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infinite_array wrote:

blazinpsycho&typhooni wrote:Why are we talking about Russians?

Simply put, as many have said before:

The IG = The hammer of the imperium
It's not pretty and many of them die, but they get the job done, most of the time.

Because that's essentially Soviet WWII tactics. I mean, we're talking about the country that had such military gems like sending men into battle without a weapon with the orders to 'pick one up as they go' and having guys with submachine guns on your side that'll shoot you if you don't go towards the other guys with guns that were shooting at you.

"Comrade-Captain! German tanks are approaching, and we have no anti-tank weaponry!"
"We shall stop their treads with the bodies of our men, and take their tanks for our own. Forward!"

"Comrade-Captain! German machine gunners have our men pinned down!"
"We have more bodies and courage than they have bullets. Forward!"

Comrade-Captain! The Germans are coming, and our artillery is out of ammunition!"
"Our soldiers have strong hearts and heads! Load our men into the cannons! Forward!"

...Ok, that last bit may be hyperbole. But you get the idea.

I love the Russians during WWII. It's a good thing they were around, or else Hitler probably would have slapped the Allies right back out of France.

I should have made that connection... A little too obvious for me to pick out....

I like guardsmen, they do their job and their pretty reliable. Allows for people to really relate to the universe, because lets face it, not everyone's a genetically enhanced super giant...

blazinpsycho&typhooni wrote:

infinite_array wrote:

blazinpsycho&typhooni wrote:Why are we talking about Russians?

Simply put, as many have said before:

The IG = The hammer of the imperium
It's not pretty and many of them die, but they get the job done, most of the time.

Because that's essentially Soviet WWII tactics. I mean, we're talking about the country that had such military gems like sending men into battle without a weapon with the orders to 'pick one up as they go' and having guys with submachine guns on your side that'll shoot you if you don't go towards the other guys with guns that were shooting at you.

"Comrade-Captain! German tanks are approaching, and we have no anti-tank weaponry!"
"We shall stop their treads with the bodies of our men, and take their tanks for our own. Forward!"

"Comrade-Captain! German machine gunners have our men pinned down!"
"We have more bodies and courage than they have bullets. Forward!"

Comrade-Captain! The Germans are coming, and our artillery is out of ammunition!"
"Our soldiers have strong hearts and heads! Load our men into the cannons! Forward!"

...Ok, that last bit may be hyperbole. But you get the idea.

I love the Russians during WWII. It's a good thing they were around, or else Hitler probably would have slapped the Allies right back out of France.

I should have made that connection... A little too obvious for me to pick out....

I like guardsmen, they do their job and their pretty reliable. Allows for people to really relate to the universe, because lets face it, not everyone's a genetically enhanced super giant...

Says who? In my neck of the woods just being 6'6 make me look like a genetically enhanced super giant. Most my buddies on base a little guys.

Lol I said not everyone, which usually entails room for exceptions XD

Kinda scrawny for a SM though....

blazinpsycho&typhooni wrote:

infinite_array wrote:

blazinpsycho&typhooni wrote:Why are we talking about Russians?

Simply put, as many have said before:

The IG = The hammer of the imperium
It's not pretty and many of them die, but they get the job done, most of the time.

Because that's essentially Soviet WWII tactics. I mean, we're talking about the country that had such military gems like sending men into battle without a weapon with the orders to 'pick one up as they go' and having guys with submachine guns on your side that'll shoot you if you don't go towards the other guys with guns that were shooting at you.

"Comrade-Captain! German tanks are approaching, and we have no anti-tank weaponry!"
"We shall stop their treads with the bodies of our men, and take their tanks for our own. Forward!"

"Comrade-Captain! German machine gunners have our men pinned down!"
"We have more bodies and courage than they have bullets. Forward!"

Comrade-Captain! The Germans are coming, and our artillery is out of ammunition!"
"Our soldiers have strong hearts and heads! Load our men into the cannons! Forward!"

...Ok, that last bit may be hyperbole. But you get the idea.

