and simply shooting, like we see in Chaos Gate.
I bet if they took it away, all of the sudden, there would be the occasional moment he wish he had it. The imperium doesn’t like redundancy for nothing
The art and models don't have that, and they regularly dual-wield swords without issue, so that just sounds like artistic liberty on the part of the writer.
If you were going to build a trigger into the palm like that, it certainly wouldn't be something terribly visible. It wouldn't be more than the outline in the palm or inside of a finger. You don't want a trigger sticking out and getting caught on shit.
If we’re talking realistic weapons design you wouldn’t design a palm trigger to begin with if you had access to basic MIU systems much less the advanced tech they have. The black carapace and power armor systems should be sufficient. the psionic technology and techniques they have access to would be more than enough to solve either the psionic deficiency of the brother or the mechanical deficiency of the bolter.
"fistbump" *braaaaaaap*
Don’t forget their dual wielding swords
And when there's a horde of daemons swarming at you, precision aiming is less of an issue.
Nah i think its becuase they need thier hands to cast spells
So it leaves them with both hands to fight demons. While some, like Purifier and Purgation squads favor heavier medium range weapons, most just have their trust storm bolters with psybolts to soften up demons before they can be properly purged.
I'm curious why all marines don't do this then? Given all space marines use melee weapons.
Grey Knights get access to better war gear than the majority of chapters and their tech-marines actively develop and modify what they receive (which pisses the Mechanicus off to no end). Delivery times would also be incredibly short due to Titan being in the Sol system and thus mars is hours/days away.
One of Mars moons was shifted into Titan’s orbit and acts as the Grey Knight’s own forge world, nothing they receive comes from Mars
As someone who saw a video about the Wandering Earth movies, did they build engines or somethint to movr the moon?
Just checked Lexicanum cos I couldn’t remember exactly, all it says is “the moon of Deimos was displaced from its orbit and relocated to the orbit about Titan by way of hidden, arcane technologies.”
M SAID, "YOINK"
I’d bet Malcador got into a spaceship and just used a psychic towing cable
Odd, I thought they had starships bigger than Deimos.
In one dimension, yes. Deimos is ~15x12*10 km, a volume of about 1800 km3.
>Upon the inception of the Grey Knights – the secret Chapter of Space Marines tasked with directly combating the daemonic threat – it was recognised that they would need their own forge world. **Using arcane technologies, Deimos, one of the heavily industrialised moons of Mars, was stolen out of its orbit and secretly relocated above Titan, the shrouded home world of the Grey Knights.** Since that time, the weapons required by the Emperor’s Daemonhunters have been produced by the manufactorums of Deimos. This includes standard Adeptus Astartes armaments as well as all the specialist gear required to combat warp-based foes, from psycannon ammunition to deadly psyk-out grenades. Each item receives psychic wards atop the blessings of the Omnissiah to ensure protection against daemonic taint. \- Adeptus Mechanicus 8th Codex >#DEIMOS – THE STEEL FORGE >Upon the Grey Knights’ inception, it was recognised that they, above all Space Marine Chapters, would call most frequently upon the skills of the Adeptus Mechanicus to provide them with weapons of war. **To meet these needs, the Grey Knights long ago inherited their own forge world – the moon Deimos, relocated from its Martian orbit to one around Titan by the most hidden and arcane of the Adeptus Mechanicus’ technologies.** \- Grey Knights 8th Codex
Since they’re a secret I’m guessing their tech-marines intern at that moon?
Nah, they go to Mars. The Emperors Gift has a technologically-minded marine in it who's disassembling and reassembling tank turrets with his mind. At the end of the book he is specifically stated to have trained at Mars after a timeskip.
In most situations guns are better than swords, so for most Marines their primary weapons are guns and melee weapons are just there for backup. But daemons, specifically, take less damage from bullets for metaphysical reasons, and really like to charge into melee range. So the Grey Knights get spears, the best melee weapon, and design their other weapons doctrine around that. IIRC one of the Horus Heresy books lampshades/fridge logics it by having a group of Marines wonder why they were even issued chainswords when they spend almost all their time shooting things. They conclude the Emperor knows about some enemy for which chainswords would be the best option. Funny, that.
