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Post by: Kid_Kyoto
This came up in the FFG forums about how many SoBs there are in the Imperium. People there cite a 2nd edition number of 30k SoBs total.
Someone else tossed out a number of 10,000 storm troopers which is just laughable.
So I thought I'd run my list by Dakka and see what people think.
PDF - 10s of billions of men (uncounted)
Local police forces - 10s of billions of men (uncounted)
IG - billions of men (more or less counted)
Militia - Crusading civilians potentially billions depending on what state the Imperium is in (completely unknown)
Imperial Navy - A billion to 100s of millions of men
Arbites - Millions? (probably the best counted of all the forces)
Sisters of Battle - millions (secretive)
Inquisition minions - millions? (very secretive)
Marines - 1 million (secretive, potentially much higher or lower)
Grey knights/Death watch/Custodes - Thousands
Assassins - Hundreds
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Post by: RedGuardian73
Sounds reasonable
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Post by: Grey Templar
Try Countless Trillions for PDF, Guard, Imperial Navy and Arbites.
the average Imperial Grand Cruiser or Battleship has about a million crew so multiply that by the several million such ships and the billions of smaller vessels.
Space marines are at around 1 million.
SoB are probably in the low billions/high millions.
there isn't a solid figure on the GK numbers. original fluff puts them at about 3k but the new codex puts them at 1k plus the specilists(Purifiers, Palidins, Terminators...) so somewhere between 1500 and 3k seems right.
There are probably hundreds of thousands of Assassins, depending on the type. there will probably be more Vindicares then Eversors.
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Post by: Kilkrazy
The population is large enough to support much larger forces of SM, GK and SoB than the fluff allows for, however these are limited by law.
I calculate the size of the specialist troop units could be about 1,000 to 1,000,000 greater than they are.
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Post by: Platuan4th
I'm going to go ahead and argue the "millions" for SoB.
There are only 6 Orders Militant.
According to Dark Heresy, the Order of the Bloody Rose only operate a single Perceptory(1000 sisters).
After Armageddon, the Order of Our Martyred Lady can barely field 3 Companies.
Argent Shroud has at least 1 Perceptory(they fielded 7 Companies during Armageddon 3).
Can't find numbers on the other 3, but even if they had 2 Preceptories each, that doesn't add up to Millions.
By all accounts, there are fewer Sisters than there are Marines in the Galaxy.
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Post by: Grey Templar
of course, there are orders that arn't millitant, but still maintain arms.
Most of the Orders are non-combatent, operate hospitals, and orphanages.
that said, i would say there are more SoB then SMs. only 6 Orders Militant seems low.
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Post by: Platuan4th
Grey Templar wrote:of course, there are orders that arn't millitant, but still maintain arms. Most of the Orders are non-combatent, operate hospitals, and orphanages. that said, i would say there are more SoB then SMs. only 6 Orders Militant seems low. The Convent Sanctorum Orders Militant * Order of the Bloody Rose * Order of Our Martyred Lady * Order of the Valorous Heart Orders Hospitaller * Order of the Eternal Candle * Order of Serenity Orders Famulous * Order of the Key * Order of the Gate Orders Dialogous * Order of the Holy Word * Order of the Quill Convent Prioris Orders Militant * Order of the Sacred Rose * Order of the Ebon Chalice * Order of the Argent Shroud Orders Dialogous * Order of the Sacred Oath * Order of the Lexicon Orders Famulous * Order of the Holy Seal * Order of the Sacred Coin Orders Hospitaller * Order of the Cleansing Water * Order of the Torch And 2 known Minor Orders, Order of the Eternal Gate and Order of the White Rose.
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Post by: Kid_Kyoto
Platuan4th wrote:I'm going to go ahead and argue the "millions" for SoB.
There are only 6 Orders Militant.
According to Dark Heresy, the Order of the Bloody Rose only operate a single Perceptory(1000 sisters).
After Armageddon, the Order of Our Martyred Lady can barely field 3 Companies.
Argent Shroud has at least 1 Perceptory(they fielded 7 Companies during Armageddon 3).
Can't find numbers on the other 3, but even if they had 2 Preceptories each, that doesn't add up to Millions.
By all accounts, there are fewer Sisters than there are Marines in the Galaxy.
The problem is that's only the big 6 orders, we don't know how many minor ones there are nor how big they can be. The long tail could stretch into the millions.
Or not.
The difference between an SoB and a crusader is training and power armor, and power armor has got to be in short supply. i could live with SoBs being in the 10s of thousands with their great unwashed hoards of crusaders being in the billions.
I left out tech guard, I'd put them in billion-100s of millions rank. I figure Mars has maybe 1% of the Imperium? Of course they can always draft servitors and other menials to up those numbers.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Grey Templar wrote:of course, there are orders that arn't millitant, but still maintain arms.
Most of the Orders are non-combatent, operate hospitals, and orphanages.
that said, i would say there are more SoB then SMs. only 6 Orders Militant seems low.
The orders probably have billions of women doing all sorts of things but I wouldn't count them as SoBs unless they have power armor or bolters, otherwise they're militia. there's a difference between the sister who trains her whole life to fight and has the 2nd or 3rd best armor in the imperium and the math teacher they hand a lasgun to when the Orks come knocking.
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Post by: Grey Templar
The Ecclesiarchy can afford PA. it isn't impossable to make, just expensive. and the Church has the money.
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Post by: Platuan4th
Grey Templar wrote:The Ecclesiarchy can afford PA. it isn't impossable to make, just expensive. and the Church has the money. If you'll notice, though, both Hospitalis and Dialogous HAVE rules and models and that neither use Power Armour and bolters. Hospitalis: Dialogous(the model with the Speaker): As for Famulous, they maintain and organize the households of Imperial Governors and Nobles.
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Post by: Grey Templar
Yes, but those arn't combat units per say.
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Post by: Platuan4th
Grey Templar wrote:Yes, but those arn't combat units per say. Exactly, that falls to the 6 Orders Militant.
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Post by: Grey Templar
I wouldn't be surprised if there were alot more Ordos Militant then 6.
many small Ordos running around with only a couple of hundred sisters each.
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Post by: Platuan4th
Grey Templar wrote:I wouldn't be surprised if there were alot more Ordos Militant then 6. many small Ordos running around with only a couple of hundred sisters each. I could see them adding more in the future, but there's really no need, as unlike Marines, Sisters aren't bound to a planet/fleet/Fortress Monastery, the orders are spread out across the galaxy in a number of Convents(which number ~200 Sisters each).
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Post by: KamikazeCanuck
That's the first time I've seen a number for the Sisters be cited and I think it's quite reasonable.
There's probably a billion or more Arbites. Every Imperial planet has a stronghold and each must have thousands.
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Post by: Harriticus
Probably far more PDF's then your figure. There are a million worlds in the Imperium, and most worlds have some kind of PDF in some form or another. However their collective size isn't important at all,. as they don't cooperate with one another and are only stationed on their own worlds. What matters regarding PDF's is how big an individual worlds force is.
Imperial Guard probably goes into the trillions, just given he size of the Imperium. Same with the Imperial Navy if you think about how many sector fleets there are, how many crewmen these massive ships require, things like orbital stations and bases, then Fighter/Aircraft squadrons.
Sisters of Battle should be much higher, I'd say at least 5-10 million given their prevalence and presentation in fluff. It's one of those area GW is being dumb on.
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Post by: Kid_Kyoto
KamikazeCanuck wrote:That's the first time I've seen a number for the Sisters be cited and I think it's quite reasonable.
There's probably a billion or more Arbites. Every Imperial planet has a stronghold and each must have thousands.
Someone brought that up but I disagree, I think a few 100 for a major world is about right. A small colony might just have 1.
They're more like the FBI than the local cops (which is why I broke out local police). They investigate crimes of interest to the imperium, your typical food riot, murder, terrorist group doesn't interest them.
I see it as local cops report to the local leader (mayor, lord, whatever). PDF reports to the planetary governor. But the Arbites report directly to Terra, they're the only ones who can enforce the law against the governor or other high ups.
The fluff has been uneven on this, I've seen stories where arbites are walking the beat, chasing down gangs etc. I figure it's a case of some planets using the term for their local police and that those guys were not real Arbites with the force of Imperial law behind them.
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Post by: Platuan4th
As well, Arbites have token presence on worlds that have their own police forces(maybe 1-5 Arbites for "official" Imperial business). I think people are also confusing the Sisters as a Military Force. They're the official Militant Force of the Church and are assigned by them and requested from them, but they're not a military in the sense that the IG or the Marines are. They're more like the Knight Templar's original purpose: to protect pilgrims and holy sites. If they are active in a war zone other than that, it's because the Church has a reason for them to be there fighting(such as fighting in a Crusade on the part of the church and leading much larger forces of zealots and militia). Like the Arbites, they're not used by fluff as a fighting force you happen to see fighting normal fights.
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Post by: KamikazeCanuck
Kid_Kyoto wrote:KamikazeCanuck wrote:That's the first time I've seen a number for the Sisters be cited and I think it's quite reasonable.
There's probably a billion or more Arbites. Every Imperial planet has a stronghold and each must have thousands.
Someone brought that up but I disagree, I think a few 100 for a major world is about right. A small colony might just have 1.
They're more like the FBI than the local cops (which is why I broke out local police). They investigate crimes of interest to the imperium, your typical food riot, murder, terrorist group doesn't interest them.
I could see an agri-world having like 5-10 guys. Like one of those small town sheriff departments but a Hive world like Armaggedon must need 10,000-100,000 or more. The have multiple offices all over the place as individual hives have a bigger population than modern day earth.
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Post by: Platuan4th
KamikazeCanuck wrote:
I could see an agri-world having like 5-10 guys. Like one of those small town sheriff departments but a Hive world like Armaggedon must need 10,000-100,000 or more. The have multiple offices all over the place as individual hives have a bigger population than modern day earth.
That's a job for the Enforcers and other local forces(see Necromunda as an example), Arbites only deal with the Upper Spire.
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Post by: KamikazeCanuck
Platuan4th wrote:KamikazeCanuck wrote:
I could see an agri-world having like 5-10 guys. Like one of those small town sheriff departments but a Hive world like Armaggedon must need 10,000-100,000 or more. The have multiple offices all over the place as individual hives have a bigger population than modern day earth.
That's a job for the Enforcers and other local forces(see Necromunda as an example), Arbites only deal with the Upper Spire.
Aren't Enforcers merely a type of Arbites?
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Post by: reds8n
There were around 4,000 surviving "Daughters of the Emperor" who survived the seige of the Ecclesiarchs' palace.
When Thor founded the initial orders - around 288M36 their ranks have swollen to over 10,000 battle sisters.
Each of the main 6 Orders Militant have spawned "dozens" of "far smaller" leser Orders Militant.
Aside from these orders there are the non militant orders ; the big 3 -- Famulous,Dialogus and Hospitaliers -- these are, aparently, as large as the Militant Orders, but there are " countless smaller orders, some as small as 12 or so sisters".
Some examples of these listed include
" The Order Madriga provide the all-female choirs that fill the cathedrals with sublime heavenly song..."
"The Order Planxilium form thousand strong processions ..."
No real mention of combat numbers, but it is noted that a deployment of a Palantine and 50 battle sisters is seen as significant on Iocanthos, whilst the largest concentration of the Order Dialogus on Solomon houses a full perceptory of Sisters Dialogus and is guarded by 1000 battle sisters.
.... and a Squadron of Imperial Navy Ships.
From FFG's (superb) Blood of Martrys.
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Post by: KamikazeCanuck
KK You forgot to The Administratum! 1 Quadrillion! More than all the rest put together. Automatically Appended Next Post: reds8n wrote:
There were around 4,000 surviving "Daughters of the Emperor" who survived the seige of the Ecclesiarchs' palace.
When Thor founded the initial orders - around 288M36 their ranks have swollen to over 10,000 battle sisters.
Each of the main 6 Orders Militant have spawned "dozens" of "far smaller" leser Orders Militant.
Aside from these orders there are the non militant orders ; the big 3 -- Famulous,Dialogus and Hospitaliers -- these are, aparently, as large as the Militant Orders, but there are " countless smaller orders, some as small as 12 or so sisters".
Some examples of these listed include
" The Order Madriga provide the all-female choirs that fill the cathedrals with sublime heavenly song..."
"The Order Planxilium form thousand strong processions ..."
No real mention of combat numbers, but it is noted that a deployment of a Palantine and 50 battle sisters is seen as significant on Iocanthos, whilst the largest concentration of the Order Dialogus on Solomon houses a full perceptory of Sisters Dialogus and is guarded by 1000 battle sisters.
.... and a Squadron of Imperial Navy Ships.
From FFG's (superb) Blood of Martrys.
That 30,000 number for M41 seems to stand up.
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Post by: KingDeath
Some calculations regarding the Imperial navy, take them with a huge bucket of salt.
We know that there are roughly 1million worlds. Each sector seems to have 100(Sabbat sector) - 200(Calixis sector) worlds which means that the Imperium has between 10.000 and 5000 sectors.
Each sector is on average defended by 50-70 imperial navy ships.
This in turn means that the Imperial Navy has between 250000/350000 and 500000/700000 warships of all relevant sizes ( escorts to battleships ).
Now we have a problem, we do not know the composition of each sectorfleet. I suppose that the majority of each sectorfleet is made up of escorts, let's say roughly 2/3rds while the remaining third
is mainly composed of cruisers and perhaps a small handful of battleships. FFG's Rogue Trader book can, if one accepts them as canon (which i will do here ), give us some valuable numbers regarding crewsize
As representative of the escort sized vessels i chose to take the Sword class frigate and for the capital ships i took the Lunar class cruiser. Both are extremely common. I also chose to disregard
battleships, batlecruisers and grand cruisers, first because they are rare compared to normal cruisers and second because i have no numbers for them. Orbital platforms and spacestations and similar things are also not included.
