***** Well Chaos doesn't generally do shit outside of warp or Eye of Terror unless one of the gods is bored enough to send out few deamons in the Imperium worlds, and that is the primary way that Chaos attacks, or rather annoys Imperium. Chaos infiltrates and possesses key figures on Imperial worlds thus turning near entire population and it's garrison into it's own fighting force, effectively propagating more infighting if you were an outside observer. Imperium of Man's fighting force is generally made out of Guardsmen and any nearby available Space Marine chapter and those are sent into the fray(Lets ignore Exterminatus exists, and chaos completely corrupted some world). Chaos on the other hand has literary anything capable of even smallest amount of sentient thought(so anything with a brain), police, garrison guardsmen(and any present SM chapter), civilian workforce, old people, children, cats, dogs and what-not, wildlife and it ends up with a give or take a few million soldiers fighting a mindless deamonic horde numbering in billions. And I'm trying to keep it short here.
***** Well Imperium does outnumber Chaos demons in pure numbers, there's a LOT of more humans in material realm than there are demons, or possessed people(The ones with actual demon inside them, not the one that jack off with barbed wire[not mutually exclusive]) in the entire galaxy, that's even including Eye of Terror, and Eye is basically Warp. Like I said, majority, if not nearly all of forces fighting under banner of Chaos are just other corrupted humans.
When the imperium shows up they typically bring a lot of folks aha. It all really depends, local pdf units during an incursion or planet wide conversion. Will be boot strapped as all hell, a few regiments being sent in to deal with such may well be out manned as well. But when the imps show up with a full combat force the numbers are not low.
I'm not sure I buy that argument. They have entire worlds dedicated to the production of goods and materials. They have billions of soldiers in the Imperial guard and must have 100x that in munitions to supply such a force. Not to mention that ammunition is not just a one for one thing. One well placed artillery shell can take out a dozen enemy combatants, and the same can be true to much greater degrees with higher yield explosives and shit. On top of all that, if the argument that "there isn't enough" is applicable here, why isn't it applicable in regards to lives? millions of soldiers die constantly and yet there are always millions more ready to take their places. So there is a near infinite number of lives available but a finite amount of ammunition? To be honest, I don't think there is a good reason for why melee is present in 40k. I think the people who developed the universe, just included it to help diversify the combat. Which is fine, I don't see why we need to try and make it logical why they use melee. There a lot of things about 40k that aren't remotely logical, yet they don't detract from the compelling nature of the universe.
Omega172 If you want to simplify it then melee for Imperium exists because it's needed as a counter to melee fighting aliens and demons, not really smart to be a fully ranged army if the enemy can burst into your lines and wreak havoc because you can't fight back, and if you do you just shoot your own comrades. Like that one fight between Tau and Anti-Tau crusade when Imperial ships simply charged in between range focused Tau ships and tore them apart.
+Sam T Yeah, this is the basic truth of it. The Orcs and Chaos like fighting in melee because they're nuts, and the Tyranids like it because their weapons are biological. As such, other armies also need melee.
+Randygandalf95 puny little wretches, surpass your biological disadvantage or surrender. we will reclaim the galaxy as it once was ours to be. (Crons ftw) btw: nothing compares to the warscythe (if it wasnt for the goddamn ini 2)
ictaris Hey man, as a Necron player myself I can say that I don't think we would have dedicated melee troops and those axe bayonet things if the Krork weren't around.
Well you can think as you want, but in star wars, there is melee with jedi, and not everyone is shitting on it. Warhammer 40K is universe means to be bloody as hell. What do you want to do with your gun if you doesn't have any ammunition left? It's not stupid, it's logic, really logic, and it means to be like this. How do you want to stop Orks? with a little "pew pew gun"? no seriously, if you figth ork, tyrannids, EVEN Daemons, the weapons the more effective will be the melee weapons. (For the deamons, it's say in the lore that Daemons are more weak to sword than to "pew pew guns" like tau weapons or imperial soldier classic lasgun. (i'm french, so sorry for the bad english that i have)
you kidding? people mock the melee in star wars al the time. also it's just the space wizard that have the swords, normal soldiers have guns, and when they fight with something other than lazers they are fighting a space wizard
Reasons to use melee in the future: 1) the enemy rushes you and gets too close for you to aim your super high-tech raygun 2) your super high-tech raygun overheats, runs out of power, or breaks 3) when you do end up in melee, the guy who's ready for it is going to kill the guy who's still trying to fix his raygun
1) a pistol is better at any distance than an axe, spear, sword or whatever 2) bring a sidearm instead of a huge fuckoff axe, retard 3) repeat after me: SIDE-ARM
The key: protection is better than weaponry. Back in the middle ages, and before, heavily armored infantry simply could not be reliably defeated by arrows (or slings). The epitome of this is the knight, who gave no fucks about SOME arrows. Until somebody came up with ranged weapons that pierced armor; crossbows, etc. Then, guns. Guns turned the tables completely. That, once and for all, made infantry armor useless. Now imagine armor catches up again, to once again stand up well to ranged attacks. 40k.
+Nicholas Ogburn Its less it catches up and more it leaps ahead considering that a standard imperial guard las-gun cannot penetrate Space Marine armour
+Arch Warhammer Yes, I am familiar with them. It still feels, like WH40k lore is a result of melee combat aesthetics , rather then melee combat being result of lore.
+Debaucheerful I must second this. The arguments presented in this video, pertaining to the "necessity" of melee in our modern world - today - have their shaky foundations built upon very thin ice. Is it possible that a modern day soldier gets into melee? Sure it is. But let's forget what is *possible* for a moment and concentrate on what is *probable*. Nothing shows how negligibly low we estimate the probability for melee to ensue on a modern battlefield, better than how we choose to spend our defense budgets and how we choose to equip and train our soldiers. In the late middle ages and in the Renaissance we had a wealth of technical literature on close combat: armed, unarmed on foot and mounted using a variety of cleverly designed implements trying to bypass equally cleverly designed protection. In just 3 short centuries from the 1450's to the 1750's, as handguns and gunpowder artillery became ever more potent and refined, the skills for melee, the tools we used in melee and the literature for using them got ever more sparse, less complex and less relevant until we were left with only a couple of melee weapons used by a far smaller fraction of soldiers than before to standards of skill nowhere near as high as during, say, the early Renaissance. What percentage of the world's defense budgets actually go into equipping and training soldiers for melee today? The ww-1 "artillery isn't that great" argument is just ridiculous. While it might have partially applied to ww-1 conditions, only 25 years later, the world was a very different place. Just look at how the Germans who got hammered into dust in Russia and northern France by the brute force of massed batteries. And today? Well... I could go on arguing about how little sense the arguments from the lore itself make sense, but that would inflate this comment beyond anything reasonable. Let's just say this much: What is to stop an engineer from implementing the same destructive technology that supposedly make melee weapons in 40k "valid", into handguns and artillery? The argument "it's in the game because it looks cool and provides more gameplay variety" is good enough for me. Trying to go one step further and present it as a viable "real-world" thing is like trying to ice-skate up the hill.
Actually, in modern conflicts like the Western forces in Iraq and Afghanistan where you move among civilians, fight insurgents, man checkpoints etc hand to hand combat have seen a bit of an renaissance. Being ambushed or jumped or just needing to restrain frightened civilians have made hand to hand skills more important.
+Andy Wilderness I never said that hand to hand was the most important part of combat in Iraq and Afghanistan. I said that it has become more important. I base this on the article "Hand-to-Hand Combat and the Use of Combatives Skills: An Analysis of United States Army Post Combat Surveys from 2004-2008" by Jensen, Peter, R. I will give you the abstract Despite technological advances, hand-to-hand combat remains a persistent aspect of the contemporary operating environment (Wojadkowski, 2007). To develop a more detailed understanding on the use of hand-to-hand combat, the researcher analyzed 30 Post-Combat Surveys administered to US Army Soldiers from 2004 to 2008 after their return from deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan. 216 out of 1,226 Soldiers (19.0%) reported using hand-to-hand combat skills in at least one encounter. The Soldiers descriptions indicated that hand-to-hand combat occurred in a variety of tactical situations and that the most common skills employed were grappling techniques (72.6%), followed by the use of weapons (e.g., rifle butt strikes; 21.9%); with striking as the least reported skill (i.e., punching and kicking; 5.5%). These results further reinforce that hand-to-hand combat remains a relevant demand and the US Army should continue such training with an emphasis on grappling skills practiced across a variety of performance settings.
we tried to bombard Iwo Jima. we turned the entire island into rubble, and still had to go into the tunnels and fight hand to hand. so i agree no matter how advanced anyone is, melee will always play a part.
@Aniquin Iwo Jima is months after Pearl Harbour. Even then, the only reason the US didn't use gas there is because your politicians intervened to stop it.
6:16 That moment when a soldier is thinking: "Hey, they are taking a picture of the fight, let's turn around and smile at the camera." ... all while they are being overrun by a swarm of Tyranids...
If armour permits troops closing in, there will be melee where there is forward movement. The same is true with modern day jet fighters. They may have missiles, but if they miss they end up dogfighting with cannons. There. Explained. And it's cool.
+Grabaka Sennin "but if they miss they end up dog-fighting with cannons";. Jet fighters are equipped with cannons instead of swords, cannons are guns, therefore your argument proves that guns trump swords. QED.
GeorgeMonet Yes, but if you had half a brain you would realise it's about distance. When one distance fails, the nature of combat is forward motion, thus you end up in closer distance. I do congratulate you captain obvious on pointing out to me that cannons are not ,melee weapons, but I want to point out that maybe you haven't thought this trough..
+GeorgeMonet Yes, because if an aircraft tries to engage in "melee combat" (AKA ramming) its going to effectively wreck the aircraft, or outright destroy it... Ultimately though two jets or props or whatever fighting it out with guns/cannons is an extremely similar concept to two humans fighting it out in hand to hand.
Katherine Winyala No it is not, but the concept of a new zone where closer combat occurs is. The nature of both things is the same. If you cannot grasp this I cannot help you.
Grabaka Sennin I more or less just said the exact same thing, worded differently. The guns on a fighter are the equivalent of a knife or whatever melee weapon a soldier may be carrying on them. They're what one uses once they end up in extreme close quarters. There's a reason why a dogfight is occasionally referred to as a "knife fight" after all.
Melee has never left the battlefield and will always be a part of armed conflict. As the saying goes, "When the gun runs dry, use the stock. When the stock breaks, use your knife. When your knife breaks, use you fists. When your fists break, use you teeth."
I think that the reason for melee in 40k is best explained by the God Emperor himself in the fifteenth episode of "If the Emperor had a Text-to-Speech Device" when he learns of the Tau preference for ranged combat. "That. Is. ABSOLUTELY DISGRACEFUL! [...] HOW CAN THEY NOT FIGHT IN GLORIOUS HAND-TO-HAND, FACE-TO-FACE COMBAT WITH THEIR ADVERSARIES, LIKE ALL TRUE CHAMPIONS OF THE BATTLEFIELD DO? [...] OHMYSWEETMISSINGLEFTHANDTHATWASONCEUSEDFORGREATERTHINGS! [...] THIS REVELATION FILLS ME WITH MORE DISGUST AND SPITE THAN A SISTER OF SILENCE BEING THROWN INTO A PILE OF FEEDING TENDRILS! [...] I CANNOT WILLINGLY ASSOCIATE MYSELF WITH SUCH DISHONOURABLE CREATURES! IF THEY WANT TO JOIN THE IMPERIUM OF MAN, THEY BETTER BRING SOME FUCKING CHAIN-KATANAS OR SOMETHING." So, if you don't fight in melee in 40k you have no right to call yourself a warrior, a soldier or even a man. If someone is put off by melee in 40k they shouldn't even be looking at it in the first place for they are not worthy (if the Emperor said it, it must be true).
+kingkong381 Must've been high that day, when aliens are mentioned he usually just says "PURGE THE XENOS!". Then again Trump has been toning down his rhetoric a bit... Its funny how some still don't get he's the Emperor.
dIRECT0R The Emperor was a militant atheist, correct me if I'm wrong but isn't Trump religious? Also the Emperor sought to unite the human race in a single regime (and quite a diverse one considering the wide array of cultures that different Imperial worlds represent). The fact that the Crimson Fists chapter are Spanish and the Tallarn Desert Raiders are all Middle Eastern would probably give Trump an aneurism since he seeks to divide humanity. Also in the same TTS episode the Emperor explains that he doesn't have a problem with aliens living within the Imperium so long as they are under human control, all the religious stuff and extreme xenophobia happened to the Imperium after he was interred on the Golden Throne and thus couldn't run it as he would have (the whole TTS series is just him being updated on the Imperium's history over the last 10000 years and raging at humanity's incompetence). Furthermore, Trump hasn't got an ounce of charisma in his rancid, bloated carcass whereas the Emperor is famously charismatic and persuasive. To quote a Horus Heresy short story by Dan Abnett (The Lightning Tower): "It was said that once you had seen him, or heard him speak, you were never in doubt again. He was the one, and had always been the one. He had been the Emperor long before there was any such office to take. No one knew his birth name because he had always, naturally, been the Emperor."
+kingkong381 Oh come on - _he's in disguise, obviously._ How do you think he went hidden all those millenia? Kind of like a Super Saiyan, trump is hiding his Full Power. Religious? Come on - _he's lying,_ look at him. I for one perceived at first glance, and was never in doubt thenceforward.
+John Trent Gaze upon the proof, ye doubtful! img.4plebs.org/boards/pol/thumb/1438/41/1438410848133s.jpg If our Emperor doesn't wish to get his hands dirty, it can only be for fear of destroying all dirt in the universe!
There is a VERY good reason for melee weapons in the 40k universe and you are missing it completely. High rate of fire armor piercing rounds and huge explosions are not good inside of space ships especially near the hull or power sources. A flamethrower in a sealed container is a bad idea also. They aren't called SPACE Marines for nothing.
That's not a huge issue actually since Space Marines don't really miss. They have to miss on table top or the game wouldn't be any fun, but lore wise they're utterly overpowered. This covers it pretty well. czcams.com/video/CMGRa4_UjE4/video.html Also there's no way in hell you're going to so much as scratch a combat ship's hull with a boltgun. Maybe with a melta gun, some time, and a death wish. But otherwise you're not getting through it.
Ok so that may cover some what the soldiers designed to fight exclusively on space ships, but most of the focus in 40k is not that limited. Also there are already today theories for projectile weapons that could work on a space ship and not puncture the hull, like weapons firing concentrated bursts of heat (ie PPG’s from Babylon 5).
