# Where are the nukes?



## dragonkingofthestars (May 3, 2010)

Exactly as title says, where are atomic weapons? the only place I know of them are in the back story of the Kreig siege regiments, and that's, it really.

This is not just an academic question, consider Titans, if i had a 100 meter high god machine with a plasma cannon the size of a house on each arm stomping toward me my first response would be hit with a nuke. and a big one at that.

so why does the Imperium, the thing that coined 'grimdark' as a trope, not use atomic weapons with all the regard of fallout 3 American and China. Is there some kind of reason?


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## hailene (Aug 28, 2009)

I imagine the plasma weaponry uses fusion for its destructive purposes. We see plasma warheads in the shape of Deathstrike missile launchers.

In the Gaunt's Ghost series novel _Necropolis_ a few officers discuss the possibility of a nuclear streak taking out a nearby Hive.

As to why nuclear weapons aren't used against titans...I am unsure. Surely we'd see some of the crazier or more desperate groups tossing nukes around.


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## zerachiel76 (Feb 12, 2010)

dragonkingofthestars said:


> Exactly as title says, where are atomic weapons? the only place I know of them are in the back story of the Kreig siege regiments, and that's, it really.
> 
> This is not just an academic question, consider Titans, if i had a 100 meter high god machine with a plasma cannon the size of a house on each arm stomping toward me my first response would be hit with a nuke. and a big one at that.
> 
> so why does the Imperium, the thing that coined 'grimdark' as a trope, not use atomic weapons with all the regard of fallout 3 American and China. Is there some kind of reason?


If I remember correctly the HH era marines and the Death Guard in particular did use things like this. I think they were known at Destroyer Squads. I'm not surprised they weren't included in the Codex since Guilliman was interested in keeping the planet's logistics and ability to support life intact. I expect that the Inquisition/Deathwatch now uses any remaining weapons such as this.


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## Galahad (Dec 21, 2006)

Considering they can do Exterminatus attacks and destroy all life on a planet from orbit I think it;s safe to say there are nukes and they do get used.

But you don't read about it or see it in the game because it's boring.

Nukes are a last-ditch "This planet is frelled and not worth saving" sort of weapon. you don;t use them on anything you intend to keep.

Meanwhile all the battles with marine sand titans and whatnot are over places that the people fighting over them want to keep. They may be batt-elravaged ruins, but at least you can build them up again and still live there.

Planets get nuked, but when they do it;s a statistic rather than a story.


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## hailene (Aug 28, 2009)

Galahad said:


> you don;t use them on anything you intend to keep.


If I recall correctly, fusion weapons are clean (modern ones aren't since we still use a fission explosion to trigger a more powerful fusion explosion).

Also, unlike us who are currently bound to a single planet, there are instances when you don't want to keep a planet. If you know you're unlikely to hold or even take a planet, it might be best to mess it up as much as you can. A scorched earth policy.

Also there are factions who don't have that sort of strategic thought. Orks or Chaos (sometimes) come to mind.


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## locustgate (Dec 6, 2009)

Nukes cause irreparable harm to planets, I you nuke a hive city you prevented your enemy AND you from holding it.


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## Romanov77 (Jan 27, 2013)

Yet most of the tabletop battles we see could be easily solved by a single tactical weapon of mass destruction.


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## MEQinc (Dec 12, 2010)

hailene said:


> If I recall correctly, fusion weapons are clean (modern ones aren't since we still use a fission explosion to trigger a more powerful fusion explosion).


It's doubtful that the Imperium's would be any better. Sure they've got lots of time to have improved them but they have even more time to forget what they're doing.



> Also, unlike us who are currently bound to a single planet, there are instances when you don't want to keep a planet. If you know you're unlikely to hold or even take a planet, it might be best to mess it up as much as you can. A scorched earth policy.


Exterminatus. I think that's the main reason you don't see a lot of nukes being used: when you don't want scorched earth you can't really use nukes and when you do the Imperium has bigger and badder ways of doing it.



> Also there are factions who don't have that sort of strategic thought. Orks or Chaos (sometimes) come to mind.


Orks may not have the capability to build nukes and Chaos, again, has bigger and badder ways to destroy planets and/or environments.


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## Galahad (Dec 21, 2006)

hailene said:


> If I recall correctly, fusion weapons are clean (modern ones aren't since we still use a fission explosion to trigger a more powerful fusion explosion).


Fusion weapons as we know them require a fission event to trigger and thus still produce radioactive fallout. There's no known way to creat a fusion bomb without a fission reaction since it requires large amounts of x-ray radiation to make the secondary (fusion) explosion. 

Even if you could create a 'clean' fusion bomb, it would still cause enough collateral damage to make the whole gesture pointless.



> Also, unlike us who are currently bound to a single planet, there are instances when you don't want to keep a planet. If you know you're unlikely to hold or even take a planet, it might be best to mess it up as much as you can. A scorched earth policy.


Which does indeed happen in the 40k universe. It was a tactic for a while to 'herd' hive fleets by completely destroying the biosphere of planets in their path, get them built up in a couple systems then wipe the whole thing with exterminatus. The only problem is, that strategy has proven way too costly.

But make no mistake, the imperium has nuked entire planets before...but as I said, that's boring. An epic war story is replaced with a single sentence where you say they blew up the planet, the end.

How do you write a story or play a game about that?
It happens, but it's not something that gets much focus.



> Also there are factions who don't have that sort of strategic thought. Orks or Chaos (sometimes) come to mind.


Orks would rather blow things up on a personal scale. Where's the fun in letting some mek push a button that blows up a city or a planet when you could eb in there personally, blowing people up one by one? Sure, you COULD nuke that spce marine chapter holding the last imperial bastion but why would any ork want to when he can charge in there and show the world he's 'ard enough to take on the marines?



locustgate said:


> Nukes cause irreparable harm to planets, I you nuke a hive city you prevented your enemy AND you from holding it.


Bingo.
You don't nuke anything you want to keep. And anything you don't want to keep probably DOES get nuked, but nobody cares because it wasn't worth keeping and the drama is gone at the push of a button.



Romanov77 said:


> Yet most of the tabletop battles we see could be easily solved by a single tactical weapon of mass destruction.


Exactly...which renders the entire game utterly pointless.
"I created a well-balanced all-comers 1500 point marines list. What did you bring?"
"A nuke. I win...rematch?"

You've got to remember this is a game and a fiction franchise first and foremost. If people actually fought logically then the whole setting wouldn;t exist as we know it.


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## emporershand89 (Jun 11, 2010)

I honestly think humanity has grown to the point of realizing the dangers and bad effects of nuclear radiation fallout. Thus they tend not to use them. Additionally from what I understand after reading Lexicanum Nukes are not common place, and only the extremely wealthy planets and governors have stockpiles of them. 

There honestly seems to be more virus bombs and Exterminatus weapons than nukes. To be fair as some have already stated Nukes in Warhammer 40k are a under powered dictators toy; barely worth the notice.


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## Galahad (Dec 21, 2006)

LOL, I think it's more that humanity has developed even better ways of blowing shit up. Nukes just don;t do enough damage.
The idea of humanity 'growing' in terms of maturity or knowledge under the imperium is hilarious.


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## Khorne's Fist (Jul 18, 2008)

There are several mentions of atomic weapons throughout the BL books, particularly in regard to space battles. As said previously though, they tend only to be used as a last resort. The Imperium is usually conquering much needed resources that might be rendered useless by the use of atomics. 

Besides, with weapons like magma bombs, lance batteries and cyclonic torpedoes available, atomics are probably down the list of effective weapons.


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## locustgate (Dec 6, 2009)

emporershand89 said:


> I honestly think humanity has grown to the point of realizing the dangers and bad effects of nuclear radiation fallout. Thus they tend not to use them. Additionally from what I understand after reading Lexicanum Nukes are not common place, and only the extremely wealthy planets and governors have stockpiles of them.
> 
> There honestly seems to be more virus bombs and Exterminatus weapons than nukes. To be fair as some have already stated Nukes in Warhammer 40k are a under powered dictators toy; barely worth the notice.