So, at the minimum the Imperial Navy has 166660 times 26000 + 83330 times 95000 = 433.310.000 + 7.916.350.000 = 12.249.510.000
The maximum size ( with my stated limitations ) would be roughly 34 billions.
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Post by: KamikazeCanuck
KingDeath wrote:Some calculations regarding the Imperial navy, take them with a huge bucket of salt.
We know that there are roughly 1million worlds. Each sector seems to have 100(Sabbat sector) - 200(Calixis sector) worlds which means that the Imperium has between 10.000 and 5000 sectors.
Each sector is on average defended by 50-70 imperial navy ships.
This in turn means that the Imperial Navy has between 250000/350000 and 500000/700000 warships of all relevant sizes ( escorts to battleships ).
Now we have a problem, we do not know the composition of each sectorfleet. I suppose that the majority of each sectorfleet is made up of escorts, let's say roughly 2/3rds while the remaining third
is mainly composed of cruisers and perhaps a small handful of battleships. FFG's Rogue Trader book can, if one accepts them as canon (which i will do here ), give us some valuable numbers regarding crewsize
As representative of the escort sized vessels i chose to take the Sword class frigate and for the capital ships i took the Lunar class cruiser. Both are extremely common. I also chose to disregard
battleships, batlecruisers and grand cruisers, first because they are rare compared to normal cruisers and second because i have no numbers for them. Orbital platforms and spacestations and similar things are also not included.
So, at the minimum the Imperial Navy has 166660 times 26000 + 83330 times 95000 = 433.310.000 + 7.916.350.000 = 12.249.510.000
The maximum size ( with my stated limitations ) would be roughly 34 billions.
The Sabbat Worlds is 200 worlds but that doesn't affect your calculations. I think that's some good Guesstimating.
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Post by: Owain
Does anyone remember the frequency of psychic blanks being born?
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Post by: UselessSage
Owain wrote:Does anyone remember the frequency of psychic blanks being born?
Off hand, I seem to recall Psykers being 1:1,000,000 and blanks being 1:1,000,000,000.
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Post by: Raxmei
KamikazeCanuck wrote:Aren't Enforcers merely a type of Arbites?
Other way around, if anything. It's a little like how Federal Marshalls are a police organization but your city's police department is not a type of Federal Marshall. Arbites are the enforcers of Imperial law empowered by the Adeptus Terra. Enforcement of local law is beneath the Arbites, the job of the governor's law enforcement officers. Local enforcers are often styled after Arbites but are not members of the Adeptus Arbites or any other Imperium-wide organization and don't have the authority of the Arbites.
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Post by: mwnciboo
I don't really think in total numbers but the size of Units seem wrong. I always think the numbers they talk about in the BL always sound wrong.
Imperial guard Regiments at 5000? Are you kidding? 5000 is a Modern Division. IG Regiments would not last long in Combat given their casualty rates, one major engagement and they would be combat ineffective.
I always thought of Guard Regiments of 20,000 minimum (about Corps or Army Group size) I actually figure Regiments would be much bigger 200,000 etc.
edit: IIRC aren't there 666 Grey Knights at anyone time?
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Post by: Conservationist
mwnciboo wrote:I always thought of Guard Regiments of 20,000 minimum (about Corps or Army Group size) I actually figure Regiments would be much bigger 200,000 etc.
edit: IIRC aren't there 666 Grey Knights at anyone time?
I think about 20000-30000 would be about right, not 200000, which is just too many.
However there are more than 666 Grey Knights present at any one point. About 1500-3000 (latest and previous fluff respectively). 666 is just thier chapter number.
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Post by: 1hadhq
mwnciboo wrote:I don't really think in total numbers but the size of Units seem wrong. I always think the numbers they talk about in the BL always sound wrong.
Imperial guard Regiments at 5000? Are you kidding? 5000 is a Modern Division. IG Regiments would not last long in Combat given their casualty rates, one major engagement and they would be combat ineffective.
Casuality rate = WWI or = BL ?
Size will vary, an armored regiment may have lower numbers at the frontline parts of the regiment but needs more ressources.
So a tank based regiment may "employ" less combatants in their IG companies but keeps lots of munitorum personnel busy...
Where infantry based regiments run with a massive headcount in combatants.
Example:
A)
Company > 5-7 x 10 Tanks = 50+ Tanks = 50 x 5 = 250 crew. Other personnel ~ 50-100. Thus 350 ~ per company.
Regiment > company x 5-10 = 1750-3500.
Are 5000 to few in this example?
B)
Company > 5-10 platoons = 400-2000 combatants. Other personnel ~ 50. Thus 500 +x per company.
Regiment > company x 5 - 10 = 2500 minimum / 10.000 max - 5000 minimum / 20.000 max.
Anything between 10k to 20k for a single formation of the IG seems ok.
C)
Codex IG page 9:
18th Valhalla = 120.000 ( infantry )
24th vostroya = 1500 ( heavy mech )
Regiment = 3-20 companys = 3-6 platoons each.
Until GW releases the "tactica imperialis",
where the exact formula for each type of IG regiment can be found, we won't ever know for sure.
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Post by: mwnciboo
Yeah so 20 - 30,000 seems about right for a IG Infantry Regiment.
10,000 for a Mechanised IG Regiment.
5,000 for a Tank Regiment e.g about 800 Tanks and vehicles.
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Post by: Uhlan
I have often wondered how many Imperial Bureaucrats you could fit on the head of a pin.
Still, it would be really hard to quantify anything without grand sweeping conjecture. Even the Astartes figures are ambiguous at best. We don't really know how many Chapters there are. There are figures that mention the total numbers of Chapters, and the total number of marines in each, but even then the fluff indicates these are educated guesses at best.
With a galactic empire where the total number of imperial worlds are numbered at about 1 million one can only guess how large the bureaucracy is. Even considering this figure of Imperial worlds it has been mentioned in the fluff that the Imperium is still spread thin amongst the stars, with vast areas of the galaxy under imperial control still unexplored.
I have to wonder if certain 'hallowed' departments even on Terra itself haven't a clue how many individuals exist. Not to mention the serious temporal difficulties involved in space travel may play havoc with these numbers.
I imagine the numbers aren't fixed for any department and are in a constant state of flux.
Even so, many of the numbers we think of in our present time simply don't correlate well with the universe of 40k. Even on our own world we have fought wars where millions upon millions of soldiers (let alone civilians) have been killed. The scale of death and destruction that can be experienced by a galactic empire in what would be considered a small engagement would still be beyond our comprehension. Yet they happen over and over.
The statement that 'you will not be missed' is imho the best quote for the 40k universe and says it all.
This all plays well for GW as they can modify the fluff with abandon and still keep some semblance of reality. A forgotten chapter, an Inquisitor returns from some long forgotten crusade, or even a unit of Sisters of Battle return to Terra after having been lost in the warp for decades. Anything is possible at this scale.
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Post by: Harriticus
mwnciboo wrote:I don't really think in total numbers but the size of Units seem wrong. I always think the numbers they talk about in the BL always sound wrong.
Imperial guard Regiments at 5000? Are you kidding? 5000 is a Modern Division. IG Regiments would not last long in Combat given their casualty rates, one major engagement and they would be combat ineffective.
I always thought of Guard Regiments of 20,000 minimum (about Corps or Army Group size) I actually figure Regiments would be much bigger 200,000 etc.
edit: IIRC aren't there 666 Grey Knights at anyone time?
5,000 is a modern brigade in many armies even. Most U.S. divisions for instance are 20,000+. I agree with the 200,000 figure for regiments, an entire regiment would probably lose half its manpower in a single engagement if it were 5,000.
However, I've heard that the size of a regiment can vary from a few thousand to even 500,000. I doubt the Imperium can maintain standardization like that so it makes sense that they would vary in size greatly.
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Post by: Grey Templar
it's probably heavily dependent on the type of regiment.
a Catachan regiment is probably smaller then a standard regiment because they need to maintain communications with the unit while crawling through dense jungle. being smaller makes that easier.
i also have rarely heard of conflicts that involved only 1 regiment. if it only needs one regiment to fix then it probably isn't a fight worth hearing.
Armageddon has several hundred regiments fighting on it, Tyranid invasions are responded by the same numbers too.
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Post by: Brother Coa
Average IG Regiment have 3 - 5.000.000 man + support stuff.
There is more than 1.000.000 Space Marines serving the Imperium.
AS for PDF, they must always have 100 - 500.000 active solders. In case of war PDF becomes every man, woman and child who can hold a gun.
Inquisiton has numerous forces, including 3000+ GK.
SoB number in millions, depending on order.
Imperial Navy number almost as IG.
etc......
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Post by: 1hadhq
Somehow, the lack of faith in the abilities of the emperors hammer and therefore in our glorious Imperial Guard is disturbing.
1) organization is standardized per GW fluff. Not exactly but there seems to be a guestimate power-level and this is the way
the IoM compares regiments. Could see the issue there, as vastly different sizes would cause problems in transport capacity and supplies
since IN transports would still be of standardized size an the fluff states units are kept separate to prevent mutiny.
The munitorum also has a tendency to bureaucratism ( hope that word exists..) and may disapprove of any "need more supplies" request
if the numbers don't fit into their forms.
2) any unit created has to be maneuvrable in the field ( in "not fighting yet"times and war itself ).
The reason for the sizes were used to, is what was proven to work.
Modern armies have comms. IG has such thing too. But it happend before and will happen again that units are unreachable.
Think about a single General HQ caring for these millions or hundreds of thousands youre putting into a regiment.
Isn't it to easy to cut them off?
Now, run with dozens of regiments and also dozens of HQ's. You may confuse one or more of them with sabotage, but never all.
The moment one is cut off, a neighbouring HQ can take over. Simply a formation of the size imagined in this thread is as unwieldy as
it gets.
Try to move a 500k strong regiment and youre pretty fast stuck somewhere.
You either get companies to big to fit on the local network of transportation ( streets, railroads, etc..) or get so many companies you'll
end up insane just from ordering them into their planned positions.
3) casualities are overestimated.
Forget the artwork of GW. It isn't the real battle. It certainly is like the old paintings you find in museums....heroic poses, thousands of enemies singlehandedly slain by whoever is the most glorious leader of that army, artistic licence ....
But, these are all battles without weapons of great range. And 40k provides those .
Does a regiment equal a whole army in size? Why should it? The IG sends multiple regiments into warzones.
Thus casualties are spread across those multiple Regiments and heavily hit regiments can be pulled back and fresh ones rotated forwards.
I am sure there are examples of this to be found within BL fluff.
We should not deem extreme examples of IG commanders marching endless rows of guardsmen in waves over the enemy until these break
as common behaviour. Like we don't assume specialized troops, especially the elysians and their main feature of having the floor wiped with
them and thus resulting in high casuality rates, are typical.
IG officers may not be as troops preserving as modern officers are, but wasting Guardsmen is still an affront against the tactica which tells us
"the lives of the IG are his currency, spent them well". Return of invest, good sirs!
Look up the casualties of: Tanith1st and only, gunheads, dead men walking.
Light infantry, losing a few hundred over time.
Armored company, losing a few dozenes and mechanized infantry losing a few hundred. Against overwhelming numbers of orks.
Heavy Infantry, DkOK, losing a few hundred against necrons. And gauss weapons don't leave wounded.....
There is nothing about supersized regiments and losing thousands per minute in a single encounter.
4) wrong opponent.
The common opponent isn't a CSm or necron, its usually something that will die to lasguns sooner than those would.
5) GW's own examples point to hundreds of regiments drawn from worlds.
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Post by: Raxmei
Everyone claiming regiments containing millions of men is making numbers up. A regiment is several thousand men, far less than a million. It's the level of organization immediately above the company.
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Post by: Brother Coa
Raxmei wrote:Everyone claiming regiments containing millions of men is making numbers up. A regiment is several thousand men, far less than a million. It's the level of organization immediately above the company.
So with your logic you can defend a planet size of Earth with 100.000 man? With that numbers you can defend every major capital of Earth?
With several thousand man you cannot hold 1 country not to mentione an entire planet. This is simple "wrighters have no sance of scale thing". For example, average Imperial Hive World have 32.000.000.000 people, but it's Imperial Guard Regiment have 10.000 man?
I say that regiments containing millions of men is not making up - but instead a real point of view.
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Post by: Platuan4th
Brother Coa wrote:Raxmei wrote:Everyone claiming regiments containing millions of men is making numbers up. A regiment is several thousand men, far less than a million. It's the level of organization immediately above the company. So with your logic you can defend a planet size of Earth with 100.000 man? With that numbers you can defend every major capital of Earth? With several thousand man you cannot hold 1 country not to mentione an entire planet. This is simple "wrighters have no sance of scale thing". For example, average Imperial Hive World have 32.000.000.000 people, but it's Imperial Guard Regiment have 10.000 man? I say that regiments containing millions of men is not making up - but instead a real point of view. Except you seem to be thinking one planet = 1 Regiment. It doesn't. Planets supply multiple regiments that share a name. For example, Catachan has multiple famous regiments, such as the Catachan VII "Catachan Devils", Catachan XVIII " Swamprats", Catachan MXIV "Unseen Lurkers", etc. Earth isn't defended by one regiment alone, and planets aren't attacked or defended by one regiment.
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Post by: Raxmei
There is no textual support for regiments of that size. Go ahead, find a reference for a single regiment containing a million men. If there is no precedent for the numbers you are claiming in the source material then you are making your numbers up.
You seem to be conflating "regiment" with "every soldier on the planet". It's possible, indeed common, for there to be multiple regiments present in a war zone.
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Post by: I-bounty-hunt-the-elderly
Platuan4th wrote:Brother Coa wrote:Raxmei wrote:Everyone claiming regiments containing millions of men is making numbers up. A regiment is several thousand men, far less than a million. It's the level of organization immediately above the company.
So with your logic you can defend a planet size of Earth with 100.000 man? With that numbers you can defend every major capital of Earth?
