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didn't want a giant QnA post lol

1: we have never fought a power that is tens of thousands of years more advanced than our own.

2: yes the rules do disagree with the fluff, because they are influenced by the fluff in a small way, for example, an auto rifle is str3, a lasgun is str3, in spite of the fluff showing us that a las rifle is generally more powerful as a weapon system, a las pistol is str3, in spite of the fluff showing us that it should really be str2, all lasguns are ap -, in spite of the fluff showing us that they can and do puncture flak armour, there are more examples if you want them.

3: no I wouldn't, not a competition, I just wouldn't be surprised, id just accept it and crack on.

4: I'm sure tech will make this possible, I'm disinclined to believe it at a run or a job either, without some kind of stability system. either way, marines have been shown to have such systems integrated into there armour.

5: .... agreed

6: gene stealers claws are not bone, they are chitin diamond, an unknown substance that doesn't exist as far as we know, funnily enough the real stuff is a carbohydrate, not a calcium carbonate (think that's what bone is made of, some is made of hair, but its not true bone) and yep, Damn nature.... you nasty

7: agreed, most would, sorry, what is your point?

8: what do you mean?

9: ...

10: some do, some don't, the dark angels for example don't care, neither do the ultras, the Templars (since the retcon) would enforce it with a chainsword, tolerant lot them , so yeah, like the crusades here on earth.

 Formosa wrote:
didn't want a giant QnA post lol

1: look at the Indians versus the colonies and the cavalry and such.

2: agreed

3: meh

4: Darpa is coming up with some seriously weird things these days even a type of shield barrier that acts like a guillotine

5: double agreed

6: when I say bones I even mean claws and such.

7: my point an army that is 10K years younger can take out the older army.

8: old SM's placed in Dreadnought armor, feel like they did it with LandRaiders but with old mechanicus warriors.

9: truly

10: people have no clue how ugly the crusades were and how it was allegedly done in the name of good

 Formosa wrote:
didn't want a giant QnA post lol

1: we have never fought a power that is tens of thousands of years more advanced than our own.

This I think is the big thing here. 40k takes place far in the future, but isnt really actually all that advanced. The pocket cell phone carried by billions today, with its ability to access the sum total of human knowledge anywhere and run programs to do a nigh infinite number of things, simply doesnt exist in 40k. The sheer number of cameras everywhere has little 40k parallel. Likewise, stuff like AWACS, radar guided counterbatteru artillery fire, laser guided and GPS directed Smart munitions, AA missiles with hundreds of kilometers of range, and tanks able to maneuver and engage targets at high speeds are all beyond anything the Imperium seems to have. Furthermore, much of their "advanced" tech is only advanced because of the skin it wears, like SM and IN ships being largely 1700's Age of Sail vessels in terms of design and internal operation and tactical usage.

 Vaktathi wrote:

 Formosa wrote:
didn't want a giant QnA post lol

1: we have never fought a power that is tens of thousands of years more advanced than our own.

This I think is the big thing here. 40k takes place far in the future, but isnt really actually all that advanced. The pocket cell phone carried by billions today, with its ability to access the sum total of human knowledge anywhere and run programs to do a nigh infinite number of things, simply doesnt exist in 40k. The sheer number of cameras everywhere has little 40k parallel. Likewise, stuff like AWACS, radar guided counterbatteru artillery fire, laser guided and GPS directed Smart munitions, AA missiles with hundreds of kilometers of range, and tanks able to maneuver and engage targets at high speeds are all beyond anything the Imperium seems to have. Furthermore, much of their "advanced" tech is only advanced because of the skin it wears, like SM and IN ships being largely 1700's Age of Sail vessels in terms of design and internal operation and tactical usage.

thats the problem by looking at the 40K universe it looks like we are getting dumber and dumber forgetting simple tech items and such.

 Vaktathi wrote:

 Formosa wrote:
didn't want a giant QnA post lol

1: we have never fought a power that is tens of thousands of years more advanced than our own.