I wouldn't say all of humanity but enough to decrees the need, plus they have alot more 'fun' alternitives.



Khorne's Fist said:


> The Imperium is usually conquering much needed resources that might be rendered useless by the use of atomics.


I wouldn't say useless, just not cost effective to get. Instead of sending down a bunch of 'workers' you have to send down 'workers' plus keep bringing them in to replace the ones that die of radiation poisoning and spend resources to give them some protection so the CAN get some of the resources.


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## Romanov77 (Jan 27, 2013)

Any technical info on these "cyclonic warheads"? 

Are they nuclear based or plasma based? Or something else?


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## locustgate (Dec 6, 2009)

Romanov77 said:


> Any technical info on these "cyclonic warheads"?
> 
> Are they nuclear based or plasma based? Or something else?


Nuclear and Plasma, it varies per missile.


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## emporershand89 (Jun 11, 2010)

Khorne's Fist said:


> The Imperium is usually conquering much needed resources that might be rendered useless by the use of atomics.


Hmmmmm..........perhaps they could feed the Tau those nukes. Hehehehe :spiteful::spiteful::spiteful::spiteful:


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## hailene (Aug 28, 2009)

MEQinc said:


> Sure they've got lots of time to have improved them but they have even more time to forget what they're doing.


Plasma reactors power many things in the Imperium. I figure if they can control it enough to use it as a source of power, they'd be capable of making a bomb out of it.



MEQinc said:


> Exterminatus


Those who can give the order for Exterminatus is very limited. According to the sixth edition rulebook, only Inquisitors, Chapter Masters, Lord High Admirals (there are only 5 of them in the Imperium, one for each Segmentum), and Lord Commanders (ditto, only 5 in the Imperium) can give the okay. 

I would also assume Exterminatus weapons are also much harder to produce and much rarer than a fusion or fission weapon.



MEQinc said:


> Orks may not have the capability to build nukes


May not. But probably, I would assume. They're capable of building starships, creating void shields (or something very similar), and creating titans. I can't imagine something as (relatively) simple as a nuclear weapon would be outside their capability. Don't they also use plasma technology for their gargunants and starships, right?



Galahad said:


> There's no known way to creat a fusion bomb without a fission reaction since it requires large amounts of x-ray radiation to make the secondary (fusion) explosion.


Known to us. But so is the creation of starships capable of crossing the galaxy, too.

If they can miniaturize fusion power into a Space Marine's backpack, I assume they could make a fusion bomb that doesn't require a fission reaction.



Galahad said:


> How do you write a story or play a game about that?


By giving reasons why a nuke isn't the first and only choice. It's tricky, but that's what the authors are for.

And if the authors screw up, it's up to devoted fans like us to try to pull an answer out of our collective asses .


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## MEQinc (Dec 12, 2010)

hailene said:


> Plasma reactors power many things in the Imperium. I figure if they can control it enough to use it as a source of power, they'd be capable of making a bomb out of it.


Plasma technology isn't the same as nuclear (similar sure but not identical), otherwise there'd be no point in this topic as the Imperium commonly uses explosive plasma technology (including plasma bombs).

And just because the Imperium knows what they're doing in one field doesn't necessarily mean they have any idea what they're doing in a related field.



> Those who can give the order for Exterminatus is very limited.


Right, the people who could order Nuking would be similarly limited, because they're very similar technologies. The difference is that Exterminatus is a far more effective means of earth scorching than nukes.



> Lord Commanders (ditto, only 5 in the Imperium)


Dunno about that, isn't Macroth a Lord Commander? He doesn't have a sector.



> I would also assume Exterminatus weapons are also much harder to produce and much rarer than a fusion or fission weapon.


Well, given that they are far more common, you'd be wrong.

In theory you could argue that a nuke might be easier to produce but then you could also argue that bullets would be easier to produce than plasma-laser tech. What the Imperium can produce is based on what they've recovered the ability to use and feel like making. 



> May not. But probably, I would assume. They're capable of building starships, creating void shields (or something very similar), and creating titans. I can't imagine something as (relatively) simple as a nuclear weapon would be outside their capability.


True but then Orks guns work because they think they should. The Orks are the only race to have weaponized teleportation technology but they still prefer axes. So... who the fuck knows if the Orks can make nukes. They don't appear to, so I'd say probably not.



> By giving reasons why a nuke isn't the first and only choice. It's tricky, but that's what the authors are for.


I think they do that, though they basically do it using the "we need this place for some reason" excuse that they use to explain why they don't use Exterminatus. Because nukes are a poor mans Exterminatus.


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## emporershand89 (Jun 11, 2010)

hailene said:


> Orks may not have the capability to build nukes


See this actually is who I would see using nukes the most. as nukes are a kind of older version of WMD I would think Orks would build them over humans. But hey....it's GW. :smoke:

Still.......nuke those Tau. Hehehehe :spiteful::spiteful::spiteful::spiteful:


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## Reaper45 (Jun 21, 2011)

The book baneblade does reference the chemdogs planting a nuke to level an ork camp.

I see nukes being a cheap to produce weapon. It's just there's a time and place for them.


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## darkreever (Apr 3, 2008)

emporershand89 said:


> See this actually is who I would see using nukes the most. as nukes are a kind of older version of WMD I would think Orks would build them over humans.


Why? Orks love getting in a good fight, hurling a nuke at your enemy would do more to hinder that then help. Orks may only rarely use a modicum of intelligence, but that doesn't mean they have zero sense.


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## hailene (Aug 28, 2009)

MEQinc said:


> Plasma technology isn't the same as nuclear (similar sure but not identical)


I'll skip this point for now.

Still, we know that Space Marines use fusion power to run their power armor. We know the Imperium has access to reliable, miniaturized fusion power sources.



MEQinc said:


> Right, the people who could order Nuking would be similarly limited,


Source?

In _Necropolis_ the Guard and local hive officers were bouncing the idea of a nearby hive using nuclear weapons on another neighboring hive. There was no comment on how they got the nukes or how they got permission to use the nukes.

Apparently it's not all that strange for a modern hive to both possess and launch nuclear weapons on their own accord.

Later on it's discovered that the hostile hive 1. Did not launch a nuclear missile 2. Had been infiltrated by a Chaos force, but still, at the time the officers in question did not know that.



MEQinc said:


> unno about that, isn't Macroth a Lord Commander?


Are you talking about Macaroth? He's a Warmaster now. I guess the rulebook didn't mention the rank of Warmaster since Warmaster is a temporary rank and not a permanent one. 



MEQinc said:


> Well, given that they are far more common, you'd be wrong.


Source?

The Deatchwatch rulebook mentions that the plasma cannon discharges "miniature suns from its barrel". Sounds like a fusion weapon to me.

It also states that plasma weapons function by feeding fuel "into the miniature fusion core inside the weapon"

The Dark Heresy rulebook states that plasma weapons "fuction by using sturdy flasks of hydrogen suspended in a photoconic state to provide the fuel needed for the *plasma reaction*." What sort of reaction would plasma be needed to do? Fusion, perhaps?

And of course the 2nd edition wargear rulebook states that when a heavy plasma gun's shell hits its target "they react with its matter to create miniature spheres of boiling nuclear energy. For this reason heavy plasma guns are sometimes called 'sun guns.'"

In _Battle Fleet Koronus_ we get mention of a a battleship and grand cruiser unleashing a "rain of fusion fire" on an enemy vessel.

Again, in the Deathwatch rulebook it mentions that vengeance rounds cause "micro-fission explosions". How they manage that in such a small size is beyond my understanding (and, I think, modern humans).



