Space marine sergeant weapon options

[Infernus]

I have just updated to the latest version of army builder. There now seems to be no way of equipping a space marine sergeant with both a bolt pistol and a power weapon. There are two columns. One for ranged weapons and one for melee weapons. But both are titled '-Replace Bolt Pistol with-'. Shouldn't one of the columns read '-Replace Melee Weapon with-' or '-Replace Boltgun with-' to give you the ability to equip a sergeant with a melee and a ranged weapon?

[gungagreg]

The rules require you to have either a Bolt Pistol or a Melee Weapon in exchange for an upgrade on either the Melee or Ranged weapons lists. The maintainers of the 40K data file believe that this prevents the Sergeant from getting two weapons as they only have one of the required items necessary for the exchange. However, some people feel that the option to replace the Bolter with a Chainsword unlocks this and thus allows what you are asking for. This is not the view of the maintainers. What we need in order for them to act is a FAQ from GW that clarifies this before the maintainers will make the change.

[Mysarl]

Originally Posted by gungagreg

The rules require you to have either a Bolt Pistol or a Melee Weapon in exchange for an upgrade on either the Melee or Ranged weapons lists.

I have read the codex repeatedly have yet to find this rule. Could you direct me to it that specifies it?

[Lord Lorne Walkier]

Originally Posted by Infernus

I have just updated to the latest version of army builder. There now seems to be no way of equipping a space marine sergeant with both a bolt pistol and a power weapon. There are two columns. One for ranged weapons and one for melee weapons. But both are titled '-Replace Bolt Pistol with-'. Shouldn't one of the columns read '-Replace Melee Weapon with-' or '-Replace Boltgun with-' to give you the ability to equip a sergeant with a melee and a ranged weapon?

I am having the same issue and i totally disagree with the reasoning for the limitation. I do understand the reasoning though. There is a image on page 135 of the codex labeled "Veteran Sergeant with power axe and storm bolter." How could this be if the maintainers are right?

[Arijharn]

Because where possible they go for rules as written as opposed to 'intended', because that's a bit of a slippery slope.

Imo, it's rather ridiculous to assume that you can't have a poweraxe with a bolt pistol, since you've been able to do that since 2nd edition etc, etc.

[jboweruk]

They are interpreting just one version of RAW, and when we all pointed this out we just got told to 'shut up and go away' in so many words. Despite that we pretty well proved the point successive times that it was not intended for a sergeant to lose out like this and they themselves have run biker sergeants differently. I'm sorry to say that AB themselves need to take a stance in this and point out that the maintainers need to be less 'stubborn' and (sorry to say it pompous) in their attitude otherwise people will drift away from AB. And that for my money would be a shame as the idea is a really good one. And it's the best builder out there currently.

[Arijharn]

They took forever to fix up Noise Marines close combat weapons as well if memory serves (there's two different selections for this, they can have it additionally, in which case it costs like 2 points per model or they can swap it out, in which case it's free).

[InMedeasRage]

"

• The Space Marine Sergeant or Veteran Sergeant may take items from the Melee Weapons and/or Ranged Weapons lists."

That's verbatim from the codex with nothing missing or added to that bullet point. Space marine sergeants can take any number of weapons. You can have a sergeant with one of each combi-weapon, as idiotic as that would be. You could equip a sergeant like Calgar, with two fists, a sword, a pistol, and a storm bolter. Stupidly expensive, doesn't really do anything that just a fist and a stormbolter wouldn't do, but possible. On top of this, the only reason the chainsword is listed is because the chainsword is not an option one can take from the armoury. Without the added option in each sergeant upgrade section, no one would be able to take chainswords... not that chainswords are any different from generic melee weapons unless there's been a FAQ where a model can take a heavy chainsword like power weapon users can take axes, staves, lances, or swords.

This is the only mistake I've encountered so far, its a very good initial C:SM build.

[Kloud13]

Would someone with knowledge of the Army Builder program be able to write in this Thread, a step by step set of instructions on how to edit this problem ourselves?

[jlong05]

If it were that simple, it would have been done already. The simple fact is that the files are not simple to manage or maintain, nor easy to alter without having repercussions.

While the community at one point expressed interest in creating a grassroots edit initiative, that was scrapped by those same individuals once they determined that anything they publicly post would become their responsibility to support ongoing and answer questions to. It was determined by them that the headache that would cause was not worth the time they would need to devote to that effort.

As such, you are better to wait for either the Author himself to decide to re-code that work on his own, or for GW to FAQ the information to help the Author determine that the approach taken was in error. At this time though, the Author is not in belief that their interpretation is in error based on rules as written.