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Real marines have different uniforms depending which combat zone they are in so why would SM in the future not consider this beneficial? If they are going to spend a couple of months bringing a planet into compliance and don't want to lose too many troops before moving on to the next planet why not prepare properly for the kind of warzone they are entering?

Ultramarine terminator to Captain... "Sir, I've noticed that everytime I enter the combat LZ the enemy shoot me directly in the face. I've been thinking about it and realised that even though we landed at night the big white face kinda, you know, sticks out and is a great target. Permission to paint it blue, Sir?"

Captain to terminator "Negative son. The big face stays white".

Because Marines are Space Knights. Heraldry is more important than camouflage, especially since fluff wise, Power armor is nigh impenetrable and 1 Marine is worth 100+ Guardsmen.

You can't think of Marines as a conventional Military force.

Painting the armor a color other than the chapter color can actually anger the machine spirit and cause the power armor to not work well.

The "not so real marines" (those in space) tend to use their armor as medieval knights did, so colorful power-armor is an act of heraldry.
Motto is "courage and Honor", not camouflage and survival.

I had thought that the chapter symbol was considered more important than the actual armour colour but I guess not. From a modelling perspective I suppose it would be a real pain in the arse to repaint your whole army everytime you played on a new board. (Jokes)

Some Chapters used camo, but these are marines, twenty feet tall knights of steel and ferrocrete that can lift tanks and spit biotoxins*! Who needs to hide when you are that powerful?!


* according to current background

Lord Froth wrote:I had thought that the chapter symbol was considered more important than the actual armour colour but I guess not.

This was true in Rogue Trader, but since 2nd edition(and especially after the release of the Insignum Astartes book) has been thrown out and the Chapter's full Heraldry is important.

Full Marines are meant to be a shining beacon striding invincibly through the enemy's fire, not cowering and hiding like Guardsmen. That's a Scout's job.

Painting the armor a color other than the chapter color can actually anger the machine spirit and cause the power armor to not work well.

does that mean that badly painted marines get a -1, -2, -3 or -4 save modifier depending on how badly painted they are?

What is going to scare you more?

Someone in light armour with 500 mates crawling through the under growth, desperate to look more like a walking bush

OR

An 8' tall fully armoured nutcase walking brazenly through the worst firepower you can muster, with his ten mates. And no only does he weather this, but his gun, which he fires with shocking accuracy, causes your comrades to explode.

Never, ever underestimate the effect of psychological warfare. The Astartes don't use Camoflague because they want you to know they are there. They want you to know certain death is coming your way....

doc, i would say you have been playing too much fire warrior

the bolter should be better S and AP :(



and to be honest, i would worry more about the 501 things creeping about through the under growth

Hmm, yes. Bright red or yellow warriors do make people gak their pants somehow.

Besides, Marines have an armor save superior to even building ruins and rocks. Why bother hiding when 90% of anything doesn't stop rounds better than your armor?

(Please note, in theory and fluff, not every army rocks AP3 or 2 weapons in order to kill marines above all.)

1hadhq wrote:The "not so real marines" (those in space) tend to use their armor as medieval knights did, so colorful power-armor is an act of heraldry.
Motto is "courage and Honor", not camouflage and survival.

Really? Someone better tell this Ultramarine with his puny Ultramarine symbol that he is in direct infraction of 1hadhq's rules then.



These guys better be on the look out for the field police as well:

As has been eloquently pointed out, back in Rogue Trader (the original edition of the game), Marines often DID wear camo.

The consistent space knights / religious fanatics angle came after.

And there is some fluff that even Guilliman recognized that sometimes you want to adopt a different armor for a warzone. If you want to do it, do it - it's your models paint them how you like.

I love the one fluff piece (probably from a long ago WD story) where the Alpha Legion attempted to infiltrate Imperial lines by painting their armor Ultramarine Blue (I hope they got a discount, that little paint pot wouldn't even cover a greave of a chaos marine). The Ultramarine perspective was somethign like, 'We knew they were vile and evil, but trying to copy our heraldry and hide theirs - that exceeded the limits of good taste!'

dietrich wrote:I love the one fluff piece (probably from a long ago WD story) where the Alpha Legion attempted to infiltrate Imperial lines by painting their armor Ultramarine Blue (I hope they got a discount, that little paint pot wouldn't even cover a greave of a chaos marine). The Ultramarine perspective was somethign like, 'We knew they were vile and evil, but trying to copy our heraldry and hide theirs - that exceeded the limits of good taste!'