MEQinc said:


> So... who the fuck knows if the Orks can make nukes. They don't appear to, so I'd say probably not.


_I_ would say they _can_. Whether they choose to use it is another matter.

Though I'd think they'd like'em a lot. The bigger the noise, the bigger the explosion, the happier an Ork is. Not much bigger than a good ole H-bomb.

Still, I will concede I can't think of an Ork using a nuclear weapon off the top of my head. Until I provide proof we will have to conclude that they don't have it (or choose not to use it, for whatever reason).



darkreever said:


> Why? Orks love getting in a good fight, hurling a nuke at your enemy would do more to hinder that then help. Orks may only rarely use a modicum of intelligence, but that doesn't mean they have zero sense.


Say that to the poor Ork bastards that stole that Deathstrike missile and blew up 100 of themselves when trying to use it. Haha.


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## Magpie_Oz (Jan 16, 2012)

MEQinc said:


> Plasma technology isn't the same as nuclear (similar sure but not identical), otherwise there'd be no point in this topic as the Imperium commonly uses explosive plasma technology (including plasma bombs).


Just a thing, Plasma and Nukes are totally different.

Plasma is basically the state (solid, liquid,gas, plasma) of an ionized superheated substance.

Nuke is converting matter to energy.


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## hailene (Aug 28, 2009)

Magpie_Oz said:


> Just a thing, Plasma and Nukes are totally different.


Different but definitely related.

Plasma is the mean that (potentially) allows for a nuclear fusion reaction to occur. If you do it right. Which apparently the Imperium does.

Although I did miss the implications of MEQ's comment. 

The answer to the thread is: Yes, they do them. Actually rather frequently. It's just named differently.


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## Magpie_Oz (Jan 16, 2012)

hailene said:


> Different but definitely related.


Only in as much as a fusion reactor provides the energy for the plasma weapon. They are related in the same way a Light Globe and a Wind Turbine are.


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## hailene (Aug 28, 2009)

Magpie_Oz said:


> They are related in the same way a Light Globe and a Wind Turbine are.


I personally would disagree. It would be like wind and a wind turbine. or gasoline and an internal combustion engine.

Plasma can do more than simply power a fusion generator. Likewise wind and gasoline can do things more than simply provide a source of electricity or locomotion.


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## Magpie_Oz (Jan 16, 2012)

hailene said:


> I personally would disagree. It would be like wind and a wind turbine. or gasoline and an internal combustion engine.
> 
> Plasma can do more than simply power a fusion generator. Likewise wind and gasoline can do things more than simply provide a source of electricity or locomotion.


Plasma doesn't power a fusion generator, fusion powers a fusion generator.

Sometimes a Plasma is used as a containment field but that has nothing to do with the reaction itself, it's just a way of keeping it in check, like a bucket does to a gallon of water.

A plasma fusion drive uses the energy from a fusion reaction to create a super heated plasma which is thrown out the back to make your star ship go.


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## shaantitus (Aug 3, 2009)

Haliene, Are you a physicist?
If the answer is no then we have the reason why you are wrong.
Plasma is the fourth fundamental state of matter.
Plasma weaponry can be defined as weapons that make use of/or use plasma as their ammunition/offensive effect.
It has absolutely nothing to do with fusion, It is completely possible to have matter in the plasma state, with no fusion occurring at all. Listen to mags. He knows what he is talking about. You do not.

A note to the wise, plasma is found in neon lighting, I don't recall any fusion occurring last time someone turned on a neon light.


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## hailene (Aug 28, 2009)

Magpie_Oz said:


> Plasma doesn't power a fusion generator, fusion powers a fusion generator.


Plasma can power a fusion generator. Fusion is the means that plasma is converted to energy.

Just like how gasoline powers an internal combustion engine. The combustion of the gasoline powers the engine.

You have to combine small atoms (like hydrogen) into something larger and heavier (like helium).

I mean, think about it, what exactly is fueling stars? Plasma. By what means are they using the plasma to create energy and heat? Fusion. 

Plasma is the energy source. Fusion is the means that energy is conceived. 

I mean, I wouldn't say gasoline doesn't power my car's internal combustion engine, internal combustion does. 

HOWEVER if _you_ do, I can understand your position. If so, we needn't go any further down this line of conversation since we both can agree on the matter--just in different words.



Magpie_Oz said:


> A plasma fusion drive uses the energy from a fusion reaction to create a super heated plasma which is thrown out the back to make your star ship go.


A fusion drive is different from a fusion generator. A fusion drive does, indeed, work as you described it.



shaantitus said:


> Haliene, Are you a physicist?


Answer is most definitely no. Please enlighten me.



shaantitus said:


> Plasma is the fourth fundamental state of matter.


I agree there. Plasma doesn't automatically mean fusion. You can have a billion tons of plasma laying around and not a single fusion reaction.

I know that much.



shaantitus said:


> Plasma weaponry can be defined as weapons that make use of/or use plasma as their ammunition/offensive effect.


Indeed, can be. Plasma can be used as a weapon outside of fusion. It's freakin' hot, for one thing.

However, we have many sources that state that the plasma weapons function as fusion weapons. Or that Imperial Navy ships have fusion weapons at the ready.

I mean, you really can't get more explicit than "[Plasma shells] react with its matter to create miniature spheres of boiling nuclear energy". Feel free to try, though.


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## Magpie_Oz (Jan 16, 2012)

Why do you argue this stuff when you don't even have the first clue what your talking about?


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## hailene (Aug 28, 2009)

Magpie_Oz said:


> Why do you argue this stuff when you don't even have the first clue what your talking about?
> 
> Real world or within the 40k fluff everything in you post is totally wrong.


Okay. Fine. For the sake of the argument, plasma can not be used to power a fusion reaction (despite what our sun is bloody doing right now).

Let's move on. I have provided sources that explicitly state plasma weaponry creates a nuclear reaction. I'll cite the source I'd like to focus our discussion on:

"[Plasma shells] react with its matter to create miniature spheres of boiling nuclear energy."

Interpret that, please.


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## Magpie_Oz (Jan 16, 2012)

hailene said:


> Okay. Fine. For the sake of the argument, plasma can not be used to power a fusion reaction (despite what our sun is bloody doing right now).


No it isn't. The heat of the fusion reaction is creating a plasma. 



hailene said:


> Let's move on. I have provided sources that explicitly state plasma weaponry creates a nuclear reaction. I'll cite the source I'd like to focus our discussion on:
> 
> "[Plasma shells] react with its matter to create miniature spheres of boiling nuclear energy."
> 
> Interpret that, please.


Give me the source.

Also prepare a response as to how a state of matter, solid, liquid, gas or plasma can be described as nuclear energy.


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## hailene (Aug 28, 2009)

Magpie_Oz said:


> No it isn't. The heat of the fusion reaction is creating a plasma.


We can touch on this later.



Magpie_Oz said:


> Give me the source.


2nd edition Wargear rulebook page 37. First paragraph.


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## Galahad (Dec 21, 2006)

I think you got it backwards, mate. The sun's fusion isn't powered by plasma, solar plasma is a side effect of the fusion generated naturally by intense gravity.

There's also a big difference between a fusion reactor and a fusion bomb...just like the difference between a nuclear fission reactior is different than a fission bomb. Blow up a nuclear reacotr and you get a lot of radiation and fallout but you don't get a city-erasing explosion.

That said, this whole fission-fusion quibble is semantic and pointless.
Fission bombs are called 'thermonuclear weapons' they;re still nukes.

Regardless of HOW the bomb is made, there's been several possible reasons cited for why *any* WMD is rarely seen in the fiction.

They do exist.
Numerous citations have been mentioned.
They are used.

They aren't depicted often because regardless of HOW you erase all life in a city/country/continent/planet, doing 0so is an extreme measure of last resort. Even 'clean' fusion bombs would utterly eradicate any assets in the area you're trying to defend. They would only be used if the area were overrun beyond all hope. That's been done in fiction before, it happens, but 90% of the action depicted in fiction, and 100% of action depicted in game is of the actually interesting aspects *before* the guy with the nuke button declares game over and bolws it all up.


