Being multiple shot D3, do people think that this just the most suitable way to represent blanket fire, or is this something that could/should be considered in how it functions?
I was thinking earlier that it’s a bit of an inappropriately named rule considering how a blunderbuss functions, as it’s the one type of firearm that you could not rapid/multiple fire from.
I guess it was just a case of having to fit it into the rulebook.
The only way I could see this actually being part of how it works would be to have something like a 3 barrel shotgun that ends in a blunderbuss flared end.
Which would just be awkward to load. A 3 barrel gun itself would not, but the whole idea of it being a blunderbuss is the flared end.
I think it’s more like a shrapnel canon, shooting a cloud of burning bits and metal chunks. You don’t no how effective it’s gonna be, so the D3 represent this uncertainty.
I imagine it is to represent the wide arc of fire, Considering Blunderbuss are known to be able to use ammo such as nails, rocks, pebbles or even birdseed, In J.R.R. Tolkien’s Farmer Giles of Ham, Giles uses Potsherds as Ammo.
When your unit of infernal guard fire the Blunderbuss’s they are firing a wall of small pellets hitting multiple targets. But as it is inconsistent the shots can easily miss hense the d3 shots rule.
The thing is, it’s called a Hailshot Blunderbuss (as opposed to blunderbuss) because it’s a fantastical version of the original, wherein it fires a hail of shrapnel, not unalike to a wide-spread shotgun (in terms of the actual way the shot comes out).
Traditional blunderbuss - flared end makes it easier to load, otherwise it’s just a musket.
Hailshot blunderbuss - Chaos Dwarf invention for covering a wide area in lots of pain and death (kind of crowd control, but more lethal).
Similarities = both are a form of firearm, both cause death and pain, both have the name blunderbuss in.
Differences = potentially how they are loaded, the mechanisms for making the lethality come out and the effect the shot has.
Yes, the Multiple Shots rule is just an abstraction to represent the weight of fire. The way the shots get more powerful with more models in the unit is to simulate this too - if each gun was literally firing up to three shots at a time, there’d be no need to add this rule because the effects would scale up automatically.
The hail shot suits CD perfectly fluff wise as it is an excellent riot suppression weapon. I see it as firing something akin to canister or grapeshot, a can of metal filled with ball bearings or shrapnel which comes apart spreading the bearings and the debris from the container in a wide arc in front of the firer. It would be perfect for a small number of soldiers slaying vast numbers of poorly/lightly armed opponents as would occur during a slave revolt.
Actually they just pack the shrapnel in the barrel as it is - they can even use stones at a pinch. I see no reason at all to assume the background for these weapons has changed since the 4th/5th Edition Chaos Dwarfs, and that’s how those worked.
I appreciate that but I just like canister shot so that’s what my blunderbusses use! I just like the fact that the container deals just as much damage as the shot itself, Gulkhar my sorc prophet is obsessed with order so wouldn’t want anything as untidy as loose shrapnel lying around lol.