With several thousand man you cannot hold 1 country not to mentione an entire planet. This is simple "wrighters have no sance of scale thing". For example, average Imperial Hive World have 32.000.000.000 people, but it's Imperial Guard Regiment have 10.000 man?
I say that regiments containing millions of men is not making up - but instead a real point of view.
Except you're thinking one planet = 1 Regiment. It doesn't. Planets supply multiple regiments that share a name, but not numbers.
Earth isn't defended by one regiment alone, and planets aren't attacked or defended by one regiment.
This is a central problem in the writers' sense of scale though - we regularly hear of X regiment being sent to conquer world Y. As a matter of fact warhammer almost never approaches the number of men who would actually be required to take a fully populated and hostile planet by force. You'd need 10s of millions of men in the combat arms alone, and the logistical problems don't bear thinking about. But warhammer is a game for kids, and essentially a fantasy game. We just hear how Commander Fancypants led ten thousand soldiers against Lord Evillaugh, and beat him in a swordfight, and saved the day. Hence, numbers in 40k are limited to whatever sounds cool.
31733
Post by: Brother Coa
Raxmei wrote:There is no textual support for regiments of that size. Go ahead, find a reference for a single regiment containing a million men. If there is no precedent for the numbers you are claiming in the source material then you are making your numbers up.
You seem to be conflating "regiment" with "every soldier on the planet". It's possible, indeed common, for there to be multiple regiments present in a war zone.
There is no textual support on my claim, but being as there is "untold number of Humans in the galaxy" and "Imperial Guard has such numbers that when one solder is killed 10 replace him" suddenly you read that "one regiment count's from several hundred to few thousand troops"???
It's just not logically, especially when they are fighting enemies like Orks or Tyranids whose numbers black the sky and the ground. And again how many Regiments can be deployed for one operation? If Regiment has 50.000 - 100.000 man, you will need at least 10 Regiments to conquer a planet. And if one system has more planets the numbers just grow up. And in the end - if you need to conquer a sector you will need around 50 - 100 Regiments. This is big numbers and many tactical errors can be made because casualties are very high and smaller Regiments are merging with bigger ones and in the end the commander becomes helpless to lead their troops who are now mostly mix of everything.
And to prove how this just look at Taros campaign. 5 Imperial Guard Regiments ( gathered from 12 different Regiments ) failed in conquering a planet from the Tau + they have 1 Titan and Space Marine support. Now, if the Regiments have counted 3.000.000 man ( the numbers that are real to them ) they would conquer planet easily. There where 12.000 locals + few thousand Tau solders and Kroot mercenariness. And the Imperium was able to defeat similar Tau force at Kronus and Kaurava using far less troops.
On original question: numbers are on my side. Not to use full potential of one population for war effort is just stupid. In war you are forming Army's of millions, now few hundreds per army. And the history tough us when you are trying to conquer or defend a city, you need lot of troops. Being that average Imperial Hive city is the size of Europe or Africa. You will need at least few millions to defend it. I cannt imagine even 2.000.000 solders defending the 30% of that city ( and that would be how many? 20 IG Regiments? ).
Automatically Appended Next Post: Platuan4th wrote:Brother Coa wrote:Raxmei wrote:Everyone claiming regiments containing millions of men is making numbers up. A regiment is several thousand men, far less than a million. It's the level of organization immediately above the company.
So with your logic you can defend a planet size of Earth with 100.000 man? With that numbers you can defend every major capital of Earth?
With several thousand man you cannot hold 1 country not to mentione an entire planet. This is simple "wrighters have no sance of scale thing". For example, average Imperial Hive World have 32.000.000.000 people, but it's Imperial Guard Regiment have 10.000 man?
I say that regiments containing millions of men is not making up - but instead a real point of view.
Except you seem to be thinking one planet = 1 Regiment. It doesn't. Planets supply multiple regiments that share a name. For example, Catachan has multiple famous regiments, such as the Catachan VII "Catachan Devils", Catachan XVIII " Swamprats", Catachan MXIV "Unseen Lurkers", etc.
Earth isn't defended by one regiment alone, and planets aren't attacked or defended by one regiment.
 I only used Earth as an example. Holy Terra is the most guarded and heavily fortified planet in the galaxy, everybody knows that. And I said "planet the size of Earth" - not Earth itself...
And by your logic in few months we will see Cadian 8516751' th Regiment? They will ran out of numbers before they ran out of Regiments if they are making them in that numbers
The point is, judging by the sheer size of the population ( as noted above ) it is unimaginable for one regiment to have so few solders. Especially if they are tasked to defend big territory. And judging by the losses the Guard is having regularly they are losing several Regiments on day. This way is just not practical for the size of the Imperium, and giving the population of a single world - it's just not realistic.
37068
Post by: Conservationist
Brother Coa wrote:Raxmei wrote:There is no textual support for regiments of that size. Go ahead, find a reference for a single regiment containing a million men. If there is no precedent for the numbers you are claiming in the source material then you are making your numbers up.
You seem to be conflating "regiment" with "every soldier on the planet". It's possible, indeed common, for there to be multiple regiments present in a war zone.
There is no textual support on my claim, but being as there is "untold number of Humans in the galaxy" and "Imperial Guard has such numbers that when one solder is killed 10 replace him" suddenly you read that "one regiment count's from several hundred to few thousand troops"???
It's just not logically, especially when they are fighting enemies like Orks or Tyranids whose numbers black the sky and the ground. And again how many Regiments can be deployed for one operation? If Regiment has 50.000 - 100.000 man, you will need at least 10 Regiments to conquer a planet. And if one system has more planets the numbers just grow up. And in the end - if you need to conquer a sector you will need around 50 - 100 Regiments. This is big numbers and many tactical errors can be made because casualties are very high and smaller Regiments are merging with bigger ones and in the end the commander becomes helpless to lead their troops who are now mostly mix of everything.
And to prove how this just look at Taros campaign. 5 Imperial Guard Regiments ( gathered from 12 different Regiments ) failed in conquering a planet from the Tau + they have 1 Titan and Space Marine support. Now, if the Regiments have counted 3.000.000 man ( the numbers that are real to them ) they would conquer planet easily. There where 12.000 locals + few thousand Tau solders and Kroot mercenariness. And the Imperium was able to defeat similar Tau force at Kronus and Kaurava using far less troops.
On original question: numbers are on my side. Not to use full potential of one population for war effort is just stupid. In war you are forming Army's of millions, now few hundreds per army. And the history tough us when you are trying to conquer or defend a city, you need lot of troops. Being that average Imperial Hive city is the size of Europe or Africa. You will need at least few millions to defend it. I cannt imagine even 2.000.000 solders defending the 30% of that city ( and that would be how many? 20 IG Regiments? ).
The problem with this is that 5 regiments are hardly the case. Usually, the Guard are deployed in numbers exceeding that. I just finished reading one of the books in Ciaphias Cain, Defender of the Imperium and 12 regiments + inquisitor were sent to deal with a tyranid threat. This threat only consists of hybrid-stealers.
If we look at this, I find it feasible that at least 50 regiments would be fielded against a much larger foe, say a tyranid invasion. This would give us about 1 250 000 (50x25000) fighting men with tanks, bombardment, space support. Morever, the Guard operates as a whole, artillery, armour, infantry and it can be assumed that the Nids field several million (say 6) at a time, giving us 4.8 Nids to a man.
If these creatures had to close the distance between Imperial lines, they would suffer devastating casualties due to said bombardments, which would thin out thier lines quite sufficiently. Assuming every round kills 3. Getting closer, they have to face the massed ranks of more than a million lasguns/hellguns/pistols/flamers/heavy weapons that have a pretty good rate of fire. This would probably take out a 2-3 Nids per man. Saying this, the Nids may retreat before they even reach Guard lines. So 20 000-30 000 men per regiment would be extremely feasible and logical.
Armegaeddon had in excess of 100 regiments fielded, plus PDF and Astartes, Against one of (or) the biggest Waaaagh! ever seen by one of (or) the biggest warboss. This probably puts the numbers of Orks to be around 10-15million Orksi. Using the numbers from above, it seems that more than 2.5million Guardsmen are deployed, not including the millions of PDF units, thousands of Astartes and Fighters from the Navy. This would put the numbers of 20-30k per regiment feasible yet again. If a million were to be in the regiment and 100 to be fielded, that would count to a number of a hundred million men.
Just what I think, feel free to argue.
8218
Post by: Raxmei
Brother Coa wrote:Raxmei wrote:There is no textual support for regiments of that size. Go ahead, find a reference for a single regiment containing a million men. If there is no precedent for the numbers you are claiming in the source material then you are making your numbers up.
You seem to be conflating "regiment" with "every soldier on the planet". It's possible, indeed common, for there to be multiple regiments present in a war zone.
There is no textual support on my claim, but being as there is "untold number of Humans in the galaxy" and "Imperial Guard has such numbers that when one solder is killed 10 replace him" suddenly you read that "one regiment count's from several hundred to few thousand troops"???
I never said "one regiment count's [sic] from several hundred to few thousand troops." Why are you putting words that nobody said in quotation marks? I said "A regiment is several thousand men" in paraphrase of the Imperial Guard codex page 9, "Regiments are typically raised with a strength of several thousand soldiers." It should be obvious that the population of the Imperium or the size of the Imperial Guard has nothing to do with the size of the typical regiment. Since your numbers are not drawn from the source material it is hard to describe them as anything other than made up.
It's just not logically, especially when they are fighting enemies like Orks or Tyranids whose numbers black the sky and the ground. And again how many Regiments can be deployed for one operation? If Regiment has 50.000 - 100.000 man, you will need at least 10 Regiments to conquer a planet. And if one system has more planets the numbers just grow up. And in the end - if you need to conquer a sector you will need around 50 - 100 Regiments. This is big numbers and many tactical errors can be made because casualties are very high and smaller Regiments are merging with bigger ones and in the end the commander becomes helpless to lead their troops who are now mostly mix of everything.
You have no problem believing a Colonel can keep thousands of companies in his regiment straight, but can't believe a war zone can contain dozens of regiments? As examples, the main rulebook defines a fortress world as having a garrison of at least 100 regiments, at the outset of the 3rd Armageddon war there were over 200 regiments on Armageddon and at the outset of the 13th Black Crusade there were over 700 regiments on Cadia and both planets received substantial reinforcements as the campaigns went on. If you take the Cadian 8th as typical (8000 men, see the previous codex) then there were about six million Imperial Guard there, presumably not counting PDF. Codex: Eye of Terror actually gives you the resources to estimate the size of the Cadian PDF: 180 million. I expect the bulk of those troops to have been reservists who had not yet been mobilized at the outset of the war but even if you take this as the strength of the 612 Cadian Shock Troops regiments that adds up to under 300,000 per regiment. Back to Armageddon, the strength of Ghazkull's horde is given at 1042 warbands of between 300 and 3000 orks, high end estimate 3 million total. If an Imperial Guard regiment is supposed to contain millions of men then the 200 Imperial regiments opposing him outnumber his orks somewhere in the ballpark of a hundred to one.
And to prove how this just look at Taros campaign. 5 Imperial Guard Regiments ( gathered from 12 different Regiments ) failed in conquering a planet from the Tau + they have 1 Titan and Space Marine support. Now, if the Regiments have counted 3.000.000 man ( the numbers that are real to them ) they would conquer planet easily. There where 12.000 locals + few thousand Tau solders and Kroot mercenariness. And the Imperium was able to defeat similar Tau force at Kronus and Kaurava using far less troops.
This paragraph is completely incoherent.
On original question: numbers are on my side. Not to use full potential of one population for war effort is just stupid. In war you are forming Army's of millions, now few hundreds per army. And the history tough us when you are trying to conquer or defend a city, you need lot of troops. Being that average Imperial Hive city is the size of Europe or Africa. You will need at least few millions to defend it. I cannt imagine even 2.000.000 solders defending the 30% of that city ( and that would be how many? 20 IG Regiments? ).
Again, the idea of a few hundred men in a regiment is a strawman argument that nobody is claiming. Again, forming the an army of millions out of a single regiment shows complete ignorance of the principles of military organization.
Platuan4th wrote:
And by your logic in few months we will see Cadian 8516751' th Regiment? They will ran out of numbers before they ran out of Regiments if they are making them in that numbers
The point is, judging by the sheer size of the population ( as noted above ) it is unimaginable for one regiment to have so few solders. Especially if they are tasked to defend big territory. And judging by the losses the Guard is having regularly they are losing several Regiments on day. This way is just not practical for the size of the Imperium, and giving the population of a single world - it's just not realistic.
A militaristic world such as Cadia would reasonably have 4 or even 5 digit regimental designations. Considering that there were 600 Cadian regiments persent in a single warzone during one campaign and those did not include the notoriously far reaching shock troops spread across the galaxy there likely are well over a thousand active Cadian regiments in the Guard. 4 digits is enough to give unique numbers to just under 10,000 regiments. With a PDF of 180 million a tithe would number 18 million troops, which at high single digit to low double digit thousands of men per regiment would use a couple thousand regimental standards per tithe. Planets highlighted in medium green in the main rulebook would likely need 5 digit regimental numbers since their tithe exceeds 50 millions per year.
In contrast, a regiment containing one million men would include an unmanageable number of companies. Lest we forget, the Guard have no level of organization between company and regiment and the company is known to number at most a few hundred men. The regimental commander would have thousands of company commanders reporting directly to him. He wouldn't be able to remember everyone's names, much less coordinate their efforts. The example regiment given in the first Imperial Guard codex designated its companies by color - red, green, blue, yellow, and black. That works if you have a small number of companies, but if you have over a thousand... could you tell the difference between Russet company and Sepia company without special equipment? The Cadian 8th had two dozen companies as presented in the 2003 codex and even that's more subordinates than a modern commander would want under his direct responsibility.
