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Terracotta Sentinel

2023-06-07T01:22:12Z

2001:8003:1C20:8C00:E102:EA54:69A8:5F90:

'''Terracotta Sentinels''' are ten-meter tall Terracotta golems used by [[Grand Cathay]].

Born of the Dragons' mastery of magic, legends say that these giants were once part of an army that the Dragon Emperor once personally built to battle Chaos thousands of years ago, when the polar gates were once breached. Though they are seen as buttressing the walls of the fortress of Nan Gau, individual Sentinels can be seen scattered across Cathay, as if quietly waiting for orders.

When finally roused to battle, Sentinels are implacable and relentless foes who will Wushu-routine your ass until nothing was left but bloody ribbons.

A '''Regiments of Renown''' version of the unit is available. Called the Green Guardian, [[Wat|because it's apparently POWERED BY WARPSTONE]], it is passively affected by the Reflect spell, which bounces back any and all ranged attacks thrown against it.

==Attributes==
* '''Harmony (Yang)''': Counts as a Yang unit, and gains melee defence and Leadership near Yang units.
* '''Immune to Attrition'''.
* '''Terror and Fear''': Causes Terror and Fear, causing units to flee and reducing Morale.
* '''Reflect''': Ranged attacks are reflected back to their source (Green Guardian only).
* '''Missile Resistance''': Reduced damage from ranged attacks.

{{Cathayan forces}}
[[Category:Warhammer Fantasy]]
[[Category:Cathay]]

Artillery

2023-06-02T20:24:47Z

2001:8003:1C20:8C00:E102:EA54:69A8:5F90: /* Cannons and Early Gunpowder weapons */

{{topquote|I took ballistics in school. Fascinating subject! Things go up, things go down!|Company of Heroes}}
{{topquote|Artillery is the god of modern war.|Joseph Stalin}}
{{topquote|In peace the cry is for mobility, in war for weight of shell.|Alan Brooke}}

If you were to ask any neckbeard into military history what they liked most about it, you'd get a few different answers. Some would tell you it's all about stories of [[Imperial Guard |regular humans]] going beyond their limits to [[Humanity Fuck Yeah|beat back impossible odds]], others are more [[Roboute Guilliman|interested in the organization and logistics needed to feed and move thousands of people]].

But for the elegan/tg/entlemen among us, it's all about [[Ordinatus|the big guns that go boom]]. Even before the advent of [[Gunpowder (Warhammer Fantasy)|gunpowder]] and [[Cannon|cannons]], humanity has long looked for ways to fling shit at their enemies from a safe distance, preferably outside of their opponent's range, and ideally, beyond their line-of-sight.

Nowadays, '''Artillery''' refers to Cannons and Cannon-accessories, like Rockets and Missiles, but we apply the label to any weapon that launches munitions far beyond the range of man-portable weapons (that being said, Mortars are still man-portable, so don't take anything an anon says to be definitive)

==Siege Engines==

[[Siege Weapon|Siege Engines]] are mechanical devices used to damage walls or kill the defenders. Weapons like the Onager, Ballista, and the Trebuchet ([[Meme|which could launch a 90kg projectile over 300m]]) are considered the first forms of Artillery.

Unlike what vidya and certain tabletop wargames will tell you, most of these weapons were too unwieldy and generally inaccurate to use against mobile targets. They were also too complicated and fragile to transport over long distances and had to be built at the site of conflict, which is why Siege [[Engineer Sapper Company|Engineers]] were their own specialization.

===List of Siege Artillery===

====Bolt Weapons====

These are Siege weapons that look like oversized crossbows, and are generally accurate enough with their bolts to snipe defenders on the walls, and were torsion (crank) powered. They range from the simple Roman Scorpio, to the [[Dakka|rapid-firing]] Greek Polybolos, both of which were developed from the much larger Ballista, which was initially used to throw small round projectiles, but would eventually fire more accurate bolts.

Technically, though they look like Crossbows, all of these machines are more complicated than that, using a combination of springs and torsion to build up energy. Some Catapult designs actually make use of the "bow" design for added strength.

====Catapults====

Arguably, the most famous of those siege engines was the almighty catapult! The romans used it, the greeks used it, and oh-so-many lords and knights used it during the Middle-Ages. It wasn't the most precise weapon on the planet, but we'd lie to you if we didn't say that it as beautiful to see a flock of rocks raining on a heavily guarded castle like it's judgement day. Catapults were generally some of the simplest siege engines around, and as mentioned above, used torsion mechanisms for power.