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## hailene (Aug 28, 2009)

While Magpie is musing over the source I provided, let's try to educate me a bit on how nuclear physics works.

Let's forget about how stars work for now.

I'll give what I understand and you guys can fill in the gaps (or bulldoze and replace) my own (flawed) understanding.

So I know there's a break point between fusion and fission (iron). Any atom heavier, when broken, will generate more energy. Any atom lighter, when combined, will generate more energy.

For our discussion purposes, we'll use hydrogen. Basically if you combine two hydrogen atoms you to create a helium atom, you net energy.

The problem is that the electrostatic force keeps the atoms apart. So you have to overcome that somehow. One way is to heat up the atoms considerably. Once they have enough energy they can slam into each other hard enough to overcome the electrostatic force and allowing the close nuclear force to come into play. One way to do that is to heat the suckers up. Heat it enough to become plasma, right?

From what you guys, it seems that I'm going astray somewhere along here.

Anyway, you manage to heat the hydrogen up high enough to turn into plasma. Then from there (there's a few different methods, apparently) have the hydrogen plasma fuse into itself (or other plasma?) and that's how you net energy from a fusion reaction.

So what went wrong?


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## Galahad (Dec 21, 2006)

The whole fusion/fission thing is a massive sidetrack. If you have any questions about how fusion works, maybe this will help.

Nuclear fusion - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Meanwhile, citing a reference book that's not just four editions out of date, but from an edition that was comically inept when it came to physics or, really, almost everything, doesn't really get you anywhere. It just proves that Gav Thorpe (or whomever) had no idea how science worked in the early 90s.

But again, it's not really the point. The original question is where are the atomic weapons. We;ve mentioned a few times they've cropped up and came up with seceral reasons why they aren;t more prominent.


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## Magpie_Oz (Jan 16, 2012)

hailene said:


> While Magpie is musing over the source I provided, let's try to educate me a bit on how nuclear physics works.
> 
> Let's forget about how stars work for now.
> 
> ...


The plasma is not what creates the energy.

The fusion reaction comes about from two hydrogen nuclei fusing together which creates energy, there is no "fuel input" via plasma. That's the cool thing with fusion you start with a given volume of hydrogen and once you kick it in to action with either heat or pressure etc it sustains itself.

The plasma might be thought of as a spark plug in the internal combustion engine analogy but it would only need the one spark as after that it is self sustaining.

The 40k take on plasma weapons is that the stored hydrogen is heated to plasma in the fusion chamber and then shot out as a ball. Describing that as Nuclear Energy is only correct in as far as the heat for the plasma came from a nuclear source.

It's like calling your fridge coal powered because the power station uses coal.


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## hailene (Aug 28, 2009)

Galahad said:


> Meanwhile, citing a reference book that's not just four editions out of date, but from an edition that was comically inept when it came to physics or, really, almost everything, doesn't really get you anywhere. It just proves that Gav Thorpe (or whomever) had no idea how science worked in the early 90s.


I actually cited quite a few sources. Almost all of them in 5th edition. That one was the most explicit. 

Besides, my citation hasn't been ret-conned, has it? If so, please provide the source.



Magpie_Oz said:


> The fusion reaction comes about from two hydrogen nuclei fusing together which creates energy


Question, though. Isn't the plasma made up of hydorgen nuclei, anyway? Plasma is simply a state of mater, right? You can have hydroplasma. Just like you can have solid hydrogen. or gaseous hydrogen. or liquid hydrogen, right?



Magpie_Oz said:


> The 40k take on plasma weapons is that the stored hydrogen is heated to plasma in the fusion chamber and then shot out as a ball.


Also the Deathwatch rulebook does state that plasma weaponry shoots out miniature suns. 

In this light, it would make sense that the fusion core is a place where a fusion reaction of some sort occurs. It's not definite proof alone, but the two sources do support each other.

Do you have a source that refutes them?

I'll dig out some other sources.

Imperial Guard Codex, 5th edition, page 69, "A soldier with a plasma pistol wields the power of a small sun in his hands."

From the fifth edition Space Wolves codex "When a plasma 'bolt' strikes a target, energy is released and the target blows apart in an almighty explosion"