The answer to "why melee" is fairly obvious. The reasons why melele disappeared with XXth century weapons are that humans: 1. Don't want to die and can therefore be suppressed, shell shocked, mentally broken. 2. As Arch mentioned humans are a finite resource, and the money investment into training and outfitting a soldier make it a bad idea to waste them. 3. Humans are also very vulnerable, and you don't need that much to put them out of the battle, and the whole way we modern militaries approach war reflects that. Any projectile hit will likely put a soldier out of combat and into hospital. A nearby explosion may knock a person out cold with the air blast alone, without direct damage etc. In WH40k all these rules are thrown away. The universe is filled with races which are much tougher than humans (orks, necrons to even begin), and who will consider a missing arm to be "just a flesh wound". Many of these aliens simply cannot be suppressed (or scared, or broken) easily, either because their culture does not put any value to deaths of their allies (orks), or they have no concept of fear (demons), or that they are sincapable of feeling fear (tyranids). And finally, many factions do not require much to outfit a fighter, like tyranids, who cap pop a hundred new ones for every one killed, making their numbers basically not a limiting factor.
We still have melee in modern war. It's not gone. But the main reason it's in 40K from a tactical perspective is because the chance of a well armed human being able to win in a melee against a space marine is zero whereas the chance of a well armed human being being able to win in a ranged fight is slightly above zero.
@@laurie1183 It is not about mortal's chances against an Astarte, man. It is about the fact that he will find himself sooner or later in a position where he will have to engage in melee, usually not willingly.
@@kronos661 Dude half of the space marine range is pure melee and there are entire chapters who are obsessed with getting into melee. There are exceptions but more space marines will want into melee than out of it by a huge number.
@@laurie1183 That's nowhere near a point I've made. As I SAID it's not about astartes, it's about mortals and what they face. Cultists, tyranids, orks and more. Not to mention goddamned daemons that are easier to kill with a sharpened piece of metal than lasgun despite it's undisputed advantage in everything due to blades having more "weight" in the warp.
Overlord rule number 150: I will provide funding and research to develop tactical and strategic weapons covering a full range of needs so my choices are not limited to "hand to hand combat with swords" and "blow up the planet".
***** Artilley is useless if you are standing right next to the artillery batteries, and with deep striking, teleporting and jump pack assaulting astartes, you may very well be looking at that scenario. Besides, there are enemies in 40k that are a lot more resistant to ranged attacks (some daemonic threats, for instance, will be more easy to dispatch with a force melee weapon like a nemesis halberd than with bolters), not to mention the scale of battles in that universe can mean you will run out of bullets, but your melee weapons will keep going. Besides, there is a lot of shock value to a group of astartes going medieval against you in close combat. Let us also not forget that astartes don't fight only in open battlefields. They also fight in the packed corridors of Space Hulks, for example, and there is merit in carrying a good and reliable melee weapon in that scenario.
***** "i dunno blow up a couple holes in the ship." That doesn't work very well when you want to salvage the darn thing. "The answer for jet packs is air defense artillery" I actually meant Jump Packs instead of jet packs. They are just used to cover ground horizontally and get over natural barriers easily, as well as a way to land right in the middle of enemy armies and disrupt them from the inside. Also, you are thinking in terms of every army being fully prepared for all threats that might come their way, when in truth, most armies in the 40k universe are a ramshackle of whatever they manage to get their hands on. And your modern warfare analysis doesn't really take into account the realities of warfare in the 40k world. Real world armies never had to fight constantly adapting giant bug things with bio weapons, for one.
***** Space Marines are just a tiny portion of the Imperium's military strenght. Their purpose is not just to be a slab of metal - they also have many other qualities such as inhuman endurance and more importantly, absolutely no fear - something important when you fight against literal gods. They are also extremely versatile. A Space Marine can be outfitted with any sort of weapon configuration depending on the job since they are trained with all of them. But the bulk of the Imperium is held by flashlight wielding humans exactly because they don't really have the resources to spend making a mass of vehicles. A tankette would be much bulkier than a Space Marine, would not be able to be deep striked or teleported, would require human controllers that aren't as resilient as Space Marines and wouldn't really offer much protection since, in 40k, bolters or worse are more or less standard, and vehicles with armor too light is just going to be ripped to shreds. I also highly doubt such a vehicle would offer better protection than what a highly mobile Space Marine packs, considering not only do they have state of the art amor, but they also have armor implanted on their bodies, which also happen to be more capable of absorbing damage than regular humans. In 40k, you can see various instances of the Space Marines detachments complaining about how slow the human auxilia would be to catch up to their marching speed. As for eye tracking software, I doubt Imperium would be able to spare it for such a lightly armored and easily destroyed vehicle. The reason you dont see mechanization on such level is simple - the most abundant resources in the Imperium are baseline humans, and making lasguns for them incredibly cheap. Since they are somewhat reliable and they have potentially infinite ammo, they are the backbone of the Imperial Guard.
People too often think of the dominance of firearms over melee weapons to be simple matter of technological progression. The truth is that guns (gradually) made armor obsolete, which led to an emphasis on ranged combat, which eventually lead to close combat weapons losing influence. It's not like swords become less deadly, there are just not a lot of opportunities to use one these days. If we were to invent a type of armor that is completely bulletproof (or close enough), not very heavy (or powered)), and reasonably inexpensive, then it's not unreasonable that melee weapons would suddenly become a lot more popular. Because what matters is whether or not the weapon makes sense in context.
+RelativelyBest It is unreasonable. The armor will be designed to protect against whatever the current threat is. And if melee weapons become prevalent then armor will be designed to protect against BOTH guns and swords.
Yeah, kinda, but here's the thing: Plate armor was technically already 100% effective against most melee weapons, except maces and hammers to a limited degree. No sword will not get through a good plate armor, it's as simple as that. So instead they developed fighting techniques to get around it, which is something you can't really do with guns. Since we are talking about a hypothetical suit of armor that is both fairly common and impervious to all conventional firearms, firing guns at it would largely be a waste of resources and suddenly we're back to the 1400s where the best way to deal with a guy in armor was to clobber him down and try to stab him through the gaps in the armor plates.
+Fervidor Fencers. Light armor and using a very thin and light sword. How they worked was that they could get into the joints and weak spots and basically either slowed him down or out right crippled the poor bastard in Armor.
best explanation of this topic I have EVER heard!! my simple answer would have been, " Once you run out of ammo, your enemy charges in, and what r u gonna use then, harsh language?"
I think it's pretty reasonably that there's melee in 40k. I mean, when you live in a Universe where the second, or perhaps even first most populous species are the Orks - every single one of whom love raging and charging at you with axes, the military is obviously going to give its guys melee weapons to fight back in hand-to-hand combat. Another is the progression of protection over damage in conventional, ranged warfare. Take a look at space marines - even with their .75 calibre bolters, two space marines firing at each other, power armour can be tough to get through - not to mention the fact that bullets often miss and they gain an incredibly amount of strength as a result of it. Even so, most tactical space marines only come equipped with Combat Knives, so melee isn't actually as common as people would think - and the Imperial Guard are clearly focused on ranged over melee because they don't have the protection that Space Marines have. The way I see it, if I was a Space Marine with a bolter-rifle and a big power sword, the chances are that the foes I go up against are either going to be the endless swarms of Orks or Tyranids, insane Chaos cultists and Chaos Space Marines who have basically the same shit that I do and Necrons, who are incredibly hard to put down with bullets. It seems to me that it's rather reasonable, in those situations, that my battles I partake in are going to quite commonly devolve into brutal hand to hand combat and in fact, as a hulking 8-foot Space Marine obsessed with honour and glory and with ridiculous super strength, I'm probably going going to prefer it when I have a big melee weapon in my hand. I'm probably going to feel like I do more damage with that weapon than I do with a gun. We still use bayonets in real life. You think a bayonet is going to pierce power armour? Probably not. A Space Marine must ever be prepared and vigilant.
+Frank G It will if you're not a sergeant, because you'll have on a helmet, and have a much thicker skull made of carbon fibre because you're a Beakie.
+Frank G Well how's he going to get close to you to bash you with his rock or club and how will he piece your fancy armor? Your comment sounds something that a 6 year old would say that still didnt develop common sense and logic,if rocks and clubs were effective against ranged weapons then today every army would be composed of caveman swinging clubs at each other,and those poor soldiers armed with ak47 and m4s wouldnt stand a chance against a rock would they?(by your logic)
Stevan Popovic My point is that, no matter how technologically advanced a military becomes, it will always need to equip its soldiers with melee weapons just in case.
+Stevan Popovic He can surprise you from a hidden place, use a distraction to approach, or maybe they are more than one and you cant contain the advance.
Because Everyone but the Tau like the feeling of beating/cutting people. Imperium: God Emprah Demands it. Chaos: Khorne........nuff said. Orks: Hit dem 'umies wit dere bashas an' choppas! Tyranids: Are Bug monsters etc, etc.
+ShadowWolfRising "It doesn't matter that you have the best gun in the world, if your opponent is bashing your brains in with a rock." - WH40k 7th edition rules
During training in the REAL U.S. Army, I came through a door and had my weapon knocked out of my hand. I was expected to fight hand to hand in the dark to defend myself. I immediately went to my knife (practice). THAT is why we have them, because CQB exists and is a very real thing in civilized areas.
+vidaett Agreed, the images he uses are awesome but it's slightly disconcerting to see a picture of a Tau Samurai (clearly one of Farsight's chaps) when the narrative is covering space marines in melee. I'm guessing that this happens because the slideshow is pre-arranged prior to him recording the audio. This results in a disconnect in the timing but I'm sure lightens his work load a lot.
Look, you can boil it down to three reasons: 1) to balance armies and give players a mix of shooty and choppy units, 2) Because most things in the 41st millennium can tank multiple bolter rounds in the time it takes to get within swinging distance and 3) it's a convenient short hand to show the technological and societal degradation humanity has undergone in the intervening 40,000 years. It's easy to convey a race's savagery by having them charge into close combat, swinging a weaponized logging tool at their foes, screaming religious rhetoric.
Simply answered in 2 points. One already mentioned. When personal protection systems surpass the capability of individual weapon systems. And the second, if you're going to "improve" on human physiology, making a man a dozen times stronger than natural AND THEN give them actual powered armor that multiplies that already greatly enhanced strength, why not give that guy a hammer?
+GeorgeMonet while true, the larger the gun, typically the larger the round it fires which requires more space to transport and reduces the load out of any given man. it's not a weight issue here, it's just about practical space requirement and a large hammer would undoubtedly take up less space than ammunition for a larger, more powerful gun. But this is 40k and GW thinks a sensible combat load is 2 40 charge magazine/batteries for a lasgun.
i love that your doing warhammer 40k it is one of my all time fav table top games and i play it every week i have a 1500pt farsight enclave army and 4000pts of tyranids its gonna be great to see you do lore on 40k as i love 40k lore i hope you do the same thing you did with warhammer and do a race lore video so a video for the tau, imperium, spacemarines, elder ect its always been hard to read through the 40k lexicanums since there Enormous so if you did these i would be very thankful i wish you luck on this and i hope you will release videos like these soon.
+wilhelmrk The Farsight enclave is essentialtly normal Tau units that does not get censored or get removed if they question leadership. They do not have as much access to the more heavy wargear, due to few worlds, but they do get close combat tranning thanks to commander Farsights delight of beating xenos to death with his warp sword
wilhelmrk Us that are part of the enclave have been led by commander farsight to seek the truth that the ethereals have hidden from us for all these years as the ethereals are corrupt and thus is why we no longer serve the tau empire. if you want to you can read the lexicanum wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Farsight_Enclaves
+charlie otero probably i am going to go about it a little differently, as many of the episodes are gone be loooooooooooooooooooooong! so probably several episodes per faction
+charlie otero yeah i know but he was only able to alter that way probably because of the blade so again it is the equipment i mean no question about his character or shere willpower or tactical abilities as a superior commander which are superior compared to other tau but physical strength and resilience is not what are Tau known for as same as the common Ork isn't known for logical thinking or superior use of tactic
Also, 40k is full of terrifying bullshit that loves melee, like Tyranids, Chaos cultists, and Orks. You've got to have something to counter them when they close in.
Battlefields in 40k get sometimes to melee because the armors are just that good, and melee is excellent too due to force weapons, tyranid and other stuff, so naturally melee occasionally happens, but besides xeno cleansing and other Astartes groundwork stuff swords are rarely the main weapon.
They did a similar thing in KOTOR. When they introduced personal energy shields to protect against blasters, melee weapons became more popular as they bypassed most shields completely. Sure you had guys like the Mandalorians who happily charged into melee when they got the chance to, but the very first introduction in the game to melee is when dealing with guys in CQC as fighting with a blaster at melee range was more difficult.
That's a hammy answer. The reality is it's just a cool concept. They didn't sit there and think, "what happens when this guy with the gun gets mobbed by corrupted civilians?" They went "give that guy a sword, bitches like swords..... with the chainsaws!" 40k is over the top nonsense, it's not really meant to be taken that seriously.
+katthedemon you realise its only because they were adapting the fantasy theme to a futuristic setting. Knights-marines, malitia-guardsmen, elves-eldar, orcs-orks, mages-psychers etc. Any explanation other than that is just contrived.
+jonnyt8524 Well, if you want to talk meta, than there are always different layers. Of course things are introduced because it is thought of as cool. If they thought it would be lame, nobody would include it and expect sales. but besides the meta, there is in-story reasoning. I don't understand why some people treat this as some sort of new discovery.
+hal lourious The in-story reasoning is just made up to give some sort of framework for the cool things they add. Realistically, ranged weapons always > melee in general warfare. Melee will likely always fulfill a role, but if you want logic, it wouldn't be anything like the 40k universe where everything and their dog just wants to beat you with a piece of metal. They wanted big knights with big swords and shiny armour, so they made them. That's literally all there is to it.
jonnyt8524 NO WAY!!!!!!! My mind is blown ;) I will tell you a secret, but pssssst to everyone else... are you ready? all of 40k is made up. Nothing of it is real. ;) So thanks for repeating what I said before. In fictional universes there is a difference between reality and realism. Realism depends on the in-story explanations why the world is what it is and how you have to bend the real world to make it convincing (suspension of disbelief). While the meta is the real world influences. I really don't get why some people treat this as some sort of secret knowledge, that has to be shared. You can't judge a fictional universe on the basis of the real world. No fictional universe will hold up.