I love the Russians during WWII. It's a good thing they were around, or else Hitler probably would have slapped the Allies right back out of France.

I should have made that connection... A little too obvious for me to pick out....

I like guardsmen, they do their job and their pretty reliable. Allows for people to really relate to the universe, because lets face it, not everyone's a genetically enhanced super giant...

Do you realise that the Russians were every bit as bad as the Germans? I realise that their aid was necessary to defeat the Nazis but they performed equaly as many if not more crimes against humanity than the Nazis. (In-fact both the Japanese and the russians were worse than the Germans)

ChocolateGork wrote:
Do you realise that the Russians were every bit as bad as the Germans? I realise that their aid was necessary to defeat the Nazis but they performed equaly as many if not more crimes against humanity than the Nazis. (In-fact both the Japanese and the russians were worse than the Germans)

Oh yeah - the Nazi's genocide killed about 6 million people, while I think the Soviet Union killed around 15 million. Crazy when you think about it, huh?

Yeup, completely relatable to the regular human being.....

completely.

infinite_array wrote:

ChocolateGork wrote:
Do you realise that the Russians were every bit as bad as the Germans? I realise that their aid was necessary to defeat the Nazis but they performed equaly as many if not more crimes against humanity than the Nazis. (In-fact both the Japanese and the russians were worse than the Germans)

Oh yeah - the Nazi's genocide killed about 6 million people, while I think the Soviet Union killed around 15 million. Crazy when you think about it, huh?

Only Germans and Japanese had committed genocides in WW2.
For all your information, Soviet Union lost 22 million people in WW2, 2 million of those were solders rest was civilians who died in bombardment, conflict or prisons.
And in war everyone were bad, even Americans. Just remember "Saving Private Ryan" scene at the Normandy after they defeat the Germans. German solders want to surrender, the two G.I's just laughed and shot them down. Everyone is doing crimes in it's own way.

Soviet Union lost over 8 million soldiers at the last check. Germans lost over 4.3 million on the Eastern Front alone and 900,000 from Axis countries. Total dead from the Russia rose above 26 million including civilians.

Russians committed genocide before, during & after the war. The purge of the army in the late 30s, the 'commune' farms that were more like prison labour camps, they wiped out groups of Poles when they invaded & occupied part of Poland in 1939-1940 (Katyn Massacre), they executed prisoners during the war and many prisoners died after the war in captivity, held in camps long after the war had ended.

Chaps, I came back to this thread and saw how it'd moved back to 40k and I was impressed how smoothly that had happened. Now it seems to be ebbing back to WW2 again. Is this going to be the natural progression for this thread?

I agree, let's get back to Guard.
Now, Imperial Gaurd should get more credit. But as long as Space Marines are In spotlight the Guard will be used as cannon fodder.

@ SomeRandomEvilGuy

not some, but the majority of German tanks were superior to the allied ones. the Panze ausf IV was superior armour and the capability of the same speed. There were only 2 true tanks capable of killing the tiger at range: the sherman Firefly with the 17pdr main gun, and the T34/85 I believe. the man who designed the Sherman was a fool. he thought that tanks shouldnt be able to kill other tanks and that armour was over-rated


Automatically Appended Next Post:
but I digress, the IG rely on massed fire and manpower to win the day. The phrase "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" comes to mind

Without the IG the imperium could not survive,

Without the Space Marines and a healthy jack up of conscription rates then the imperium would have a chance of surviving,

(And in a war the IG would win)

Its hard to return fire when you have millions of lasers flying at your forces. And heavy artillery pumbeling your positions

xXSir MontyXx wrote:Its hard to return fire when you have millions of lasers flying at your forces. And heavy artillery pumbeling your positions

Unless you have any of the following attributes:
1. A carapace as a hard as adamantium and quadrillions ready to take your place should you fall.
2. Iridium armor and godlike firepower which can vaporise whole squads instantly. And your own artillery which can destroy super heavy tanks.
3. A body made of self-repairing living metal which can survive the strike from a deathstrike missile only to crawl back together. And Tesla-weapons which can one-shot platoons.
4. Experience from 10 000 years of warfare and blessed with the power of otherworldy creatures.
5. You feel no pain, do not care about anything else than fighting and have countless friends at your side shooting ridiculous amounts of projectiles in the air.
6. You have been trained for decades and you have weapons millions of years ahead the enemy's technology.
7. You have things which cause fear and pain just to look at.