299
Post by: Kilkrazy
GW probably haven't thought about or defined what a "regiment" is, as far as the IG is concerned. It's just a nice military sounding name.
In historical armies, a regiment is often a recruitment and training organisation rather than a unit in itself.
The units organised for armies are actually battalions, of which each regiment might have one to six. A battalion usually has between 600 and 1,000 men depending on official establishment and current status. Each battalion would have several companies, usually containing 100 to 200 men each.
Battalions from a regiment were often brigaded together, and led by their colonel, and referred to as "the xxth regiment", so from a practical viewpoint you can talk about regiments on the battlefield.
Certainly there would have to various levels of organisation in the IG, ranging from the basic squad up to the whole army. There is evidence of this sort of organisation with similar levels and sizes of units in professionally organised armies from the ancient Egyptians onwards. It derives from basic limits on the human capability for relating to, organising and managing people.
31733
Post by: Brother Coa
Raxmei wrote:You have no problem believing a Colonel can keep thousands of companies in his regiment straight, but can't believe a war zone can contain dozens of regiments? As examples, the main rulebook defines a fortress world as having a garrison of at least 100 regiments, at the outset of the 3rd Armageddon war there were over 200 regiments on Armageddon and at the outset of the 13th Black Crusade there were over 700 regiments on Cadia and both planets received substantial reinforcements as the campaigns went on. If you take the Cadian 8th as typical (8000 men, see the previous codex) then there were about six million Imperial Guard there, presumably not counting PDF. Codex: Eye of Terror actually gives you the resources to estimate the size of the Cadian PDF: 180 million. I expect the bulk of those troops to have been reservists who had not yet been mobilized at the outset of the war but even if you take this as the strength of the 612 Cadian Shock Troops regiments that adds up to under 300,000 per regiment. Back to Armageddon, the strength of Ghazkull's horde is given at 1042 warbands of between 300 and 3000 orks, high end estimate 3 million total. If an Imperial Guard regiment is supposed to contain millions of men then the 200 Imperial regiments opposing him outnumber his orks somewhere in the ballpark of a hundred to one.
You state that Orks have precise numbers? The army that can grow another solder from the one sample of hair? You need to check the Ork reproduction and culture, they are society without numbers. Where did you get the number of 1042 warbands? And I believe that more than 50 Regiments can be deployed in battle. But 700 Regiments? I think that you are now playing with numbers. +612 Shock Troops Regiments? This is highly unrealistic, ask Imperial Guard General for all of his Regiment commanders, and what's the one Regiment for. In this kind of situations the battle progress with Regiments merging into one, one is destroyed and on the end you got chaos on the ground and commander giving the orders to Regiments that do not exist anymore. And please, give up the damn codex, every next one is giving the different story and the different numbers. Reliying on them is higly unlicky, especially when GW writers don't have scale for numbers.
This paragraph is completely incoherent.
It is, it shows how IG Regiment organisation is not realistic. It shows how the IG having the superior numbers and armor fail to conquer a planet with 12.000 inhabitants. And it shows that this kind or Regimental organization is not realistic because solders mix up pretty quick and then giving orders is pointless because man from armor division are receiving orders for infantry division. The Taros campaign proves my point.
Again, the idea of a few hundred men in a regiment is a strawman argument that nobody is claiming. Again, forming the an army of millions out of a single regiment shows complete ignorance of the principles of military organization.
Again giving the population of one Imperial worlds is totally claimable. Again, forming one Regiment of infantry simplify things when it comes to giving orders and move army's. It's much easier to move 10 than 100 Regiments.
A militaristic world such as Cadia would reasonably have 4 or even 5 digit regimental designations. Considering that there were 600 Cadian regiments persent in a single warzone during one campaign and those did not include the notoriously far reaching shock troops spread across the galaxy there likely are well over a thousand active Cadian regiments in the Guard. 4 digits is enough to give unique numbers to just under 10,000 regiments. With a PDF of 180 million a tithe would number 18 million troops, which at high single digit to low double digit thousands of men per regiment would use a couple thousand regimental standards per tithe. Planets highlighted in medium green in the main rulebook would likely need 5 digit regimental numbers since their tithe exceeds 50 millions per year.
In contrast, a regiment containing one million men would include an unmanageable number of companies. Lest we forget, the Guard have no level of organization between company and regiment and the company is known to number at most a few hundred men. The regimental commander would have thousands of company commanders reporting directly to him. He wouldn't be able to remember everyone's names, much less coordinate their efforts. The example regiment given in the first Imperial Guard codex designated its companies by color - red, green, blue, yellow, and black. That works if you have a small number of companies, but if you have over a thousand... could you tell the difference between Russet company and Sepia company without special equipment? The Cadian 8th had two dozen companies as presented in the 2003 codex and even that's more subordinates than a modern commander would want under his direct responsibility.
Prof there where 600 Cadian Regiments http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/List_of_Imperial_Guard_regiments I can see here only 32 Regiments? And I can see here a few more http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Notable_Cadian_Trooper_Regiments. Other are presumably destroyed over centuries of battles. And there is the military organisation between company and Regiment, it's called divisions. I saw a few Imperial Guard Regiments consisting of a few combined divisions each consisting few thousand men. And again don't take codex to much serious for background with numbers. You can't defend planet size of Earth with 2.500.000 man. You can't even defend Hive city with those numbers, the man would be simply to stretch to hold out defense perimeter and enemy would harass them between defense lines. Automatically Appended Next Post: Conservationist wrote:
The problem with this is that 5 regiments are hardly the case. Usually, the Guard are deployed in numbers exceeding that. I just finished reading one of the books in Ciaphias Cain, Defender of the Imperium and 12 regiments + inquisitor were sent to deal with a tyranid threat. This threat only consists of hybrid-stealers.
If we look at this, I find it feasible that at least 50 regiments would be fielded against a much larger foe, say a tyranid invasion. This would give us about 1 250 000 (50x25000) fighting men with tanks, bombardment, space support. Morever, the Guard operates as a whole, artillery, armour, infantry and it can be assumed that the Nids field several million (say 6) at a time, giving us 4.8 Nids to a man.
If these creatures had to close the distance between Imperial lines, they would suffer devastating casualties due to said bombardments, which would thin out thier lines quite sufficiently. Assuming every round kills 3. Getting closer, they have to face the massed ranks of more than a million lasguns/hellguns/pistols/flamers/heavy weapons that have a pretty good rate of fire. This would probably take out a 2-3 Nids per man. Saying this, the Nids may retreat before they even reach Guard lines. So 20 000-30 000 men per regiment would be extremely feasible and logical.
Armegaeddon had in excess of 100 regiments fielded, plus PDF and Astartes, Against one of (or) the biggest Waaaagh! ever seen by one of (or) the biggest warboss. This probably puts the numbers of Orks to be around 10-15million Orksi. Using the numbers from above, it seems that more than 2.5million Guardsmen are deployed, not including the millions of PDF units, thousands of Astartes and Fighters from the Navy. This would put the numbers of 20-30k per regiment feasible yet again. If a million were to be in the regiment and 100 to be fielded, that would count to a number of a hundred million men.
Just what I think, feel free to argue.
Just one question: where did you get Tyranid numbers? I thought that they attack in hundred million warriors at once, outnumbering every Guardsman 100 to 1. And again where did you get 15.000.000 Orks when one is made from the sample of hair?
8218
Post by: Raxmei
Source for number of Ork warbands and IG regiments on Armageddon is Codex: Armageddon. Source for number of regiments on Cadia at the outset of the 13th Black Crusade is Codex: Eye of Terror. The back of Codex Armageddon lists all notable Ork battle forces on the planet along with the amount of warriors that a warband might contain. 300 to 3000 orks per warband, a bit over 1000 warbands when you add them all together. The same source lists all Imperial Guard, Space Marine, Sororitas, Mechanicus, and various other Imperial forces present. Likewise Codex Eye of Terror lists the notable forces present including 612 regiments of Cadian shock troops. Just skimming through the current IG codex a moment ago I noticed page 27. 1st list item "The Red Corsairs descend upon the Dentor system slaughtering millions. Over one hundred new regiments are raised." 5th entry "Chaos renegades raid Gothic Sector. One hundred and fifty additional Imperial Guard regiments to be raised." Two current in text citations for over a hundred guard regiments committed to a single campaign. I'm not the one making numbers up here, I'm going by official literature. The only argument you have against this is your own incredulity at the ability of a general to keep track of a few hundred regiments. Meanwhile, you are posting numbers with no source other than your imagination. As long as we're ignoring everything the books say and and just going by what feels right, there are ten people in the Imperium and two of them are Guardsmen.
If you feel like posting Lexicanum links now
http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Regiment "The size and composition of Imperial Guard regiments is not standardised across the Imperium; the number of individual Guardsmen alone can vary enormously between regiments, with some only a few hundred strong at founding-strength, whilst others possess tens of thousands of fighting troops.1"
31733
Post by: Brother Coa
Raxmei wrote:Source for number of Ork warbands and IG regiments on Armageddon is Codex: Armageddon. Source for number of regiments on Cadia at the outset of the 13th Black Crusade is Codex: Eye of Terror. The back of Codex Armageddon lists all notable Ork battle forces on the planet along with the amount of warriors that a warband might contain. 300 to 3000 orks per warband, a bit over 1000 warbands when you add them all together. The same source lists all Imperial Guard, Space Marine, Sororitas, Mechanicus, and various other Imperial forces present. Likewise Codex Eye of Terror lists the notable forces present including 612 regiments of Cadian shock troops. Just skimming through the current IG codex a moment ago I noticed page 27. 1st list item "The Red Corsairs descend upon the Dentor system slaughtering millions. Over one hundred new regiments are raised." 5th entry "Chaos renegades raid Gothic Sector. One hundred and fifty additional Imperial Guard regiments to be raised." Two current in text citations for over a hundred guard regiments committed to a single campaign. I'm not the one making numbers up here, I'm going by official literature. The only argument you have against this is your own incredulity at the ability of a general to keep track of a few hundred regiments. Meanwhile, you are posting numbers with no source other than your imagination. As long as we're ignoring everything the books say and and just going by what feels right, there are ten people in the Imperium and two of them are Guardsmen.
If you feel like posting Lexicanum links now
http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Regiment "The size and composition of Imperial Guard regiments is not standardised across the Imperium; the number of individual Guardsmen alone can vary enormously between regiments, with some only a few hundred strong at founding-strength, whilst others possess tens of thousands of fighting troops.1"
Ok, now answer me this: how many Regiments you need to protect a planet size of Earth. Who has, let's say 3 large continents and 2 major Hive cities with population of total 25.000.000.000 citizens? And the attackers are Orks. Automatically Appended Next Post: And here is one more question: how can 1 Imperial Guard Regiment, counting several thousand man hold on entire star system?
6838
Post by: 1hadhq
Brother Coa wrote:
Ok, now answer me this: how many Regiments you need to protect a planet size of Earth. Who has, let's say 3 large continents and 2 major Hive cities with population of total 25.000.000.000 citizens? And the attackers are Orks.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
And here is one more question: how can 1 Imperial Guard Regiment, counting several thousand man hold on entire star system?
1)Raxmei's numbers are correct citations of GW sources.
2) The Imperial navy defends the system. The PDF defends the hives. The IG backs them up.
Its a few hundred-thousands of orks vs a PDF around 1-2.000.000. Orks are outnumbered.
A planet with just 2 hives would be rather uninhabitable and therefore its population concentrated at the Hives.
So just a few strongpoints to defend. Dug in PDF cabn handle that ( if theyre not lead by someone like van Straab ...).
IG is just a bonus there.
3) systems are hold by the Imperial navy and the PDF. The IG is the mobile reserve of the IoM.
8218
Post by: Raxmei
Brother Coa wrote:Ok, now answer me this: how many Regiments you need to protect a planet size of Earth. Who has, let's say 3 large continents and 2 major Hive cities with population of total 25.000.000.000 citizens? And the attackers are Orks.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
And here is one more question: how can 1 Imperial Guard Regiment, counting several thousand man hold on entire star system?
Trick question. Neither task requires any Imperial Guardsmen at all.
The jobs you have listed both fall upon the shoulders of the PDF, which follows a completely different command structure. The Guard are an attack and counterattack force. Imperial Guard strike forces are assembled as needed at the scale that the mission and strength of the opposition dictate. This is frequently done ad hoc - first whatever forces are on hand are sent which are then reinforced with additional regiments until resistance collapses. At one extreme I expect that by the end of the 13th Black Crusade there will be well over a thousand regiments committed to counterattacking Abaddon's legions across numerous fronts, with hundreds of regiments having by that point been annihilated or consolidated due to casualties. The Eye of Terror codex does note that the high turnover of regiments in the campaign eventually made it impossible to keep detailed track of all units involved. The supreme commander would most sensibly delegate operational authority to the senior officer at each front, each of them charged with the handling of a reasonably self-contained force of, say, a couple dozen regiments. On a campaign of such an extraordinary scale as this there would likely be additional levels of command at the planetary, continental, and strategic direction levels as appropriate.
Now, there are a few worlds that do have large permanent Imperial Guard garrisons even when there is no active conflict. Worlds of great importance can have over a hundred, possibly much more than a hundred, regiments of Imperial Guard dedicated to nothing other than defending them in addition to whatever the PDF might have. Cadia is the most famous of the Imperium's fortress worlds. Its guard garrison numbered several hundred regiments on top of a large PDF. Supposing that our hypothetical 25-billion man world is such a place then the size its Guard garrison would naturally depend on its importance to the Imperium and the level of activity in its sector. A few hundred regiments of Guard would be within the realm of possibility. The number actually required would of course depend on how many Orks are attacking. If the PDF and garrison are not sufficient then additional regiments will be raised from the local population and surrounding systems until the Imperium does have sufficient forces on planet to drive out the foe, however many that may be.