This I think is the big thing here. 40k takes place far in the future, but isnt really actually all that advanced. The pocket cell phone carried by billions today, with its ability to access the sum total of human knowledge anywhere and run programs to do a nigh infinite number of things, simply doesnt exist in 40k. The sheer number of cameras everywhere has little 40k parallel. Likewise, stuff like AWACS, radar guided counterbatteru artillery fire, laser guided and GPS directed Smart munitions, AA missiles with hundreds of kilometers of range, and tanks able to maneuver and engage targets at high speeds are all beyond anything the Imperium seems to have. Furthermore, much of their "advanced" tech is only advanced because of the skin it wears, like SM and IN ships being largely 1700's Age of Sail vessels in terms of design and internal operation and tactical usage.

Exactly. For all intents and purposes, the 40k Imperium is roughly on par with the Napoleonic era. That is why their weapon ranges are so pathetic. It's also why they're so big on close quarters combat versus how we'd just shoot things dead. And the tanks? Barely comparable to WW1 stuff.

The modern era is a lot closer to the Dark Age of Technology, than the decayed stuff of the Imperium. DAoT >>>>>> Imperium, so yeah, I feel pretty comfortable that no SM Chapter could take Earth. Heck, they wouldn't take Switzerland or Afghanistan. And even tiny little Luxembourg would give a full Chapter a LOT of trouble. Sweden? No way. America? No chance in hell.

 JohnHwangDD wrote:

 Vaktathi wrote:

 Formosa wrote:
didn't want a giant QnA post lol

1: we have never fought a power that is tens of thousands of years more advanced than our own.

This I think is the big thing here. 40k takes place far in the future, but isnt really actually all that advanced. The pocket cell phone carried by billions today, with its ability to access the sum total of human knowledge anywhere and run programs to do a nigh infinite number of things, simply doesnt exist in 40k. The sheer number of cameras everywhere has little 40k parallel. Likewise, stuff like AWACS, radar guided counterbatteru artillery fire, laser guided and GPS directed Smart munitions, AA missiles with hundreds of kilometers of range, and tanks able to maneuver and engage targets at high speeds are all beyond anything the Imperium seems to have. Furthermore, much of their "advanced" tech is only advanced because of the skin it wears, like SM and IN ships being largely 1700's Age of Sail vessels in terms of design and internal operation and tactical usage.

Exactly. For all intents and purposes, the 40k Imperium is roughly on par with the Napoleonic era. That is why their weapon ranges are so pathetic. It's also why they're so big on close quarters combat versus how we'd just shoot things dead. And the tanks? Barely comparable to WW1 stuff.

The modern era is a lot closer to the Dark Age of Technology, than the decayed stuff of the Imperium. DAoT >>>>>> Imperium, so yeah, I feel pretty comfortable that no SM Chapter could take Earth. Heck, they wouldn't take Switzerland or Afghanistan. And even tiny little Luxembourg would give a full Chapter a LOT of trouble. Sweden? No way. America? No chance in hell.

The imperium is not on par with napoleon's era, just because the bfg game plays like age of sale, doesn't mean that how they actually fight, infact, the entire starship combat fluff doesn't support this, if anything it supports Ww2 style Long range combat between battleships, cruiser and aircraft carriers, the destructions of the planet killer is basically an analogy of sinking the bismarck, and again we have the fluff showing imperial ships doing all kinds of rolls, dives in and out of combat, feints, using main line carriers backed up by cruisers and escorts to harass the enemy, like modern naval warfare.

There weapon ranges are not pathetic, we have examples of targets being engaged beyond line of sight, missile systems and the like thay can manoeuvre around terrain to hit there targets (aelos if your wondering) and plenty more, these are all in the fluff, and I'm surprised people keep insisting it's not.

Close combat in 40k.is as much a psychological element as it is necessary due to firearms not being as effective as the close combat technology, advanced armour is common, weapons that can punch through this armour are rare, it takes a plasma weapon to punch through terminator armour, we have no equivalents. 40k tech isn't ww1 tech, we've been over this, multiple times, it looks a certain way because the designers made it that way, if the vehicles were real, they would look similar possibly, but be engineered to actually work, they are stc designs after all.