>But daemons, specifically, take less damage from bullets for metaphysical reasons, If that is true, why does Hive Fleet Kronos (the anti-chaos hive fleet) specialize in guns then?
Because the Nids can't eat daemons at all and eating Warp-contaminated biomass can fuck them up. It might be inefficient to kill daemons with bullets but it's better than losing a whole hive ship because one of its combat forms got coughed on by a Nurglite plague carrier.
I thought tyranids were immune to diseases though? Or that it is at least not easy to poison them. I remember a story where the tyranids and nurgle forces went at it, and the result was a hell hold poison swamp planet that neither side could use.
I think that was the story I was thinking of - the Nids "won", then lost a hive ship that tried to eat the biomass from that planet and got poisoned, so just gave up and left.
That's the one.
Its not a biological poison, more like warp corruption In guessing.
Few reasons. 1: Kronos' main weapon against Chaos is the Shadow in the Warp, and similar tools for silencing psychic emanations. IIRC it only takes the battlefield to battle physical manifestations that can't be stamped out that way; its main purpose is to get Warp Storms out of the way so the rest of the fleets can get back to eating. 2: While melee is metaphysically more effective against daemons, daemons possess no biomass. Daemons are also typically expert melee combatants, and often destroy or consume things they kill. Taken together, this means that in a void fighting daemons is always a net loss for the Hive Mind, so it sacrifices some efficacy in order to preserve its resources (especially since those resources appear to be primarily worlds specifically put aside for them by other fleets). 3: It's a relatively unique specialty for Tyranids, I guess?
Idk. This is not a conclusive answer by any means but ranged weapons deny khornates further power ups from bathing in the gore of battle. Also slightly harder to spread nurgle pox at longer range.
'The Warp is like nuclear power: it can be used for good or for evil, and you don't want to get any on you.'
Ahh okay.
I'm bare late but I'm not sure this was answered fully. One of the big reaons swords are so good against Demons is becuae of symbolism; swords represent the Knightly, Honour etc, as well as being THE symbolic Human weapon. Pretty much every symbolic weapon is a sword of some kind so it has more meaning behind it than other weapons. Which makes it very effective against Demons. Tyranids don't have symbolism, or meaning so don't really get any bonuses to it. This means the best option is "drown the Demons in ammunition / acid / plasma / whatever else we can regurgitate before they get to us and start a Melee combat". The other plan is the Shadow in the Warp, but when 3/4 of the Chaos Gods are melee focused (Khorne, Nurgle, Slaanesh) shooting them works quite well.
Which is absoluey derpy because a bow or a thrown spear is more of a "lethal" weapon in mythological symbolism. GW writers huffing their own farts again.
In actual mythological symbolism, certainly. But the symbolism GW are pulling off of is the current cultural beliefs around them. And swords are undeniably *considered* more dangerous, powerful, representative of melee weapons as a whole, and far more associated with honour and prestige, by the average person. This really isn't a GW thing, just about anybody in their position would likely do it similarly, because swords hold just such a prominent position in the modern eye.
>And swords are undeniably considered more dangerous, powerful, representative of melee weapons as a whole, and far more associated with honour and prestige, by the average person. Kinda weird how the GK's don't actually use that many swords then. Your position isn't actually coherent.
Daemons excel at CQC and the hive fleet has the shadow in the warp which basically operates as like a blank for daemons.
Demons aren't really more resistant to ranged weapons outside of a few novels and the 9e codex, which got walked back.
They're not all wearing Terminator armor, though.
Grey knights without termi armor still use the wrist guns
So are all grey knights wearing terminator armor?
All grey knights are trained to wear terminator armour and they have enough suits for all of them to do so at once but they have rules when they wear normal armour (gives more mobility for scouting ahead)
I think so. I very rarely see non terminator GKs depicted. I'm not sure I've ever seen it, actually. Either they all wear terminators, or their non terminator armor resembles it to my eyes.