And besides, not every guard force out there has millions of troopers or heavy vehicles. Most only have limited amount (if any) armored support and just a few thousand men.

3 is a bit difficult if you're flash vapourised by a billion "freakin laser beams"

Personally i preffered the old cron fluff

Yeah, it has its perks. But I love the fact that they are a little more individual now, instead of just being Tyranids number 2.

ChocolateGork wrote:

blazinpsycho&typhooni wrote:

infinite_array wrote:

blazinpsycho&typhooni wrote:Why are we talking about Russians?

Simply put, as many have said before:

The IG = The hammer of the imperium
It's not pretty and many of them die, but they get the job done, most of the time.

Because that's essentially Soviet WWII tactics. I mean, we're talking about the country that had such military gems like sending men into battle without a weapon with the orders to 'pick one up as they go' and having guys with submachine guns on your side that'll shoot you if you don't go towards the other guys with guns that were shooting at you.

"Comrade-Captain! German tanks are approaching, and we have no anti-tank weaponry!"
"We shall stop their treads with the bodies of our men, and take their tanks for our own. Forward!"

"Comrade-Captain! German machine gunners have our men pinned down!"
"We have more bodies and courage than they have bullets. Forward!"

Comrade-Captain! The Germans are coming, and our artillery is out of ammunition!"
"Our soldiers have strong hearts and heads! Load our men into the cannons! Forward!"

...Ok, that last bit may be hyperbole. But you get the idea.

I love the Russians during WWII. It's a good thing they were around, or else Hitler probably would have slapped the Allies right back out of France.

I should have made that connection... A little too obvious for me to pick out....

I like guardsmen, they do their job and their pretty reliable. Allows for people to really relate to the universe, because lets face it, not everyone's a genetically enhanced super giant...

Do you realise that the Russians were every bit as bad as the Germans? I realise that their aid was necessary to defeat the Nazis but they performed equaly as many if not more crimes against humanity than the Nazis. (In-fact both the Japanese and the russians were worse than the Germans)

But they're still less villainous than the Germans, because their reasons were comprehensible, if deplorable. The Nazis were motivated primarily by gibbering lunacy. It's like how Ted Bundy is a more villainous figure than Al Capone.

Or back on 40k. The imperium is a less villainous figure than chaos.

Sir Pseudonymous wrote:
But they're still less villainous than the Germans, because their reasons were comprehensible, if deplorable. The Nazis were motivated primarily by gibbering lunacy.
Just because you don't understand their reasoning doesn't mean that they're insane. It's like saying that the Imperium is mad because it has a hatred of all xenos. Just because most people nowadays (in the West) would disagree with it doesn't mean that they don't have logical reasons for their actions and feelings.

ChocolateGork wrote:Without the IG the imperium could not survive,

Without the Space Marines and a healthy jack up of conscription rates then the imperium would have a chance of surviving,

(And in a war the IG would win)

I don't know, there are some scenarios that SM would work a lot better in than a crap tonne of IG. What about corruption amongst it's ranks? What about Tau "peace" talks? Superior firepower is great! But only if you're the one weilding it, it REAAALLY sucks if it's turned around and pointed at you

ChocolateGork wrote:Without the IG the imperium could not survive,

Without the Space Marines and a healthy jack up of conscription rates then the imperium would have a chance of surviving,

(And in a war the IG would win)

I like imperial guard more but no, the imperium would die without space marines. Especially since it was the legions that were the backbone of the great crusade.