We are nowhere near the DAoT kind of tech....

Anyway, I'm gonna bow out of this chat, I feel like I'm bashing my head against a wall of ignorance of the background in favour of "hoo ra! Merica!" and no matter how often I've shown certain information is wrong, people keep re hashing the same false argument or not reading previous posts, anyway, enjoy people, I'll continue to read with some interest.

Nobody is talking "Hoo Murica", that has been entirely a projection by others.

Even taking out BFG game rules, the ships are still fundamentally Age of Sail vessels. Their weapons are stacked on broadside arrays that are only really suited to engage in 2D combat. They have huge impressed slave crews to do things like track gun turrets. None of which would make any sense or could actually function on a real vessel. An IN ship or a Battlebarge couldnt slow down without spinning around and burning into the direction of its momentum. Nothing about their design would really works on even the most basic levels.

As for tech levels, again, ultimately we have real life equivalents to many 40 weapons. Stuff like autocannons, krak missiles, mortars, etc. All stuff that verifiably kills stuff in the 40k universe, and which is described as being similar if not identical in operation and construction to modern weapons.

Again, a Marine chapter can easily take Earth. The Librarians could pretty much solo us. We have absolutely no psychic defense, unlike the 40k races. They can just go on rampage, mindcontrol population leaders...

 Ashiraya wrote:
Again, a Marine chapter can easily take Earth. The Librarians could pretty much solo us. We have absolutely no psychic defense, unlike the 40k races. They can just go on rampage, mindcontrol population leaders...

And how exactly do the Librarians go about making such a massive strategic difference? Especially without direct contact of some sort with the enemy? Its not like they just can show up in orbit and target specific individuals from space, especially when they may have no idea who theyre looking for. How are they gonna find out who to mind control? How are they gonna find out where they are and how are they gonna get close enouhh to do so? Even in 40k that modus operandi is almost unheard of, I cant recall that ever being done in such a manner.

And half the 40k races have little or no psychic defense, and few have psychic defense as a regular item. That doesnt seem to make them ultra vulnerable to this kind of thing.

 Ashiraya wrote:
Again, a Marine chapter can easily take Earth. The Librarians could pretty much solo us. We have absolutely no psychic defense, unlike the 40k races. They can just go on rampage, mindcontrol population leaders...

Nope. First they need to get in range. Their powers only go 500 feet, MAX, so he's easily shot down by the mob and their guns.

Pretending that they wanted to MC Hillary Clinton, the Secret Service would take just take his head with a sniper, because idiot doesn't ever wear a helmet...

 Formosa wrote:

 JohnHwangDD wrote:

 Vaktathi wrote:

 Formosa wrote:
didn't want a giant QnA post lol

1: we have never fought a power that is tens of thousands of years more advanced than our own.

This I think is the big thing here. 40k takes place far in the future, but isnt really actually all that advanced. The pocket cell phone carried by billions today, with its ability to access the sum total of human knowledge anywhere and run programs to do a nigh infinite number of things, simply doesnt exist in 40k. The sheer number of cameras everywhere has little 40k parallel. Likewise, stuff like AWACS, radar guided counterbatteru artillery fire, laser guided and GPS directed Smart munitions, AA missiles with hundreds of kilometers of range, and tanks able to maneuver and engage targets at high speeds are all beyond anything the Imperium seems to have. Furthermore, much of their "advanced" tech is only advanced because of the skin it wears, like SM and IN ships being largely 1700's Age of Sail vessels in terms of design and internal operation and tactical usage.

Exactly. For all intents and purposes, the 40k Imperium is roughly on par with the Napoleonic era. That is why their weapon ranges are so pathetic. It's also why they're so big on close quarters combat versus how we'd just shoot things dead. And the tanks? Barely comparable to WW1 stuff.

The modern era is a lot closer to the Dark Age of Technology, than the decayed stuff of the Imperium. DAoT >>>>>> Imperium, so yeah, I feel pretty comfortable that no SM Chapter could take Earth. Heck, they wouldn't take Switzerland or Afghanistan. And even tiny little Luxembourg would give a full Chapter a LOT of trouble. Sweden? No way. America? No chance in hell.

