Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

Quad 50s are all sorts of cool. But, what about the XM1028 Cannister Round? Or, the classic "Beehive" rounds from Vietnam?

Anyways. Sure, the Guard are (supposed to) advance when there is any question as to what to do, and if their officers and NCOs are killed, they'll advance. Sure, that's cool and all. But.....

....what good is advancing forward without direction? As in, what good is an uncoordinated advance? Furthermore, most NATO countries have doctrines in place to emphasize maneuver, both on the offense and on the defense. So, without officers, a Guard unit advances forward.....into a crossfire where they get ripped apart. By and large, the Guard standard doctrine does not emphasize maneuver. Properly executed maneuver is a force multiplier. The Guard does not rely on force multipliers, it relies on brute force.

Last, dudeeaterkiller, your first post is flat-out nonsense that bear as much relation to the reality of war as the clueless crap that Games Workshop's writers spew forth. In fact, its somewhat obvious that you've bought in wholesale to GW's propaganda, which as far as I can tell, has only a casual relation to reality, and is based off of movies and video games. I would advise you to do some actual, academic research on warfare, instead of relying on your misconceptions and the filth vomited forth from GW.

They would be under the direction of their sergeants, connected by a vox net. The line of succession is very clearly determined in an IG army just like in a modern army, with senior NCO becoming the next officer.

Imperial Guard have better armour, better weaponry, greater determination, better technology overall, and better training on average (obviously it depends on regiment). Their tactics are different sure, but Imperial Guard regiments are trained for every environment, perhaps specialising in a particular one.

Ribon Fox wrote:IG would win, they have 38k years of more fighting than todays troops, plus the LRBT will just steam roll any thing we have, the Vendetta will blow our tanks to dust and any other goodie you can think of. The Guard just have more toys than our boys and they know how to use them better.
Don't get me worng, we'll give it a go but in the end the IG are just more hard core.

38k years of dogmatically stale and never improving tactics which rely on, at best WW2 era strategies, and at worst medieval battle tactics (let's all line up and then trade shots).

A modern military, from a more advanced country would wipe the walls with the IG. Better equipment and support structures, better training, better tactics, etc.

Officers trained for months (some may even say years depending on rank) on the art of war. Information on war that has been gleaned from forty thousand years of warfare and strife. Sure we see terrible tactics at a squad based level, but if you see the big picture Imperial Commanders are tactical genius's. And I believe the experienced commanders would not be stupid enough to use the tactics that are so commonplace in million man battles against horrific monstrosities against us. I believe they'd be intelligent enough to realize what advantages they have over us. (Everything. Weapons, vehicles, transportation, logistics, morale.) And use them to defeat us easily.

Take the modern US military as an example. IG train for months and maybe even a few years? Ok, the average US officer has trained a minimum of 4 years before he even gets the lowest level butter bars. Weapons? How so, modern cruise missle, laser designation, vastly superior air support (A-10 >> then a wing of anything the guard has), guns that shoot around corners, dialed airburst underslung grenade launchers, drone support, forward air controllers, tanks that are over 20 years old and still can do 65 up and down hills and yet accurately land a round on a target, stealth fighters...

Logistics? You mean, oh good grief, the warp sucks everything into oblivion? Morale? Yeah, the same kind of morale that involves holding a gun to guys heads to make them fight (i.e. that's what comissars do, also, study your own history, forced conscription armies have NEVER had equivalent morale to all volunteer armies, this is exactly why the US does not force it's citizens to serve in the armed forces).

They may have seen crazy aliens, I'll give them that, but it's not much more horrific than war already is.

bleh why do you guys keep talking about what you read in some book as to what and how said gun/armor works.

Fluff = crap

It will change with every writer that picks up a pin to tell his 40k story.
In game terms the IG are so much weeker then any mordern day army it would be almost murder for the US army to fight them.
Str 3 auto gun
vs The IG have some armor....that I cant see being any better then our own. In game terms
Str 3 Las gun.

Its all the same other then we win as the IG have no clue how to fight a real war.

It will come down to training and the mighty leadership.
And from how the guard play in game, there training sucks.
And iv never seen any guard unit do anything in game, that a modern day army could not do 10x better in the real world.
So the IG leadership seems to suck as well.

We win they lose, and lose bad.
And then we back engineer all there las guns and kick the crap out of the next 40k army that lands.
Because we unlike everyone in the IPoM, we can think out of the box.