+hal lourious There's a difference between writing a fictional universe and giving its characters weapons and technology appropriate to their era w/e. And writing a story around characters, weapons and technology. 40k is over the top nonsense that' just meant to be fun and cool, that's it. Stop trying to justify the over the top sillyness with contrived rationale.
Hey i would like to thank you a lot Arch for the great answer! I have beeing asking myself that question and your answer take me to really interestings thoughts that made a lot of sence to me! Thank you! Love your videos and your great abbility to speak and show your passion for that fantastic world.
it is quite abwies that the tau have advanced in range warfare and try to stay out of melee combat just because the Tau body's physiology is very fragile compared to other races even compare to Eldar and Humans
+MrSupergambo i think you find that a mistake as yes the way the tau fight is from range and rarely fight in close combat willingly but there are a Independent tau entity called the Farsight enclave whos commander promotes the training of close combat and is a extremely adept leader in close combat commander farsight does not shy away from close combat with his special battle suit and his warp blade which gives him eternal life he encourages his followers to fight in close combat and he can take down the scariest things the mind can imagine All hail commander farsight!
it is as you say he doesn't shy away from close combat as long he has the battlesuit and blade without it he probably would try to do so because he is a tau and physically to fragile for melee combat even versus a human soldier it is the equipment that buys him the ability to go into melee combat and survive it and to train your troops in melee combat doesn't necessary means to deploy them in that art of warfare but it still raises the chances for your soldier to survive
MrSupergambo yes but compared to lets say the tau empire he would never shy from close combat and embrace it and initiate it. so i want to talk table top wise i had farsight with body guards in my army and he deep striked as normal. he then charged a imperial knight that was sitting right next to farsight after his unit survived a couple volleys from a battle cannon from the knight the knight killed every last body guard and it was just farsight vs a knight guess who won farsight did he is a extremely good close combat model but what am trying to say is he is not some fragile weak tau even without the suit on he would be quite powerful every one in the 40k universe thats good in melee generaly has very good armor so whats the difference between his suit and power armor they do pretty much the same thing and regarding the troops most of the troops in the farsight enclave are battle suits they pride themselves in swift and precise attacks and all of his army most of which are suits are extremely adept at fight close quarters so to note the farsight enclave are not like there brothers in the tau empire and take pride in there close combat doctrine.
'Very fragile' is an over statement. They are certainly much weaker then eldar but not that much weaker then a normal human. They suck at melee for sure but the range focus is also to do with their war philosophy of quick planned strikes and not holding ground but rather staying mobile. If they wanted to they could arm their crisis suits with power swords and wreak face so it's not just their physical disadvantage.
+Mr Sniffes compared to humans and elders which are also not known not to be the toughest bastards of the Warhammer 40k universe the tau are very fragile and arming their crisis suits with power swords that doesn't sounds really smart i mean why should you sacrifice your superior fire power for some limited close combat enhancement which is only available to crisis suits and even so that makes only the crisis suits better in melee combat what about the rest of your combat forces
if there is no melee combat in 40k then khorne would have to go into retirement.. how would khorne go into retirement if there is no retirement homes in the 40k universe.. so thats the answer.. the reason why there is melee in 40k is cause there is no retirement homes for khorne to go to and no one plans on building a retirement home for khorne anytime soon am i right.. now the true question is why would khorne have to go to a retirement home?.. i mean why not join the true retired senior citizens of the 40k universe, the Necrons? AAHAA answer that! well it could because they smell bad, ya know, since all the janitors were turned into pariahs and placed in coffins for a million years.. but then again khorne sits on a throne made out of a pile of bloody carcassas for christ sakes.. that must smell horrible.. not as bad as nurgle but still pretty bad..
Oh I remember in Dawn of War where smart about it you knew when to pick melee over range. Even use range troops sometimes is just better to tie up other side in melee to deprive them of any advantage they might get. Your example of Imperial Guard vs Space Marines is a pretty good one. That is a situation where I found is better just to force the Imperial Guard in to melee.
your vids a fantastic i thought i was alone obsessing over every tiny detail and how it functions, well presented well read and really informative ie i learned alot about titans i didnt know and now some answers to the questions non 40k ppl always ask bravo keep up the good work, one happy sub☺
+ Extremely fucking messy against flesh, have you ever seen how much wood a chainsaw shoots out in real life? Imagine that was all flesh and blood, yea you won't be able to see anything most likely.
Simple really, armor in the 40k universe is powerful enough to deflect multiple shots, which is why melee can be done. In the real world melee cannot be done because modern armor isn't strong enough to deflect a modern gun. This is why all melee became obsolete, muskets penetrated armor.
Yeah, they have armor that can deflect ammunition but also have literal power swords that cut through armor like butter. Basically their melee tech is more advanced than their ranged tech, kinda the opposite of the modern era.
We can't forget about those fucking Tyranids. Lord knows you want a chain sword when a brood of Genestealers comes knocking on your Baneblade. Rending claws, adrenal glands, and toxin sacks ughhh I'm having flash backs lol.
Using impractical weapons and tactics isn't really unrealistic. Advanced powers were still using Napoleonic line tactics (and bayonet charges) right up until World War 1.
+SlyBiffrons While they've certainly lost their usefulness as mass infantry tactics, small-scale bayonet charges are not unknown in modern warfare. Sometimes it's just because you run out of ammunition, but sometimes it's a variation on the points made in the video - if you have better training, morale, or numbers you can still get bogged down in a costly firefight, but if you can charge the enemy (and survive) you can force them to commit to the fight where you have the advantage or run away. Of course the other reason to have it is because the 40k rules don't make ranged combat especially interesting.
+SlyBiffrons They were still using bayonet charges because they hadn't adapted their tactics to account for the greater devastation caused by modern semi-automatic and automatic firearms.
The last bayonet charge in recorded history was in the year 2011. Yes, 2011. While not very common anymore, melee combat is very much still around these days, either because you're out of ammo, at REALLY, REALLY close range, or are just out of any other options. Hell, look at Vietnam; that kind of environment, there were cases of marines breaking their M-16's not out of the un-reliability at the time or just because, but they had broken them beating men to death with the stocks.
Two main reasons: Reason #1: Changes in the 4th and 5th and following edition rules of the Tabletop system greatly rewarded hand to hand combat over ranged combat. Reason #2: Vidya game designers just don't understand firearms (especially bolters), fireteam combat, and space marines in general; it's just a lot easier to give them a stick and nerf gun then have them run off and beat the other guy upside the head. (Edited for missed shift-enters, thanks google!)
Exactly. The bolters sounds so devastating in the lore and in the games that thing is like a normal fucking 5.45 and not the freakin 998. explosive launcher!
The funniest thing about the Bolter is that its ammunition would be extremely impractical due to it being, well, a full-auto rocket launcher. Considering how it's not even a conventional RPG styled rocket (AKA, the big ol' stereotypical RPG-7 when anyone says "Rocket Launcher") and is actually a gyrojet, an actual round that cost $200 USD apiece... But hey, 40k, what do I know?
I don't know why I'm watching this video. It is so obvious to me that melee combat is such an indispensable aspect of warfare and yet your voice and budding and fast growing taste for 40K lore have brought me here to listen to stuff i already know. Oh well I'm learning about the nitty gritty bits of the fluff so I'm happy.
I cant imagine taking someone out with a bayonet being silent unless your extremely skilled in unarmed combat and know the way to take someone down silently even if you took out the throat there would still be noise.
True it can not be complet silent but most of the sound can be muffled by you hand even more so if you are wearing cloves . though the best solution when it comes to CQC are the surprise.
+1stshockarmy My brother had a similar question once, but instead of WHY (because he knows the rule of cool) he asks "How could you expect a medieval looking sword gonna hack through armour?". Then I had to explain the CCW technology, after which he replied "that's overpowered"
I doubt they could do that, believe me I know it would be epic, but the problem is the size, and weapon teams, marines don't come in battalions of hundreds, they come in squads, and they don't have men over a thousand, a few of them do, and then you have to create different units in a single squad, such as having a Heavy Bolter/Meltagun/Flamer/etc. they have different stats, and different firing types, second marines follow modern tactics, they don't stay in rank and file and fire all at once, they separate and take cover. So you have to make it so that when taking fire they move to the closest piece of cover, third, you have to make different stats for the different weapons. And then the size of the maps, it either comes in to forms. Either campaigns use whole solar systems, where you have multiple planets, each with smaller regions or they use the whole bloody universe .Then you have to deal with the maps themselves, unless dwarves actually have under ground cities in TW:W then you
then you have to deal with sieges, how will they pull off an attack on a hive city where it is mostly corridor close quarter combat, and you have to deal with the units, how will you pull off Titans and mechs, when they have different combinations of weapons at the same time. And I could go on and on about this, but I believe you get the gist.
+Kfunderwood i dont think that could work i think fantasy is gonna be great but the 40k universe is too different they would have to add bolt guns magic vehicles flying vehicles and such but the biggest problem would be were would this be set in the 40k universe is Huge and there is no 1 world like warhammer i just cant see it working also license wise the reason CA are being able to make this is because gw sold the license because they sold all there warhammer fantasy battles stuff and made AOS so i doubt they will let CA make total war 40k
+charlie otero I don't see why guns or magic would be the problem since they are already doing it, it would be all the different types of guns that would be the problem.
I was talking bout the tau's as a tau with railgun I would not go into melee But I am not tau I represent Chaos Undivided! and would swing my blood thirsty axe to any Ultra Marines with great fury!
Piet Andersen Yes, communist China. Many have the religion tauism. Not Japan. Closest thing to samurai is probably the Dark Eldar Lhamaean. Though the Imperium is very similar to Imperial Japan too actually.
Really like your vids. You explain alot of this complicated lore very well. The sound is very low on these vids, not sure if you can but would like it to be louder. Really need to crank you up when i watch.
Oh I think is a bit unfair to compare long range rifles and Artillery with melee. They fill different roles. I am guessing that people that object to melee in 40k object to it more as there guns today that do close range combat pretty darn well. Carbines, SMGs, Pistols and so on. That is what Melee is competing with in general. Weapons that are meant to handle close range combat. Of course Rule of Cool triumph that. And in the Warhammer 40k universe there are some explanations for melee that are pretty logical for the universe it self. Not to mention that even in our modern world we still see melee combat from time to time. Even if it has become increasingly rare. But I can also see why some would view it as a bit weird or anachronistic. (Though the anachronism is part of the charm of Warhammer 40k I say! It is meant to be a universe stuck in the past.)
+Cythil Fancy armor and advanced technology ain't gonna help you if the enemy is bashing your brains out with a rock or club. That is why every army still issues melee weapons to its troops.
Frank G Well there is a reason why the Americans in the Philippines (back when it was a US colony) got high calibre handguns. What is issued is generally Knifes and Trench tool. These are not primarily made for hand to hand combat though of course can be used for that to.
Cythil When you are fighting in a confined space like a bunker or the poorly lit hallway of an abandoned house, your chances of survival are higher if you use a melee weapon than a gun.
cant wait for the long ass 40k stuff, you have bitten of a lot in this situation arch, love the casts and love WH lore. lovely English pronunciation as well. also what would be your fav faction from WH40k? im keeping a record of humanity before the Necrons rise. as they will.
Nice vid! I think that there are three main reasons there is still melee in W40K: 1. When you are attacked by tyranids, you are shooting at them, but then, in melee, the Imperial guard will be destroyed rapidly (see Starship Troopers). 2. Melee is used in W40K because of the "mythological" aspect of the battles: Elves (Eldars), Orcs... Uses also melee weapons, the Holy Imperium against evil... 3. It looks cool and badass! ;)
Thing is, they are barely if ever used, especially so if it came down to a conventional war today. This goes back to what he says about weaponry today surpassing the protection soldiers can receive, since assault rifles will kill practically everyone even if they're wearing Kevlar, there is no need for melee combat in the first place. There's a reason why the US Army doesn't train soldiers in use of bayonets anymore... they only train them in the use of their knife IF their firearm is taken off them. Same even applies to Army Rangers, whose form of "melee" combat pretty much just involves throwing the enemy on the floor so that you can shoot them more safely.
kill4money213 right on the money, buddy of mine is in the army reserves and he was telling us at work about how they train them to use a knife and even the direction and angle that they are trained to thrust at. In a nutshell hes like either his rifle or his side arm will have enough rounds to kill anything that moves at a distance.
Hi arch, love your lore vids, but I've got a couple of requests... Could you put text over the pics just describing what we're seeing? Also would love to see a vid about the primarchs! Keep up the good work :)
+jpala821 Same for Imperial Guard. Or the Necrons; they might usually not have as much range as some others but they can blast absolutely everything to pieces with their bazillions of gauss weapons.
+Faridah Malik Hahaha, Imperial ranged weapons not being underpowered. Comic gold. "We are the Guard. We have many mottos, but none we feel are worth sharing. Like our combat style, our motto production was much more about quantity than quality. Speaking of which, where are all your friends? Sixty to one seems a little unfair, even for us..."
HeliosKitty A common lasgun can cut an adult in half with a single salvo, this is canon. The IG is merely overshadowed by machine guns that shoot microrockets, guns that fire green lightning that evaporates you, guns that fire miniature shurikens in swarms, guns that fire live maggots, guns that fire miniature black holes and many more.
Faridah Malik And if unenhanced humans were a significant part of the threats the Imperium faced, that might matter. They aren't. Unenhanced humans are leagues weaker than pretty much everything they might be up against. What cuts a member of the Imperial Guard in half needs to be fired in salvos of dozens just to substantially wound even the foot soldiers of other races. I suppose I wasn't really thinking about it in terms of their tanks and such, but even those are regularly outdone by most competing species, so the term "underpowered" still applies.
if you EVER used a CHAINSAW to cut things (which you don't, obviously), you would know that it's a pain in the ass to even cut a tree - even though chainsaw was developed for this very purpose. And tree is stationary object. I'm not even going into the other stuff :D I mean, chainsaw as weapon looks cool, I'll give you that. But it's the most stupid, uncomfortable, and impractical idea, to use it as one. For example, even if you cutting a tree, if you don't hold it completely steady and straight,, the chain will fall from it's socket/place. Also, if you don't hold, adjust the chainsaw correctly while cutting a tree, there is a good chance that your chain will get stuck, and if you don't pay attention, you could actually very easily break the damn thing. The chain itself, aspecially the teeth, are fragile as fuck. My point is, even when cutting a tree (which is the MAIN reason for chainsaw), you have to pay attention and know what you're doing. Otherwise you will just break the damn thing. So how do you expect to use it on a moving metal object? If you don't believe me or common sense, watch how man at arms tried to create chainsaw from warhammer :D Especially in the end when they tried to cut a lemonade bottle and ended up splashing themselves :D Chainsaw weapons are cool concept I agree, but it's viable only in fiction. Anyone who says otherwise, probably never had one, or is lying :D
I do see what you are saying, but at the same time at CQB range most people would not drop their battle rifles and stab people. This whole idea of there being reason for hand to hand is based on wish fulfillment and the rule of cool. You need to make this more clear and stop making excuses. Warhammer 40k is a power fantasy at its heart. That's all it has ever been. I love 40k. I just accept what it is.