The imperium is not on par with napoleon's era, just because the bfg game plays like age of sale, doesn't mean that how they actually fight, infact, the entire starship combat fluff doesn't support this, if anything it supports Ww2 style Long range combat between battleships, cruiser and aircraft carriers, the destructions of the planet killer is basically an analogy of sinking the bismarck, and again we have the fluff showing imperial ships doing all kinds of rolls, dives in and out of combat, feints, using main line carriers backed up by cruisers and escorts to harass the enemy, like modern naval warfare.

There weapon ranges are not pathetic, we have examples of targets being engaged beyond line of sight, missile systems and the like thay can manoeuvre around terrain to hit there targets (aelos if your wondering) and plenty more, these are all in the fluff, and I'm surprised people keep insisting it's not.

Close combat in 40k.is as much a psychological element as it is necessary due to firearms not being as effective as the close combat technology, advanced armour is common, weapons that can punch through this armour are rare, it takes a plasma weapon to punch through terminator armour, we have no equivalents. 40k tech isn't ww1 tech, we've been over this, multiple times, it looks a certain way because the designers made it that way, if the vehicles were real, they would look similar possibly, but be engineered to actually work, they are stc designs after all.

We are nowhere near the DAoT kind of tech....

Anyway, I'm gonna bow out of this chat, I feel like I'm bashing my head against a wall of ignorance of the background in favour of "hoo ra! Merica!" and no matter how often I've shown certain information is wrong, people keep re hashing the same false argument or not reading previous posts, anyway, enjoy people, I'll continue to read with some interest.

lets agree to disagree, great anti-SM/Termy stuff does exist in real life and also being developed:

http://www.military.com/video/off-duty/tech/new-progress-on-plasma-weapons/2324951333001

and then we have the magnetic thermite grenade which are essentially a plasma torch on a magnetic grenade where it burns down on point of sticking. those can be a nasty bit of business.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Ashiraya wrote:
Again, a Marine chapter can easily take Earth. The Librarians could pretty much solo us. We have absolutely no psychic defense, unlike the 40k races. They can just go on rampage, mindcontrol population leaders...

ok lets extend the fantasy section and say that the Earth the 40K universe finds is the Marvel Universe Earth, with all them muties and such, how would your Librarian fare against say Xavier?

we already know how the SM's would fare against Magneto, can we say Blue Smurf Jam ?

 Vaktathi wrote:

 Ashiraya wrote:
Again, a Marine chapter can easily take Earth. The Librarians could pretty much solo us. We have absolutely no psychic defense, unlike the 40k races. They can just go on rampage, mindcontrol population leaders...

And how exactly do the Librarians go about making such a massive strategic difference? Especially without direct contact of some sort with the enemy? Its not like they just can show up in orbit and target specific individuals from space, especially when they may have no idea who theyre looking for. How are they gonna find out who to mind control? How are they gonna find out where they are and how are they gonna get close enouhh to do so? Even in 40k that modus operandi is almost unheard of, I cant recall that ever being done in such a manner.

I believe that the intelligence gathering portion would be more of an Officio Assassinorum thing, specifically the sort of thing that you'd use a Callidus Assassin for. But that's the Imperium overall, not Adeptus Astartes. Much like how the SM Chapter doesn't have IG or IN support. Nor Knight Household or Inquisition support. Just whatever transport they have for their 1,000 forces and servants.

The SMs aren't smart enough or patient enough for that sort of thing, being raving meatheads and all...

That's not exactly an accurate assessment of Space Marines, now is it?

At least, not all Space Marines, right?

 Vaktathi wrote:
And how exactly do the Librarians go about making such a massive strategic difference?

Mind controlling civil and military leaders is a good start. That is just telepathy and divination. In the short term it will completely cripple any attempt at resistance on a strategic level, and in the long term it completely prevents centralised organisation.

Alternatively, mind control the president, find out how to activate the nukes, mind control those people too, send off the US nuke store, boom.

Especially without direct contact of some sort with the enemy?