Alpha Legion do that all the time(see IA: Alpha Legion and the Siege of Vraks), it's part of their fighting doctrine.

Don't forget though, that back then when they wore camo, marines were mostly convicts and other ne'er do wells. They also had a guardsman's stats.

When they became genetic giants and uber-warriors, they stopped with the camo (or the eavy metal team finds camo too hard to paint, one or the other).

I think it mostly comes down to simple colours are easier for new players to paint. I see no reason why you couldn't have a desert or jungle camo space marine, but it wouldn't work very well. The round edges on the armour are very distinct, so they're not going to hide very well anyway. Plus I imagine wearing that much metal makes you so noisy it's a non-issue.

Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:What is going to scare you more?

Someone in light armour with 500 mates crawling through the under growth, desperate to look more like a walking bush

OR

An 8' tall fully armoured nutcase walking brazenly through the worst firepower you can muster, with his ten mates. And no only does he weather this, but his gun, which he fires with shocking accuracy, causes your comrades to explode.

Never, ever underestimate the effect of psychological warfare. The Astartes don't use Camoflague because they want you to know they are there. They want you to know certain death is coming your way....

Actually, I'd be more scared of the guys sneaking. I mean, at least you can see the Space Marine.

Fafnir wrote:

Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:What is going to scare you more?

Someone in light armour with 500 mates crawling through the under growth, desperate to look more like a walking bush

OR

An 8' tall fully armoured nutcase walking brazenly through the worst firepower you can muster, with his ten mates. And no only does he weather this, but his gun, which he fires with shocking accuracy, causes your comrades to explode.

Never, ever underestimate the effect of psychological warfare. The Astartes don't use Camoflague because they want you to know they are there. They want you to know certain death is coming your way....

Actually, I'd be more scared of the guys sneaking. I mean, at least you can see the Space Marine.

If you played using the movie marines rules, you would be scared

They're shock troops, plain and simple.

You don't hide your shock troops, they lose their effectiveness if not wielded as a great psychological tool.

JD21290 wrote:

Painting the armor a color other than the chapter color can actually anger the machine spirit and cause the power armor to not work well.

does that mean that badly painted marines get a -1, -2, -3 or -4 save modifier depending on how badly painted they are?

nono badly painted marine gets + 1,2,3 invulnerable saves from repainting different camo for different battles over the centuries.

*in before thin paints! strip the paint!

A lot of 40K models are designed to be easy to paint.

The way the panels and pieces of armour are laid out give well defined areas in which to paint, line, and highlight. You see this particularly in SM, Eldar and Tau models.

ph34r wrote:Painting the armor a color other than the chapter color can actually anger the machine spirit and cause the power armor to not work well.

LOL, good one!

Its simple.

In the grim darkness of the far future, paint is expensive. Buy single colors in bulk and save save save!

nono badly painted marine gets + 1,2,3 invulnerable saves from repainting different camo for different battles over the centuries.

*in before thin paints! strip the paint!

can we also add that imperial fists get a rule in which they can blind anyone looking at them?

I still can't paint a space marine armor scheme that I like. Just Grey Knights.

malf, ive got 12 termies all in different test colours
i have the same problem, allthough i can never get the blue tint just right on GK's, allways comes out too light and covered up.

Cruentus wrote:Don't forget though, that back then when they wore camo, marines were mostly convicts and other ne'er do wells. They also had a guardsman's stats.

I think they were better than guard. iirc, they were +1 WS, BS, Init, and Leadership - because they were elite. And power armor gave anyone a +1 Str, so they were Str 4 as well. But, they were still T3 and W1. But, they were 'normal' humans, no geneseed, etc. - just elite normal humans.

Weren't a lot of marines (back in RT) basically given the, "you can enlist or go to prison for life" sentence?

Let's be honest here, what would be the point in camouflage when they are pretty much unkillable.

Plus, real life marines still get shot don't they?