37647
Post by: Laodamia
Brother Coa wrote:Raxmei wrote:Everyone claiming regiments containing millions of men is making numbers up. A regiment is several thousand men, far less than a million. It's the level of organization immediately above the company.
So with your logic you can defend a planet size of Earth with 100.000 man? With that numbers you can defend every major capital of Earth?
With several thousand man you cannot hold 1 country not to mentione an entire planet. This is simple "wrighters have no sance of scale thing". For example, average Imperial Hive World have 32.000.000.000 people, but it's Imperial Guard Regiment have 10.000 man?
I say that regiments containing millions of men is not making up - but instead a real point of view.
Since when do single regiments have to watch over a single world on their own?
As previously said, regiments are the organisational classification just above the company (which numbers somewhere between 150-250 soldiers). Which would mean that a single regiment, usually made of ten companies, would number around 1500-2500 fighting men. But a single regiment would also have tech-crews, HQ staff, reserve men, attached specialized units, etc. Thus, a single regiment could probably number around 6000 men.
But remember that above the regiment, you have the brigade, the division, etc.
IG regiments have to conquer an entire world on their own only in very poor and unrealistic BL publications.
Most of GW's serious and experienced authors (Abnett, Parker...) always mention IG regiments fighting in divisions and army groups.
31733
Post by: Brother Coa
1hadhq wrote:Brother Coa wrote:
Ok, now answer me this: how many Regiments you need to protect a planet size of Earth. Who has, let's say 3 large continents and 2 major Hive cities with population of total 25.000.000.000 citizens? And the attackers are Orks.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
And here is one more question: how can 1 Imperial Guard Regiment, counting several thousand man hold on entire star system?
1)Raxmei's numbers are correct citations of GW sources.
2) The Imperial navy defends the system. The PDF defends the hives. The IG backs them up.
Its a few hundred-thousands of orks vs a PDF around 1-2.000.000. Orks are outnumbered.
A planet with just 2 hives would be rather uninhabitable and therefore its population concentrated at the Hives.
So just a few strongpoints to defend. Dug in PDF cabn handle that ( if theyre not lead by someone like van Straab ...).
IG is just a bonus there.
3) systems are hold by the Imperial navy and the PDF. The IG is the mobile reserve of the IoM.
1) Those " GW sorces" cannot tell the difference between semi and full automated rifle. Not to mention military branch numbers.
2) I hate to tell you this but...how the hell can you get the Orks outnumbered? When they are reproducing in that way when you kill one 20 more replace him. Imperial navy that defend the planet is just few ships and maybe one frigate. Majority of the system fleet is always on the move or it's guarding the docks. And that is not enough man to defend the Hive city, you need at least 10.000.000 solders for that. Remember that in any city every hard point can be flanked and outmaneuvered as we have seen in every war. Except when the hard points are connected via defense lines. And giving the sher number of Hive and the Hive population you will have at least around 10.000.000 solders to create a stable defense line to hold out.
3) Seen that at Tartarus, Lorn V, Kronus, Kaurava, Aurelia... In most cases 20% of the planet systems of Imperium is defended by the way you described above. The rest 80% are defended by PDF with feew Navy ships and 1 IG Regiment. Automatically Appended Next Post: Raxmei wrote:Brother Coa wrote:Ok, now answer me this: how many Regiments you need to protect a planet size of Earth. Who has, let's say 3 large continents and 2 major Hive cities with population of total 25.000.000.000 citizens? And the attackers are Orks.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
And here is one more question: how can 1 Imperial Guard Regiment, counting several thousand man hold on entire star system?
Trick question. Neither task requires any Imperial Guardsmen at all.
The jobs you have listed both fall upon the shoulders of the PDF, which follows a completely different command structure. The Guard are an attack and counterattack force. Imperial Guard strike forces are assembled as needed at the scale that the mission and strength of the opposition dictate. This is frequently done ad hoc - first whatever forces are on hand are sent which are then reinforced with additional regiments until resistance collapses. At one extreme I expect that by the end of the 13th Black Crusade there will be well over a thousand regiments committed to counterattacking Abaddon's legions across numerous fronts, with hundreds of regiments having by that point been annihilated or consolidated due to casualties. The Eye of Terror codex does note that the high turnover of regiments in the campaign eventually made it impossible to keep detailed track of all units involved. The supreme commander would most sensibly delegate operational authority to the senior officer at each front, each of them charged with the handling of a reasonably self-contained force of, say, a couple dozen regiments. On a campaign of such an extraordinary scale as this there would likely be additional levels of command at the planetary, continental, and strategic direction levels as appropriate.
Last time I checked Guard = Guarding = Defending. And in most cases that is the thing - they are always defending something, rarely conquering.
And most PDF are so poorly trained that IG Regiments must be healed on capital world for extra protection. The only PDF earning that mane is the one of Ultramar.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Laodamia wrote:
Since when do single regiments have to watch over a single world on their own?
As previously said, regiments are the organisational classification just above the company (which numbers somewhere between 150-250 soldiers). Which would mean that a single regiment, usually made of ten companies, would number around 1500-2500 fighting men. But a single regiment would also have tech-crews, HQ staff, reserve men, attached specialized units, etc. Thus, a single regiment could probably number around 6000 men.
But remember that above the regiment, you have the brigade, the division, etc.
IG regiments have to conquer an entire world on their own only in very poor and unrealistic BL publications.
Most of GW's serious and experienced authors (Abnett, Parker...) always mention IG regiments fighting in divisions and army groups.
Seen it just to many times....To many worlds of the Imperium are guarded by 1 Regiment only. Only the realy important ones are guarded by several Regiments.
And you are saying me that 1 Chinese battalion have more man than 1 Imperial Guard Regiment? ( 1 Chinese Battalion have 750.000 man )
And that's the military progress in 41' st millennium.
8218
Post by: Raxmei
Oh goody, the background material that comprises literally everything we know about the Warhammer 40,000 setting is not a valid source. Bearing that in mind:
You don't need an army to fight Orks. Ork boyz are only six inches tall so Imperial citizens have no trouble simply squishing all but the most numerous of Ork armies underfoot. However, at one point the citizens of the verdant paradise world known as Krieg got tired of constantly having to clean ork off their shoes so they called the Imperial Guard for help. The Imperial Guard was a man named Abraham Lincoln, and as his title implied it was his job to guard every citizen of the Imperium from danger. He swiftly rode to Krieg on his multicolored unicorn named Charlie. Upon arrival Lincoln rode Charlie right into the the thick of the ork horde. He dismounted to fight and between his two boots and Charlie's four hooves many thousands of orks were squished that day. However, there were still many Orks left so Abraham called on his good friend Isambaard Kingdom Brunel, the Adeptus Mechanicus. The Adeptus Mechanicus was the most crafty craftsman in the entire Imperium. If anyone could solve this problem it was him. Isambaard pondered the problem for two long minutes before he finally thought of a solution. He built a legged war machine to automatically stomp the orks beneath its tireless mechanical feat. The very next day the ork stompa was ready for action and Krieg was free of the ork pest once and for all within the week. Orks have appeared on other Imperial worlds since then but have never posed a serious problem in no small part due to the commendable efforts of Abraham Lincoln and Isambaard Kingdom Brunel.
When composing your response keep in mind that you are not allowed to refer to any source material that contradicts my account. The source material is ridiculous and unrealistic so we can't base any arguments on anything it says.
Are we ready to talk about the Warhammer 40,000 setting as described by Games Workshop now?
6838
Post by: 1hadhq
Brother Coa wrote:
1) Those "GW sources" cannot tell the difference between semi and full automated rifle. Not to mention military branch numbers.
Oh really?
Codex Imperial guard, 3rd ed, page 31:
Selction screen of the ad munitorum, force request.
Options shown:
type of formation:
- lists 37 types, sorted alpabetically from aeronautical to supply units.
size fo formation:
- lists 17 levels.
- sorted alpabetically from Army down to squad.
( Beware: translated, may be wrong )
Army, battalion, battery, division, front, cohort, company, corps, patrol, phalanx, regiment, group?, squadron, team, company-parts?, squad.
type of warzone:
- lists 37 types, sorted alpabetically. From aequatorial to "other".
Selection process of the ad munitorum seems to be able to deal with anything from a few pirates/rebels to a full crusade.
Codex Imperial guard, 3rd ed, page 40:
Organization of a regiment.
Regiment > 5+ companies
Company > 2-6 platoons
Platoon > 2-6 squads.
Does not add up to "millions per regiment" I am afraid.
Codex Imperial Guard, 3rd ed, last page / codex imperial guard ,4th ed, page 9:
Invasion of Jucha ( macharian crusade ).
Regiments involved: 2nd Mordian, 4th Catachan ( lost), 5th catachan, 6th catachan, 14th catachan, 12th catachan.
4 battlecruiser deployed to land and support the invasion force.
codex imperial guard, 4th ed, page10/11:
8th cadia, pic. Shown 4k of 8k. 12 companies = 4000. Add the absent companies and there will be ~20 of them.
If the 8th would be lost, they would raise a "new" 8th cadia to replace.
Considering there is a 3 digit regiment number already, up to 1000 x 8000 => 8.000.000.
Just the minimum contribution to the IG.we know of....
Brother Coa wrote:
2) I hate to tell you this but...how the hell can you get the Orks outnumbered? When they are reproducing in that way when you kill one 20 more replace him. Imperial navy that defend the planet is just few ships and maybe one frigate. Majority of the system fleet is always on the move or it's guarding the docks. And that is not enough man to defend the Hive city, you need at least 10.000.000 soldiers for that. Remember that in any city every hard point can be flanked and outmaneuvered as we have seen in every war. Except when the hard points are connected via defense lines. And giving the sheer number of Hive and the Hive population you will have at least around 10.000.000 soldiers to create a stable defense line to hold out.
Don't hate, just admit humans can outnumber orks...
Orks aren't reproducing in seconds. Dead orks are still losses that need some time to be replaced.
Nobody could ever stop a waaagh if orks could just reinforce what they lost "just-in time". And waaghs have been stopped often enough.
Hives are fortified settlements. They got enough gun-emplacements to cut the numbers of any attacker down to a size the garrison can handle. Dug in forces can hold out against a hundred times their number.
A defense line is a bad idea with orks, these like it to gather where a big fight is expected. Decreasing their numbers in mobile warfare
is the way to go. Hives are immobile and you should not draw orks to them, but away from them.
But sooner or later the orks will try to conquer the hive.
The hive isn't a mess of building sprawled across dozens of square miles. So you don't have to defend uncounted miles of fortress walls.
I would even doubt if its possible to put 10% of your 10.000.000 on the walls.
Brother Coa wrote:
3) Seen that at Tartarus, Lorn V, Kronus, Kaurava, Aurelia... In most cases 20% of the planet systems of Imperium is defended by the way you described above. The rest 80% are defended by PDF with few Navy ships and 1 IG Regiment.
Sorry, the Planetary defense force isn't just for fun named that way.
Before you have a go at Guard = guarding again, its still "Imperiale Armee" where I live...
Not sure why computer-games ( kronus, lorn V, etc ) are valid sources here and GW publications are doubted.
Brother Coa wrote:
Seen it just to many times....To many worlds of the Imperium are guarded by 1 Regiment only. Only the realy important ones are guarded by several Regiments.
And you are saying me that 1 Chinese battalion have more man than 1 Imperial Guard Regiment? ( 1 Chinese Battalion have 750.000 man )
And that's the military progress in 41'st millennium.
IG outclasses the chinese that much, obviously.
Seriously, PDF isn't IG. The tithe of IG is usually 10% of local military, so a tithe of 5.000.000 IG would translate into 50.000.000 PDF.
But, as GW preferres to keep it foggy, the size of the PDF is unknown as is the size of the IG.
31733
Post by: Brother Coa
Raxmei wrote:Oh goody, the background material that comprises literally everything we know about the Warhammer 40,000 setting is not a valid source. Bearing that in mind:
You don't need an army to fight Orks. Ork boyz are only six inches tall so Imperial citizens have no trouble simply squishing all but the most numerous of Ork armies underfoot. However, at one point the citizens of the verdant paradise world known as Krieg got tired of constantly having to clean ork off their shoes so they called the Imperial Guard for help. The Imperial Guard was a man named Abraham Lincoln, and as his title implied it was his job to guard every citizen of the Imperium from danger. He swiftly rode to Krieg on his multicolored unicorn named Charlie. Upon arrival Lincoln rode Charlie right into the the thick of the ork horde. He dismounted to fight and between his two boots and Charlie's four hooves many thousands of orks were squished that day. However, there were still many Orks left so Abraham called on his good friend Isambaard Kingdom Brunel, the Adeptus Mechanicus. The Adeptus Mechanicus was the most crafty craftsman in the entire Imperium. If anyone could solve this problem it was him. Isambaard pondered the problem for two long minutes before he finally thought of a solution. He built a legged war machine to automatically stomp the orks beneath its tireless mechanical feat. The very next day the ork stompa was ready for action and Krieg was free of the ork pest once and for all within the week. Orks have appeared on other Imperial worlds since then but have never posed a serious problem in no small part due to the commendable efforts of Abraham Lincoln and Isambaard Kingdom Brunel.
When composing your response keep in mind that you are not allowed to refer to any source material that contradicts my account. The source material is ridiculous and unrealistic so we can't base any arguments on anything it says.
Are we ready to talk about the Warhammer 40,000 setting as described by Games Workshop now?
First of all: your story is for little kids.
Second of all, I can respond WHATEVER I WANT at any source material that contradicts your account. You are not the law, neither my mother to tell me what I cannon and can do.
Third of all, we are talking about realistic stuff in 40k. And it's not realistic that today's Earth military forces have more solders than 1 Imperial star system, nor that they have population of ~billions and they only making military groups of 10.000 solders. And that group is in most times the only force defending a planet. ( like we saw 85' th Vendoland in defence of Meridian and later on Aurelia. )
31733
Post by: Brother Coa
1hadhq wrote:Brother Coa wrote:
1) Those "GW sources" cannot tell the difference between semi and full automated rifle. Not to mention military branch numbers.