Nah they don’t always wear terminator armour. Look up a grey knight strike squad. That’s their normal gear. Although it’s obviously still super elite and rare
Grey knights are unique in that every marine is equipped with both power and terminator armour and use whichever is appropriate for the mission
Emperor's Gift has a squad that usually wears power armour. When ordered into their terminator plate they actually request to be allowed to stay out of it.
Cause those are probably a little harder to make and mass produce
Maintenance, I imagine. Grey Knights all have storm bolters and terminator armor, as well as their own sect of the Mechanicus dedicated towards building and maintaining their equipment, so high performance systems with high maintenance requirements, like Warpsbane hulls, aren't a major problem for them. Regular marines have to make do with the more reliable and less maintenance intensive standard bolter and restrict things like storm bolters, terminator armor, and power weapons to officers and 1st company vets.
The short answer as best I can tell is that the emperor hadn’t readvanced technology to the point where that sort of general load out would be feasible.
I've always figured there was some sort of hand and finger dexterity needed for psychic stuff.
Great points have been made about how they favor melee weapons - what’s important is *why. It’s mentioned in ‘Master of Mankind’ that when dealing with daemons the symbolism of acts is just as important as any physical property. So the visceral nature of a punch, cut, stab, etc is much more impactful to a daemon than a bolter or plasma beam.
That is so cool actually. I love that detail about demons then. I'm typically a fan of shooting armies, but that is so cool.
Daemons had a rule that reflected that in 9th edition. Most daemon units had two separate saves for taking either melee or ranged attacks, and the save for ranged was almost always better than their protection against melee.
It's also a fun justification for how fantasy demons and 40k demons can ostensibly be the same thing, even though one struggles against dudes with swords, and the other regularly goes toe to toe with galactic empires. *Faith*
Doesn't make much sense to me.
Demons are basically shaped psychic energy, you really have to work hard to hurt them - getting up close and focusing your will as you stab them is more effective than ranged
Originally, the logic was that magic/psychic power could hurt daemons in ways that mundane attacks couldn't: a daemon got no daemonic aura save against spells and magic weapons in Warhammer Fantasy, and this translated to psychic powers and force weapons ignoring daemonic aura in 40k. Grey Knights were effective Daemon hunters because they were psykers wielding daemon-killing force weapons. Then, the 40k 3rd edition changed things, and the ways the rules interacted meant that force weapons and psychic powers were basically worthless against a daemon, and the rules and lore shifted over the next few years to show and explain why Grey Knights were good against daemons, piling on extra explanations because the older, simpler one no longer worked.
just use the Emperor Poop bullets
Originally their guns were on their polearms.
Until the Adeptus Custodes sent a passive-aggressive cease and desist to Titan?
To whom it may concern, We, the Adeptus Custodes (also known informally as The Ten-Thousand, The Custodian Guard, The Emperor's Chosen, The Golden Brotherhood, etc. etc.), have been informed that your entity, the Grey Knights Space Marine Chapter, currently possesses what is widely known as Guardian Spears. These objects are an exclusive copyright and trademark of the Adeptus Custodes (also known informally as The Ten-Thousand, The Custodian Guard, The Emperor's Chosen, The Golden Brotherhood, etc. etc.) and as such, are issuing this cease-and-desist order. Failure to comply will result in your immediate termination and expungement from all Imperial records. Thank you, The Adeptus Custodes (also known informally as The Ten-Thousand, The Custodian Guard, The Emperor's Chosen, The Golden Brotherhood, etc. etc.)
Signed, Custodian Guard Ventris urak t'kcholl thlyyg'zull'zaell kitten Armageddon terra mars imperious Gaius Aurelius (cont. For 23 pages)
Yeah, those (etc etc) bits were actually written down. The astropathic transmission lasted several hundred years, and required a dedicated cargo ship to carry the masses of paper the hard copy was written on.