We have no way to interfere or detect their attempt. Just do it from orbit.

Its not like they just can show up in orbit and target specific individuals from space

Yes, they can. They can either read thoughts to discern who is in charge, or simply take note of where they are (it doesn't take long to figure out that the White House is special and that mindcontrolling the guy sitting at the command table in the middle room is useful.

And half the 40k races have little or no psychic defense

And which race is that?

The IG have psykers of their own. As do SM. SoB are a nobrainer. Tau are naturally all semi-blanks. Tyranids have psykers, as do Orks. Eldar are all psychic to some degree. Dark Eldar are extremely wary of, and used to dealing with, psykers.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Alpharius wrote:
That's not exactly an accurate assessment of Space Marines, now is it?

At least, not all Space Marines, right?

I believe this is where we say something about rotating stones and bladed weapons.

 Alpharius wrote:
That's not exactly an accurate assessment of Space Marines, now is it?

At least, not all Space Marines, right?

It's just the Loyalists.

Controlling a mind is hardly the most special thing a librarian have done. Alpha level psykers are described as being able to snap a Titan in half with a thought. The Salamander Librarian in the eponymous series flies into space and slices a warship in half with his force sword. I am not joking.

And you are putting Earth up against this? xD


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 JohnHwangDD wrote:

 Alpharius wrote:
That's not exactly an accurate assessment of Space Marines, now is it?

At least, not all Space Marines, right?

*snip*

It's just the Loyalists.

In 40k, this is a completely sound tactic. Evidently they are tough enough to not need to bother.

Also, the first one to quote game mechanics at me gets a slap on the wrist.

Yes, all this is completely nuts, I agree. But it is what 40k is, and it is what you are putting up poor Earth against. If you pick a fight you don't get to complain!

 Ashiraya wrote:
Controlling a mind is hardly the most special thing a librarian have done. Alpha level psykers are described as being able to snap a Titan in half with a thought. The Salamander Librarian in the eponymous series flies into space and slices a warship in half with his force sword. I am not joking.

And you are putting Earth up against this? xD


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 JohnHwangDD wrote:

 Alpharius wrote:
That's not exactly an accurate assessment of Space Marines, now is it?

At least, not all Space Marines, right?

*snip*

It's just the Loyalists.

In 40k, this is a completely sound tactic. Evidently they are tough enough to not need to bother.

Also, the first one to quote game mechanics at me gets a slap on the wrist.

Yes, all this is completely nuts, I agree. But it is what 40k is, and it is what you are putting up poor Earth against. If you pick a fight you don't get to complain!

that is why I say we pit them against the Marvel Universe Earth. 40K would be doomed from the start, Magneto would be making Space Marine Jam, Jean grey and Xavier would have them doing flips and seeing pink elephants and the list goes on and on. although i'm curious what an admantium claws would do on an admantium armored suit?

Ugh, the one thing 40k needed, more super heroes in its fluff. That psyker superman is really worse than anything I heard so far, what kind of idiot wrote that, it's worse than anything Goto wrote.

Not every psykers are on par with that and I've yet to read any mentions of psykers able to affect things by staying in orbit.

I mean, it is pretty damn dumb, no arguments there, but it is there and it is canon so it's what we have to deal with.

It's like the Beast series. That gak is arguably worse than Goto but it is also canon now unfortunately.

 Ashiraya wrote:

 Vaktathi wrote:
And how exactly do the Librarians go about making such a massive strategic difference?

Mind controlling civil and military leaders is a good start.

How do they know who these are...?

That is just telepathy and divination. In the short term it will completely cripple any attempt at resistance on a strategic level, and in the long term it completely prevents centralised organisation.

Alternatively, mind control the president, find out how to activate the nukes, mind control those people too, send off the US nuke store, boom.

How do they find out all these things having no idea what governments look like or who are the great powers and who has what weapons and where these people may be and on and on...

This would take a great deal of time. And again, I cannot recall a fluff example of Space Marines having done anything like this, especially not with anything like the routine nature they should if they have such capabilities.

Especially without direct contact of some sort with the enemy?