The mathematics of what you are suggesting doesn't make sense. Hand to hand weapons will always I think exist, but at the same time it would almost always be better to use a sidearm than a sword because of the amount of energy transferred. Just love what 40k is man. It doesn't make sense, and that's fine.
+David Eno What are your thoughts on the use of judo to take down fully armored samurai as the katana could not cut through the armor. Same for the misericorde and knights etc. Suppose armor gets to the point where a sidearm could not penetrate. Would a soldier be better off trying to get a a shot in under a joint, or with a cutting edge? (Actually the correct answer would be C, use a damn rock/blunt object and knock his ass out, but you get where I was going) This all being said. Melee is not obsolete in the sense that it not not advantage. In fact, the ability to do so i think ironically is the mark of being futuristic. I say this as many people question melee not as a matter of ability as you do mention, but as a practicality of war.
+katthedemon As armor advances so do arms. If an advanced standard issue armor system is created, advanced standard issue firearms will also be created to defeat that armor with as little rounds as possible (preferably with one round, not 15 like in GoW or Halo).
burneden This is a very indulgent view. Basically, Melee is *almost* useless. There will of course be some rare situations were it might be used as a last resort, but the idea of a rock being used instead of a bullet is stupid. A better bullet for the task would just be designed. As to the idea of Judo. It's a compelling idea that forgets that Judo was designed by people who didn't have access to weapons. That was the actual history of martial arts. People developing techniques for defense in a location where having weapons was illegal.
+David Eno one important point you dont seem to have considered is the sheer number of enemies that any 1 unit of Space marines or guardsmen will come up against, since the majority of their enemies favour huge massed wave attacks with countless numbers of infantry ie orks and tyranids, this actually makes having melee weapons essential for when the inevitable happens and they run out of ammunition or the sheer weight of numbers overwhelms them, this is nothing to do with the rule of cool and more to do with common sense, melee weapons are a must in this universe the same as they will always be a must in the real world as a back up and weapon of last resort to defend yourself...
You should have just stuck with the "it's cool" explanation, instead of trying to articulate and explanation from the lore. Better thing would have been to give your audience the context when the game was made, and it's influences, and who the game's community consisted of. Maybe if you told your friends it's 40k is the result of putting a fantasy game in a science fiction setting, and the swords something that was cool that the community liked that was kept (at one point there were even space dwarves...)
Hey mate, great vid, one thing that may help ur vids is to put images of wat ur speaking of in when ur speaking of them, for those new to this, I'm a massive fanboy of 40k so I can put images to what your saying. Either way man figured I'd give a tip, dunno if anyone else thinks the same
There is absolutely no possible way you can legitimize anything in Warhammer. At all. It is all nonsense and stupidity, bred out of 12 year olds with the ability to paint.
Roman Stenzel They put spikes on swords... spikes... on swords... what kind of fool puts spikes on swords? Let alone armor.... and why does the armor look like they over turned an entire continent to get the ore for a single pauldron? It looks more like a Minecraft project on a server ran by a 6 year old, than a fantasy game with millions of followers.
Sherlock Holmes It's quite epic in scale, spiked weapons are not uncommon, spiked swords I will admit are not as common, and usually stand in the more obscure side of warfare. I love how wasteful the Emperium of man look, there culture is obviously heavily inspired by the Romans and architecturally inspired by Gothicism and incredibly wasteful. They dress there more important soldiers with religious propaganda, and are adorned with more obscure, but specific items. These are a people who would annihilate a planet if given the order, you have to understand that the proportions of the 40k universe are ridiculous, they are dramatic. Though in their complete defense, I don't know of any 12 year old of this generation that could come up with something like the 40k universe, I don't know how much lore you've read, but it's quite an impressive amount of work.
Back in 2nd edition I usually found myself shooting more, but using models like my Wolf Lord (terminator armour, thunder hammer, storm shield) and Wolf Guard in terminator armour (lightning claws) if I needed a melee presence. The Grey Hunters generally did more damage with bolters and special weapons. Armour save modifiers meant that even Space Marines could die to bolter fire.
I like that you touched on perhaps the most common reason (Lore wise, by sheer numbers) I can think of for melee in 40k, and judging form the comments section here was wholly overlooked by most. Simply that a lot of melee happens because that's all they know. I mean for Orks? Well, Orks are crappy shots anyway, and most Feral Orks have barely progressed above the tech levels of "Rock and Stick", after all. Even "Evolved" Orks generally haven't progressed beyond that level. But looking at the Imperial Guard. Sure you got regiments like the Elysians and the Kasrkin who are hardcore badass Technological Warriors decked out in the best equipment that the Imperium can afford to give them, and they fight with their gadgets as they should... but then you have regiments like the Atillian Rough Riders who come from a world where Horse and Lance are the epitome of warfare... and that's what they bring to the battlefield. Almost every world in the lore will contribute something to the Imperium, and that 'Something' usually includes a tithe of warriors for the Imperial Guard. And it's not like it's just a FEW worlds in the Imperium that are Feral Backwaters. Heck if you look at detailed breakdowns of some sectors it seems closer to 25% if not higher are feral backwaters where the height of technology might be "The Rock" again or maaaaybe Black Powder Muskets and Plate Armor at the high end. In true military tradition "Well we'll find a use for you". If the Regiment you got tithed for a Crusade is filled with cavemen wearing furs and using stone axes? Well you'll get a Cleric to whip them into a frenzy of hatred and find a battlefield to throw them in as shock troops. They might get slaughtered. Heck they probably WILL get slaughtered. But if they don't? Well a bunch of frenzied barbarians with Axes to the Face tends to break up orderly battleplans and formations. Worst case scenario and they die horribly? Well every moment they're spending on Captain Expendable and his Mooks over there are moments they're NOT spending on Catachan Commandos sneaking up and planting Demo Charges all over. Or Iron Guard giving disciplined ranked fire of devastation, or Kasrkin breaking enemy resistance with precision fighting and hellgun volleys, or Vindicare Assassins taking pot shots at enemy leaders and one shotting tanks, etc. It's the Imperium. Life is cheap. You have to realize you're trying to think of a universe where literally a Lasgun is worth FAR more than the Guardsman who carries it. You have many, many times more Guardsmen than Lasguns out there in the Imperium. And the Lasgun is after all the most numerous weapon in the Galaxy by far (Well, ranged, probably "The knife" is actually the most numerous). We're not really talking about a universe that follows the rules of war as we think of them in the modern day. The Imperium fights more (If you could make any comparison really) to Soviet Russia circa World War II. Throw men at it until It no longer exists. Giving the new recruits equipment? Pssh, they can loot whatever, or just take whatever they came with to battle. Just make sure the Political Officer is there to execute them if they are cowards in the face of not being equipped, or try anything too heretical. Contrary to the modern militaries of our world, where often a soldier has an estimated value (In training, etc) of hundreds of thousands of dollars on the low end, and his gun is worth a couple of hundred. The soldier is far more valuable. You try to protect them. You try to keep them out of unnecessary risks. You can get more grenades, get more guns, etc. You wouldn't throw a soldier into a "Almost assuredly suicidal" action. In the Imperium? Who cares about the Guardsmen? We got billions more of those up in orbit. Grab his lasgun though, next guy needs it. As well, feeding on it. As far as I can tell the Imperium is not Industrialized, as we'd think of it. This sounds weird since they literally have "Forge Worlds". But as far as I can tell from the Lore (And I do accept this might be mistaken), most technology that is created is more of a cottage industry level of creation. When a suit of Space Marine Power Armor is created it's the work of a single artisan who works on it from creating the ceramite, shaping and molding it, to working in the power cabling and fiber bundles, to finishing up the optics, etc. We see evidence of this in say, when they talk about the Salamanders Chapter who all create and maintain their own gear. As well as the few glimpses I've seen of Forge Worlds in Lore. It's why a Forge World might crank out as few as 2-3 Super Heavy Tanks per year, instead of millions of them. Each one is basically the singular creation of a senior Magos steeped in the knowledge necessary, with some assistance from his apprentices, rather than an industrialized, assembly line, mass production factory. When the industrial complex that supports your military functions like that? Well you have the situation where Gear is more valuable than Man, you can throw away men, etc. Or heck, literally just don't have enough gear to give the half trained savages some lasgun that they'd probably just use as a club anyway, so might as well let them use an actual club they picked up off the ground.
"Why does melee exist?"
Because it doesn't need ammunition.
And when you're fighting Orks, Tyranids or Chaos, you don't have enough ammunition.
***** Well Chaos doesn't generally do shit outside of warp or Eye of Terror unless one of the gods is bored enough to send out few deamons in the Imperium worlds, and that is the primary way that Chaos attacks, or rather annoys Imperium.
Chaos infiltrates and possesses key figures on Imperial worlds thus turning near entire population and it's garrison into it's own fighting force, effectively propagating more infighting if you were an outside observer.
Imperium of Man's fighting force is generally made out of Guardsmen and any nearby available Space Marine chapter and those are sent into the fray(Lets ignore Exterminatus exists, and chaos completely corrupted some world).
Chaos on the other hand has literary anything capable of even smallest amount of sentient thought(so anything with a brain), police, garrison guardsmen(and any present SM chapter), civilian workforce, old people, children, cats, dogs and what-not, wildlife and it ends up with a give or take a few million soldiers fighting a mindless deamonic horde numbering in billions.
And I'm trying to keep it short here.
***** Well Imperium does outnumber Chaos demons in pure numbers, there's a LOT of more humans in material realm than there are demons, or possessed people(The ones with actual demon inside them, not the one that jack off with barbed wire[not mutually exclusive]) in the entire galaxy, that's even including Eye of Terror, and Eye is basically Warp.
Like I said, majority, if not nearly all of forces fighting under banner of Chaos are just other corrupted humans.
When the imperium shows up they typically bring a lot of folks aha. It all really depends, local pdf units during an incursion or planet wide conversion. Will be boot strapped as all hell, a few regiments being sent in to deal with such may well be out manned as well. But when the imps show up with a full combat force the numbers are not low.
I'm not sure I buy that argument. They have entire worlds dedicated to the production of goods and materials. They have billions of soldiers in the Imperial guard and must have 100x that in munitions to supply such a force. Not to mention that ammunition is not just a one for one thing. One well placed artillery shell can take out a dozen enemy combatants, and the same can be true to much greater degrees with higher yield explosives and shit. On top of all that, if the argument that "there isn't enough" is applicable here, why isn't it applicable in regards to lives? millions of soldiers die constantly and yet there are always millions more ready to take their places. So there is a near infinite number of lives available but a finite amount of ammunition?
To be honest, I don't think there is a good reason for why melee is present in 40k. I think the people who developed the universe, just included it to help diversify the combat. Which is fine, I don't see why we need to try and make it logical why they use melee. There a lot of things about 40k that aren't remotely logical, yet they don't detract from the compelling nature of the universe.
Omega172 If you want to simplify it then melee for Imperium exists because it's needed as a counter to melee fighting aliens and demons, not really smart to be a fully ranged army if the enemy can burst into your lines and wreak havoc because you can't fight back, and if you do you just shoot your own comrades.
Like that one fight between Tau and Anti-Tau crusade when Imperial ships simply charged in between range focused Tau ships and tore them apart.
Why is melee viable in 40k? Simple, the orks believe it to be viable. WAAAAGGH!
The truth... The truth has been spoken!
+Sam T Also; Tyranids are quick...
+Sam T Yeah, this is the basic truth of it. The Orcs and Chaos like fighting in melee because they're nuts, and the Tyranids like it because their weapons are biological. As such, other armies also need melee.
+Randygandalf95 puny little wretches, surpass your biological disadvantage or surrender. we will reclaim the galaxy as it once was ours to be. (Crons ftw)
btw: nothing compares to the warscythe (if it wasnt for the goddamn ini 2)
ictaris Hey man, as a Necron player myself I can say that I don't think we would have dedicated melee troops and those axe bayonet things if the Krork weren't around.
I think the thing that keeps most people away from 40K is the price
Azzalack same
Azzalack Dawn of War is good.
Still less expensive then people make it out to be. play the video games, RPG, or just learn the lore if you cant play.
And the sheer dumbassery that is Games Workshop.
alot of people find the humans boring and overpowered, or find orks with guns in space stupid
Why melee is a valid fighting option in 40K ?
Because Orks believe to be so.
oohhhhhhh
GOD DAMN IT OF COURSE SOMEBODY SAYS IT!!!
Deeze boyz get it
Well you can think as you want, but in star wars, there is melee with jedi, and not everyone is shitting on it. Warhammer 40K is universe means to be bloody as hell. What do you want to do with your gun if you doesn't have any ammunition left? It's not stupid, it's logic, really logic, and it means to be like this. How do you want to stop Orks? with a little "pew pew gun"? no seriously, if you figth ork, tyrannids, EVEN Daemons, the weapons the more effective will be the melee weapons. (For the deamons, it's say in the lore that Daemons are more weak to sword than to "pew pew guns" like tau weapons or imperial soldier classic lasgun. (i'm french, so sorry for the bad english that i have)
you kidding? people mock the melee in star wars al the time. also it's just the space wizard that have the swords, normal soldiers have guns, and when they fight with something other than lazers they are fighting a space wizard
To say *"drive me closer, I want to hit them with my sword"*
MyViolador or ta sayz "WAAAAAAAGH!!!"
Ah 40K were nothing makes sense yet makes sense at the same time 😆
WAAAAAAAAGGHHHHHH
"why is there melee"
Because melee weapons are metal as fuck, And wh40k is basically the cover of every metal album given form.
Wurm Made manifest. The cover of every metal album made manifest.
Bolt thrower
@@eviltwinzak Yeah that sounds way better. Wish I woulda seen this reply 3 years sooner
Reasons to use melee in the future:
1) the enemy rushes you and gets too close for you to aim your super high-tech raygun
2) your super high-tech raygun overheats, runs out of power, or breaks
3) when you do end up in melee, the guy who's ready for it is going to kill the guy who's still trying to fix his raygun
Three years late but you basically described the problem of the Tau.