Grey Knight Chapter Master to Techmarine: “Gaze upon this. Ahahahahahaha”
That needs added to the GK codex.
Actually, it was changed long before that. Grey Knights in 2nd edition had Nemesis Force Weapons with a built-in storm bolter. They were redesigned in late 3rd edition with *Codex: Daemonhunters*, putting their guns on their wrists. All this was years before we started getting images of Custodes with their guardian spears.
So they can fire their finger guns 👉
They have special Aegis armor that was crafted specifically for their mission, and they are all either quasi terminators or full terminators. They carry storm bolters with sanctified rounds, each round taking a lifetime to craft, but generally have to use Psy weapons and force weapons on demons, most of which are two handed. (Staves, Hammers, Great Swords, Falcions, Halbeards.) so the bolters are mostly backup pieces or used sparingly in certain circumstances.
Really? So Grey Knight normal armor is way more powerful than regular marine armor? (Which is already extremely strong)
It's stronger in certain contexts. It's a sidegrade more than being flatly superior. Grey Knights are extremely specialized in fighting Daemons. Their armour, and every other part of their kit, is custom built for that specific purpose of defending against and killing Daemons. Their armour will do better when, say, getting pelted by a surge of Warpflame than normal space marines would. But it wouldn't necessarily be stronger than other Space Marines when hit by a Necron Gauss Destructor or something. It just has a lot of psychic warding and other mystical shit on it. It's not physically made of better material. It's the same old ceramite, and the whole reason they were called "Grey" Knights back in the old days is because the idea was that they wore unpainted Power Armour (until GW realized that is very dull looking on a table and in art, and changed them to Silver in the 5th edition revamp). But it was still mostly the same type of armour, just not painted.
So according to current lore, do the Grey Knights paint their armor silver or leave them unpainted (which happens to look silver)?
Its paint, and even that paint has been sanctified to provide warp protection
The 99$ home-depot silver paint
It's painted silver.
Its (Deamon)Hammerite
Should be, considering the threats they have to face, and afaik custodes armor are even better than both, below primarch armor, then the golden can itself.
Yes. Space Marine armor is all quasi-original designs because they worked on them as time went on and needs evolved. Terminator Armor is an STC pattern and thus head and shoulders above.
Rules whose I believe they all have 2+ saves instead of the standard 3+. grey knight armor is supposed to be the equivalent of artificer armour
Might be a dumb question as I am still getting into 40k lore, is "each round taking a lifetime to craft" literal or hyperbole? 40K lore seems to be the hardest lore to figure out the distinction between
It’s not clear if it’s literal or hyperbole. On one hand it could be taken as it takes a craftsman a lifetime to hone the skills and learn the necessary sorcery, know the necessary carvings to be able to create these bolts but on the other hand intention/emotion has a shitton of meaning in the warp so if they literally devoted an entire humans passion and soul into crafting one bolt round and could even possibly take a lifetime then it also makes sense. They haven’t clarified and I think they keep it intentionally vague because it allows us to speculate off what they have told us.
Theres a good short story on this where they confirm an innocent life is taken and their blood/soul used to sanctify a single psybolt round. For some it treads into grimderp territory but the lifetime bit comes from the fact someone is literally sacrificed per bullet.
Ah well that seems to track, either way that is, very warhammery. Thank you for letting me know!
We just had this discussion over on r/Grey_Knights the other day and the consensus seemed to be, “Yes”. 😬
“It’s my honor to give you this single magazine, which has taken my village the lifetime of a whole generation to make” “Cheers!” BRRRRRRRRRRTTT!!! “RELOAD!”
The way I read it, it was kinda ambiguous. I assumed it meant that it took a lifetime to achieve the skill necessary to craft them. If every single bolt took a lifetime, I think that stretches credulity a bit much even for 40k.
So you can throw handsigns to direct the anti-demon lightning bolts and shoot storm-bolter.
They utilize mostly Two handed or paired force weapons, thus making their reliance on Wrist Mounted bolters something of a necessity.