Oh really?
Codex Imperial guard, 3rd ed, page 31:
Selction screen of the ad munitorum, force request.
Options shown:
type of formation:
- lists 37 types, sorted alpabetically from aeronautical to supply units.
size fo formation:
- lists 17 levels.
- sorted alpabetically from Army down to squad.
( Beware: translated, may be wrong )
Army, battalion, battery, division, front, cohort, company, corps, patrol, phalanx, regiment, group?, squadron, team, company-parts?, squad.
type of warzone:
- lists 37 types, sorted alpabetically. From aequatorial to "other".
Selection process of the ad munitorum seems to be able to deal with anything from a few pirates/rebels to a full crusade.
Codex Imperial guard, 3rd ed, page 40:
Organization of a regiment.
Regiment > 5+ companies
Company > 2-6 platoons
Platoon > 2-6 squads.
Does not add up to "millions per regiment" I am afraid.
Codex Imperial Guard, 3rd ed, last page / codex imperial guard ,4th ed, page 9:
Invasion of Jucha ( macharian crusade ).
Regiments involved: 2nd Mordian, 4th Catachan ( lost), 5th catachan, 6th catachan, 14th catachan, 12th catachan.
4 battlecruiser deployed to land and support the invasion force.
codex imperial guard, 4th ed, page10/11:
8th cadia, pic. Shown 4k of 8k. 12 companies = 4000. Add the absent companies and there will be ~20 of them.
If the 8th would be lost, they would raise a "new" 8th cadia to replace.
Considering there is a 3 digit regiment number already, up to 1000 x 8000 => 8.000.000.
Just the minimum contribution to the IG.we know of....
Brother Coa wrote:
2) I hate to tell you this but...how the hell can you get the Orks outnumbered? When they are reproducing in that way when you kill one 20 more replace him. Imperial navy that defend the planet is just few ships and maybe one frigate. Majority of the system fleet is always on the move or it's guarding the docks. And that is not enough man to defend the Hive city, you need at least 10.000.000 soldiers for that. Remember that in any city every hard point can be flanked and outmaneuvered as we have seen in every war. Except when the hard points are connected via defense lines. And giving the sheer number of Hive and the Hive population you will have at least around 10.000.000 soldiers to create a stable defense line to hold out.
Don't hate, just admit humans can outnumber orks...
Orks aren't reproducing in seconds. Dead orks are still losses that need some time to be replaced.
Nobody could ever stop a waaagh if orks could just reinforce what they lost "just-in time". And waaghs have been stopped often enough.
Hives are fortified settlements. They got enough gun-emplacements to cut the numbers of any attacker down to a size the garrison can handle. Dug in forces can hold out against a hundred times their number.
A defense line is a bad idea with orks, these like it to gather where a big fight is expected. Decreasing their numbers in mobile warfare
is the way to go. Hives are immobile and you should not draw orks to them, but away from them.
But sooner or later the orks will try to conquer the hive.
The hive isn't a mess of building sprawled across dozens of square miles. So you don't have to defend uncounted miles of fortress walls.
I would even doubt if its possible to put 10% of your 10.000.000 on the walls.
Brother Coa wrote:
3) Seen that at Tartarus, Lorn V, Kronus, Kaurava, Aurelia... In most cases 20% of the planet systems of Imperium is defended by the way you described above. The rest 80% are defended by PDF with few Navy ships and 1 IG Regiment.
Sorry, the Planetary defense force isn't just for fun named that way.
Before you have a go at Guard = guarding again, its still "Imperiale Armee" where I live...
Not sure why computer-games ( kronus, lorn V, etc ) are valid sources here and GW publications are doubted.
Brother Coa wrote:
Seen it just to many times....To many worlds of the Imperium are guarded by 1 Regiment only. Only the realy important ones are guarded by several Regiments.
And you are saying me that 1 Chinese battalion have more man than 1 Imperial Guard Regiment? ( 1 Chinese Battalion have 750.000 man )
And that's the military progress in 41'st millennium.
IG outclasses the chinese that much, obviously.
Seriously, PDF isn't IG. The tithe of IG is usually 10% of local military, so a tithe of 5.000.000 IG would translate into 50.000.000 PDF.
But, as GW preferres to keep it foggy, the size of the PDF is unknown as is the size of the IG.
I just have to say this : http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/SciFiWritersHaveNoSenseOfScale
And that my Imperial Guard Regiment (since everyone can make up their own + fluff + warfare style + paint job ) will have 3 million Guardsman.
And one more thing, if I call some military expert to wright down some weapon specification to me doesn't mean that I know about military.
And they don't have sense of scale.
37755
Post by: Harriticus
That 2.5 million figure was similar to the amount used in the Siege of Vraks I believe, a conflict whose scale was far smaller then Armageddon. I'd put the number much higher, Armageddon was one of the Imperiums titantic struggles.
299
Post by: Kilkrazy
Remember that according to official GW policy, fluff is a mix of legend, myth, propaganda, lies, misunderstanding, and some genuine (possibly misreported) history.
If there is ever a conflict between fluff and logic, you have to bear in mind the possibility that the fluff is wrong.
6838
Post by: 1hadhq
Brother Coa wrote:
I just have to say this : http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/SciFiWritersHaveNoSenseOfScale
And that my Imperial Guard Regiment (since everyone can make up their own + fluff + warfare style + paint job ) will have 3 million Guardsman.
And one more thing, if I call some military expert to write down some weapon specification to me doesn't mean that I know about military.
And they don't have sense of scale.
Remember GW has M-Ward now. They don't need sense.......
PS: I do expect you to take pics of these 3.000.000 guardsmen and post them in Modelling&Painting.
 May the Emperor protect you on this quest to contribute so many fine warriors to his all-conquering forces!
2764
Post by: AgeOfEgos
Kid_Kyoto wrote:*Snip----billions of guys, billions of billions of soldiers, etc*
Approves this post
37647
Post by: Laodamia
Brother Coa wrote:First of all: your story is for little kids.
Second of all, I can respond WHATEVER I WANT at any source material that contradicts your account. You are not the law, neither my mother to tell me what I cannon and can do.
Third of all, we are talking about realistic stuff in 40k. And it's not realistic that today's Earth military forces have more solders than 1 Imperial star system, nor that they have population of ~billions and they only making military groups of 10.000 solders. And that group is in most times the only force defending a planet. ( like we saw 85'th Vendoland in defence of Meridian and later on Aurelia. )
hey, calm down coa, it's fine  . You can have billions of guards in your army if you want to. Keep in mind that we're guessing the unknown numbers of a s ci-fi's universe's imaginary army. Difficult to have a more abstract conversation topic.
If I were you, I would say your army is the fifth Army Group of urlivingroom, and have your squads taken from different regiments from this army group, with different backgrounds, etc. It would explain why your army is able to slaughter billions of green-skins and provide a nice background.
24054
Post by: MikeV37
wait, a Chinese battalion is 750,000?
A battalion is supposed to be around 3000 men.
A Chinese PLA Group Army, contains 65.000 men
An army consists of dozens to hundreds of brigades/regiments
Considering that you're going by realism:
If you count up the amount of Regiments on Earth
There will probobly be hundreds of regiments.
A sector is never guarded by one regiment, unless its a token force in a very peaceful area.
25 billion population on a planet
1 billion hive militia (2-5 if pressed)
50 million PDF soldiers.
Orks come in warbands of 300-3000, That's the reason they're not the considered a large threat unless they have a great leader among them.
Every time an ork dies, a few more will respawn in a couple months, become warriors in several years. There are several ways to deal with this.
Kill it with fire- ork spores will die from extreme heat. No new orks.
Kill them all. After the first generation, orks will stop using modern weaponry, because they don't know of its existance/how to use it. That makes orks again managable.
This has precedence in all the fluff as feral orks, but it also makes sense.
Now assuming you meant a huge waagh, of dozens of millions of orks led by a strong leader, The imperium would see it coming from very far away. Mobilized would be the PDF and Nearby guard units from planets where the orks are not expected to show up, and moved to the areas that the orks are moving towards. As the orks get closer to this planet, the imperium would have a better understanding to where they're going, and the troops would get redeployed closer and closer to the planet, until finally several hundred guard regiments(Which is still 1-2 army groups) is guarding the planet, with a sizable fleet around it.
Remember, imperial fleets move faster than orks through space, giving them the logistical advantage. There is also much less infighting, which helps with the same.
20243
Post by: Grey Templar
orks have the knowledge to build their Technology in their DNA. a Big Mek doesn't learn how to build something, he knows.
it may take a few generations for feral orks to get back into building the real stuff, but they are only limited by the materials to hand and their imagination.
28848
Post by: KamikazeCanuck
A regiment is around 4000-12,000. Cadia sets the standard for most things and a cadian regiment is 8,000.
8218
Post by: Raxmei
MikeV37 wrote:wait, a Chinese battalion is 750,000?
A battalion is supposed to be around 3000 men.
A Chinese PLA Group Army, contains 65.000 men
An army consists of dozens to hundreds of brigades/regiments
Now now, if Brother Coa wants to tell us that the entire People's Liberation Army consists of three battalions I see no reason to doubt him. If you read his other posts in this thread I am sure you will find he knows a lot about military organization.
31733
Post by: Brother Coa
Laodamia wrote:Brother Coa wrote:First of all: your story is for little kids.
Second of all, I can respond WHATEVER I WANT at any source material that contradicts your account. You are not the law, neither my mother to tell me what I cannon and can do.
Third of all, we are talking about realistic stuff in 40k. And it's not realistic that today's Earth military forces have more solders than 1 Imperial star system, nor that they have population of ~billions and they only making military groups of 10.000 solders. And that group is in most times the only force defending a planet. ( like we saw 85'th Vendoland in defence of Meridian and later on Aurelia. )
hey, calm down coa, it's fine  . You can have billions of guards in your army if you want to. Keep in mind that we're guessing the unknown numbers of a s ci-fi's universe's imaginary army. Difficult to have a more abstract conversation topic.
If I were you, I would say your army is the fifth Army Group of urlivingroom, and have your squads taken from different regiments from this army group, with different backgrounds, etc. It would explain why your army is able to slaughter billions of green-skins and provide a nice background.
Of course, sorry for all that brother. I mean no disrespect and thank you for your support of my Regiment
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Raxmei wrote:MikeV37 wrote:wait, a Chinese battalion is 750,000?
A battalion is supposed to be around 3000 men.
A Chinese PLA Group Army, contains 65.000 men
An army consists of dozens to hundreds of brigades/regiments
Now now, if Brother Coa wants to tell us that the entire People's Liberation Army consists of three battalions I see no reason to doubt him. If you read his other posts in this thread I am sure you will find he knows a lot about military organization.
Actually PLA have 385,821,101 males and 363,789,674 females available for active military service. And + 10,406,544 male and 9,131,990 females that are reaching age for military service ( 18 years ). The now have 2,285,000 active solders and 510,000 support personnel.
Which is a LOT of solders if you ask me, and Indians are not so far behind them. They also have 2,500 aircraft (1,300 are fighters ) and unknown number of tanks, artillery and APC-s.
And you are right Raxmei, as codex stand with you. But nowhere said that IG Reginemt must have up to 12.000 man. So my will have 3.000.000 Guardsman
But, as the vise Kilkrazy said "Remember that according to official GW policy, fluff is a mix of legend, myth, propaganda, lies, misunderstanding, and some genuine (possibly misreported) history.
If there is ever a conflict between fluff and logic, you have to bear in mind the possibility that the fluff is wrong." So it may be that even the codex is wrong when it comes to the fluff.
8218
Post by: Raxmei
Brother Coa wrote:Actually PLA have 385,821,101 males and 363,789,674 females available for active military service. And + 10,406,544 male and 9,131,990 females that are reaching age for military service ( 18 years ). The now have 2,285,000 active solders and 510,000 support personnel.
Which is a LOT of solders if you ask me, and Indians are not so far behind them. They also have 2,500 aircraft (1,300 are fighters ) and unknown number of tanks, artillery and APC-s.
The astute reader might notice that the above does not actually address the size of Chinese battalions. The claim that Chinese battalions number 750,000 is false, provably false, and I can't imagine where that number could possibly have come from. No organizational level in the People's Liberation Army or any other army is that big.
And you are right Raxmei, as codex stand with you. But nowhere said that IG Reginemt must have up to 12.000 man. So my will have 3.000.000 Guardsman
But, as the vise Kilkrazy said "Remember that according to official GW policy, fluff is a mix of legend, myth, propaganda, lies, misunderstanding, and some genuine (possibly misreported) history.
If there is ever a conflict between fluff and logic, you have to bear in mind the possibility that the fluff is wrong." So it may be that even the codex is wrong when it comes to the fluff.
However, there is absolutely no precedent for a regiment of 3 million. While a maximum size is never explicitly stated the largest example ever shown is many times smaller. In this perceived contradiction you seem to have gone out of your way to find the most ridiculous possible solution. The problem is you don't believe a ten thousand man regiment could have a meaningful impact in battle. The idea that there might be multiple regiments involved and only the most prominent gets mentioned, or that the usual engagement in 40k is much smaller than you think it is, both are dismissed out of hand. No, the obvious solution is that the standard regiment is of a size that is completely without precedent in fluff or history and literally everything the fluff has to say on the subject is wrong.
The main thrust of my argument from the start has been that the claim that a regiment contains 3 million men has no basis in the published background and that the number obviously comes from somebody's imagination. I have proven this to my satisfaction.
29408
Post by: Melissia
Platuan4th wrote:There are only 6 Orders Militant.
False. There are many Orders Minoris whom are militant.
The Sisters have to patrol across the entire Imperium, safeguarding its various pilgrimage routes and sites. The Sisters have to safeguard Ecclesiarchal domains. The Sisters participate in wars of faith, which are fairly common, and have participated in every major war in the Imperium. And all the while half of all of the Orders Majoris must stay on Terra and Ophelia IV.