What made them supplant the Ballista was that you could use to basically throw anything more-or-less heavy with it; Boulders, would-be cannon balls, humans, barrels, literal sacks of shit (Yes, this did happen) over a longer, arcing trajectory and with more power. And it was one easier to build. Of course, it wasn't the most effective thing on the planet at destroying things, but the point of sieges was to capture a castle, not raze one. Why pass on the opportunity of getting a free castle? The best way to penetrate it was to simply injure the people inside.

====Trebuchet====
But when the need to [[Exterminatus|eradicate the infidels, burn their houses, slaughter their families, destroy their unholy temples and autels of doom]] came around, Europeans perfected of destroying shit really hard by inventing the next big thing in siege engineering; the motherfucking trebuchet. Ten to Eighteen tons of a massive wooden tower made out of "Fucketh thee, I farteth ast thoust general direction".

The Chinese technically invented it, but it consisted of using <s>slaves</s> very brave and loyal soldiers to pull the projectile down and then releasing it. And then, reusing the design, engineers added a counterweight that would drop down with the force of a thousand suns to flung the heaviest of projectiles directly at the enemy at incredible speeds. A technological miracle of the XIIth Century to be sure, using the wonders of levers, momentum, and gravity to do most of the work.

Started a trend among technicians and engineers to come up with new tools of warfare, most notably Da Vinci who made a whole bunch of sketches of a multitude of possible war engines that were all kinds of wonky.

==Cannons and Early Gunpowder weapons==

As mentioned, the Chinese had various experimentations with Gunpowder. They had weapons like [[Rough Riders|exploding lances]] and basic rockets, the best example of which was the Korean MLRS called the Hwacha, which fired a storm of rocket-powered arrows. The Chinese also had cannons, but it wasn't until Gunpowder reached the Middle East/Europe that the tech really started to find its niche.

In the Middle East, the Gunpowder Empires (Ottomans, Safavids, and the Mughals) were credited with perfecting Cannons, but thats kinda [[bullshit]]. While the three empires were early adopters of Gunpowder into their armies and even used them to devastating effect against their gun-less neighbors (Romeaboos will forever [[Butthurt|cope and seethe]] about how Constantinople was taken down by a big ass gun), but they generally still relied on traditional weapons and tactics in battle. For example, going back to the Fall of Constantinople, there is a story that even though the Ottoman cannons were very good at ''damaging'' the city's famous double-walls, they weren't great at ''breaching'' at it; the rubble caused by the collapsing walls was still in the way, so the besiegers had to keep shooting at the breach until the rubble was removed.

Generally, Islamic artillery came in two flavors: large and unwieldy bombard types specifically meant for sieges and wall-breaking, and much lighter, man-sized (but still to heavy to carry) cannons firing from emplacements. Field guns were not as widespread in Europe, because the terrain and the style of warfare just didn't make them worth it.

In contrast, European artillery started out similarly, with cannons being mostly built for sieges, but this soon became an arms race of experimenting with more mobile variants. Swedish King [[Karl Franz|Gustavus Adolphus]] is famous for making Sweden a Great Power simply by adopting smaller Field Guns that could be quickly repositioned by horse; Napoleon did the same much later, advocating for entire companies of mobile, wheeled cannons because multiple cannons enfilading the enemy army was much more useful than a single gun that couldn't even be aimed properly.

While this was happening, back in Asia, breachloaded swivel guns were the norm. These were much smaller cannons that could swivel in place and incorporated elements from Chinese, Muslim, and Indian weapons. They were breachloaded and used pre-packaged powder and ammunition, and so they could fire off multiple shots in quick succession. These were very popular in Southeast Asia, and the Mongol's fought against these weapons in their failed invasion of Java.

Artillery also included Rockets, such as the Indian Mysorean Rocket, which became the British Congreve Rocket (the Rocket's Red Glare in Traditional Americanese Music). These Rockets were as you'd expect, inaccurate and chaotic, but also spread terror and could be fitted with a variety of armaments. An attacking force would launch a bareage of rockets of different types, some would explode in midair and rain shrapnel, others would set fires, and a particularly annoying type would snake along the ground and stab people in the dick.