Is this argument still about 100 marines versus 100 Imperial Guard? Or has it changed to a discussion on what would happen if The Imperium ever sent a force of Imperial Guard to conquer us?
Either way, an equivalent force of Imperial Guard are in every way superior to our 'modern' army, barring basic training.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Snogs wrote:bleh why do you guys keep talking about what you read in some book as to what and how said gun/armor works.

Fluff = crap

It will change with every writer that picks up a pin to tell his 40k story.
In game terms the IG are so much weeker then any mordern day army it would be almost murder for the US army to fight them.
Str 3 auto gun
vs The IG have some armor....that I cant see being any better then our own. In game terms
Str 3 Las gun.

Its all the same other then we win as the IG have no clue how to fight a real war.

It will come down to training and the mighty leadership.
And from how the guard play in game, there training sucks.
And iv never seen any guard unit do anything in game, that a modern day army could not do 10x better in the real world.
So the IG leadership seems to suck as well.

We win they lose, and lose bad.
And then we back engineer all there las guns and kick the crap out of the next 40k army that lands.
Because we unlike everyone in the IPoM, we can think out of the box.

Well, seeing as how the only thing we have to go on is the fluff, it's not crap.
In game rules? A lasgun is VASTLY superior to ANY modern day rifle. You're average lasgun is more powerful, more efficient and more accurate. Every Guard soldier wears armour that could protect him from our firepower.

You can't use in-game rules for an army that has no rules.

Please, tell us what a 'real war' is?

Well, if you insist that it will come down to training and leadership, then I guess the US has better training overall. Leadership is a no contest. Imperial Guard Leadership is better. End of.
Could the US military fight battles against highly advanced xenos involving millions of troops across an entire planet? No.

I'm sorry, are you saying that the US could DEFEAT THE IMPERIUM? Wow. Are you out of you're fething mind? That's American arrogance at it's best. As soon as they land a single company of Space Marines, or a single regiment of Imperial Guard, we're .

Maniac_nmt wrote:38k years of dogmatically stale and never improving tactics which rely on

Technically, it's 28k years of tactical development, and then 10k years of sterility. Keep in mind the Imperium is a mere 10,000 years old. And even then, it's not that they're tactically stale so much as they've had so much experience that they have already written the book on military tactics anyway (the Tactica Imperialis, which is more of a rough guide compared to the Codex Astartes) and most of the time it works.

Maniac_nmt wrote:A modern military, from a more advanced country would wipe the walls with the IG.

Which we aren't.

Maniac_nmt wrote:Take the modern US military as an example. IG train for months and maybe even a few years?

IG officers from the Schola Progenium train from infancy to adulthood just like all other members of that organization, which produces the best of the best of any particular field. For the rest of the mperium, it depends on the planet.

Maniac_nmt wrote:Weapons? How so, modern cruise missle

IG has it That's basically what the Manticore/Deathstrike is, amongst other weapons.

Maniac_nmt wrote:laser designation

IG either has it or does better anyway with orbital sighting.

Maniac_nmt wrote:vastly superior air support (A-10

I'm a HUGE A-10 fan, but even an A-10 wwould be hard pressed to survive against the Aeronautica Imperialis. With air superiority-- which we wouldn't have with our laughably inefficient and technologically backwards (in comparison) aircraft-- it can do a lot of damage, but without... it'd struggle to survive. Kinda like IRL, but at least IRL our opponents tend not to have air superiority to begin with these days.

Maniac_nmt wrote:guns that shoot around corners

Imperium has that and better.

Maniac_nmt wrote:dialed airburst underslung grenade launchers

Imperium has that. (it's advanced and not given to most guardsmen sure, but I could say the same thing about our modern army)

Maniac_nmt wrote:drone support

Imperium has that (servitors are effectively used as such)

Maniac_nmt wrote:forward air controllers

Imperium has that (certain imperial infantrymen are trained as such, and any aircraft or even orbital craft can do it),

Maniac_nmt wrote:tanks that are over 20 years old and still can do 65 up and down hills and yet accurately land a round on a target,

Imperium has it and better (the Leman Russ is generally superior to the Abrams, while being older. Same speed, superior armaments and armor, and for some regiments, superior electronics).

Maniac_nmt wrote:stealth fighters...

Stealth does not work against superior avionics, which is why stealth must constantly race to keep up and ahead of avionics equipment.

Maniac_nmt wrote:Logistics? You mean, oh good grief, the warp sucks everything into oblivion?