They can't do this with a just a few thousand. Even a few million would leave Sisters dangerously short-handed.
31733
Post by: Brother Coa
Raxmei wrote:Brother Coa wrote:Actually PLA have 385,821,101 males and 363,789,674 females available for active military service. And + 10,406,544 male and 9,131,990 females that are reaching age for military service ( 18 years ). The now have 2,285,000 active solders and 510,000 support personnel.
Which is a LOT of solders if you ask me, and Indians are not so far behind them. They also have 2,500 aircraft (1,300 are fighters ) and unknown number of tanks, artillery and APC-s.
The astute reader might notice that the above does not actually address the size of Chinese battalions. The claim that Chinese battalions number 750,000 is false, provably false, and I can't imagine where that number could possibly have come from. No organizational level in the People's Liberation Army or any other army is that big.
And you are right Raxmei, as codex stand with you. But nowhere said that IG Reginemt must have up to 12.000 man. So my will have 3.000.000 Guardsman
But, as the vise Kilkrazy said "Remember that according to official GW policy, fluff is a mix of legend, myth, propaganda, lies, misunderstanding, and some genuine (possibly misreported) history.
If there is ever a conflict between fluff and logic, you have to bear in mind the possibility that the fluff is wrong." So it may be that even the codex is wrong when it comes to the fluff.
However, there is absolutely no precedent for a regiment of 3 million. While a maximum size is never explicitly stated the largest example ever shown is many times smaller. In this perceived contradiction you seem to have gone out of your way to find the most ridiculous possible solution. The problem is you don't believe a ten thousand man regiment could have a meaningful impact in battle. The idea that there might be multiple regiments involved and only the most prominent gets mentioned, or that the usual engagement in 40k is much smaller than you think it is, both are dismissed out of hand. No, the obvious solution is that the standard regiment is of a size that is completely without precedent in fluff or history and literally everything the fluff has to say on the subject is wrong.
The main thrust of my argument from the start has been that the claim that a regiment contains 3 million men has no basis in the published background and that the number obviously comes from somebody's imagination. I have proven this to my satisfaction.
Ok but I still believe in my point. You have proven that based on books and codex's. Ok, so see it my way: one planet Ork invasion. Imperial Guard have been deployed with 100 Regiments, each with 6000 man ( that's total of 600.000 Guardsman ). And we know that they are losing man at a very high rate. So I believe that in the end Orks are still there but the Guard control most of the planet, with losses of 450.000 Guardsman. Now let me see, that's about 75 Regiments destroyed in action. Now time to gaiter all info about killed Guardsman, Regiments destroyed and all survivors will take a lot of time. From this example I see several logical errors:
1) They need a lot of time cataloging losses, in most cases they are never cataloged. The army of 100 Regiments require a lot of of paperwork, and when they start losing that numbers they then must catalog every killed Guardsman and sing the surviving one ( if the regiment falls below 500-1000 man ) to other Regiments. But, seeing as every time they finish one planet they must move on they just mix them up at speed and leave, without regards where did this guy served or what's his profession. The simple thing would be to have larger Regiments witch require less of paperwork and better organisation.
2) And jugding by IG organisation they are still using today's Earth army's organisation as you can see here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battalion. This method is excellent for a world with 7 billion and maybe 10 billion people. But when you have world of 25 billion citizens this kind of organisation becomes outdated. My point is proven as codex writers cannot see into the future but using information of the past. It's like today's army's fighting like Napoleon troops in 19' th century. That combat style is outdated, like today's arm'y organisation must be outdated for 10.000 year old army 40.000 years in the future. Judging by the size of one planet population, it's logical for one Regiment to have more than 12.000 man, maybe even up to million. This kind or organisation simplify things and this order is meant for planetary defense. Army organisation today is made for a country's, witch makes them absolute in defending an entire planet.
3) And if we see Cadia we see that they only had 648 Regiment's in 10.000 years. Witch is little strange giving where are they standing and who are they fighting. How that we never see Cadian 1056' th Regiment? I mean given the losses over millennial and destruction of countless Regiments Cadia must had 1000 Regiment's for sure. But codex states only 600 Regiments so this must be wrong or Abaddon is simply became lazy  . So the fluff here is wrong, again.
In the end I am right again, Regiments may not have million - but them may have much larger numbers than 12.000 Guardsman. Simply because from the logical side it simplify command since you have much numbers with equal force to deal with and it is realistic given the population of various Imperial worlds. So from a logical side I am right. And still, since there is no regulations about regiment numbers my Guard Regiments will still have 3 million Guardsman. And it's not solution to my problem, it's just an idea.
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Post by: Laodamia
Brother Coa wrote:
3) And if we see Cadia we see that they only had 648 Regiment's in 10.000 years. Witch is little strange giving where are they standing and who are they fighting. How that we never see Cadian 1056' th Regiment? I mean given the losses over millennial and destruction of countless Regiments Cadia must had 1000 Regiment's for sure. But codex states only 600 Regiments so this must be wrong or Abaddon is simply became lazy  . So the fluff here is wrong, again.
Actually, it seems that IG regiments are re-funded quite regularly. When a regiment is completely wiped out during a campaign, it seems to be fairly common to actually re-create the regiment from nothing. I've read about these situations a few times already.
This would explain why we don't see the 13 098th Cadian, or something like that.
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Post by: Raxmei
1. That would be necessary no matter what the size of the individual regiments was. You keep saying that this all being one big regiment would simplify the paperwork but all it really does is dump an army's worth of paperwork in the laps of a regimental staff. If there are to be subordinate levels of command between the regiment and the tens of thousands companies that you believe make it up then managing those units is organizationally no different from a higher command doing the same with subordinate regiments of the official size. All that inflating the manpower of the regiment realistically would accomplish is renaming the stage of the chain of command corresponding to that size to regiment. It does not change any organizational requirements at all.
I will note in addition that had these men all been one single regiment this engagement would have been the end of its existence as a regiment. At only a quarter of its former size it is far below the strength it should be and now must be disbanded and its surviving members sent to other units.
2. Population size is a non sequitur. It has absolutely nothing to do with the size of a regiment. A larger total size of the army becomes possible but that army won't have unusually large squads, platoons, companies, or regiments. An army numbering many millions would likely require the invention of additional levels at the top of the chain of command but that's above the regiment's head.
3. The regiment numbers of destroyed regiments get reused. The number you see is not indicative of the total number of regiments that have been raised in the planet's history. Now, there are a few regiments mentioned in the codex with 4-digit numbers. Cadian 1056th isn't one of them but they've probably just never done anything worthy of note. There is nowhere near enough space in the codex to list more than a tiny fraction of the Guard's regiments.
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Post by: Ogiwan
Um. Just because its the future doesn't necessarily mean that unit sizes will necessarily go up. One of the problems of large formations is command and control; simply directing tens of thousands of men, lugging hundreds of thousands of pieces of equipment, is a staggering proposition. That's why modern armies have staff systems and elaborate hierarchies. Furthermore, one of the things that enabled army sizes to swell between the Napoleonic Wars and the First World War was advances in communications (some wireless, but also telegraph) and transportation (railroads). Come World War II, more advances in communications and transportation enable even larger armies. Granted, after WWII, the push seems to be more towards efficiency rather than size, but whatever. In neither of those cases, though, did low-echelon unit size grow. What happened is that levels above that of regiment, were created. In World War I, you see regiments being formed into actual divisions, rather than the ad-hoc assignment of a few regiments to a general being called a division. Hell, when the US got into World War I, Pershing's Chief of Staff stated in his memoirs that prior to World War I, nobody in America had ever seen a division. World War I forced a new hierarchy in upper-echelon command structure; you have regiments (or brigades), then divisions, then corps, then armies, then army groups. And actually, even in World War I, we can see cases where different fighting styles can yield different-sized divisions. British and French divisions were designed for trench warfare; American divisions were designed for open-field combat. Granted, American deficiency in artillery and officers may have forced it, but American divisions were, "fully twice the size of any other European division," at 27,123 men according to the 8 August 1917 TO&E. American units were so big and powerful that they were treated as corps-level units by the Allied High Command. You Europeans are more than welcome to make snide comments about how Americans have to be bigger than anybody else, or whatever else you want to say, but the simple fact is that during the 1918 offensives, the American divisions took casualties that would shatter British and French divisions (I seem to remember a casualty count of about 8,000 for one engagement), and the Americans "kept on trucking," as the saying goes.
In any case, whoever it was who brought up the TVTropes article about how Sci Fi writers have no sense of scale is dead on. In the current Guard codex, there is a quote (that I know I've seen in past codicies, but w/e). It reads as follows: "I have at my command an entire battle group of the Imperial Guard. Fifty regiments, including specialized drop troops, stealthers [sic], mechanised [sic] formations, armored companies, and mobile artillery. Over half a million fighting men and thirty thousand tanks and artillery pieces are mine to command."
So, an entire Imperial Guard battle group is between 500,000 and 1,000,000 men?
Yawn.
According to my Ospery books, during Operation BARBAROSSA, the German Army Group South (as in, there were two other army groups called North and Center) attacked into Russia with 972,000 men. Irritatingly enough, the other two books in the series don't give similar hard numbers. Wikipedia gives us a number of 3.9 million Germans, but does not cite it. I have read a figure of 3 million, but either number is more than sufficient for the purpose of this post (Sci-Fi writers have no sense of scale). Wikipedia also gives us 3,600 tanks, 4,389 aircraft (the aircraft figure comes from a book, but I don't know how reliable it is, seeing that JMH did not review it), and 46,000 artillery pieces. An interesting factoid from one of the Osprey books I have on BARBAROSSA is, "The Ostheer suffered 300,000 killed during Barbarossa - the equivilent of one regiment per day - and most of them were infantrymen."
So, again, Sci Fi writers have no sense of scale - one side of one front in World War II is bigger than a Guard Battlegroup, according to the 'dex. Hell, the Coalition forces in the First Gulf War had more men (more than half a million), and probably had more (and more capable) vehicles, and the First Gulf War was....kind of a small war.
In any case. The Guard codex also specifically mentions the major disparity in unit sizes; it specifically stipulates the 120,000-man strength of the Valhallan 18th Light Infantry (the "Tundra Wolves" of that asshat Chenkov), contrasted to the 1,500-man Vostroyan Heavy Armored 24th. The first Eisenhorn book gives the strength of the 50th Gundurian (spelling?) at 250,000 men, whereas the Valhallan 597th of Sandy Mitchell's Ciaphus Cain books stands at a strength of 1,000.
Now, the thing is that these smaller unit sizes can still make sense; the Imperium is petrified by the possibility that a unit might go rogue; so, the smaller the unit, the less power it has, and the less of a threat if it does go rogue. If the Guard needs combat power, well, they just take a couple of regiments, group them in a division, and then go stomp on somebody. That's also the reason the Guard codex states that regiments are usually homogenous; regiments won't have organic heavy artillery, so they need to work with another unit to get heavy artillery. (I choose to interpret this as regiments not having access to Bombards, and only having a battery or two, or perhaps a company, of organic artillery).
I'll check back in a few hours, and for the next couple of days.
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Post by: Raxmei
Mechanised isn't a spelling error, it's just British english. The quote in the codex also spells armour with a u. The example isn't necessarily indicative of poor scale. There's nothing stopping anyone from fielding more than one battle group. However in general the numbers of troops involved in any given 40k conflict are, when given, with few exceptions curiously small. An example brought up in this thread is 3rd Armageddon, the largest Ork waaugh in history being fought with a few million combatants on each side. Small numbers on the attacking side are easy enough to understand because they're limited by their transport capacity. The defense is on a highly populous world heavily involved in arms manufacture. My best guess at what's limiting their numbers is a bottleneck in the training facilities. Nobody expected a war this big right on their doorstep so they don't have the cadre or facilities to rapidly expand their army to the degree necessary. You can give a man a lasgun but that won't make him a soldier. On the scale of armies that gets even worse. Ten thousand armed but untrained men with inadequate leadership are worse than useless.
There is an entertaining theory that the 40k universe is much less violent than is implied. Attacks in strength are rare and the typical conflict is either a raid or a clash of expeditionary forces. When something comes along that seriously threatens major worlds (Black Crusade, Armageddon, Tyrannic Wars) it enters a short list of major wars. The Imperium only seriously mobilizes in response to such a threat or when they intend to launch such an offensive themselves. At all other times the tithes are perfunctory, the troops either sent on whatever make work missions won't compromise readiness or shipped across the galaxy in quest of an active conflict.
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Post by: Laodamia
Raxmei wrote: There is an entertaining theory that the 40k universe is much less violent than is implied.
The W40K universe is pretty much the most violent piece of science fiction ever created IMO.
It is simply that, as other people pointed out, most sci-fi writers have absolutely no sense of scale or any knowledge about warfare. Which means that uncountable pieces of W40K fluff are poorly written and completely unrealistic.
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Post by: Brother Coa
Laodamia wrote:Raxmei wrote: There is an entertaining theory that the 40k universe is much less violent than is implied.
The W40K universe is pretty much the most violent piece of science fiction ever created IMO.
It is simply that, as other people pointed out, most sci-fi writers have absolutely no sense of scale or any knowledge about warfare. Which means that uncountable pieces of W40K fluff are poorly written and completely unrealistic.
My point exactly. And if the people think it's less violent - just wait until "Space Marines" arrive. I have a sense it will be like: "100 ways to butcher an OrK"
Seriously, I saw in promotion video that marine is catch the Ork throat, slam it to the ground and then he hit his head with his boot. Or when he stab him with Chainsword and then he pull him in the air to slice him at half. Now tell me is this less violent than Star Wars or Halo?
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Post by: 1hadhq
Just to clean up a few things:
1) sci or fantasy isn't realistic. Since 40k is not a historic or realistic setting ( orks&elfs&...etc ), real events have no bearing on 4ok's possibilities.