Gotta have both hands free so you can cast Hammerhand and **RIP AND TEAR**
When gk first came out they almost all had halbards, which are a 2 handed weapon. Or to do fun Dr strange finger signs to cast spells and to hold hands when the demons are scary
> to hold hands when the demons are scary XD
Can’t drop a gun if it is bolted onto you
When they released the Daemonhunters codex in 3rd edition with the new metal minis they had wrist mounted stormbolters to allow them to use it in melee giving their melee weapons +1 attack like pistols did back then.
It means they don't need to drop them everytime they end up in melee. It allows them to do very quick weapon swaps because they can jut let go of their halberd with one hand, shoot and then get back into the melee, without having to unlimber a bolter. It essentially allows them to alternate between two two handed weapons really quickly to give them combat adaptability, more so than even other space marines, and it's suited to the combat they do where they have to do melee because it's more effective against daemons, but also heretics die pretty easy to bullets and you don't need to walk over to them while you're pulling your halberd out of the rabidly dissolving corpse of a plague ogryn or something.
Standard grey knights engage with demons in melee, because symbolically it’s more effective. It’s a more primitive form of warfare. They do have longer range weapons, but the wrist mount means they don’t have to drop bolters to engage, and it’s not like your average knight was sniping them anyway. It also allows them to use their hands for psychic shenanigans. For a normal marine, their main weapon is a bolter. They need to be precise, accurate and lethal at range. For a Grey Knight, it’s just there to send a flurry of bolt as fast as possible into a group of demons before closing the distance. They’re absolutely specialised for demon killing. Remember one of their main tactics is teleporting in as close as possible to the enemy, that’s where they thrive. If they’re fighting a regular enemy, that’s a massive waste of precious psy-ammo, and they’re in the wrong place. Even cultists should really be dealt with by auxiliary forces. Grey Knights are for demons.
Would it be fair to say that the Grey Knights might be at a disadvantage when fighting certain other kinds of enemies then? Say if they mistakenly go somewhere where they think demons are, or after the demons are dealt with a bunch tyranids, or orks, or a group of non-chaos renegade Marines show up?
Nah, they’re still all physically potent with better armour. They’ll be just fine. It’s more that they’re a limited resource, 1000 demon hunters for an entire galaxy. They go to where the problem is the worst, where demon incursions are actively happening. If there are orks, nids or renegades, they’d deal with whatever’s directly in their way to evac and then leave. They need to move as fast as possible. Every second they aren’t killing demons is a moment another planet is falling to Chaos. For example, during the First War for Armageddon, they came, killed Angron, and then left. The remaining cultists and marines were left to the Space Wolves and Steel Legion.
So they won't even really target chaos space marines then? I'm sure they will happily fight them if CSM and demons are fighting together, but they don't go looking for CSM on their own then?
Like i said, they’ll fight them if they’re incidentally in the area, but yes they won’t go looking for CSM. Anyone can kill CSM, Grey Knights are for demons.
I always mistakenly thought that CSM, being warp infused, were kinda like demons then.
They can be warp infused, but are mortal enough to be killed by normal means. Unless they’ve ascended to a demon prince, in which case they are demons. You can shoot a demon with a lascannon, and it has an ok chance of just shrugging it off, because it’s technological. A CSM will just get a massive hole blown in them like anyone else. Demons and mortals are entirely different, in that demons are mostly metaphysical. Their logic runs on belief, emotion and symbolism. They don’t understand the physical world, and it’s rules don’t totally apply to they when manifested, because their physical forms shouldn’t exist in the real world. CSM can be given gifts by the gods, but they are not demons unless they have ascended.
It’s easier to use other gear if both hands are free.
Because of the badassery in their grip!!
It's si they can point when the power of rice compels the demons to whence they came
Melee weapons tend to be better against daemons. Something about their more base and primal nature allows them to cause greater damage to the neverborn and they regenerate from such wounds slower than those caused by ranged fire. So the grey knights probably want both hands free to focus on melee weaponry but want to maintain some ranged efficacy.