From the fifth edition Dark Angel's codex: "...a plasma 'bolt' of molten gas explodes on impact, generating the destructive heat of a small sun." Isn't the heat of a sun, as you said, the net result of the fusion process?

~~~~~~~

On a side note, I would assume the plasma reactor used in, at least Warhound titans, are fusion powered.

In Imperial Armour III the the Warhound entry mentions that the reactor, if not carefully watched is endanger of a "catastrophic run away reaction..." What sort of reaction could they be running with plasma that could run away?

Anywho, I have work in the morning so I'm checking out.

I await sources describing plasma technology from you guys. As the thread about logistics (which turned into a debate about whether a ship could maintain geostationary, low orbit on its own power came about), sometimes the authors don't really care/know about the sciences. And it's always cool to pick apart my sources, but I'd love to see some sources provided that I get to pick apart, too.

With that, I leave you guys. Until tomorrow. Or maybe a couple-three days, depending on how my work goes.


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## Galahad (Dec 21, 2006)

Alright, the amateur sci-fi physics lecture needs to end, it's just getting silly and has nothing to do with the topic at hand.


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## Xabre (Dec 20, 2006)

I think all the blood plasma in my brain just exploded from this conversation.

I remember reading something about Klingons earlier today; the reason the entire race hadn't nuked itself into oblivion was because they were too honorable to be firing missiles from afar and see each other in the eyes for death. In a way, alot of the Imperium is like that... If it's not honor, it's the need for a confirmed kill.

On the flip side, I direct your attention to the prologue of Nemesis.... I recently reread it... did the Venumeum (or however you call the poisoner Clade) land on the planet, acknowledging to himself he was already dead from the rads saturating the world from atomic bombing?


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## Romanov77 (Jan 27, 2013)

Has anyone mentioned the possibility of teleporting nukes right into the target?

I mean, what's the point of teleporting terminators into an enemy ship when you can teleport a cyclonic warhead?
Aside from the obvious "Because boarding actions are heroic and awesome".


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## Beaviz81 (Feb 24, 2012)

Yeah I have wondered about the wisdom of teleporting guys over as teleporting seems to be a bit dangerous. I mean I would rather send a few Sharks with nukes than men into a Tyranid ship due to the men being not good after it.


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## Magpie_Oz (Jan 16, 2012)

Problem with teleporting a weapon over is if it doesn't go off you've just gifted the enemy a weapon, a pretty powerful one at that.


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## Beaviz81 (Feb 24, 2012)

Can't you just set the timer to one second and teleport it to the bridge?


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## Magpie_Oz (Jan 16, 2012)

And if the timer doesn't work? 

Also don't forget time is a very different thing in the warp.


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## Beaviz81 (Feb 24, 2012)

Right every enemy will know how the Imperial nukes would go and manage to disarm it. I means bombs are complicated stuff, and here you have semi-sentient bombs loyal to the IOM, they won't react good to f.ex. an ork tampering with it.


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## Magpie_Oz (Jan 16, 2012)

Beaviz81 said:


> Right every enemy will know how the Imperial nukes would go and manage to disarm it. I means bombs are complicated stuff, and here you have semi-sentient bombs loyal to the IOM, they won't react good to f.ex. an ork tampering with it.


Don't be a tool. 

All I am saying is that teleporting a nuke has the problem that if the detonator for what ever reason fails then the enemy now has this uber killy huge kaboomer that they can throw straight back at you. 

Better to launch it on a missile that explodes on contact.

It one of the reasons nukes aren't launched into orbit around earth on "killer satellites".

It was also a pretty big consideration with the first atomic bomb in WW2


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## spanner94ezekiel (Jan 6, 2011)

Also, we're talking about the Imperium here. Their nuclear arms are likely to be very unstable, so prone to detonation at inopportune moments. There's far more potential for shit to go wrong if you're trying to teleport them through the warp to a moving ship. What happens if it pops up in the wrong place (as is possible) - such as your own bridge?


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## Beaviz81 (Feb 24, 2012)

If the detonator fails, that's a pretty big if. You have a point however if the enemy manage to stasis-cell the weapon.

Plus unlike on a torpedo the weapon would detonate against the weakest part of the space ship not the strongest.


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## Magpie_Oz (Jan 16, 2012)

Point is they don't do it. There a 1,000,000 reasons why it is a bad idea, I and spanner have highlight some.


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## Beaviz81 (Feb 24, 2012)

spanner94ezekiel said:


> Also, we're talking about the Imperium here. Their nuclear arms are likely to be very unstable, so prone to detonation at inopportune moments. There's far more potential for shit to go wrong if you're trying to teleport them through the warp to a moving ship. What happens if it pops up in the wrong place (as is possible) - such as your own bridge?


The nuke appearing on your own bridge, that's a good enough point even if the Machine Spirit of the weapon could work as a failsafe there. And yeah the nucelear weapons blowing up at the wrong time would be bad, but the ordnance is stored onboard for centuries without going off in general.


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## Magpie_Oz (Jan 16, 2012)

Beaviz81 said:


> And yeah the nucelear weapons blowing up at the wrong time would be bad.


That would be the one time you'd NOT want the "delayed" result on the mishap table !!


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## Beaviz81 (Feb 24, 2012)

Don't you mean the other way around? I mean if I accidentally teleported a nuke to the bridge of my own vessel I would thank the Ommnissiah if it didn't go off immediately and allowed the nearby Tech-Priest to disarm it.


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## Magpie_Oz (Jan 16, 2012)

Nuke blowing up at the wrong time I mean


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## Galahad (Dec 21, 2006)

Yeah, when you get into the nutty unreliability of imperial tech (literally they have rituals for kicking machinery to get it working), and couple it with the insane unpredictable nature of warp tracel, teleporting a nuke seems like a double bad idea...no, actually it would be a bd idea squared. All the things that could go wrong with a malfunctioning WMD multiplied by all the things that can go wrong with teleporter mishaps. 

Timers wouldn't work at all because as stated, time inside the warp is way different than outside. At best it might blow up inside the warp. A radio detonation might not work if it's deep enough inside the enemy vessel (lots of metal between you and it), and comm signals could easily be jammed on an active battlefield that's no doubt swamped in ECM.

And this is assuming you can actually teleport past their Void Shields or whatever equivalent device they use, which as i understand it, you generally cannot. 

Really, if you ARE going to teleport a bomb, the only way to do it would be completelyand utterly in 40k style: Teleport a squad of terminators in with it. They can pick it up and carry it to where it needs to go if it ends up (inevitably) out of place, fight off any attempts to tamper or intercept it and manually detonate it in an act of hroic sacrifice.

Because THAT is how shit works in 40k, and is about the only interesting way to use a nuke or other wmd in the setting. You could even play a game around it. 

The nuke is treated as a squad member with whatever stats. Say, T4, 4+ save. If the enemy manages to 'wound' it then it goes off and there's say a 3+ chance it was close enough to the vitals of the ship to destroy it and the bomber wins. 

So the only 'safe' way to handle it would be to melee a squad of terminators. Meanwhile the terminators need to get it within 6" of some vital bit of machinery and set it off. Defender wins if all terminators are slain or they capture the nuke by killing all terminators within 2" of it and moving a squad into cohesion with it (which they already would be if they're in melee), then take it to the edge of the board.

Could make a good space hulk scenario too.


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## Beaviz81 (Feb 24, 2012)

They must be respectful to you weaponry, or else you risk f.ex. your lasgun setting itself on high and blasting your commanding officer because you reloaded it wrong ten years ago. That's how ridiculous it is. I mean half the Uplifting Primer are prayers for keeping your weapons in working order.


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## Reaper45 (Jun 21, 2011)

So I guess no one cares that the imperium does use nukes.


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## Beaviz81 (Feb 24, 2012)

They are called the Vortex Missiles.


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## spanner94ezekiel (Jan 6, 2011)

Reaper45 said:


> So I guess no one cares that the imperium does use nukes.


Care to explain your point? I think I'm missing some context here.


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## locustgate (Dec 6, 2009)

Beaviz81 said:


> They are called the Vortex Missiles.


They are NOT nukes, they are teleporter missiles. They teleport everything in a area to the warp. I like to imagine the demons in the warp where all the stuff gets dumped out, "Who the warp keeps throwing out these good beds".


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## Reaper45 (Jun 21, 2011)

spanner94ezekiel said:


> Care to explain your point? I think I'm missing some context here.


Oh I don't know aside from the fact that everyone is arguing about how nukes won't work. When I did point out that in the book baneblade a big part of the book involves the chemdogs planting a nuke mine under an ork base.


