Board Thread:Warhammer 40k General Discussion/@comment-203.134.114.240-20130721023526/@comment-8881468-20130726022234

so let's do this simple:

equipment of line imp guard trooper: lasgun, bayonet,entrenching tool, maybe knife, maybe autopistol.

specialist ranks switch their lasgun for another weapon (long las, sniper rifle,shotgun,melta,flamer,etvc) and may take specialised kit, still this does not have any influence on the simple rule of exchanging weapons, since they do not really receive that much training with other weapons

just to make the comparison to "space marine"

in space marine, you play a captain of a space marine chapter, to become captain, you need to fulfill a rotation in all 4 roles (scout,assault, devastator and tactical marine) and have enough experience to make it to 1st company and then through the ranks of commanding a squad and later a company, aka: the character you play, has had experience with all different types of wargear and is used to them, probably has years/decades worth of experience with them.

compare that to your single guardsman, who is given a lasgun and have fun. (not even mentioning the problems that playing single player and wielding a heavy weapon would give you.

this also does not change the fact that the imperial guard is issued lasguns especially because of their identity as horde army, with the sheer amounts of firepower laid down by many guardsmen, tghey can overcome those much more armoured foes like space marines and/ or necrons and tau in battlesuits and whatnot (aside from sheer number of artillery and armoured units)

still. the singular guardsmen is expendable and not really given much thought aside from basic training and hope that they make it through the first engagements.

guardsmen are so "motivated" and well trained that you have the corps of comissars to maintain order and focus...

and sure the imperial guard is not having high attrition rates, yeah right, it is not like you don't have whole planets/systems solely devoted to providing guardsmen and wargear (catachan,vostroya,cadia,xyz...)  yeah they don't die that much... ^^

the 1 million astartes of the imperium cannot do it all, the horde of guardsmen do a whole lot of the heavy lifting