==Modern Era==

World war 1
World War 2
Cold war
Drones and MLRS today

==On the Tabletop==

===Warhammer 40k===

See: [[Imperial Guard]], a faction that can only be described as "[[Cheese|How Many Artillery Pieces Can I Afford]]?" Infantry can take Mortars, Lascannons, or Missile Launchers, while you have not [[Basilisk|one]], not [[Manticore|two]], not even [[Basilisk|three]], but [[Awesome|'''FOUR''']] types of indirect artillery vehicles, with that last one being a [[Deathstrike Missile Launcher|A motherfucking Nuclear Missile.]] And they just got a new option in the form of [[Field Ordnance Battery|Field Ordnance Batteries]], letting you relive the [[Team Yankee|PTSD dreams of an American infantryman whose FOB just got hit by the Taliban]] but IN SPESS.

Sure, Baneblades and Conscript Spam are more iconic of the faction, but that's mostly because of how unfun it is to both play and play against someone that goes all in on artillery, with pieplate blast templates or indirect fire spam from 3 units of 3 model artillery.

Space Marines can only wish they were this cool, but they instead have to rely on Missiles guided by the remains of failed Initiates, or [[Desolation Squad|derpy multi-barreled missile launchers]] instead.

===Team Yankee===

[[M270 MLRS|MLRS]] [[TOS-1 Buratino|go]] [[RM-70|BRRR]]

Twin-Linked

2023-06-02T14:11:08Z

2001:8003:1C20:8C00:E102:EA54:69A8:5F90: /* In Game Terms */

{{Wh40k-stub}}
[[File:Nerf_Twin_Linked.jpg|right|400px]]
'''Twin-Linked''' weapons are a subtype of weapon found in the [[Warhammer 40,000]] universe that embody the timeless tactic in warfare of ensuring a hit by slinging more rounds at the target. The way this is done is typically duct taping two guns together and firing them at once so that the target has to avoid twice the number of rounds. Typically vehicles, monstrous creatures and terminators carry twin-linked weapons, considering that typically only heavy weapons are twin-linked. Although storm bolters are twin-linked boltguns in appearance, they actually increase the fire rate of the weapon. Perhaps a prerequisite of being allowed to wear Terminator armor is knowing where those extra shots go.

Where exactly the other gun's shots go if you hit the first time is a mystery whose answers are known to none, but it means that twin-linked weapons are, somewhat ironically, [[Ork|horribly inaccurate]] as at least one of the guns is always guaranteed to [[Fail|miss the enemy]]. As of 8th Edition, this is now no longer an issue, see below.

For the most part, twin-linked weapons are more often found to be mounted on vehicles, turrets, batteries, specific emplacements and etc. for a variety of reasons. From the fact that they can afford to have that much dakka, they might actually ''need'' that much dakka, and being mounted on a vehicle or some static weapon emplacement means that recoil or weight isn't much of an issue (depending on the weapon of course).
==In Game Terms==

When trying to hit a target, you can reroll if you miss. This is useful especially if you are using a weapon that [[Plasma|has a good chance of melting your face off rather than firing]], as it means that if you get a Gets Hot! result you can reroll, though template Gets Hot! weapons roll for it before resolving scatter, [[Leman Russ Battle Tank#Leman Russ Executioner|so don't put too much faith in plasma cannons]]. Weapons that scatter reroll an undesirable result if they are twin-linked as well. This can be exploited to allow you to reroll ordnance (for example, coupling a [[Necron|Triarch Stalker with a Doomsday Ark]]).

This, however, resulted in a rather odd display of mechanics over common sense: if you hit with your first shot, rolling the second bullet would cause it to just disappear into the warp itself. This made twinlinking always flatly worse than just having a second shot: Two of the same gun have the same odds to get at least one shot, but the two guns have a chance to score a hit and wound with the second shot.

===8th edition===
Twin-linked no longer gives you a reroll - in an incredible display of common sense, [[Games Workshop|our overlords]] have decided that a twin-linked autocannon is simply two autocannons duct taped together, and twin-linked weapons now give you twice as many shots as a non twin-linked weapon.

Aside from the logical improvement to its advantages, since the additional shots now actually go somewhere (they can all hit the target), it also logically makes twin-linked plasma weapons more likely to melt your own face, instead of less likely. Which really does make sense.