But yes you are right, if the IG faced off against the SM in a massive battle. The IG would take it hands down. There's just so many of those guys.

xXSir MontyXx wrote:

ChocolateGork wrote:Without the IG the imperium could not survive,

Without the Space Marines and a healthy jack up of conscription rates then the imperium would have a chance of surviving,

(And in a war the IG would win)

I like imperial guard more but no, the imperium would die without space marines. Especially since it was the legions that were the backbone of the great crusade.

But yes you are right, if the IG faced off against the SM in a massive battle. The IG would take it hands down. There's just so many of those guys.

Yeah but in the crusade there were 20x more space marines. There role in the crusade has nothing to do with the imperiums capabilities ten thousand years later.

Except that they basically built the Imperium?

SomeRandomEvilGuy wrote:

Sir Pseudonymous wrote:
But they're still less villainous than the Germans, because their reasons were comprehensible, if deplorable. The Nazis were motivated primarily by gibbering lunacy.

Just because you don't understand their reasoning doesn't mean that they're insane. It's like saying that the Imperium is mad because it has a hatred of all xenos. Just because most people nowadays (in the West) would disagree with it doesn't mean that they don't have logical reasons for their actions and feelings.

I agree. Propaganda works, people are stupid and easily brainwashed and the only EVIL people are the few higher ups of each faction.

The 30s in Russian saw over 1 million people executed and 10 million excess deaths. The Russians were very happy to help Germany invade parts of east Europe and commited just us many atrocities against the people of those countries as the Germans did.

The crazy amount of russians deaths in the war can partly be attributed to stalins paranoia and the executions of nearly all competent commanders .

And i would argue that the Russian march into and occupation of Germany and its cities and the crimes commited during this march and occupation more than made up for the German invasion. That's not to say the german invasion wasn't wrong. BUT the soviets got retribution far before they left.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

BrainDeleted wrote:Except that they basically built the Imperium?

Not really. They conquered planets (later on with help from the imperial army.) and the lesser humans held the empire together.

xXSir MontyXx wrote:

ChocolateGork wrote:Without the IG the imperium could not survive,

Without the Space Marines and a healthy jack up of conscription rates then the imperium would have a chance of surviving,

(And in a war the IG would win)

I like imperial guard more but no, the imperium would die without space marines. Especially since it was the legions that were the backbone of the great crusade.

But yes you are right, if the IG faced off against the SM in a massive battle. The IG would take it hands down. There's just so many of those guys.

I agree. Not to mention the huge morale loss if all Space Marines were killed. They are pretty much the incarnation of the Emperor, and whenever thay appear, all forces (including IG) think that victory is assured.

Both the IG and Marines are vital for the Imperium. IG is the one who keeps the wall upright, and Space Marines are the ones who run around and fix all the cracks in its surface.

And IG is also respected more than one would think. It is considered a great honor to be conscripted into it, and the civilian population hails them as heroes. Marines on the other hand are nothing short of legends to ordinary people. They are believed to be the sons of the Emperor, and they are hold in a special position. It is a foregone conclusion that when they appear they will win, so at least civilians notice the bravery and sacrifice of the Imperial Guard. It is just much more encouraging to hear news about "demigods who defeated the whole Dark Eldar raid without a single casualty", than it is to hear about "thousands dead so the raid could be driven back".

And a war like that would never happen. If it would, the Imperium would be doomed.

Battle Brother Ambrosius wrote:

xXSir MontyXx wrote:

ChocolateGork wrote:Without the IG the imperium could not survive,

Without the Space Marines and a healthy jack up of conscription rates then the imperium would have a chance of surviving,

(And in a war the IG would win)

I like imperial guard more but no, the imperium would die without space marines. Especially since it was the legions that were the backbone of the great crusade.

But yes you are right, if the IG faced off against the SM in a massive battle. The IG would take it hands down. There's just so many of those guys.

I agree. Not to mention the huge morale loss if all Space Marines were killed. They are pretty much the incarnation of the Emperor, and whenever thay appear, all forces (including IG) think that victory is assured.

Both the IG and Marines are vital for the Imperium. IG is the one who keeps the wall upright, and Space Marines are the ones who run around and fix all the cracks in its surface.