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## Magpie_Oz (Jan 16, 2012)

Reaper45 said:


> Oh I don't know aside from the fact that everyone is arguing about how nukes won't work.


Don't think anyone actually said that tho'


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## Galahad (Dec 21, 2006)

no, they were arguing about clean fusion and how plasma works and a bunch of other unrelated crap 

I acknowledged the reference though, along with the others people have made.
Anyone else got examples of when nukes were used?


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## hailene (Aug 28, 2009)

So I'm back in the conversation. You guys (were) talking about the plausibility of teleporting a nuke. I would say yes, it is very likely. Why?

We've seen them teleport potential nukes dozens of times. Fusion reactors on Space Marine power armor. None of those, to my knowledge, has ever malfunctioned because of teleportation. Minus times when they're teleported into walls or something.


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## Galahad (Dec 21, 2006)

hailene said:


> So I'm back in the conversation. You guys (were) talking about the plausibility of teleporting a nuke. I would say yes, it is very likely. Why?
> 
> We've seen them teleport potential nukes dozens of times. Fusion reactors on Space Marine power armor. None of those, to my knowledge, has ever malfunctioned because of teleportation. Minus times when they're teleported into walls or something.


Again, there's a world of difference between a fusion reactor and a BOMB
Bombs are designed to explode catastrophically, reactors are designed to fail as safely as possible.

Imperial tech in general is shoddy and prone to malfunction. Space marines generally have a higher level of manufacture and maintenance than the rest of the imperium, but that's beside the point.

How do you set the bomb off?
Assuming it doesn't get teleported into a bulkhead and rendered inert.
Assuming it doesn't just get lost in the warp entirely.
Assuming it doesn't surface inside your own ship.
Assuming it doesn't resurface a thousand years later.
Assuming it ends up close enough to something vital to actually cause more damage than impacting against the outside.

Assuming everything goes perfectly with the teleport, which rarely happens in 40k

How do you set it off?
I already mentioned that timers would be ill-advised because even when a teleported object arrives at the right time in the real world, time passes differently inside the warp. From the object's perspective, seconds culd have passed, or hours, or days.

Meanwhile your bomb is now inside what is no doubt a large mass of metal or equivalent structure. Radio signals are unlikely to penetrate, and even if they do they're easy to jam.

The only way to effectively teleport a WMD onto an enemy ship is to do it the 40k way, escorted by heroes who do it as a suicide mission. Tell me that doesn;t sound like 40k?

If beaming warheads around is so easy and plausible then i'm sure you can find several instances of it being done.
I'll wait.


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## scscofield (May 23, 2011)

The SM are more likely to teleport in termies who pulled the trigger as the teleport started.


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## Galahad (Dec 21, 2006)

Exactly. The only way to reliably trigger a teleported bomb is to teleport someone in with it to set it off.

Heroic sacrifice for the glory of the emperor.

that's how shit gets done in the grimdark future.


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## hailene (Aug 28, 2009)

Galahad said:


> Again, there's a world of difference between a fusion reactor and a BOMB


Here's my spin on things. If something as delicate as a reactor that must finely control itself least it 1. Fail 2. Explode catastrophically because some key component was lost in the warp, I assume a (relatively) much simpler bomb could survive the translation.

So, yes, I agree that they're vastly different things.

and let's not forget the intricacies of what power armor is. And that thing goes through without a hitch.



Galahad said:


> Assuming everything goes perfectly with the teleport, which rarely happens in 40k


 Actually, in fluff, teleports work remarkably smoothly. I can think of only one teleport failure off the top of my head and that was in _Know No Fear_. And that was hardly under normal (even for battlefield) conditions.



Galahad said:


> How do you set it off?


Machine spirit. Servitor. You might say that the servitor couldn't survive if he's stuck in the warp for a billion years. We've seen at least dozens of teleports where the time dilation is negligible. I, for one, can't recall one where the teleporties were stuck in there for any undue amount of time. You're more than free to cite some sources to the contrary.

They have self-guided torpedoes that can find, track, and select new targets on the fly. I'm pretty sure they could program a machine spirit to figure out whether or not if it's inside the bowels an enemy vessel.

I mean, hell, the Land Raider can fight on its own in a battlefield. Sans crew. That's an incredible feat of AI...I mean, an example of the potency of its machine spirit.

Don't sell Imperial tech short.


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## Galahad (Dec 21, 2006)

I never stated that warp travel would *cause* the bomb to fail (though that's not out of the question), just that anything built by humans (discounting space marines) should already be considered not fully reliable, and when coupled with the notoriously unreliable medium of warp travel it multiplies the odds that something will go wrong.

And say what you will, teleport mishap tables and scattering on teleport happen for a reason. 


Also fusion reactors don't explode when they fail. 
I don't know how many times I have to explain that bombs and reactors are totally different things. Fusion requires a lot of things to work exactly right in order to create and sustain the fusion reaction. If anything fails, the fusion reaction simply ceases. The reactor becomes inert and at worst you have a small amount of radioactive fuel to contend with. Fission reactors melt down and/or explode because fission is a chain reaction that requires a lot of effort to control. If the control mechanism breaks down the chain reaction can go out of control and cause a melt down. But even an exploding nuclear reactor is not the same as a nuclear explosion. It's generally the result of hot radioactive material melting its way to groundwater or into a reservoir and causing a violent steam explosion that hurls radioactive vapor and debris into the air. Bad, but not an atomic bomb.

I really wish you would take a second to look things up before you talk about them with such certainty. But that's back into the physics lesson territory and not really relevant to the conversation.



Which takes us back to 'if it's so easy and practical to teleport a warhead onto an enemy vessel where can we see it done?'

We've had a few examples from Reaper and others of nukes being used in 40k, can you give me one of someone teleporting one offensively?

I'm pretty sure you can't teleport through void shields, and once the shields are down, conventional weapons are pretty effective. Why take a chance beaming warheads around when you can just hammer the defenseless vessel with lance batteries and conventional missiles, or beam in strike teams to seize it?


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## hailene (Aug 28, 2009)

Galahad said:


> when coupled with the notoriously unreliable medium of warp travel it multiplies the odds that something will go wrong.


If that stopped the Imperium, we'd still be stuck in Sol waiting for the Tyranids and Necrons to eat us. It's reliable...enough.



Galahad said:


> And say what you will, teleport mishap tables and scattering on teleport happen for a reason.


Just a bit off-topic, but I must say the overall impression I get of your knowledge seems to be from a table top hobbyist point of view mixed with some logical know how from the real world. Am I wrong?



Galahad said:


> Also fusion reactors don't explode when they fail.


The _Waning Moon_ in _Battle for Abyss_ went reactor-critical. And exploded because of it.

The _Imperial Crux_, a Reaver class titan reactor "developed a critical reactor event"..."As the gauges red-lined, Dendrake frantically attempted to eject his crew.
No one had made it. There had been a blink of light, and then, where the proud Reaver had once stood, there was only a deep, black crater and a slowly curling, slowly souring mushroom cloud."

When the fusion reactor in _Mechanicum_ was destroyed it caused "serve damage" to three Knights nearby. Its explosion is described as a "fireball".

Later in the book three of an Adept's fusion reactors "suffered critical meltdowns, the mushroom clouds of their detonations drifting east and north..."

Another unnamed Reaver was destroyed and "as the reactor core was breached, the Reaver vanished as a newborn sun flared into life."

In _Helsreach_ there's ann enemy titan whose plasma core was breached and it "exploded, taking the bulk of the fatbodied gargunant".

I can find more citations of reactors exploding, if you want. 

Also I found 2 references to these plasma cores using fusion as its power source. The most obvious being in _Helsreach_ where it's described as "In place of organs, _Stormherald _ [an Emperor class Titan.] possessed a generator core of intensely radioactive and fusion-hot plasma. Asavan found it a curious paradox that the heart of a sun was hermetically sealed and insulated many decks below him, yet here he was, on the edge of freezing to death."

The other would be in _Galaxy in Flames_: "The plasma reactor at its heart was beating in time with his own, a ball of nuclear flame that burned with the Emperor’s own righteous strength."



Galahad said:


> really wish you would take a second to look things up before you talk about them with such certainty.


I would definitely say this to you. You can't assume WH40k works the way our (limited) understanding works.



Galahad said:


> teleporting one offensively?


I'll look for one.



Galahad said:


> I'm pretty sure you can't teleport through void shields, and once the shields are down, conventional weapons are pretty effective. Why take a chance beaming warheads around when you can just hammer the defenseless vessel with lance batteries and conventional missiles, or beam in strike teams to seize it?