"high-tech raygun"
Where are these weapons, all we have on the frontlines is flashlights.
@@scotcheggable they're with the tau
1) a pistol is better at any distance than an axe, spear, sword or whatever
2) bring a sidearm instead of a huge fuckoff axe, retard
3) repeat after me: SIDE-ARM
The key: protection is better than weaponry.
Back in the middle ages, and before, heavily armored infantry simply could not be reliably defeated by arrows (or slings). The epitome of this is the knight, who gave no fucks about SOME arrows. Until somebody came up with ranged weapons that pierced armor; crossbows, etc.
Then, guns. Guns turned the tables completely. That, once and for all, made infantry armor useless.
Now imagine armor catches up again, to once again stand up well to ranged attacks.
40k.
+Nicholas Ogburn Its less it catches up and more it leaps ahead considering that a standard imperial guard las-gun cannot penetrate Space Marine armour
+deamongimli not unless you spam the damn things a hundred fold
deamongimli
You just derped hard.
deamongimli You mean Plasma guns, right?
Windra dyne +Mash Bash I haven't played WH40K in like.... 3 years :) I just remembered that exploding and jamming weapons was a frequent problem
I didn't know, that it takes 17 minutes to say:"Because it looks cool".
+Debaucheerful there are one ot two other reasons for melee
+Arch Warhammer
Yes, I am familiar with them. It still feels, like WH40k lore is a result of melee combat aesthetics , rather then melee combat being result of lore.
+Debaucheerful I must second this. The arguments presented in this video, pertaining to the "necessity" of melee in our modern world - today - have their shaky foundations built upon very thin ice. Is it possible that a modern day soldier gets into melee? Sure it is. But let's forget what is *possible* for a moment and concentrate on what is *probable*. Nothing shows how negligibly low we estimate the probability for melee to ensue on a modern battlefield, better than how we choose to spend our defense budgets and how we choose to equip and train our soldiers. In the late middle ages and in the Renaissance we had a wealth of technical literature on close combat: armed, unarmed on foot and mounted using a variety of cleverly designed implements trying to bypass equally cleverly designed protection. In just 3 short centuries from the 1450's to the 1750's, as handguns and gunpowder artillery became ever more potent and refined, the skills for melee, the tools we used in melee and the literature for using them got ever more sparse, less complex and less relevant until we were left with only a couple of melee weapons used by a far smaller fraction of soldiers than before to standards of skill nowhere near as high as during, say, the early Renaissance. What percentage of the world's defense budgets actually go into equipping and training soldiers for melee today? The ww-1 "artillery isn't that great" argument is just ridiculous. While it might have partially applied to ww-1 conditions, only 25 years later, the world was a very different place. Just look at how the Germans who got hammered into dust in Russia and northern France by the brute force of massed batteries. And today? Well...
I could go on arguing about how little sense the arguments from the lore itself make sense, but that would inflate this comment beyond anything reasonable. Let's just say this much: What is to stop an engineer from implementing the same destructive technology that supposedly make melee weapons in 40k "valid", into handguns and artillery? The argument "it's in the game because it looks cool and provides more gameplay variety" is good enough for me. Trying to go one step further and present it as a viable "real-world" thing is like trying to ice-skate up the hill.
Actually, in modern conflicts like the Western forces in Iraq and Afghanistan where you move among civilians, fight insurgents, man checkpoints etc hand to hand combat have seen a bit of an renaissance. Being ambushed or jumped or just needing to restrain frightened civilians have made hand to hand skills more important.
+Andy Wilderness I never said that hand to hand was the most important part of combat in Iraq and Afghanistan. I said that it has become more important. I base this on the article "Hand-to-Hand Combat and the Use of Combatives Skills: An Analysis of United States Army Post Combat Surveys from 2004-2008" by Jensen, Peter, R.
I will give you the abstract
Despite technological advances, hand-to-hand combat remains a persistent aspect of the contemporary
operating environment (Wojadkowski, 2007). To develop a more detailed understanding on the use of
hand-to-hand combat, the researcher analyzed 30 Post-Combat Surveys administered to US Army Soldiers
from 2004 to 2008 after their return from deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan. 216 out of 1,226 Soldiers
(19.0%) reported using hand-to-hand combat skills in at least one encounter. The Soldiers descriptions
indicated that hand-to-hand combat occurred in a variety of tactical situations and that the most common
skills employed were grappling techniques (72.6%), followed by the use of weapons (e.g., rifle butt strikes;
21.9%); with striking as the least reported skill (i.e., punching and kicking; 5.5%). These results further
reinforce that hand-to-hand combat remains a relevant demand and the US Army should continue such
training with an emphasis on grappling skills practiced across a variety of performance settings.
we tried to bombard Iwo Jima. we turned the entire island into rubble, and still had to go into the tunnels and fight hand to hand. so i agree no matter how advanced anyone is, melee will always play a part.
More because the US was impatient than anything else tbh.
@@laurie1183 Japan has proven they are very stubborn foes.
If you're gonna die, then you might as well buy as much time and do as much damage to the enemy as possible.
@@VaSoapman that was the idea
@Aniquin Iwo Jima is months after Pearl Harbour. Even then, the only reason the US didn't use gas there is because your politicians intervened to stop it.
6:16 That moment when a soldier is thinking: "Hey, they are taking a picture of the fight, let's turn around and smile at the camera." ... all while they are being overrun by a swarm of Tyranids...
It’s 40k,what did you expect ?
If armour permits troops closing in, there will be melee where there is forward movement.
The same is true with modern day jet fighters. They may have missiles, but if they miss they end up dogfighting with cannons. There. Explained. And it's cool.
+Grabaka Sennin "but if they miss they end up dog-fighting with cannons";. Jet fighters are equipped with cannons instead of swords, cannons are guns, therefore your argument proves that guns trump swords. QED.
GeorgeMonet Yes, but if you had half a brain you would realise it's about distance.
When one distance fails, the nature of combat is forward motion, thus you end up in closer distance.
I do congratulate you captain obvious on pointing out to me that cannons are not ,melee weapons, but I want to point out that maybe you haven't thought this trough..
+GeorgeMonet Yes, because if an aircraft tries to engage in "melee combat" (AKA ramming) its going to effectively wreck the aircraft, or outright destroy it... Ultimately though two jets or props or whatever fighting it out with guns/cannons is an extremely similar concept to two humans fighting it out in hand to hand.
Katherine Winyala No it is not, but the concept of a new zone where closer combat occurs is. The nature of both things is the same. If you cannot grasp this I cannot help you.
Grabaka Sennin I more or less just said the exact same thing, worded differently. The guns on a fighter are the equivalent of a knife or whatever melee weapon a soldier may be carrying on them. They're what one uses once they end up in extreme close quarters. There's a reason why a dogfight is occasionally referred to as a "knife fight" after all.
So when chaos hits a planet everyone pretty much goes full on Stalingrad
In the imperial guard , Stalingrad is called Tuesday :)
Valerius Wolf in the imperial guard,every day is Tuesday
James.T .Adams
It's the imperial gaurd, the only day is Tuesday
in the grim dark world of the dark grim future of grim darkness, there is only tuesday.
@@scar445 Because someone has to mention it...
Taco Tuesday.
#JoinTheDornianHeresy
Melee has never left the battlefield and will always be a part of armed conflict. As the saying goes, "When the gun runs dry, use the stock. When the stock breaks, use your knife. When your knife breaks, use you fists. When your fists break, use you teeth."
...When you lose all your limbs, you call it a draw.
imagine going into melee in the 21st century. only barbarians use melee instead of just bringing down the entire structure with a tank.
Soldier with no teeth: Gueth I’ll die.
When your teeth break there is always another man to take your place.
@@theblancmange1265 'tis but a flesh wound.
- Black Knight
I think that the reason for melee in 40k is best explained by the God Emperor himself in the fifteenth episode of "If the Emperor had a Text-to-Speech Device" when he learns of the Tau preference for ranged combat. "That. Is. ABSOLUTELY DISGRACEFUL! [...] HOW CAN THEY NOT FIGHT IN GLORIOUS HAND-TO-HAND, FACE-TO-FACE COMBAT WITH THEIR ADVERSARIES, LIKE ALL TRUE CHAMPIONS OF THE BATTLEFIELD DO? [...] OHMYSWEETMISSINGLEFTHANDTHATWASONCEUSEDFORGREATERTHINGS! [...] THIS REVELATION FILLS ME WITH MORE DISGUST AND SPITE THAN A SISTER OF SILENCE BEING THROWN INTO A PILE OF FEEDING TENDRILS! [...] I CANNOT WILLINGLY ASSOCIATE MYSELF WITH SUCH DISHONOURABLE CREATURES! IF THEY WANT TO JOIN THE IMPERIUM OF MAN, THEY BETTER BRING SOME FUCKING CHAIN-KATANAS OR SOMETHING." So, if you don't fight in melee in 40k you have no right to call yourself a warrior, a soldier or even a man. If someone is put off by melee in 40k they shouldn't even be looking at it in the first place for they are not worthy (if the Emperor said it, it must be true).
Agreed, I loved that episode
+kingkong381 Must've been high that day, when aliens are mentioned he usually just says "PURGE THE XENOS!". Then again Trump has been toning down his rhetoric a bit... Its funny how some still don't get he's the Emperor.
dIRECT0R The Emperor was a militant atheist, correct me if I'm wrong but isn't Trump religious? Also the Emperor sought to unite the human race in a single regime (and quite a diverse one considering the wide array of cultures that different Imperial worlds represent). The fact that the Crimson Fists chapter are Spanish and the Tallarn Desert Raiders are all Middle Eastern would probably give Trump an aneurism since he seeks to divide humanity. Also in the same TTS episode the Emperor explains that he doesn't have a problem with aliens living within the Imperium so long as they are under human control, all the religious stuff and extreme xenophobia happened to the Imperium after he was interred on the Golden Throne and thus couldn't run it as he would have (the whole TTS series is just him being updated on the Imperium's history over the last 10000 years and raging at humanity's incompetence). Furthermore, Trump hasn't got an ounce of charisma in his rancid, bloated carcass whereas the Emperor is famously charismatic and persuasive. To quote a Horus Heresy short story by Dan Abnett (The Lightning Tower):
"It was said that once you had seen him, or heard him speak, you were never in doubt again. He was the one, and had always been the one. He had been the Emperor long before there was any such office to take. No one knew his birth name because he had always, naturally, been the Emperor."
+kingkong381 Oh come on - _he's in disguise, obviously._ How do you think he went hidden all those millenia? Kind of like a Super Saiyan, trump is hiding his Full Power. Religious? Come on - _he's lying,_ look at him. I for one perceived at first glance, and was never in doubt thenceforward.
+John Trent Gaze upon the proof, ye doubtful!
img.4plebs.org/boards/pol/thumb/1438/41/1438410848133s.jpg
If our Emperor doesn't wish to get his hands dirty, it can only be for fear of destroying all dirt in the universe!
There is a VERY good reason for melee weapons in the 40k universe and you are missing it completely. High rate of fire armor piercing rounds and huge explosions are not good inside of space ships especially near the hull or power sources. A flamethrower in a sealed container is a bad idea also. They aren't called SPACE Marines for nothing.
That's not a huge issue actually since Space Marines don't really miss. They have to miss on table top or the game wouldn't be any fun, but lore wise they're utterly overpowered. This covers it pretty well. czcams.com/video/CMGRa4_UjE4/video.html
Also there's no way in hell you're going to so much as scratch a combat ship's hull with a boltgun. Maybe with a melta gun, some time, and a death wish. But otherwise you're not getting through it.
Ok so that may cover some what the soldiers designed to fight exclusively on space ships, but most of the focus in 40k is not that limited. Also there are already today theories for projectile weapons that could work on a space ship and not puncture the hull, like weapons firing concentrated bursts of heat (ie PPG’s from Babylon 5).
The answer to "why melee" is fairly obvious. The reasons why melele disappeared with XXth century weapons are that humans:
1. Don't want to die and can therefore be suppressed, shell shocked, mentally broken.
2. As Arch mentioned humans are a finite resource, and the money investment into training and outfitting a soldier make it a bad idea to waste them.
3. Humans are also very vulnerable, and you don't need that much to put them out of the battle, and the whole way we modern militaries approach war reflects that. Any projectile hit will likely put a soldier out of combat and into hospital. A nearby explosion may knock a person out cold with the air blast alone, without direct damage etc.
In WH40k all these rules are thrown away. The universe is filled with races which are much tougher than humans (orks, necrons to even begin), and who will consider a missing arm to be "just a flesh wound". Many of these aliens simply cannot be suppressed (or scared, or broken) easily, either because their culture does not put any value to deaths of their allies (orks), or they have no concept of fear (demons), or that they are sincapable of feeling fear (tyranids). And finally, many factions do not require much to outfit a fighter, like tyranids, who cap pop a hundred new ones for every one killed, making their numbers basically not a limiting factor.
We still have melee in modern war. It's not gone. But the main reason it's in 40K from a tactical perspective is because the chance of a well armed human being able to win in a melee against a space marine is zero whereas the chance of a well armed human being being able to win in a ranged fight is slightly above zero.
@@laurie1183 It is not about mortal's chances against an Astarte, man. It is about the fact that he will find himself sooner or later in a position where he will have to engage in melee, usually not willingly.
@@kronos661 Dude half of the space marine range is pure melee and there are entire chapters who are obsessed with getting into melee. There are exceptions but more space marines will want into melee than out of it by a huge number.
@@kronos661
Yeah, even at 5ft distance a pistol is infinitely better than a fucking sword, lol.
@@laurie1183
That's nowhere near a point I've made. As I SAID it's not about astartes, it's about mortals and what they face. Cultists, tyranids, orks and more. Not to mention goddamned daemons that are easier to kill with a sharpened piece of metal than lasgun despite it's undisputed advantage in everything due to blades having more "weight" in the warp.
Overlord rule number 150: I will provide funding and research to develop tactical and strategic weapons covering a full range of needs so my choices are not limited to "hand to hand combat with swords" and "blow up the planet".
Ever watched a match Imperial Guard vs Tau?
That's why there is melee.
Because even in the Grimdarkness of the 41st millennium, there is only glorious melee combat.
+Spyder3107
Except the Tau the most dishonorable race of them all!
+wilson ribeiro filho Don't you DARE to disrespect the mighty weaboo space communists! Not doing meelee is for THE GREATER GOOD!
+1stshockarmy purge the heretic!!!!!!!