We have no way to interfere or detect their attempt. Just do it from orbit.

Since when can typical (not the one in a hundred trillion Alphas) Psykers routinely pick out unfamiliar individuals and access their minds with great efficiency from orbit?

Its not like they just can show up in orbit and target specific individuals from space

Yes, they can.

Since when? If they could just do this then most 40k fluff would be radically different and would almost never require military forces.

They can either read thoughts to discern who is in charge, or simply take note of where they are (it doesn't take long to figure out that the White House is special and that mindcontrolling the guy sitting at the command table in the middle room is useful.

how do they know what America or any individual nation is? Likewise, the white house has hundreds of people with the President absent much of the time...how are they gonna find the President? And there isnt some great command dias in the white house...

There would be years of research and planning involved in something like that.

And half the 40k races have little or no psychic defense

And which race is that?

The IG have psykers of their own.

And they are not routinely attached to every IG force by any means, especially those capable of providing psychic defense or powerful telepathy.

As do SM. SoB are a nobrainer.

these forces neither always have psykers or psychic defense of a caliber to stop a powerful telepath. Black Templars for instance.

Tau are naturally all semi-blanks.

they have a weak warp presence but are hardly blanks.

Tyranids have psykers, as do Orks. Eldar are all psychic to some degree.

sure, but the Orks and Tyranids dont generally use them in a defensive manner to block telepathic scanning of random individuals and Ive never heard of them using psykers in the way you are describing. And many Ork forces have no Psykers even though the Ork race as a whole does.

Dark Eldar are extremely wary of, and used to dealing with, psykers.

but have none of their own nor any great realspace anti psyker defenses beyond essentially artifact wargear

 Vaktathi wrote:
There would be years of research and planning involved in something like that.

No, it takes mindcontrolling one random American to find out that the White House is the boss place, that Obama is boss, where he is and what he looks like. Then mind control Obama and find out everything else of importance.

That doesn't take years, that takes like two hours - if we are to be extra harsh on the Marines and assume it takes a whole hour of preparation for the Librarius conclave to muster the necessary mental domination power.

Using this method also gives information that the Techmarines can use to really mess with our technology.

One mistake people are making is conflating the rules with the game universe.

The game rules are not meant to simulate 40K battles. They are designed to sell plastic toys in large quantities by presenting a way to fight unrealistic battles between evenly matched forces on neutral terrain. Something that never happens in real life.

Space Marines would never fight the way they do on the tabletop in a real situation. That removes all of their inherent advantages.

Also, simple real-world economics: if you only needed 15 Space Marines to play a battle, who would buy 200 Tyranids?

 Ashiraya wrote:

 Vaktathi wrote:
There would be years of research and planning involved in something like that.

No, it takes mindcontrolling one random American to find out that the White House is the boss place, that Obama is boss, where he is and what he looks like. Then mind control Obama and find out everything else of importance.

And again, how do they know what America is, what's the difference between the President and the Speaker of the House and Congress and the Joint Chiefs and more? Even if you figured out "ok, there's like 200 countries here, this one called America is the most powerful, but also Russia, China, India, and others are powerful and have weapons that can hurt us, and in America I specifically need the President and not Congress or the Supreme Court or the Joint Chiefs...", then it's not just as simple as mind controlling Obama. A Librarian can't just pick someone out from space and control them and read their mind freely, I cannot recall any fluff to support that, particularly that such abilities are commonly available and utilized by Librarians and not some special one-off. Even if they know who the President is, they can't just decide "oh I'll just mind control him". He'd be but one of hundreds at the white house, or he may be elsewhere.

To reiterate, I cannot recall a single instance of a Librarian engaging in anything like this on such a scale, especially from orbit tens of thousands of miles away. If it were this easy, the Inquisition wouldn't need to do 99% of what it does and the Space Marines would never have to drop pod onto a command center to destroy it if a Librarian was present. Given that this is not the case, I don't see where we justify assuming this is possible.

 Vaktathi wrote:
And again, how do they know what America is

Again, they do not have to. You just have to mind control someone who does, and most people do.