Ships are much more durable than that. Look at _Soul Hunter_. A grand cruiser, without shields, getting pounded by an Astartes strike cruiser and 3 Great Crusade Era capital ships (one being the _Vengeful Spirit _ herself) would have been perfectly fine with its shields down for a whole minute.

Edit: I've found an example of a very large weapon being teleported and then having it explode in "Blood Games". I'll look further for a specific nuclear weapon being teleported offensively. The bomb was small enough to be carried in a 2-seater recreational hover craft. It exploded with enough force to concuss a Custodes in his armor from 2 kilometers away. I would imagine that'd be enough to gut a ship.

I'll keep looking.

Editx2: I found it. In _Dark Creed_. A "friendly" vessel is captured by the Word Bearers and sent hurtling towards a White Consul space fortress. The White Consuls are hesitant to fire upon the vessel since they are unaware that the Word Bearers had captured the ship and are using it to ram the space fortress.

"“Scan the Sword of Truth again, officer.”
“In progress, sir!”
“One kilometre!”
“Sir! We are reading… Throne! Sir! Massive readings of atomic warheads aboard the_ Sword of Truth!_”
“Guilliman’s blood, they’ve teleported them across,” said Ostorius, the colour draining from his face."

Consequently, the _Sword of Truth_ rams the space fortress and the nukes on it explode. Lots of damage is done.

So there you go. Happy ?

Anywho, off to bed. I'll see you guys tomorrow night (Pacific time).


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## Magpie_Oz (Jan 16, 2012)

hailene said:


> Editx2: I found it. In _Dark Creed_. A "friendly" vessel is captured by the Word Bearers and sent hurtling towards a White Consul space fortress. The White Consuls are hesitant to fire upon the vessel since they are unaware that the Word Bearers had captured the ship and are using it to ram the space fortress.
> 
> "“Scan the Sword of Truth again, officer.”
> “In progress, sir!”
> ...


OK so the nukes weren't actually teleported onto the Space Fortress. In the earlier posed scenario that is what would be required. 

The nukes in this case have been teleported onto a friendly ship and then somehow detonated from there not teleported onto the target ship and detonated when they materialise. 

Nukes will not detonate properly, if at all, if set off by anything other than the correct initiator, so a nuke getting blown up by another explosion wouldn't result in a nuclear explosion. 

This leads me to think that the Nukes on the ram where detonated by command somehow. Perhaps the story explains or give a hint ?


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## AAAAAAAAARRRGGHH (Apr 17, 2009)

hailene said:


> Editx2: I found it. In Dark Creed. A "friendly" vessel is captured by the Word Bearers and sent hurtling towards a White Consul space fortress. The White Consuls are hesitant to fire upon the vessel since they are unaware that the Word Bearers had captured the ship and are using it to ram the space fortress.
> 
> "“Scan the Sword of Truth again, officer.”
> “In progress, sir!”
> ...


Well, TBH there is such things in the 40k universe as Locator Beacons. So teleporting a warhead unto a vessel you have had the time to tamper with is miles better than to attempt to do so on anywhere else.



Magpie_Oz said:


> Nukes will not detonate properly, if at all, if set off by anything other than the correct initiator, so a nuke getting blown up by another explosion wouldn't result in a nuclear explosion.


I doubt the person who wrote the story is aware of this. So I would just assume that in the grim darkness of the far future there is only explosions, explosions and more explosions.


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## spanner94ezekiel (Jan 6, 2011)

AAAAAAAAARRRGGHH said:


> So I would just assume that in the grim darkness of the far future there is only explosions, explosions and more explosions.


Directed by Michael Bay.
Script Writing by Matthew Ward.


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## Beaviz81 (Feb 24, 2012)

spanner94ezekiel said:


> Directed by Michael Bay.
> Script Writing by Matthew Ward.


Wow a movie even worse than Ultramarines, that can't be good.


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## AAAAAAAAARRRGGHH (Apr 17, 2009)

spanner94ezekiel said:


> Directed by Michael Bay.
> Script Writing by Matthew Ward.


"Prepare for a story of epic proportions, a story as old as time, a story of explosion-induced explosions. Experience the action, the drama and the thrill of special effects. Experience the awesome tale that is: Kaboooomm!! the motion picture. Coming to a theater near you!"


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## Protoss119 (Aug 8, 2010)

spanner94ezekiel said:


> Directed by Michael Bay.
> Script Writing by Matthew Ward.


Starring Steven Seagal.

I'm sorry, that was a cheap shot.


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## hailene (Aug 28, 2009)

Magpie_Oz said:


> In the earlier posed scenario that is what would be required.


Galahad asked for an offensive use. This is offensive.

AAAAAAAAARRRGGHH mentioned that the WBs may have used a teleport homer. Potentially, but if you can teleport a bunch of terminators aboard an enemy vessel I'd assume you could send a teleport homer as well. 



Magpie_Oz said:


> This leads me to think that the Nukes on the ram where detonated by command somehow. Perhaps the story explains or give a hint ?


Thankfully, it does.

"The timed warheads that had been teleported across into her holds detonated and the battle-barge’s plasma core exploded in a blinding corona."

So the warheads were timed.

And yet another example of a plasma (fusion) core exploding.


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## Galahad (Dec 21, 2006)

I'll admit it, that's a pretty good example.

I still think the suicide squad scenario is more realistic and in keeping with the 40k vibe, but I asked for an example and got one.

As to fusion reactors exploding in 40k, this just goes to show how absoplutely pointless it is to have physics debates in a sci-fi context. It's not that the imperium has a more advanced understanding of physics...it;s that the writers of the books don;t have a fucking clue how fusion works 

Maybe the imperium is so warlike that they forgot how to make real fusion reactors so they just strap bombs to themselves and hook up jumper cables hoping for the best? 

Reactors and bombs are completely opposite things. One was designed to sustain a safe reaction and then fail safely, the other as designed to initiate a runaway reaction and fail catastrophically

Only an idiot would design a fusion reactor that explodes like a warhead when it fails. What possible purpose would that serve when you can make one using real physics that simply shuts down.


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## hailene (Aug 28, 2009)

Galahad said:


> I'll admit it, that's a pretty good example.


Thank you very much. On an online discussion it's very rare to get this sort of acknowledgement. Cheers to you.



Galahad said:


> it;s that the writers of the books don;t have a fucking clue how fusion works


Very likely. 

To give more credit to the authors, maybe their fusion reactors are configured in a different method than we're familiar with. Perhaps this configuration is somehow advantagous one way or another. The downside is that they, for whatever reason, explode when they're severely damaged.

Perhaps they function on some principle we have yet to discover. 

Ooooooooooorr they don't know that a fusion reactor ought to explode if things go bad. I prefer trying to find an in-universe reason, though.


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## Galahad (Dec 21, 2006)

Perhaps they're deliberately built that way in order to give people a suicide bomb option. Sounds fairly imperial to me ;-)


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## hailene (Aug 28, 2009)

Maybe if the local commissar had the button to it .


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## Protoss119 (Aug 8, 2010)

Galahad said:


> Perhaps they're deliberately built that way in order to give people a suicide bomb option. Sounds fairly imperial to me ;-)





hailene said:


> Maybe if the local commissar had the button to it .


Suddenly I realize that _Dwarf Fortress_ is an accurate representation of life in the Imperium.


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## emporershand89 (Jun 11, 2010)

darkreever said:


> Why? Orks love getting in a good fight, hurling a nuke at your enemy would do more to hinder that then help. Orks may only rarely use a modicum of intelligence, but that doesn't mean they have zero sense.


True, and normally I would concur. However the more and more I read about Orks to more I feel they love the rattling of a large bolter and the flashes of large caliber artillery exploding than they do the choppa and cleava. I think therefore that Orks using nukes would not only be exciting for them, but the ultimate light show to watch.

I could see them fire a nuke missile, destroying say some Tau. They'd be hooting and hollering from there lines; probably falling over dead after laughing themselves to death over the destruction. :laugh:



Romanov77 said:


> Has anyone mentioned the possibility of teleporting nukes right into the target?


I believe in "Fire Warrior" they did something similar to this did they not? Or was that another game?

In any case that would be an ungGodly move of awesomeness :rtfm:


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## Reaper45 (Jun 21, 2011)

Galahad said:


> Perhaps they're deliberately built that way in order to give people a suicide bomb option. Sounds fairly imperial to me ;-)


Most of the tech around is dark age tech. However things like power armour was designed by the emperor. I can see them building in fail safes to ensure that it can't fall into enemy hands. 

And as I said before it's dark age tech. We really don't know why they built it that way. Perhaps they wanted failsafes to keep it from enemy hands?


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## emporershand89 (Jun 11, 2010)

Is cerimite armor strong enough to withstand nuclear fallout and detonation at all? Begs the question?


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## Magpie_Oz (Jan 16, 2012)

emporershand89 said:


> Is cerimite armor strong enough to withstand nuclear fallout and detonation at all? Begs the question?