+Sadistic Spece Marine reads all the comments above me and dies of laughter ^ but not before uttering "indeed my brother."
Sometimes, its easier to just stab that bloody warp spider in the face instead of trying to shoot it down.
***** Artilley is useless if you are standing right next to the artillery batteries, and with deep striking, teleporting and jump pack assaulting astartes, you may very well be looking at that scenario. Besides, there are enemies in 40k that are a lot more resistant to ranged attacks (some daemonic threats, for instance, will be more easy to dispatch with a force melee weapon like a nemesis halberd than with bolters), not to mention the scale of battles in that universe can mean you will run out of bullets, but your melee weapons will keep going.
Besides, there is a lot of shock value to a group of astartes going medieval against you in close combat.
Let us also not forget that astartes don't fight only in open battlefields. They also fight in the packed corridors of Space Hulks, for example, and there is merit in carrying a good and reliable melee weapon in that scenario.
***** "i dunno blow up a couple holes in the ship."
That doesn't work very well when you want to salvage the darn thing.
"The answer for jet packs is air defense artillery"
I actually meant Jump Packs instead of jet packs. They are just used to cover ground horizontally and get over natural barriers easily, as well as a way to land right in the middle of enemy armies and disrupt them from the inside.
Also, you are thinking in terms of every army being fully prepared for all threats that might come their way, when in truth, most armies in the 40k universe are a ramshackle of whatever they manage to get their hands on.
And your modern warfare analysis doesn't really take into account the realities of warfare in the 40k world. Real world armies never had to fight constantly adapting giant bug things with bio weapons, for one.
***** Space Marines are just a tiny portion of the Imperium's military strenght. Their purpose is not just to be a slab of metal - they also have many other qualities such as inhuman endurance and more importantly, absolutely no fear - something important when you fight against literal gods. They are also extremely versatile. A Space Marine can be outfitted with any sort of weapon configuration depending on the job since they are trained with all of them. But the bulk of the Imperium is held by flashlight wielding humans exactly because they don't really have the resources to spend making a mass of vehicles.
A tankette would be much bulkier than a Space Marine, would not be able to be deep striked or teleported, would require human controllers that aren't as resilient as Space Marines and wouldn't really offer much protection since, in 40k, bolters or worse are more or less standard, and vehicles with armor too light is just going to be ripped to shreds.
I also highly doubt such a vehicle would offer better protection than what a highly mobile Space Marine packs, considering not only do they have state of the art amor, but they also have armor implanted on their bodies, which also happen to be more capable of absorbing damage than regular humans. In 40k, you can see various instances of the Space Marines detachments complaining about how slow the human auxilia would be to catch up to their marching speed.
As for eye tracking software, I doubt Imperium would be able to spare it for such a lightly armored and easily destroyed vehicle.
The reason you dont see mechanization on such level is simple - the most abundant resources in the Imperium are baseline humans, and making lasguns for them incredibly cheap. Since they are somewhat reliable and they have potentially infinite ammo, they are the backbone of the Imperial Guard.
***** Autism is not an insult. It's a powerful weapon.
People too often think of the dominance of firearms over melee weapons to be simple matter of technological progression. The truth is that guns (gradually) made armor obsolete, which led to an emphasis on ranged combat, which eventually lead to close combat weapons losing influence. It's not like swords become less deadly, there are just not a lot of opportunities to use one these days.
If we were to invent a type of armor that is completely bulletproof (or close enough), not very heavy (or powered)), and reasonably inexpensive, then it's not unreasonable that melee weapons would suddenly become a lot more popular. Because what matters is whether or not the weapon makes sense in context.
+RelativelyBest It is unreasonable. The armor will be designed to protect against whatever the current threat is. And if melee weapons become prevalent then armor will be designed to protect against BOTH guns and swords.
Yeah, kinda, but here's the thing: Plate armor was technically already 100% effective against most melee weapons, except maces and hammers to a limited degree. No sword will not get through a good plate armor, it's as simple as that. So instead they developed fighting techniques to get around it, which is something you can't really do with guns.
Since we are talking about a hypothetical suit of armor that is both fairly common and impervious to all conventional firearms, firing guns at it would largely be a waste of resources and suddenly we're back to the 1400s where the best way to deal with a guy in armor was to clobber him down and try to stab him through the gaps in the armor plates.
+Fervidor Fencers. Light armor and using a very thin and light sword. How they worked was that they could get into the joints and weak spots and basically either slowed him down or out right crippled the poor bastard in Armor.
Fervidor why not just shoot the gaps?? -_-
Navilus thats what i thought too lol
best explanation of this topic I have EVER heard!! my simple answer would have been,
" Once you run out of ammo, your enemy charges in, and what r u gonna use then, harsh language?"
I think it's pretty reasonably that there's melee in 40k. I mean, when you live in a Universe where the second, or perhaps even first most populous species are the Orks - every single one of whom love raging and charging at you with axes, the military is obviously going to give its guys melee weapons to fight back in hand-to-hand combat.
Another is the progression of protection over damage in conventional, ranged warfare. Take a look at space marines - even with their .75 calibre bolters, two space marines firing at each other, power armour can be tough to get through - not to mention the fact that bullets often miss and they gain an incredibly amount of strength as a result of it. Even so, most tactical space marines only come equipped with Combat Knives, so melee isn't actually as common as people would think - and the Imperial Guard are clearly focused on ranged over melee because they don't have the protection that Space Marines have.
The way I see it, if I was a Space Marine with a bolter-rifle and a big power sword, the chances are that the foes I go up against are either going to be the endless swarms of Orks or Tyranids, insane Chaos cultists and Chaos Space Marines who have basically the same shit that I do and Necrons, who are incredibly hard to put down with bullets. It seems to me that it's rather reasonable, in those situations, that my battles I partake in are going to quite commonly devolve into brutal hand to hand combat and in fact, as a hulking 8-foot Space Marine obsessed with honour and glory and with ridiculous super strength, I'm probably going going to prefer it when I have a big melee weapon in my hand. I'm probably going to feel like I do more damage with that weapon than I do with a gun.
We still use bayonets in real life. You think a bayonet is going to pierce power armour? Probably not. A Space Marine must ever be prepared and vigilant.
+Benjamin Drinkwater Fancy armor and expensive weaponry ain't gonna help you if the enemy is bashing your brains out with a rock or club.
+Frank G It will if you're not a sergeant, because you'll have on a helmet, and have a much thicker skull made of carbon fibre because you're a Beakie.
+Frank G Well how's he going to get close to you to bash you with his rock or club and how will he piece your fancy armor? Your comment sounds something that a 6 year old would say that still didnt develop common sense and logic,if rocks and clubs were effective against ranged weapons then today every army would be composed of caveman swinging clubs at each other,and those poor soldiers armed with ak47 and m4s wouldnt stand a chance against a rock would they?(by your logic)
Stevan Popovic My point is that, no matter how technologically advanced a military becomes, it will always need to equip its soldiers with melee weapons just in case.
+Stevan Popovic He can surprise you from a hidden place, use a distraction to approach, or maybe they are more than one and you cant contain the advance.
Because Everyone but the Tau like the feeling of beating/cutting people.
Imperium: God Emprah Demands it.
Chaos: Khorne........nuff said.
Orks: Hit dem 'umies wit dere bashas an' choppas!
Tyranids: Are Bug monsters
etc, etc.
+ShadowWolfRising "It doesn't matter that you have the best gun in the world, if your opponent is bashing your brains in with a rock." - WH40k 7th edition rules
+Joachim Vorbech Christensen
"Captain! Why are we not winning this battle???"
"Sorry sir! Our men keep rolling ones."
+ShadowWolfRising Kroot - TIME TO EAT!
expect Tau who just prefer shot you from distance
STOP TELLING PEOPLE ABOUT THE SECRET MOON BASE!
90% of war in 40k involves guns, the other 10% is bloody ass dragged out melee horror.
Unless you're 'nids
Marcus Avery They may not be "Shooting" but spitting acid and bio goop all over may as well count, you do it during the shooting phase so... yeah.
"nids thrive in C.C. its most of their power
They're not bad psykers either.
During training in the REAL U.S. Army, I came through a door and had my weapon knocked out of my hand. I was expected to fight hand to hand in the dark to defend myself. I immediately went to my knife (practice). THAT is why we have them, because CQB exists and is a very real thing in civilized areas.
Pls do images that are relevant to what u talk about. Like show tau when u talking about tau, not orcs.
+vidaett Agreed, the images he uses are awesome but it's slightly disconcerting to see a picture of a Tau Samurai (clearly one of Farsight's chaps) when the narrative is covering space marines in melee. I'm guessing that this happens because the slideshow is pre-arranged prior to him recording the audio. This results in a disconnect in the timing but I'm sure lightens his work load a lot.
Basicly life sucks, there is only war and you will probably getting eaten by tyranids....have fun ^^
As a tyranid player I love seeing TBs quote so I'm going to throw all the Internets at you my fine meal for my every hungry gribbles.
+Dead Panther hellfire cannons lots and lots of hellfire canons then kiss your tyrants infestation goodbye
GirlPainting ...no girls in 40k
red pill red pill red pill red pill
Adam Fox yeah cause the sister of battle are all trans...
This would explain alot
Look, you can boil it down to three reasons: 1) to balance armies and give players a mix of shooty and choppy units, 2) Because most things in the 41st millennium can tank multiple bolter rounds in the time it takes to get within swinging distance and 3) it's a convenient short hand to show the technological and societal degradation humanity has undergone in the intervening 40,000 years. It's easy to convey a race's savagery by having them charge into close combat, swinging a weaponized logging tool at their foes, screaming religious rhetoric.
I haven't got why the necrons use melee, like you have fucking gauss weapons as standard weapons.
@@jesusjuice3809 Of all the races, undead robots with hyper-sharp techno-blades should be the ones wading into close combat.
Warhammer 40K gets right what many other "sci-fi" franchises get wrong; sighted guns and close combat weapons.
Because, in the grin darkness of the far future, there is Fox only, no items, Final destination.
Simply answered in 2 points.
One already mentioned. When personal protection systems surpass the capability of individual weapon systems.
And the second, if you're going to "improve" on human physiology, making a man a dozen times stronger than natural AND THEN give them actual powered armor that multiplies that already greatly enhanced strength, why not give that guy a hammer?
+Dylan Cagnard If you enhance the strength of a person and give them powered armor then you can give them a bigger gun which will do even more damage.
+GeorgeMonet while true, the larger the gun, typically the larger the round it fires which requires more space to transport and reduces the load out of any given man. it's not a weight issue here, it's just about practical space requirement and a large hammer would undoubtedly take up less space than ammunition for a larger, more powerful gun.
But this is 40k and GW thinks a sensible combat load is 2 40 charge magazine/batteries for a lasgun.
i love that your doing warhammer 40k it is one of my all time fav table top games and i play it every week i have a 1500pt farsight enclave army and 4000pts of tyranids its gonna be great to see you do lore on 40k as i love 40k lore i hope you do the same thing you did with warhammer and do a race lore video so a video for the tau, imperium, spacemarines, elder ect its always been hard to read through the 40k lexicanums since there Enormous so if you did these i would be very thankful i wish you luck on this and i hope you will release videos like these soon.
+charlie otero What's the deal with Farsight anyway. I mean they obviously lack the controll of the Etherals so are they more free or what? :P
+wilhelmrk The Farsight enclave is essentialtly normal Tau units that does not get censored or get removed if they question leadership. They do not have as much access to the more heavy wargear, due to few worlds, but they do get close combat tranning thanks to commander Farsights delight of beating xenos to death with his warp sword
wilhelmrk Us that are part of the enclave have been led by commander farsight to seek the truth that the ethereals have hidden from us for all these years as the ethereals are corrupt and thus is why we no longer serve the tau empire. if you want to you can read the lexicanum wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Farsight_Enclaves
+charlie otero probably i am going to go about it a little differently, as many of the episodes are gone be loooooooooooooooooooooong! so probably several episodes per faction
+charlie otero yeah i know but he was only able to alter that way probably because of the blade so again it is the equipment i mean no question about his character or shere willpower or tactical abilities as a superior commander which are superior compared to other tau but physical strength and resilience is not what are Tau known for as same as the common Ork isn't known for logical thinking or superior use of tactic
"why is there melee?" ammunition is a finite resource on the battlefield. the end.
Also, 40k is full of terrifying bullshit that loves melee, like Tyranids, Chaos cultists, and Orks. You've got to have something to counter them when they close in.
Erh in year 40000 you would expect advanced laser weapons, not metal bullets, therefore they should be infinite
Pumpkin Pie Do you think lazer weapons require no energy or something
Ex Oblivione but them again you wouldnt have a melee weapon as a main weapon, thats just non-sense
Battlefields in 40k get sometimes to melee because the armors are just that good, and melee is excellent too due to force weapons, tyranid and other stuff, so naturally melee occasionally happens, but besides xeno cleansing and other Astartes groundwork stuff swords are rarely the main weapon.
They did a similar thing in KOTOR. When they introduced personal energy shields to protect against blasters, melee weapons became more popular as they bypassed most shields completely.
Sure you had guys like the Mandalorians who happily charged into melee when they got the chance to, but the very first introduction in the game to melee is when dealing with guys in CQC as fighting with a blaster at melee range was more difficult.
Because when you have a high explosive weapon and an Ork is in your face it's better to give them the old uppercut.
That's a hammy answer.
The reality is it's just a cool concept.
They didn't sit there and think, "what happens when this guy with the gun gets mobbed by corrupted civilians?"
They went "give that guy a sword, bitches like swords..... with the chainsaws!"
40k is over the top nonsense, it's not really meant to be taken that seriously.
+katthedemon you realise its only because they were adapting the fantasy theme to a futuristic setting. Knights-marines, malitia-guardsmen, elves-eldar, orcs-orks, mages-psychers etc. Any explanation other than that is just contrived.
+jonnyt8524 Well, if you want to talk meta, than there are always different layers.
Of course things are introduced because it is thought of as cool. If they thought it would be lame, nobody would include it and expect sales.
but besides the meta, there is in-story reasoning.
I don't understand why some people treat this as some sort of new discovery.
+hal lourious The in-story reasoning is just made up to give some sort of framework for the cool things they add.
Realistically, ranged weapons always > melee in general warfare. Melee will likely always fulfill a role, but if you want logic, it wouldn't be anything like the 40k universe where everything and their dog just wants to beat you with a piece of metal.
They wanted big knights with big swords and shiny armour, so they made them.