 Vaktathi wrote:
To reiterate, I cannot recall a single instance of a Librarian engaging in anything like this on such a scale, especially from orbit tens of thousands of miles away. If it were this easy, the Inquisition wouldn't need to do 99% of what it does and the Space Marines would never have to drop pod onto a command center to destroy it if a Librarian was present. Given that this is not the case, I don't see where we justify assuming this is possible.

In addition to that the Inquisition gets first pick of any psykers the Black Ships bring in. Space Marines and IG can have what's left if it looks useful. So while some Chapters do recruit their own Librarian material many receive their psykers from Terra, after the cream has been skimmed off. Librarians do become powerful over time but very very few are top of the list compared to what the Inquisition has. Ergo if Inquisitors aren't shown subduing whole worlds with their psychic might Space Marines are even less likely to be able to try such a thing.

 Ashiraya wrote:

 Vaktathi wrote:
And again, how do they know what America is

Again, they do not have to. You just have to mind control someone who does, and most people do.

Sure, but out of 7 billion people on earth, randomly picking people will probably take a while to get what you need without a fair number of tries and a whole lot of time working through lots of different lines to really get a game plan you can pull off, and such capabilities are not demonstrated by any 40k faction that I can find.

Spetulhu wrote:

 Vaktathi wrote:
To reiterate, I cannot recall a single instance of a Librarian engaging in anything like this on such a scale, especially from orbit tens of thousands of miles away. If it were this easy, the Inquisition wouldn't need to do 99% of what it does and the Space Marines would never have to drop pod onto a command center to destroy it if a Librarian was present. Given that this is not the case, I don't see where we justify assuming this is possible.

In addition to that the Inquisition gets first pick of any psykers the Black Ships bring in. Space Marines and IG can have what's left if it looks useful. So while some Chapters do recruit their own Librarian material many receive their psykers from Terra, after the cream has been skimmed off. Librarians do become powerful over time but very very few are top of the list compared to what the Inquisition has. Ergo if Inquisitors aren't shown subduing whole worlds with their psychic might Space Marines are even less likely to be able to try such a thing.

Exactly.

And yet, re-consider the fate of the Imperial Fists LEGION at the Iron Cage... They certainly didn't have any sort of superman psyker to help them out...

Conflating game rules with the game universe isn't an honest mistake. It's intentional, it's out-and-out trolling, and at least one person has been doing it consistently since page one. Ignore that person and the conversation becomes more reasonable.

Anyway, this conversation is silly. If you take the fluff at face value, it makes no sense but it clearly supports marines (somehow) fighting competent 21st century militaries and prevailing. If you don't buy the fluff, then I don't know what you argue from.

Even then, a space marine chapter could systematically level every population center and military base from orbit, declare victory, and leave. That is supported by fluff and by logic. Anyone left would be mopped up by the Guard when they got around to it.

 JohnHwangDD wrote:
And yet, re-consider the fate of the Imperial Fists LEGION at the Iron Cage... They certainly didn't have any sort of superman psyker to help them out...

Easily explainable. The Iron Warriors can counter them with their own psykers.

That said, this entire discussion is kind of moot because Space Marines are not limited by realism in their warfare (so their things work better than they would IRL and they pull feats that would be impossible IRL). Putting them against a 100% realistic foe like Earth misses the point entirely and it is also a bit of a rigged fight either way; either we use 40k logic and SM win with their superman powers or we use RL logic and the SM cease to exist because none of their things could exist IRL (not even the SM creation process would work IRL, so yeah, congratulations on your walkover).

 JohnHwangDD wrote:


Exactly. For all intents and purposes, the 40k Imperium is roughly on par with the Napoleonic era. That is why their weapon ranges are so pathetic. It's also why they're so big on close quarters combat versus how we'd just shoot things dead. And the tanks? Barely comparable to WW1 stuff.

Gonna need sources for Napoleon wielding nuclear weapons, orbital insertion, man portable laser cannons and guided missiles.

Some people seem to be mistaking the word "tactics" for "technology". I mean, they both start with a 't'. . . Maybe that's why?