Not as often as the internet makes it out to be.

Maniac_nmt wrote:Morale? Yeah, the same kind of morale that involves holding a gun to guys heads to make them fight

Only for some regiments. Cadians and Catachan don't need a commissar to tell them to fight, they'd probably think fighting human soldiers is a vacation compared to warfare against their usual enemies.

Maniac_nmt wrote:They may have seen crazy aliens, I'll give them that, but it's not much more horrific than war already is.

Says the man that hasn't seen an alien teleport into his friend's chest, tear itself out,a nd then jump out and eat the face of another friend, all the while this gigantic horde of brutal barbarians is taking every bullet you shoot and still running at you wanting nothing more than to tear you limb from limb while you struggle to get your bayonet on in time so that you might stand a chance of taking a few down before you're killed in a messy and painful way.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Snogs wrote:The IG have some armor....that I cant see being any better then our own.

Then you'd be wrong. Even IF it is equal in terms of its ability to reject bullets (there is no reason to believe this given the lore), it's lighter while covering more of the body and is designed to work against energy weapons as well, which our armor isn't. So lasguns would burn right through our armor, making it completely pointless, while their armor would work quite damned well.

I mean hell, Ork weapons are high caliber weapons with explosive rounds, and flak armor blocks THOSE a third of the time. Ork weapons do FAR more damage than modern assault rifles and flak armor holds up fine against them.

A fluff vs. real world argument is purely speculation and intended for fun. Why people are getting their panties in a wad is beyond me. American arrogance against the Imperium!? Wha!? Why is this offensive to anyone? Of course Americans would wipe the ground with them, the IG exist on paper and Americans soldiers are real with real weapons... I could beat the entire Imperial Guard just using a matchstick...

Anyway...

It would depend completely on which 100 Guardsmen, which 100 modern day soldiers you'd choose and the location. Location is a great equalizer and shouldn't be discounted.

When you get down to numbers that small anything goes really.

That said, a straight up mono-y-mono fight on a desert plain with an overcast day... yadayadayada. I think the Guard would win. The Imperial Guard is not a PDF force, sometimes I think people get the two confused.

The Lasers in 40k aren't merely flashlights... 1 mw of power in a laser is equal to 200 grams of explosive. There are no specifics to the power of the Lasgun in 40k so I'm left to guess here. Modern day soldiers and operatives have very primitive body armor, but would be of little use against a high powered laser.

The armor worn by the IG is at least equal to our modern day armor so should have a fair chance at stopping low caliber kinetic rounds.

Here is where location and training can be a great equalizer. Both the IG and moderns are Human so CQB might be fought on fairly equal terms.

The thing is though, and here's where it gets sticky... Many IG units are used to fighting (those units that survive anyway) in a manner totally foreign to modern troops. Imagine fighting for years and years against forces we simply can't comprehend often times equipped with less than stellar equipment. Those IG veterans would be truly fearsome opponents psychologically.

But, again it depends on the troops selected and the location of the fight.

The thing is, even if it is equal in protective value (there's no real reason to believe this...), flak armor is lighter despite covering more of the body than our modern body armor.

Maniac_nmt wrote:
dialed airburst underslung grenade launchers

Imperium has that. (it's advanced and not given to most guardsmen sure, but I could say the same thing about our modern army)

My understanding is that the US military is in the process of "fixing" this. They're somewhat rare at the moment (they've just come out of testing), but it'll probably be a vastly different story in a few years as mass production of the weapons is just about to start.




As for the rest, I'd rate the modern US military as better in organization and tactical flexibililty. But we're talking millenia of technological differences between the two as far as equipment is concerned. Just because you can't *see* something doesn't mean that it doesn't exist. There are no doubt a whole host of other things involved that any modern student of the military would assume are present and yet are ignored in the game either because they're automatically assumed under the rules (for instance, why the Eldar are the only race that get anything resembling ECM, via their holo-fields; everyone else probably already has similar gear, but the Eldar stuff is light-years ahead of everyone elses', and thus the only one that needs special rules to set it apart), or because this is Warhammer 40K and not Advanced Squad Leader In The Future.

Oh no, all those things I mentioned really are there.

Skull Servitors can and are equipped with weapons and cameras and made to deliver precision strikes against enemies. Hell at least one example almost assassinated Ciaphas Cain, and would have succeeded if his plot armor / luck / attentiveness / paranoia weren't all so refined.