That's literally all there is to it.
jonnyt8524
NO WAY!!!!!!! My mind is blown ;)
I will tell you a secret, but pssssst to everyone else...
are you ready?
all of 40k is made up. Nothing of it is real. ;)
So thanks for repeating what I said before.
In fictional universes there is a difference between reality and realism. Realism depends on the in-story explanations why the world is what it is and how you have to bend the real world to make it convincing (suspension of disbelief).
While the meta is the real world influences.
I really don't get why some people treat this as some sort of secret knowledge, that has to be shared.
You can't judge a fictional universe on the basis of the real world. No fictional universe will hold up.
+hal lourious There's a difference between writing a fictional universe and giving its characters weapons and technology appropriate to their era w/e. And writing a story around characters, weapons and technology.
40k is over the top nonsense that' just meant to be fun and cool, that's it. Stop trying to justify the over the top sillyness with contrived rationale.
Hey i would like to thank you a lot Arch for the great answer! I have beeing asking myself that question and your answer take me to really interestings thoughts that made a lot of sence to me! Thank you! Love your videos and your great abbility to speak and show your passion for that fantastic world.
it is quite abwies that the tau have advanced in range warfare and try to stay out of melee combat just because the Tau body's physiology is very fragile compared to other races even compare to Eldar and Humans
+MrSupergambo i think you find that a mistake as yes the way the tau fight is from range and rarely fight in close combat willingly but there are a Independent tau entity called the Farsight enclave whos commander promotes the training of close combat and is a extremely adept leader in close combat commander farsight does not shy away from close combat with his special battle suit and his warp blade which gives him eternal life he encourages his followers to fight in close combat and he can take down the scariest things the mind can imagine All hail commander farsight!
it is as you say he doesn't shy away from close combat as long he has the battlesuit and blade without it he probably would try to do so because he is a tau and physically to fragile for melee combat even versus a human soldier it is the equipment that buys him the ability to go into melee combat and survive it and to train your troops in melee combat doesn't necessary means to deploy them in that art of warfare but it still raises the chances for your soldier to survive
MrSupergambo yes but compared to lets say the tau empire he would never shy from close combat and embrace it and initiate it. so i want to talk table top wise i had farsight with body guards in my army and he deep striked as normal. he then charged a imperial knight that was sitting right next to farsight after his unit survived a couple volleys from a battle cannon from the knight the knight killed every last body guard and it was just farsight vs a knight guess who won farsight did he is a extremely good close combat model but what am trying to say is he is not some fragile weak tau even without the suit on he would be quite powerful every one in the 40k universe thats good in melee generaly has very good armor so whats the difference between his suit and power armor they do pretty much the same thing and regarding the troops most of the troops in the farsight enclave are battle suits they pride themselves in swift and precise attacks and all of his army most of which are suits are extremely adept at fight close quarters so to note the farsight enclave are not like there brothers in the tau empire and take pride in there close combat doctrine.
'Very fragile' is an over statement. They are certainly much weaker then eldar but not that much weaker then a normal human. They suck at melee for sure but the range focus is also to do with their war philosophy of quick planned strikes and not holding ground but rather staying mobile. If they wanted to they could arm their crisis suits with power swords and wreak face so it's not just their physical disadvantage.
+Mr Sniffes compared to humans and elders which are also not known not to be the toughest bastards of the Warhammer 40k universe the tau are very fragile and arming their crisis suits with power swords that doesn't sounds really smart i mean why should you sacrifice your superior fire power for some limited close combat enhancement which is only available to crisis suits and even so that makes only the crisis suits better in melee combat what about the rest of your combat forces
if there is no melee combat in 40k then khorne would have to go into retirement.. how would khorne go into retirement if there is no retirement homes in the 40k universe.. so thats the answer.. the reason why there is melee in 40k is cause there is no retirement homes for khorne to go to and no one plans on building a retirement home for khorne anytime soon am i right.. now the true question is why would khorne have to go to a retirement home?.. i mean why not join the true retired senior citizens of the 40k universe, the Necrons? AAHAA answer that! well it could because they smell bad, ya know, since all the janitors were turned into pariahs and placed in coffins for a million years.. but then again khorne sits on a throne made out of a pile of bloody carcassas for christ sakes.. that must smell horrible.. not as bad as nurgle but still pretty bad..
Oh I remember in Dawn of War where smart about it you knew when to pick melee over range. Even use range troops sometimes is just better to tie up other side in melee to deprive them of any advantage they might get. Your example of Imperial Guard vs Space Marines is a pretty good one. That is a situation where I found is better just to force the Imperial Guard in to melee.
your vids a fantastic i thought i was alone obsessing over every tiny detail and how it functions, well presented well read and really informative ie i learned alot about titans i didnt know and now some answers to the questions non 40k ppl always ask bravo keep up the good work, one happy sub☺
Arch you are by far the best warhammer and 40k lore guy on CZcams. Super duper Funny and really in depth. Thanks Arch keep up the good work.
Guns can jam and ammo isn't always available in some cases..
bingo
Cameron Birch right, so they use chain swords instead. Much more reliable XD
Why Name? Not really, more moving parts = less reliability.
+ Extremely fucking messy against flesh, have you ever seen how much wood a chainsaw shoots out in real life? Imagine that was all flesh and blood, yea you won't be able to see anything most likely.
I doubt space marines (holy warriors of the emperor) dont get enough supply.
Simple really, armor in the 40k universe is powerful enough to deflect multiple shots, which is why melee can be done. In the real world melee cannot be done because modern armor isn't strong enough to deflect a modern gun. This is why all melee became obsolete, muskets penetrated armor.
Yeah, they have armor that can deflect ammunition but also have literal power swords that cut through armor like butter. Basically their melee tech is more advanced than their ranged tech, kinda the opposite of the modern era.
I've been listening to your videos for five days straight. I can listen to you all day. Keep going. :)
Fits the brutal themes of the setting, the close proximity of miniatures on the tabletop, and is cool in general.
We can't forget about those fucking Tyranids. Lord knows you want a chain sword when a brood of Genestealers comes knocking on your Baneblade. Rending claws, adrenal glands, and toxin sacks ughhh I'm having flash backs lol.
The answer is: "Because it looks cool and medieval. Now shut up."
This is the only correct answer
After listening to your siege of Vraks series, it puts what you said about melee on Vraks into a *whole* new light.
This is a well researched and based answer. I love it. It's always been a part of warfare. Thanks! You've got another subscriber.
Presumably the same reason as for why all warfare isn't resolved by orbital bombardment.
If you didn't have melee in 40k, then Slanesh couldn't make face pizza. :D
Ah, the video that originally brought me to your channel. Good stuff.
great video. explained the concept extremely well!
Using impractical weapons and tactics isn't really unrealistic. Advanced powers were still using Napoleonic line tactics (and bayonet charges) right up until World War 1.
+SlyBiffrons While they've certainly lost their usefulness as mass infantry tactics, small-scale bayonet charges are not unknown in modern warfare. Sometimes it's just because you run out of ammunition, but sometimes it's a variation on the points made in the video - if you have better training, morale, or numbers you can still get bogged down in a costly firefight, but if you can charge the enemy (and survive) you can force them to commit to the fight where you have the advantage or run away.
Of course the other reason to have it is because the 40k rules don't make ranged combat especially interesting.
+SlyBiffrons They were still using bayonet charges because they hadn't adapted their tactics to account for the greater devastation caused by modern semi-automatic and automatic firearms.
The last bayonet charge in recorded history was in the year
2011. Yes, 2011. While not very common anymore, melee combat is very much still around these days, either because you're out of ammo, at REALLY, REALLY close range, or are just out of any other options. Hell, look at Vietnam; that kind of environment, there were cases of marines breaking their M-16's not out of the un-reliability at the time or just because, but they had broken them beating men to death with the stocks.
SlyBiffrons “Were”
Great argument points! Thank you!
When you take about a unit(Striking Scorps) you should show a picture of them. This helps new people get an idea... Awesome Vid!!!
Two main reasons:
Reason #1: Changes in the 4th and 5th and following edition rules of the Tabletop system greatly rewarded hand to hand combat over ranged combat.
Reason #2: Vidya game designers just don't understand firearms (especially bolters), fireteam combat, and space marines in general; it's just a lot easier to give them a stick and nerf gun then have them run off and beat the other guy upside the head.
(Edited for missed shift-enters, thanks google!)
This.
Exactly. The bolters sounds so devastating in the lore and in the games that thing is like a normal fucking 5.45 and not the freakin 998. explosive launcher!
The funniest thing about the Bolter is that its ammunition would be extremely impractical due to it being, well, a full-auto rocket launcher. Considering how it's not even a conventional RPG styled rocket (AKA, the big ol' stereotypical RPG-7 when anyone says "Rocket Launcher") and is actually a gyrojet, an actual round that cost $200 USD apiece...
But hey, 40k, what do I know?
>Trying to apply logic to a world where Orks exist and their weapons only work because they all believe they work
BECAUSE ITS METAL AS ALL HELL THAT'S WHY
I just expected you to start the video like CUZ ITS COOOOL and just end it there XD
I don't know why I'm watching this video. It is so obvious to me that melee combat is such an indispensable aspect of warfare and yet your voice and budding and fast growing taste for 40K lore have brought me here to listen to stuff i already know.
Oh well I'm learning about the nitty gritty bits of the fluff so I'm happy.
why do we use bayonets on today's rifles? ammo? close range engagement? yes its uncommon but everyehere I went I had my bayonet.
+Karl Ward And how often did you use your bayonet?
+GeorgeMonet none thankfully but think of resupply at least if I ran out of ammo I had a weapon.
+Karl Ward Also if you had to make a silent takedown that bayonet is the better option without any sound supressor.
I cant imagine taking someone out with a bayonet being silent unless your extremely skilled in unarmed combat and know the way to take someone down silently even if you took out the throat there would still be noise.
True it can not be complet silent but most of the sound can be muffled by you hand even more so if you are wearing cloves . though the best solution when it comes to CQC are the surprise.
Do you really get the question THIS often? I mean the answer is simple: There is meelee because it LOOKS FUCKING AWESOME!
+1stshockarmy you would be surprised
+1stshockarmy My brother had a similar question once, but instead of WHY (because he knows the rule of cool) he asks "How could you expect a medieval looking sword gonna hack through armour?". Then I had to explain the CCW technology, after which he replied "that's overpowered"
+Pallyrulez He does realise everything about 40k is overpowered, right?
+Death Incarnate He didn't; he does now.
There are exactly two tiers of weaponry in 40k. There's "OMG hax plz nerf it devs" and there's "standard issue imperial flashlight."
"There's always more officers where the last one came from." Truer words have yet to be spoken.
I feel like you and TotalBiscuit would enjoy talking about the lore in a podcast or something, it sounds like a goddamn riot.
Because not everybody is a frickin tau
So Arch are you hoping that there will be a Total War : Warhammer 40k after this fantasy warhammer total war?
I doubt they could do that, believe me I know it would be epic, but the problem is the size, and weapon teams, marines don't come in battalions of hundreds, they come in squads, and they don't have men over a thousand, a few of them do, and then you have to create different units in a single squad, such as having a Heavy Bolter/Meltagun/Flamer/etc. they have different stats, and different firing types, second marines follow modern tactics, they don't stay in rank and file and fire all at once, they separate and take cover. So you have to make it so that when taking fire they move to the closest piece of cover, third, you have to make different stats for the different weapons. And then the size of the maps, it either comes in to forms. Either campaigns use whole solar systems, where you have multiple planets, each with smaller regions or they use the whole bloody universe .Then you have to deal with the maps themselves, unless dwarves actually have under ground cities in TW:W then you
then you have to deal with sieges, how will they pull off an attack on a hive city where it is mostly corridor close quarter combat, and you have to deal with the units, how will you pull off Titans and mechs, when they have different combinations of weapons at the same time. And I could go on and on about this, but I believe you get the gist.
+Kfunderwood i dont think that could work i think fantasy is gonna be great but the 40k universe is too different they would have to add bolt guns magic vehicles flying vehicles and such but the biggest problem would be were would this be set in the 40k universe is Huge and there is no 1 world like warhammer i just cant see it working also license wise the reason CA are being able to make this is because gw sold the license because they sold all there warhammer fantasy battles stuff and made AOS so i doubt they will let CA make total war 40k
+charlie otero I don't see why guns or magic would be the problem since they are already doing it, it would be all the different types of guns that would be the problem.
+Kfunderwood gods no... i dont trust CA with guns...
oh boy finally some 40k stuff. about to nail myself to my seat because im going to bench it all from start to finish
Finally I find a 40k channel that has long videos, thank the Omnimessiah
Everyone going out after the Tau's ... like guys the Tau's have rail guns.... who the fuck goes into melee with Rail Guns
I was talking bout the tau's as a tau with railgun I would not go into melee But I am not tau I represent Chaos Undivided! and would swing my blood thirsty axe to any Ultra Marines with great fury!
+DarkEgo1000 He is one of the exceptions.
+friendssmoking The tau fire warriors have a blade on their backpack. (just in case)
Ashen One Ceremonial Blades
Ashen One lol hows does that make sense?
goddamnit now i want tau samurai
They aren't Japanese in any way at all.
Carbon 12 they are based on east asia I think.
Piet Andersen Yes, communist China. Many have the religion tauism. Not Japan. Closest thing to samurai is probably the Dark Eldar Lhamaean. Though the Imperium is very similar to Imperial Japan too actually.
***** A little, but they look like crap.
***** I mean, as samurai.
Really like your vids. You explain alot of this complicated lore very well.
The sound is very low on these vids, not sure if you can but would like it to be louder. Really need to crank you up when i watch.
14:16 Arists and Chapter? Holy shit that is an awesome interpretation of the armor
Mr.Arch, can I pay you to narrate a normal day in my life?
+Frizky The price would be too high.
Oh I think is a bit unfair to compare long range rifles and Artillery with melee. They fill different roles. I am guessing that people that object to melee in 40k object to it more as there guns today that do close range combat pretty darn well. Carbines, SMGs, Pistols and so on. That is what Melee is competing with in general. Weapons that are meant to handle close range combat.
Of course Rule of Cool triumph that. And in the Warhammer 40k universe there are some explanations for melee that are pretty logical for the universe it self. Not to mention that even in our modern world we still see melee combat from time to time. Even if it has become increasingly rare. But I can also see why some would view it as a bit weird or anachronistic. (Though the anachronism is part of the charm of Warhammer 40k I say! It is meant to be a universe stuck in the past.)
+Cythil Fancy armor and advanced technology ain't gonna help you if the enemy is bashing your brains out with a rock or club. That is why every army still issues melee weapons to its troops.