"It is even said that Terminator armour can withstand the titanic energies at a plasma generator's core,"

Given that it appears that Plasma is usually generated by a Fusion Reactor is would seem that it can.


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## Beaviz81 (Feb 24, 2012)

I don't think it would be so in the center of the explosion. I mean basically nuclear weapons are really large meltabombs, and we know what meltaguns does to things heavily armoured.


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## Lost&Damned (Mar 25, 2012)

emporershand89 said:


> Is cerimite armor strong enough to withstand nuclear fallout and detonation at all? Begs the question?


fallout? yes.
Nukes? so long as it isnt direct.


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## Moriouce (Oct 20, 2009)

Don't the Imperium have scarier stuff these days? Why would you still use a musket if there is automatic assult rifles around? 

Then I don't think it would be fair if you could buy a 5000point weapon with the following profile. Range-unlimmited Strenght-D Ap-1 Special-Boardwide blast. Any surviving model take one hit at strenght 8 Ap- for each turn hereafter due to fallout.


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## Beaviz81 (Feb 24, 2012)

They have the Vortex Missisles, that blasts everything into the warp. That place must be quite flooded with things now. I mean for 10k. years the IOM have blasted things into it so think of all the building, trees, cars, Genestealers just floating around in the warp. I mean it must be full of everything including whole planets.


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## hailene (Aug 28, 2009)

Beaviz81 said:


> I mean it must be full of everything including whole planets.


Vortex missiles are exceedingly rare and used with equal care.


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## hailene (Aug 28, 2009)

Pardon the double post and necro, but I found something relevant to the discussion that...burned rather hot, earlier in the thread.

So there was a big hoo-hah earlier in the thread about how plasma and fusion technology worked. I couldn't really get an answer out of the supposed experts, but I did find an interesting excerpt from _Betrayer_.

"Imperial plasma technology combined elemental gases to form the fire that licked
across the skin of stars. In ancient ages, the process was better known as fusion – the
ionising of hydrogen at a hundred million degrees – to recreate the heartbeat of a sun
through human ingenuity."

Which more or less aligns with my idea of how (hot) fusion worked, anyway. Just information for the future, I guess.


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## Over Two Meters Tall! (Nov 1, 2010)

While this is a fluff thread, from a practical standpoint, nukes don't really play nice with a table top game, even on the Armageddon scale. "OK, everything within a 5 kilometer radius is vaporized, including all Titans, heavy armor and marines; although there is a savign throw for any resources located in underground bunkers at least 200 meters deep. We'll reconvene at Tommy's house down the block in an hour since his terrain is 150 km away from the blast site. Please tell me all the planet strike nukes have been used up. Oh, and the Orks have decided to pull out their little umbrella drinks to watch the rest of the war, which is far more visually entertaining from this standpoint."

I also don't think plain ol' nukes would be very helpful against Necrons, unless they're susceptible to the EM pulse... they just lay down on the ground and wait for all the organics to die from heat or radiation. Hmmmm... is Imperial vox/cogitator tech proof against EM pulses? This might be another reason not to use nukes, even on a tactical scale.


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## BlackGuard (Sep 10, 2010)

While I cannot speak for the Imperium in the 41st Millennium, I believe I read in Outcast Dead that the Emperor had forbidden nuclear weapons just after the Unification Wars. They were used only as desperate last resorts. Something about the trauma and horror they caused on Earth and he didn't wish to see it spread across the galaxy.

Perhaps the Imperium maintains this more-so as a religious observance to the Emperor. Sort of like how they do not wish to do things like 'research and development' that doesn't take thousands of years to get right.


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## Alsojames (Oct 25, 2010)

For the record, there ARE nuclear weapons in the 40k universe, at least pre-heresy.

Rad missiles, people. Weapons so nasty they lower your toughness by a point if they hurt you. Ouchie.

Presumably, they were lost in the post-heresy years, as they don't show up post-30k.


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## Svartmetall (Jun 16, 2008)

hailene said:


> In the Gaunt's Ghost series novel _Necropolis_ a few officers discuss the possibility of a nuclear strike taking out a nearby Hive.


Vannick Hive is indeed taken out with a nuclear strike (assumed to be from Ferrozoica Hive, which has been taken over by Heritor Asphodel's Chaos forces), which Gaunt witnesses. The inference is that Chaos, being Chaos, don't really give two shits about wimpy stuff like fallout anyway. 




Galahad said:


> Fusion weapons as we know them require a fission event to trigger and thus still produce radioactive fallout. There's no known way to create a fusion bomb without a fission reaction since it requires large amounts of x-ray radiation to make the secondary (fusion) explosion.
> 
> Even if you could create a 'clean' fusion bomb, it would still cause enough collateral damage to make the whole gesture pointless.


An antimatter bomb would produce massive energy output - orders of magnitude in excess of 'thermonuclear' fusion devices, which are still fairly inefficient in terms of extracting convertible energy from physical matter - and also produce no radioactive fallout. It should certainly be feasible for a civilisation on the Imperium's tech level to produce antimatter devices; in fact, I've often wondered if cyclonic torpedoes and other tools of Exterminatus would actually be AM weapons of some sort, since the force needed to physically disrupt a planet would require that sort of power level. 

I strongly recommend reading Greg Bear's excellent 'The Forge Of God' (I literally stayed up all night to finish it when I first read it years ago, it's that good) for more on the mechanics of destroying a planet.


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## Ddraig Cymry (Dec 30, 2012)

The Night Lords used nukes in unpopulated areas of Grendel's World to plunge the planet into darkness, helping them scare the living shit out of the planet. I think I read they were low yield nuclear bombs.


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## locustgate (Dec 6, 2009)

BlackGuard said:


> Stuff


In mechanicum it also mentioned the traitors using forbidden nukes


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## Zooey72 (Mar 25, 2008)

locustgate said:


> Nukes cause irreparable harm to planets, I you nuke a hive city you prevented your enemy AND you from holding it.


Not at all true. Nagasaki, Hiroshima, and Chernobyl are all inhabitable now. So are the 2 places in the Nevada desert where we exploded the first 2 atomic bombs, so is every place that has had an above ground nuclear test.

I think that nukes are not used for the same reason cannonballs are not used now. Yes, a cannonball can kill someone but there are better ways of doing it. At ground zero of 1945 size A-bomb you would kill everything within a mile. But in 40k terms it will not breach a Landraider much less a Baneblade, not even sure if it would go through Terminator armor IMO. If you up the scale to the largest to date atomic ever used it was by the Russians and was 50 megatons. This will do damage no matter what tech you are using to defend yourself (except Titans or dug in bunkers). However you are than looking at a different kind of warfare. In which case a 50 megaton bomb pales in comparison to the type of bombardment an astartes fleet in orbit can achieve. Lion'el Johnson blew his planet up, think about that for a second.

Where you argument does have merit though is with the swarm type of armies. I think atomics would cut through the vast majority of Tyranids, and honeslty I am sure they are used that way.

Anyway, the Russian 50 megaton bomb was the Tzar Bomba. The start of this youtube shows it:


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## Svartmetall (Jun 16, 2008)

Zooey72 said:


> So are the 2 places in the Nevada desert where we exploded the first 2 atomic bombs, so is every place that has had an above ground nuclear test.


The first atomic bomb detonated was the Trinity test, the second one was the one used on Hiroshima. There was serious concern that the one used on Hiroshima - being of a different design to the Trinity device - might not even work at all when dropped; the 'Fat Man' device used on Nagasaki was similar to the Trinity device, although it was dropped 2 miles off target.


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## Ddraig Cymry (Dec 30, 2012)

Zooey72 said:


> Nagasaki, Hiroshima, and Chernobyl are all inhabitable now


Hiroshima and Nagasaki are habitable, they've been rebuilt and are heavily populated. Chernobyl also wasn't a nuclear bomb, but rather a meltdown from a nuclear reactor, which released a lot more radiation. The area is still abandoned but it's relatively safe to walk around, the forests surrounding the area are referred to as 'Red Forests' due to the excessive radiation and radioactive dust being kept in the ground by the snow. I watched a VICE documentary where they went and tried to study some wild pigs around Chernobyl and they mentioned it.









Hiroshima









Nagasaki


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## Zooey72 (Mar 25, 2008)

Ddraig Cymry said:


> Hiroshima and Nagasaki are habitable, they've been rebuilt and are heavily populated. Chernobyl also wasn't a nuclear bomb, but rather a meltdown from a nuclear reactor, which released a lot more radiation. The area is still abandoned but it's relatively safe to walk around, the forests surrounding the area are referred to as 'Red Forests' due to the excessive radiation and radioactive dust being kept in the ground by the snow. I watched a VICE documentary where they went and tried to study some wild pigs around Chernobyl and they mentioned it.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


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