2) scale. The ruleset of unexpanded 40k isn't able to handle a single battle fully. What you get is a small focus at parts of it.
Expanded it may deal with a single battle, but even then does not include limits of fuel, ammo, food, etc.
Certainly a codex covers a fight of 2 opponents at max company-level. The fluff to support the participants was never meant to
create a whole world to enact battles, just to give a general setting to place these fights in an better environment than a empty
kitchen desk. Thus the description of the worlds is vague.
3) threat level. Some authors tend to raise the threat level each time they move the timeline. Until their series fails to work...
GW made it supergrimextradark with supersized casuality rates at one hand and contradicting these with believable casuality rates
at the other. It would be enough to fight for cities. But it had to be systems...
Now, the "end-times" shall end the species....so how to move on to 6th ed???
4) managable size. The formations have evolved and some stood the test of time. Those that were proven to work, have been kept.
Gw has admit they just call a formation "regiment", in 5th ed. Before this, there was at least an attempt to crosscheck fluff and
provide detailed background. Now, its the secret of the munitorum how big a certain regiment is....the range seems to be a few thousand
to hundredthousands. So it changes from 3rd ( borrowed scale down from History ) to 5th ( 1k to 100k, please look up TacticaImperialis..)
mostly from given examples to "imagination". But for those without experience with real formations its hard to imagine anything believable...
Therefore, the issue of size returns because 40k and the fluff only covers company-level and regiments are above that.
Companies are managable. Regiments below 100k too IMO. Above this, further "ranks" are neccessary.
to be continued...
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Post by: MikeV37
While in the warhammer 40k game nobody will look down on you for saying "My regiment is 3 million strong"(Well, they would, but they shouldn't, since ANYTHING is possible in warhammer), if you want a realistic size for a regiment, 200,000 is the absolute max. Putting more work on less shoulders does not make the army or regiment in question any more efficient. If the paperwork required after 450,000 people die is alot for 100 command units, it will be much harder on one command unit of your proposed regiment. Unless of course you rush the entire 3 million as one large dwindling mob, which would be much less effective as a fighting unit. In fact, at that point, I'm not sure you can call it a proper military outfit. Notice how your regiment is larger than The ENTIRE ACTIVE ARMY OF CHINA. Perhaps you might want to change the fluff of your "regiment" into your "army" And the 25 billion population hive is surrounded by several agri worlds which have a population of less than 500,000 that it has to protect. If it fails, then a majority of the hives population will starve and die.
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Post by: Ogiwan
Heh. Bit of a tangent. I once came up with figures showing annual recruitment of the Guard in a worst-case scenario. I figured it on an average planetary population of 5 billion, since that 25 billion Hive World (and that's actually a small Hive World) has to be offset by 4 worlds with population: 1 in order to equal out to 5 billion.
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Post by: Brother Coa
I have found another hole in GW official fluff. Commander Chenkov lost 10.000.000 Guardsman while trying to conquer one Hive City. Giving the size of Regiment is 12.000 (for example), thats about 834 Regiments?
And Raxmei said that when Chaos conquer a world Guard raise 100 more Regiments. Giving the amount of man lost to retake 1 Hive City, they will go out of Regiments long before they go out of enemies.
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Post by: ChrisWWII
Brother Coa wrote:I have found another hole in GW official fluff. Commander Chenkov lost 10.000.000 Guardsman while trying to conquer one Hive City. Giving the size of Regiment is 12.000 (for example), thats about 834 Regiments?
Chenkov could easily be a higher level commander than a Colonel, and thus, yes, he sent 834 regiments into the meat grinder to take back one Hive City. Remember, this is Warhammer 40k, so that's probably exagerated to make Chenkov seem more heroic/brutal, etc. But it's not impossible that Chenkov threw a thousand regiments in, and got a couple hundred out. This is the Imperium. You seriously seem to fail to understand the basics of military organization. WHy are you so obsessed with the idea that it's one regiment to one planet?
And Raxmei said that when Chaos conquer a world Guard raise 100 more Regiments. Giving the amount of man lost to retake 1 Hive City, they will go out of Regiments long before they go out of enemies.
Remember, Chenkov's assault on that planet was known because he DID the stereotypical Guard thing and just kept charging men at the Hive City till the enemy collapsed. He did it without significant armor or artillery support, which is part of why that victory was mentioned--it was abnormal for the Guard. The Guard are dogmatic, but not stupid, a more common tactic for dealing with a hive city would be to lay siege and bombard with artillery until the shield/walls/defenses collapsed, and then attack with a mixed armor-infantry formation to clear out the survivors. This could take back a hive with much fewere casualities at the expense of taking much, MUCH longer to accomplish. Chenkov was memorialized not for following SOP, but for breaking it and trading lives for a quicker victory.
Remember, on the other hand the DKoK managed to reduce an entire hive to nothing but rubble over 10 years with limited casualties. Both of these cases are atypical, and can not be held up as a 'standard' Guard operation.
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Post by: Ogiwan
Brother Coa wrote:Giving the size of Regiment is 12.000 (for example), thats about 834 Regiments?
Again, the size of a regiment is not fixed. The 18th Valhallan Light Infantry, Chenkov's "Tundra Wolves", is g a given fighting strength of 120,000 on page 9 of the current Guard codex. On the same page, the Vostroyan 24th Heavy Armored has a strength of 1,500. The 50th Gundurian Rifles of the Eisenhorn trilogy is given a strength of 250,000 men. Ciaphus Cain's Valhallan 597th is given a strength of 1,000.
As for that asshat Chenkov losing ten million men, well, what ChrisWWII said.
Actually, what ChristWWII said to pretty much everything. The reduction of that hive was an abnormal operation; Chenkov traded expanding time and ammo for expanding bodies.
I'm curious, Brother_Coa. What, exactly, are you arguing? Also, have you ever done any reading on military affairs, and if so, what?
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Post by: Che-Vito
31733
Post by: Brother Coa
Ogiwan wrote:
I'm curious, Brother_Coa. What, exactly, are you arguing? Also, have you ever done any reading on military affairs, and if so, what?
I will answer you: it's the SIZE. To me at least, this is how I imagine things.
Earth is a sizable planet ( 510.065.600 km ), and we Humans are pretty small ( 10 km is a long way for us ). To maintain planet security you must have sizable military force to control local population + defend against alien attacks. Further more, when you see Hitlers army in 1941 that attacked USSR it numbered ~3.9 million solders. That was still not enough to defeat and eventually to hold on waves of enemies. So if you want to defend entire planet you must have 1 regiment per continent ( Asia and Africa should have 2 because of size ).
And to defend let's say Europe you must have concentration of large army's per country. And if Europe is attacked on one side, send available army's there. To successfully defend Europe you will need at least 20.000.000 solders. For Asia 3x that number and for Africa 2x that number. An when you work numbers you get around 1.8 billion people ( there are around 7 billion Humans today). And if one Regiment have 12.000 Guardsman (average Regiment) thats about 150000 Imperial Guard Regiments.
And my point is not one Regiment on planet - but few. I would, for example, made European 1' st Regiment that could guard mainland Europe ( of course not 20.000.000 man, but some 3.000.000 ) to guard every Europe capital, every strategic point and every military installation. In case of an Ork invasion, I would regroup as many solders as possible, and defend as many territory as I can.
My point is that this fluff is broken because: we can use only around 20% of our entire population and made enough Regiments to guard entire Segmentum ( Solar for example ), then the size of Regiments is not realistic due to Human population in 41' st millennium and due to that they are still using 20' th century military organisation ( like they are in 1991 not 41999 ), and they don't take the size of planets itself into account ( it's very hard to defend very big please with very limited manpower ) like " 20 Regiments have been deployed in sector defense' - Earth is 510 million km long, those 20 Regiments have max of 300.000 man, you try to defend just Africa from Ork invasion with that many man.
And only that, everything else if fine ( well, almost ). And I am sorry if I have upset you all, I didn't mean it, I just wanted to point out my opinion.
Cheers...
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Post by: KamikazeCanuck
Dude, like many have said:
Regiment, that word I don't think it means what you think it means. For example Canada has like 5-10 Regiments and our population is < 1 planet.
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Post by: Ogiwan
Its fairly obvious that English is not your first language; are you confusing "regiment" with "division," perhaps? 20th century divisions can be 12,000 men strong (though that may be a bit light), and Guard regiments don't have a fixed size.
Crap. Have to do housework. Back later.
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Post by: ChrisWWII
Brother Coa, please remember regiment != army. WHy do we have to have just two regiments? The US Army is divided up into about 47 real regiments spread over the world. The British army has about 6 divisions, with only 2 available for deployment at any one time, except for times of general war. The RUssians are divided up into about 10 ARMIES. If Earth was attacked, why would there HAVE to be only one regiment defending a continent? Why can't the forces be divided into smaller components for ease of command? If you look at every large military in history, they have a strict level of military units. In general, that is:
Army Group > Army > Corps > Division > (Brigade) > Regiment > Batallion > Company > Platoon > Squad.
Various nations tend to put stress on different levles within their command. The British and Americans tend to rely on smaller formations mostly at or around the regiment/brigade level, with high quality NCOs. The Russians tend to rely on division level formations. Although the IG is dvided permanantly into regiments, in times of actual war it's not too hard to assume they are arranged into adhoc larger formations for ease of command, and I find it hard to believe that een internally there's not SOME kind of organization besides squad < company < regiment.
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Post by: Ogiwan
ChrisWWII wrote:The US Army is divided up into about 47 real regiments spread over the world.
Quibble: American regiments are pretty much paper formations only. They're used for heraldry and little else. All the actual operational details are handled in brigades.
But, if you want to know more, perhaps the Army Institute of Heraldry can give you some interesting information!
The RUssians are divided up into about 10 ARMIES.
Did they call them "fronts" or some such? Wait, no, a Front is a Soviet Army Group. I think? Yeah, so says Wikipedia. So, nevermind.
If Earth was attacked, why would there HAVE to be only one regiment defending a continent? Why can't the forces be divided into smaller components for ease of command?
Agreed.
Although the IG is dvided permanantly into regiments, in times of actual war it's not too hard to assume they are arranged into adhoc larger formations for ease of command, and I find it hard to believe that een internally there's not SOME kind of organization besides squad < company < regiment.
Again, agreed. Frankly, I think its more than likely that the next level up from a regiment is a Brigade (command by, of course, a brigadier), composed of multiple regiments.
Away again!
edit: the quote tags.
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Post by: Grey Templar
another thing to consider is that the IG doesn't do security work.
thats the PDFs job, and even then the Arbites and Enforcers are who do actual police work.
the IG is an offensive organization. analogous to the U.S armed forces and all it's branches(Army, Marines, Navy, Air Force...)
the PDF is a defensive organization. analogous to the National Guard(a state by state military organization that can only be deployed to defend the assigned territory)
the Arbites/Enforcers are a police organization(albiet one armed to the point of being paramilitary) analogous to all police organizations(State Troopers, City Police, SWAT teams...)
when a planet isn't under threat, the PDF will be confined to their barracks and training grounds.
the Arbites will be doing the menial things like issuing traffic tickets, arresting criminals, and dealing with domestic problems...
the PDF only gets involved in the case of rebellions or major riots.
if the IG gets involved in planetary affairs, the planet has either outright rebelled or there is an invasion. normally, the PDF is sutible for all tasks requiring a military intervention.
an IG regiment will often become a PDF regiment if it subdues a planet. the local populace can't be trusted with weaponry for at least a generation so the PDF won't have any local troops for many years.
the Arbites will start out with a small off-world group of trained personel. these will then recruit locals to form the Arbites/Enforcer force(local born people will have an easier time of enforcing the law rather then off-worlders)
the Imperium actually has few laws proper.
they are basically, Pay the Tithe and Worship the Emperor.
aside from that the locals will hardly notice a difference in everyday life.
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Post by: Brother Coa
Alright, you all have proven your point. I just imagine that with the empire that size and numerless population there would be more numerous military organisations.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Ogiwan wrote:Its fairly obvious that English is not your first language; are you confusing "regiment" with "division," perhaps? 20th century divisions can be 12,000 men strong (though that may be a bit light), and Guard regiments don't have a fixed size.
Crap. Have to do housework. Back later.
И зашто мислиш да је енглески мој први језик? Did you see the flag at all?
And our army was once 4' th in military power in Europe. And like I said, it is just my opinion that IG regiments should have more man, given the.... no matter....
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Post by: KamikazeCanuck
Brother Coa wrote:Alright, you all have proven your point. I just imagine that with the empire that size and numerless population there would be more numerous military organisations.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Ogiwan wrote:Its fairly obvious that English is not your first language; are you confusing "regiment" with "division," perhaps? 20th century divisions can be 12,000 men strong (though that may be a bit light), and Guard regiments don't have a fixed size.
Crap. Have to do housework. Back later.
И зашто мислиш да је енглески мој први језик? Did you see the flag at all?
And our army was once 4' th in military power in Europe. And like I said, it is just my opinion that IG regiments should have more man, given the.... no matter....
They are numerous. Like we said there are trillions of Guardsmen. We were just pointing out the difference between An Army and A Regiment.
What country are you from by the way?
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Post by: Brother Coa
KamikazeCanuck wrote:
They are numerous. Like we said there are trillions of Guardsmen. We were just pointing out the difference between An Army and A Regiment.
What country are you from by the way?
Republic of Serbia, former Yugoslavia.
I just can't imagine the paperwork with all those Guardsman and Regiments on the field...
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Post by: Ogiwan
Hahahaha. That's the job of the Administratum and the Departmento Munitorium, both of which have their own legions (of clerks) grimly expanding thousands of boxes (of pencils) a day in the Emperor's name.
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Post by: Samus_aran115
Seems about right, in the first post
I'd say there's a few more assassins than listed, but that's about it.
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