Frank G
Well there is a reason why the Americans in the Philippines (back when it was a US colony) got high calibre handguns.
What is issued is generally Knifes and Trench tool. These are not primarily made for hand to hand combat though of course can be used for that to.
Cythil No matter how powerful the weapon, you are still gonna need to send infantry to mop up any survivors.
Frank G
Yeah you do not mop up with melee weapons any longer. (That actually sounds like you would put you self in unnessesery risk.)
Cythil When you are fighting in a confined space like a bunker or the poorly lit hallway of an abandoned house, your chances of survival are higher if you use a melee weapon than a gun.
cant wait for the long ass 40k stuff, you have bitten of a lot in this situation arch, love the casts and love WH lore. lovely English pronunciation as well. also what would be your fav faction from WH40k? im keeping a record of humanity before the Necrons rise. as they will.
Nice vid! I think that there are three main reasons there is still melee in W40K: 1. When you are attacked by tyranids, you are shooting at them, but then, in melee, the Imperial guard will be destroyed rapidly (see Starship Troopers). 2. Melee is used in W40K because of the "mythological" aspect of the battles: Elves (Eldars), Orcs... Uses also melee weapons, the Holy Imperium against evil... 3. It looks cool and badass! ;)
Did anyone say melee ? Death Korps of Krieg approve :)
Angry Marines aswell.
FYI, modern armies still have close quarters/melee weapons. Please think really hard about why.
eeyup i once saw some combat knives locked away in the far back corner of the arms room XD
+TempleGuard72 ...strategically.
when the bullet's run out or your slow on the draw. melee makes sense in 40k.
Thing is, they are barely if ever used, especially so if it came down to a conventional war today.
This goes back to what he says about weaponry today surpassing the protection soldiers can receive, since assault rifles will kill practically everyone even if they're wearing Kevlar, there is no need for melee combat in the first place. There's a reason why the US Army doesn't train soldiers in use of bayonets anymore... they only train them in the use of their knife IF their firearm is taken off them. Same even applies to Army Rangers, whose form of "melee" combat pretty much just involves throwing the enemy on the floor so that you can shoot them more safely.
kill4money213
right on the money, buddy of mine is in the army reserves and he was telling us at work about how they train them to use a knife and even the direction and angle that they are trained to thrust at. In a nutshell hes like either his rifle or his side arm will have enough rounds to kill anything that moves at a distance.
Hi arch, love your lore vids, but I've got a couple of requests... Could you put text over the pics just describing what we're seeing? Also would love to see a vid about the primarchs! Keep up the good work :)
I like warhammer 40k, but the ranged weapons are way under-powered.
***** lol yea that's true
+jpala821 Same for Imperial Guard. Or the Necrons; they might usually not have as much range as some others but they can blast absolutely everything to pieces with their bazillions of gauss weapons.
+Faridah Malik Hahaha, Imperial ranged weapons not being underpowered. Comic gold.
"We are the Guard. We have many mottos, but none we feel are worth sharing. Like our combat style, our motto production was much more about quantity than quality. Speaking of which, where are all your friends? Sixty to one seems a little unfair, even for us..."
HeliosKitty
A common lasgun can cut an adult in half with a single salvo, this is canon. The IG is merely overshadowed by machine guns that shoot microrockets, guns that fire green lightning that evaporates you, guns that fire miniature shurikens in swarms, guns that fire live maggots, guns that fire miniature black holes and many more.
Faridah Malik And if unenhanced humans were a significant part of the threats the Imperium faced, that might matter. They aren't. Unenhanced humans are leagues weaker than pretty much everything they might be up against. What cuts a member of the Imperial Guard in half needs to be fired in salvos of dozens just to substantially wound even the foot soldiers of other races.
I suppose I wasn't really thinking about it in terms of their tanks and such, but even those are regularly outdone by most competing species, so the term "underpowered" still applies.
if you EVER used a CHAINSAW to cut things (which you don't, obviously), you would know that it's a pain in the ass to even cut a tree - even though chainsaw was developed for this very purpose. And tree is stationary object. I'm not even going into the other stuff :D
I mean, chainsaw as weapon looks cool, I'll give you that. But it's the most stupid, uncomfortable, and impractical idea, to use it as one.
For example, even if you cutting a tree, if you don't hold it completely steady and straight,, the chain will fall from it's socket/place.
Also, if you don't hold, adjust the chainsaw correctly while cutting a tree, there is a good chance that your chain will get stuck, and if you don't pay attention, you could actually very easily break the damn thing.
The chain itself, aspecially the teeth, are fragile as fuck.
My point is, even when cutting a tree (which is the MAIN reason for chainsaw), you have to pay attention and know what you're doing. Otherwise you will just break the damn thing. So how do you expect to use it on a moving metal object?
If you don't believe me or common sense, watch how man at arms tried to create chainsaw from warhammer :D
Especially in the end when they tried to cut a lemonade bottle and ended up splashing themselves :D
Chainsaw weapons are cool concept I agree, but it's viable only in fiction. Anyone who says otherwise, probably never had one, or is lying :D
1Ceslovas Considering Chainswords in 40K are made of materials not available to us today. Its safe to say it would work.
"Take me closer so I can cut them with my sword!" Some random tank Commander.
I like how you speak in this video. It is like sitting down in 40k class.
I do see what you are saying, but at the same time at CQB range most people would not drop their battle rifles and stab people. This whole idea of there being reason for hand to hand is based on wish fulfillment and the rule of cool. You need to make this more clear and stop making excuses.
Warhammer 40k is a power fantasy at its heart. That's all it has ever been. I love 40k. I just accept what it is.
The mathematics of what you are suggesting doesn't make sense. Hand to hand weapons will always I think exist, but at the same time it would almost always be better to use a sidearm than a sword because of the amount of energy transferred.
Just love what 40k is man. It doesn't make sense, and that's fine.
+David Eno What are your thoughts on the use of judo to take down fully armored samurai as the katana could not cut through the armor. Same for the misericorde and knights etc. Suppose armor gets to the point where a sidearm could not penetrate. Would a soldier be better off trying to get a a shot in under a joint, or with a cutting edge? (Actually the correct answer would be C, use a damn rock/blunt object and knock his ass out, but you get where I was going) This all being said. Melee is not obsolete in the sense that it not not advantage. In fact, the ability to do so i think ironically is the mark of being futuristic. I say this as many people question melee not as a matter of ability as you do mention, but as a practicality of war.
+katthedemon As armor advances so do arms. If an advanced standard issue armor system is created, advanced standard issue firearms will also be created to defeat that armor with as little rounds as possible (preferably with one round, not 15 like in GoW or Halo).
burneden This is a very indulgent view. Basically, Melee is *almost* useless. There will of course be some rare situations were it might be used as a last resort, but the idea of a rock being used instead of a bullet is stupid. A better bullet for the task would just be designed.
As to the idea of Judo. It's a compelling idea that forgets that Judo was designed by people who didn't have access to weapons. That was the actual history of martial arts. People developing techniques for defense in a location where having weapons was illegal.
+David Eno one important point you dont seem to have considered is the sheer number of enemies that any 1 unit of Space marines or guardsmen will come up against, since the majority of their enemies favour huge massed wave attacks with countless numbers of infantry ie orks and tyranids, this actually makes having melee weapons essential for when the inevitable happens and they run out of ammunition or the sheer weight of numbers overwhelms them, this is nothing to do with the rule of cool and more to do with common sense, melee weapons are a must in this universe the same as they will always be a must in the real world as a back up and weapon of last resort to defend yourself...
You should have just stuck with the "it's cool" explanation, instead of trying to articulate and explanation from the lore. Better thing would have been to give your audience the context when the game was made, and it's influences, and who the game's community consisted of. Maybe if you told your friends it's 40k is the result of putting a fantasy game in a science fiction setting, and the swords something that was cool that the community liked that was kept (at one point there were even space dwarves...)
This shouldn't even be a question just accept the glorious melee.
Hey mate, great vid, one thing that may help ur vids is to put images of wat ur speaking of in when ur speaking of them, for those new to this, I'm a massive fanboy of 40k so I can put images to what your saying. Either way man figured I'd give a tip, dunno if anyone else thinks the same
There is absolutely no possible way you can legitimize anything in Warhammer. At all. It is all nonsense and stupidity, bred out of 12 year olds with the ability to paint.
Sherlock Holmes does it agian.
+Sherlock Holmes Those are some messed up 12 year olds.
Roman Stenzel They put spikes on swords... spikes... on swords... what kind of fool puts spikes on swords? Let alone armor.... and why does the armor look like they over turned an entire continent to get the ore for a single pauldron? It looks more like a Minecraft project on a server ran by a 6 year old, than a fantasy game with millions of followers.
Sadly, this is how most modern fantasy looks like :(
Sherlock Holmes It's quite epic in scale, spiked weapons are not uncommon, spiked swords I will admit are not as common, and usually stand in the more obscure side of warfare. I love how wasteful the Emperium of man look, there culture is obviously heavily inspired by the Romans and architecturally inspired by Gothicism and incredibly wasteful. They dress there more important soldiers with religious propaganda, and are adorned with more obscure, but specific items. These are a people who would annihilate a planet if given the order, you have to understand that the proportions of the 40k universe are ridiculous, they are dramatic. Though in their complete defense, I don't know of any 12 year old of this generation that could come up with something like the 40k universe, I don't know how much lore you've read, but it's quite an impressive amount of work.
I literally just googled this, and a great video. The last points really drove it in!
TL:DR; too many things to shoot.
1:30 what do ya mean "cool factor" is a huge part of it!! *looking cool gives me plot armour!!*
love your voice. i just started getting into warhammer.
Ah yes our secret moon base, quite lovely. Went there on vacation last summer, very quaint.
Back in 2nd edition I usually found myself shooting more, but using models like my Wolf Lord (terminator armour, thunder hammer, storm shield) and Wolf Guard in terminator armour (lightning claws) if I needed a melee presence. The Grey Hunters generally did more damage with bolters and special weapons. Armour save modifiers meant that even Space Marines could die to bolter fire.
The best thing about the chainsword is how ridiculous it is. Also insanely badass.
these 2 videos in a nutshell.... it looks cool
Because rule of cool has been at the core of the franchise since the rogue trader days
I like that you touched on perhaps the most common reason (Lore wise, by sheer numbers) I can think of for melee in 40k, and judging form the comments section here was wholly overlooked by most. Simply that a lot of melee happens because that's all they know. I mean for Orks? Well, Orks are crappy shots anyway, and most Feral Orks have barely progressed above the tech levels of "Rock and Stick", after all. Even "Evolved" Orks generally haven't progressed beyond that level. But looking at the Imperial Guard. Sure you got regiments like the Elysians and the Kasrkin who are hardcore badass Technological Warriors decked out in the best equipment that the Imperium can afford to give them, and they fight with their gadgets as they should... but then you have regiments like the Atillian Rough Riders who come from a world where Horse and Lance are the epitome of warfare... and that's what they bring to the battlefield. Almost every world in the lore will contribute something to the Imperium, and that 'Something' usually includes a tithe of warriors for the Imperial Guard. And it's not like it's just a FEW worlds in the Imperium that are Feral Backwaters. Heck if you look at detailed breakdowns of some sectors it seems closer to 25% if not higher are feral backwaters where the height of technology might be "The Rock" again or maaaaybe Black Powder Muskets and Plate Armor at the high end.
In true military tradition "Well we'll find a use for you". If the Regiment you got tithed for a Crusade is filled with cavemen wearing furs and using stone axes? Well you'll get a Cleric to whip them into a frenzy of hatred and find a battlefield to throw them in as shock troops. They might get slaughtered. Heck they probably WILL get slaughtered. But if they don't? Well a bunch of frenzied barbarians with Axes to the Face tends to break up orderly battleplans and formations. Worst case scenario and they die horribly? Well every moment they're spending on Captain Expendable and his Mooks over there are moments they're NOT spending on Catachan Commandos sneaking up and planting Demo Charges all over. Or Iron Guard giving disciplined ranked fire of devastation, or Kasrkin breaking enemy resistance with precision fighting and hellgun volleys, or Vindicare Assassins taking pot shots at enemy leaders and one shotting tanks, etc.
It's the Imperium. Life is cheap. You have to realize you're trying to think of a universe where literally a Lasgun is worth FAR more than the Guardsman who carries it. You have many, many times more Guardsmen than Lasguns out there in the Imperium. And the Lasgun is after all the most numerous weapon in the Galaxy by far (Well, ranged, probably "The knife" is actually the most numerous). We're not really talking about a universe that follows the rules of war as we think of them in the modern day. The Imperium fights more (If you could make any comparison really) to Soviet Russia circa World War II. Throw men at it until It no longer exists. Giving the new recruits equipment? Pssh, they can loot whatever, or just take whatever they came with to battle. Just make sure the Political Officer is there to execute them if they are cowards in the face of not being equipped, or try anything too heretical.
Contrary to the modern militaries of our world, where often a soldier has an estimated value (In training, etc) of hundreds of thousands of dollars on the low end, and his gun is worth a couple of hundred. The soldier is far more valuable. You try to protect them. You try to keep them out of unnecessary risks. You can get more grenades, get more guns, etc. You wouldn't throw a soldier into a "Almost assuredly suicidal" action.
In the Imperium? Who cares about the Guardsmen? We got billions more of those up in orbit. Grab his lasgun though, next guy needs it.
As well, feeding on it. As far as I can tell the Imperium is not Industrialized, as we'd think of it. This sounds weird since they literally have "Forge Worlds". But as far as I can tell from the Lore (And I do accept this might be mistaken), most technology that is created is more of a cottage industry level of creation. When a suit of Space Marine Power Armor is created it's the work of a single artisan who works on it from creating the ceramite, shaping and molding it, to working in the power cabling and fiber bundles, to finishing up the optics, etc. We see evidence of this in say, when they talk about the Salamanders Chapter who all create and maintain their own gear. As well as the few glimpses I've seen of Forge Worlds in Lore. It's why a Forge World might crank out as few as 2-3 Super Heavy Tanks per year, instead of millions of them. Each one is basically the singular creation of a senior Magos steeped in the knowledge necessary, with some assistance from his apprentices, rather than an industrialized, assembly line, mass production factory.
When the industrial complex that supports your military functions like that? Well you have the situation where Gear is more valuable than Man, you can throw away men, etc. Or heck, literally just don't have enough gear to give the half trained savages some lasgun that they'd probably just use as a club anyway, so might as well let them use an actual club they picked up off the ground.