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What happens to Space Marine intiates that fail their tests?
Can they join the Imperial guard? and if they do do they automatically become stormtroopers :

Nope. They will most likely be horrendously deformed or turned into a servitor.

I've also read that some failed initiates who aren't completely destroyed by geneseed rejection become chapter serfs. Maintenance crew, pilots of thunderhawks, etc.

Yeah, they either die or stay in some service to the chapter.

once you are on the path to becoming a space marine, you either pass in one way or another (serf, servitor, cleaner etc.) or die, either way you serve the chapter in the end

MandalorynOranj wrote:Yeah, they either die or stay in some service to the chapter.

+1 to that.And my dice hate me as well.

Depends, some porcedures just don't take, but the subject is still intact. These surviving failures will become serfs and keep their minds. But the more deformed and broken ones will become servitors.

They're probably too fethed up to know day from night, nevermind to figure out how to handle simplistic tools like lasguns or bayonets.

I always thought the ones that failed the first few rounds of testing became guardsmen (Like before they start getting injected with chemicals)

Zarake wrote:I always thought the ones that failed the first few rounds of testing became guardsmen (Like before they start getting injected with chemicals)

No, the only way to fail those first few rounds is to dishonor yourself (and be turned into a servitor) or die.

Zarake wrote:I always thought the ones that failed the first few rounds of testing became guardsmen (Like before they start getting injected with chemicals)

Mostly if you're chosen fit to became SM - you're part of the Chapter, with no way back to ordinary people.

IIRC BL stuff:

IF - failed intact initiates turned to servitors or die.
BF - failed intact iniitiates became serfs
SW -failed intact initiates became serfs
DA - even boys who failed at final step of initial trials killed "to spare their honour"
Salamanders - serfs

So if somebody remembers what happens to Utramarine initiates,please tell - as i can see them as only ones capable of such pragmatism (something like this: chapter serf ->Ultramar PDF advisor/NCO/officer-> IG offiicer/NCO)

The vast majority of failed recruits become Serfs. Most chpaters have many more Serfs than actual Astartes.

What is a 'serf'? I understand everything else, just not this

Zarake wrote:I always thought the ones that failed the first few rounds of testing became guardsmen (Like before they start getting injected with chemicals)

The IG is completely seperate from space marine chapters and seeing as most chapter worlds don't raise IG units it doesn't make any sense to 'ship off' two or three failed initiates to the IG.

NoBaconz4You wrote:What is a 'serf'? I understand everything else, just not this

A chapter serf is a Astartes who didn't quite make it. They do all the unglamourous jobs that you don't think of like swabbing the deck on the Battle Barge and shining up Pouldrons. They still dangerous in their own right. If you try to board a SM ship you will be faced with thousands of half-space marines with high-calibur shotguns.

They aren't even really astartes, as they haven't made it yet.

But at any rate, a serf is this:

"a person who is bound to the land and owned by the feudal lord"

So in this sense, a chapter serf is someone who is bound to the chapter's holdings and owned by the chapter master, and by extension his subbordinates.

Melissia wrote:They aren't even really astartes, as they haven't made it yet.

There is no "yet". They have failed, they'll never be Marines. The may have benefited from some or even all the psyhical enhancements though.

But far more likely than not (according to the Deathwatch roleplay's explanation) they're psychotic and unhinged murderers.

Bah! Who are you?

A person with a name? Perhaps several!

At any rate, those that failed the first tests are serfs. Those that failed tests AFTER they started putting organs inside of them... are psychotic, mentally unbalanced, and generally speaking unable to fulfill any roles except maybe shock infantry.

if the initiate survives(many die as a result of problems) he will likely become a chapter serf, but it stands to reason that he could leave and do other things. especially if he was on a more advanced world like say Maccragge.

Aspirants for the Smurfs who fail the tests join the Ultramar defense force.


if a Aspirant had some of the modifications he would be far different from a normal human and would have abilities to match.

Kaleb from of the Death Guard was an aspirant who failed the trials and became a servant to Garro. The main character in 'Message in a Bottle' was an aspirant who survived the trials but his body rejected the Geneseed and he was reassigned to alternative duties.

If you don't die or go crazy you get a more mundane job, like Boot scrubber of the Astartes or Chief sword carrier.

KamikazeCanuck wrote:A chapter serf is a Astartes who didn't quite make it. They do all the unglamourous jobs that you don't think of like swabbing the deck on the Battle Barge and shining up Pouldrons. They still dangerous in their own right. If you try to board a SM ship you will be faced with thousands of half-space marines with mops and buckets.

Fixed that for you. There's a scenario in there I'm sure.

Howard A Treesong wrote:

KamikazeCanuck wrote:A chapter serf is a Astartes who didn't quite make it. They do all the unglamourous jobs that you don't think of like swabbing the deck on the Battle Barge and shining up Pouldrons. They still dangerous in their own right. If you try to board a SM ship you will be faced with thousands of half-space marines with POWER mops and buckets.

Fixed that for you. There's a scenario in there I'm sure.

fixed it again,

they are pretty angry at not making the cut...

I think the Iron Hands tend to turn theirs into servitors. The SW Iron Priests definitely do this to their failed initiates; seems a little harsh, but i suppose the failed applicants did waste their time a bit.

Gorskar.da.Lost wrote:I think the Iron Hands tend to turn theirs into servitors. The SW Iron Priests definitely do this to their failed initiates; seems a little harsh, but i suppose the failed applicants did waste their time a bit.

In the previous codex it mentions several trials for SW initiates. The penalty for failing the trial of Iron was being turned into a servitor.

Gorskar.da.Lost wrote:I think the Iron Hands tend to turn theirs into servitors. The SW Iron Priests definitely do this to their failed initiates; seems a little harsh, but i suppose the failed applicants did waste their time a bit.

i thought the SWs didn't use Servitors?

all of their ships are run by chapter bondsmen and serfs(mostly failed initiates)

Grey Templar wrote:

Gorskar.da.Lost wrote:I think the Iron Hands tend to turn theirs into servitors. The SW Iron Priests definitely do this to their failed initiates; seems a little harsh, but i suppose the failed applicants did waste their time a bit.

i thought the SWs didn't use Servitors?

all of their ships are run by chapter bondsmen and serfs(mostly failed initiates)

They use servitors for some purposes.
Their ships are crewed by thralls though...

Grey Templar wrote:

Gorskar.da.Lost wrote:I think the Iron Hands tend to turn theirs into servitors. The SW Iron Priests definitely do this to their failed initiates; seems a little harsh, but i suppose the failed applicants did waste their time a bit.

i thought the SWs didn't use Servitors?

all of their ships are run by chapter bondsmen and serfs(mostly failed initiates)

They use servitors, after a fashion. Not as many as some chapters, but they are there.

Melissia wrote:
At any rate, those that failed the first tests are serfs. Those that failed tests AFTER they started putting organs inside of them... are psychotic, mentally unbalanced, and generally speaking unable to fulfill any roles except maybe shock infantry.

What do you base this on? Organ rejection does not mean mental instability. But regardless, the question was about serfs who don't come across as lobotomised drones, that's the fate of the servitors.
The serfs provide crew for the ships, crew the defence weapons for the ships and bases of the chapter, look after the marine's equipment, do all the other jobs to keep things running smoothly that a servitor is too limited to do. They also provide a secondary line of defence if any ship or base is boarded, the marines themselves being the first line of defence. It seems that many of the chapter serfs are allowed to take wives because the position is hereditary (from the Lexicanum article). That suggests that chapter serfs are a mix of failed initiates with whatever enhancements they might have and normal humans.