And IG is also respected more than one would think. It is considered a great honor to be conscripted into it, and the civilian population hails them as heroes. Marines on the other hand are nothing short of legends to ordinary people. They are believed to be the sons of the Emperor, and they are hold in a special position. It is a foregone conclusion that when they appear they will win, so at least civilians notice the bravery and sacrifice of the Imperial Guard. It is just much more encouraging to hear news about "demigods who defeated the whole Dark Eldar raid without a single casualty", than it is to hear about "thousands dead so the raid could be driven back".

And a war like that would never happen. If it would, the Imperium would be doomed.

Well ofcourse the war would never happen. Purely hypothetical, it doesn't even have to happen to know the results.

ChocolateGork wrote:

xXSir MontyXx wrote:

ChocolateGork wrote:Without the IG the imperium could not survive,

Without the Space Marines and a healthy jack up of conscription rates then the imperium would have a chance of surviving,

(And in a war the IG would win)

I like imperial guard more but no, the imperium would die without space marines. Especially since it was the legions that were the backbone of the great crusade.

But yes you are right, if the IG faced off against the SM in a massive battle. The IG would take it hands down. There's just so many of those guys.

Yeah but in the crusade there were 20x more space marines. There role in the crusade has nothing to do with the imperiums capabilities ten thousand years later.

It's not so much that there were more of them, but that they were actually fielded in appreciable numbers in any given theater, instead of scattered about the Imperium as effectively independent states unto themselves, each without the numbers or firepower to actually accomplish anything. Not that all together they'd hold a candle to the Guard now, since the effective equivalent of every last loyalist marine gathered in one place would be under twelve million Guardsmen, about 70% of the Guard presence at Macragge, and a tenth of the annual recruitment of Armageddon.

Space Marines only ever win in the fluff because they're Mary-Sue action heroes. Without that they'd end up like the SoB do in every last engagement. Tiny numbers of heavily armored soldiers with effectively no ammo reserves or supply lines once in the field, who don't the meaning of "retreat" simply don't work when they're not even more heavily armored with plot armor, and it certainly doesn't help that their entire knowledge of strategy and tactics comes from a book that was explicitly written to hamstring them so that they couldn't threaten the Imperium again.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

SomeRandomEvilGuy wrote:

Sir Pseudonymous wrote:
But they're still less villainous than the Germans, because their reasons were comprehensible, if deplorable. The Nazis were motivated primarily by gibbering lunacy.

Just because you don't understand their reasoning doesn't mean that they're insane. It's like saying that the Imperium is mad because it has a hatred of all xenos. Just because most people nowadays (in the West) would disagree with it doesn't mean that they don't have logical reasons for their actions and feelings.

The Nazis weren't insane, but their overarching ideology and goals were, primarily. Their early strategic decisions were reasonable, if ultimately ill-fated, though the same cannot be said later, as they seem to have lost all touch with reality once things started to turn against them, when they may still have had a chance to turn things around, or grind the whole war to a bloody enough stalemate that they'd escape with their lives.

ChocolateGork wrote:

BrainDeleted wrote:Except that they basically built the Imperium?

Not really. They conquered planets (later on with help from the imperial army.) and the lesser humans held the empire together.

Yeah, they conquered most of the galaxy. They built the Imperium. I'm not devaluing the guard, just don't devalue the Astartes either.

Maccrage was plot armour 100%. Any huge scale battle for space marines is plot armour, there simply aren't enough of them. However operations like Helgate are more than possible.

The part about the 1st company being wiped out to a man defending the Northern fortresses was qutie belieavable. And it did buy time for the fleets to defeat the tyranids in space. They also didn't attribute the main victory in space to entirely to the Ultramarines. That was won in the end because an emperor battleship self detonated its warp drives in the heart of the hive fleet Behemoth.

That's the thing though. Its described as a few survivors inside the fortress being lktteraly flooded by Tyranid. I'm sorry but I don't care if you are a terminator. That is a lot of claws and scythes hitting you every second.