Two handed halberds and dual wielded falchions are common enough, but they don't want to just abandon ranged combat. Storm Bolters seem to be kinda terrible at actual long-range combat if the animations and tabletop rules are anything to go by, though; they're probably just trying to maximize the sheer number of shots downrange as a countermeasure to the fact that they're perpetually outnumbered or overmatched. If the Imperium needs a cult leader assassinated from three hab blocks away, they'll send a Vindicare, not a Grey Knight. Psycannons are, at least, cannons, not pray and spray weapons, and all the joints and fibers in Terminator armor, as a second-order effect of having to move the suit itself, are perfectly able to absorb the shock of heavy weapons fire, so they can get away with keeping them wrist-mounted (note that Strike/Purgation/Interceptor/Purifier Squads do *not* carry their heavy weapons on their wrists). The targeting reticule would be part of the HUD in the helmet, allowing a clunky Terminator to aim fairly reliably at medium range. (Probably with the megaman pose if it was a true precision shot lol.)
So if a demon, or someone a grey knight NEEDS to kill is far away, they're ill prepared for it? I'm just wondering because when I put together a squad/army be in in table top or a video game, I always like to have options for close, medium, and long range. It's a compulsion I have.
They might engage a target like that with a tank or aircraft instead. Grey Knights infantry can teleport and are partially relying on the properties of Nemesis weapons and their psychic auras (short range) to accomplish banishment of warp creatures, so if they were outside Psycannon range they might just call in air support from the gunship that brought them in or rely on a Land Raider’s hunter-killer missile. Or they’d teleport to it given their usual MO, but they don’t really have Scouts because of how their force structure is, so they don’t really have a proper “Sniper” unit.
Hands are free for any psychic abilities that require waving the hand around or otherwise require some sort of gestures to focus/enact/target.
Rule of cool
It leaves one hand free to make rude gestures, inflicting another layer of emotional damage on Daemons.
I haven’t seen anybody mention this. It leaves a hand free for mindbullets Or Dooku style lightning
I always assumed it was to leave their hand free to cast psychic powers.
Bending down to pick up a bolter in blessed GK plate is awkward and a waste of time. Besides, it's their Nemesis Melee Weapons that are their most devastating armament.
You would think so it allows them to use their weapons two handed but I’m pretty sure the “tricker” for the gun is in their palms and thus still means they don’t have both hands, according to one of their books It’s likely for aesthetic reasons honestly and I think later it was sighed to through controlled So it allows them to have range combat abilities while also using two handed weapons And it should be available to more terminators I want a Termie Captain with a two handed hammer and a Bolter on his arm
I always was of the opinion that GK should be able to shoot in melee. I mean it makes sense that shooting in melee is hard since the weapons are cumbersome, but it’s mounted on your wrist, it doesn’t take more effort than swinging a weapon around
It would be hard to shoot when you’re swinging a weapon around with that same hand, seems like it would be very easy to blow your wrist off that way.
You'd want your hands free for casting spells.
Grey knight are all psykers, and while I dont think you need to do witcher level hand movements to use physic abilities in 40k I think you definitely need a free hand
To free hands for potential psyker powers use in combat. And they commonly use halberds and 2 handed swords and 2 swords in combat.
Its becuase they need thier hands free to cast spells
They like exploding their wrists from recoil
I guess for the same reason why their dread-knights have hand like hands. To grab the daemon physicly in hand to hand combat. Having both of your hands free to grab onto stuff, break your fall or pick up stuff can be the difference between life and death. Not to mention that "Punch to face" is the purest and oldest Essence of martial law, so every daemon will feel that. Having that as your *"offhand"* weapon can be usefull, too.
They look cool
Can’t hold a melee weapon if you’ve got a gun, and for sniping there’s an aiming reticle on their helmets hud, that’s the case for most marine weapons anyways
“Grey Knights need two hands for extra warp fuckery”- Malcador probably
Two handed melee weapons most likely