=== 10th edition ===
...and now we're back to them simply granting a re-roll to hit, while good for mechanics (as GW had issues balancing the 8th and 9th edition style), it once again makes them [[Derp|the most inaccurate weapons in the game]]. [[Matt Ward|Plus a number of the new Marine guns previewed still get the two shots, most notably the Land Raider's Twin-Linked Lascannons]].

Why GW doesn't just take [[Age of Sigmar|AoS']] notes for once and have twin-linked weapons proc an additional hit on a natural 6 eludes even /tg/'s greatest minds.

==In Real Life==
Functionally in reality, twin linked weapons are most often seen in modern warfare in situations where you or the target are moving very fast and you need to increase your odds of hitting by shooting more bullets. This is why pretty much all small caliber AA weapons tend to be mounted in pairs such as the M45 Quadmount, quite literally two pairs of twin-linked Browning Machine Guns that were twin-linked in turn, or the German Wirbelwind AA tank, or the 4 twin linked 50 calibers on the P-47 for eight total. In ground combat twin-linking is rarer but not unheard of, the SAS jeeps used by long range desert patrols were sometimes armed with twin-linked <s>Lewis guns.</s> Vickers 'K' guns.

The more common use in the past was for single shot weapons in which case reloading would take so long that being able to get a second shot off quickly was more important, cost be damned. This is why many old time 'elephant guns' have two barrels. If the elephant or even a boar turns on you if your first shot does not kill it you better pray you can get a follow up shot to connect. Over-under shotguns (breech loading double shot shotguns) for hunting are another example: getting a second shot off immediately matters in case your target escapes you, be it a deer or especially a bird.

Muskets can count too, as some variants were built custom by gunsmiths to fire both musketballs at the same time, though these would tend to fetch a higher price than just a good old normal musket, and as such were usually reserved to men of great wealth or standing within either the merchant classes or the nobility, the nobility being the more likely of the two.

===In Other Words...===

[[Dakka|MOAR DAKKA]]

==Gallery==
===Imperium===
<gallery>
File:SquadStubber.png|<center>Close-up of the [[Death Korps of Krieg| Krieg]] [[Heavy Weapons Squad]]'s Heavy Stubber.</center>
File:SaberStubber.png|<center>The Sabre Gun Platform, when you think one pair of Heavy Stubbers isn't enough dakka</center>
File:TigrusBolter53.jpg|<center>A Tigrus Combi-Bolter (Although you can't really tell at this view)</center>
File:Leman_russ_exterminator_(las).jpg|<center>Leman Russ Exterminator</center>
File:Annhilator.jpg|<center>Leman Russ Annihilator</center>
File:99590105335_Dkkmarsalphapatternannihilator02.jpg
File:Rogal_Dorn_Battle_Tank.jpg
File:Dorn_Tank_Top.PNG
File:Hellfire_Dread.jpg|<center>Hellfire Dreadnought with Twin-linked LasCannons</center>
File:MortisDreadMini.jpg|<center>Mortis Dreadnought with two pairs of Autocannons for massive dakka</center>
File:DeathwingDreadnought.jpg|<center>Deathwing Dreadnought</center>
File:99120101083 VenerableDreadnoughtNEW01.jpg|<center>Venerable Dread with a pair of LasCannons</center>
File:Deredeo_Dreadnought.jpg|<center>Deredeo Dread, even more dakka than the Mortis<center>
File:OsironPattern.jpg|<center>Contemptor-Osiron Dread with twin-linked Autocannons<center>
File:Contemptor-Cortus.jpg|<center>Contemptor-Cortus Dread with twin-linked Heavy Bolters</center>
File:Tartaros.jpg|<center>Two marines in Tartaros Terminator Armor;one carrying a [[Combi-Bolter]] the other a [[Reaper Autocannon]]<center>
</gallery>
===Orks===
<gallery>
File:Twin-Linked_Shoota.PNG|<center>MegaNob Twin-linked Shoota</center>
TwinShootaFront.jpg|<center>Front View</center>
TwinShootaBack.jpg|<center>Back View</center>
TwinShootaNob.jpg|<center>Common Twin-linked Shoota</center>
TwinShootaTrakk.jpg|<center>Twin-linked Shoota mounted on a [[Wartrakk|Wartrakk]]</center>
KombiSlugga.jpg|<center>[[Shootas'an_Dakkas#Slugga|Slugga Variant of the Shoota]]</center>
</gallery>

==See Also==
* [[Combi-weapon]]

[[Category:Warhammer 40,000]]