Melissia wrote:The thing is, even if it is equal in protective value (there's no real reason to believe this...), flak armor is lighter despite covering more of the body than our modern body armor.

Is the IG stuff lighter? A full set of IBA with DAPS and inserts tops out at 33 lbs or so. Still, that level of protection is not universal.

Uhlan wrote:

Melissia wrote:The thing is, even if it is equal in protective value (there's no real reason to believe this...), flak armor is lighter despite covering more of the body than our modern body armor.

Is the IG stuff lighter? A full set of IBA with DAPS and inserts tops out at 33 lbs or so. Still, that level of protection is not universal.

Yep.

A full set of Imperial Guard Flak Armor-- boots, gauntlets/bracers, front/back plates and abdomen protection, greaves, pauldrons (shoulderpads), and helmet-- weighs 11kg or about 24 pounds. Believe me, Guard Flak Armor, if it was discovered by our modern armies somehow, would be a DREAM armor for them.

uhh yea the US wins this fight.

I'm so going to keep saying that just for how much pain it brings the fan boys

I wish we had not stopped teaching history in schools.
There are real reasons why we stopped fighting like they did in WW1.

Snogs wrote:There are real reasons why we stopped fighting like they did in WW1.

Because we don't have the same kinds of enemies we did in WW1/2 with the same equipment, experience, and resources we had then.

The only IG army that really represents WW1 would be DKoK, and even then only defensively with their trench fighting. At WORST, they'd be more comparable to WWII armies even then many IG regiments are closer to modern armies than you think.

Melissia wrote:

Uhlan wrote:

Melissia wrote:The thing is, even if it is equal in protective value (there's no real reason to believe this...), flak armor is lighter despite covering more of the body than our modern body armor.

Is the IG stuff lighter? A full set of IBA with DAPS and inserts tops out at 33 lbs or so. Still, that level of protection is not universal.

Yep.

A full set of Imperial Guard Flak Armor-- boots, gauntlets/bracers, front/back plates and abdomen protection, greaves, pauldrons (shoulderpads), and helmet-- weighs 11kg or about 24 pounds. Believe me, Guard Flak Armor, if it was discovered by our modern armies somehow, would be a DREAM armor for them.

Do all IG have this? It seems what you are talking about is what the Kasrkins or Stormtroopers wear. At least if you go by the figures. If so, then to the OP's topic it really depends on the troops selected as I mentioned.

And YEAH. It would be a dream armor then... I've worn a full set of MTV for a week and it kicked my butt and I still got hurt. What I would have given for a set of flak and a Lasgun... lol.

Why is there no discussion of communication? What does the IG company have in the way of communication vs. a company of US marines. If you have to blob together in a wave then its WWI and you end up like in WWI, dead in a field from machine gun fire.

Uhlan wrote:Do all IG have this? It seems what you are talking about is what the Kasrkins or Stormtroopers wear. At least if you go by the figures. If so, then to the OP's topic it really depends on the troops selected as I mentioned.

And YEAH. It would be a dream armor then... I've worn a full set of MTV for a week and it kicked my butt and I still got hurt. What I would have given for a set of flak and a Lasgun... lol.

Not all IG has this. For example, Catachan really do basically just wear a flak shirt and maybe a jacket over it and some flak pants (which wouldn't be as good as a hardened plate of flak armor), they're a rather lightly armored group. DKoK wear a lighter version than Cadian armor which is a flak trenchcoat with chestplate basically, it's more mobile than most flak armor and has fewer holes but slightly less protection due to having fewer hard areas. But this description is representative of Cadian style flak armor.

And no, what Stormtroopers wear is carapace armor. Carapace armor is so effective that it can prevent penetration of what basically amounts to a .75 caliber rocket propelled armor piercing cannon frequently enough to be considered a useful countermeasure to it, whereas flak armor is useless against the same ammunition.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Frazzled wrote:Why is there no discussion of communication? What does the IG company have in the way of communication vs. a company of US marines. If you have to blob together in a wave then its WWI and you end up like in WWI, dead in a field from machine gun fire.

It depends on the regiment. But on average, IG regiments have squad-based comm-beads, with sergeants having connections to their platoon captain and other sergeants, captains having connections upwards of that, etc through the chain of command, with each member capable of contacting further up in an emergency. Each squad has a voxcaster which can radio secure transmissions anywhere in a sizeable location.

This coming from Dark Heresy and the various Guard books, especially the Cain books (Cain stating that these things were very standard across the Imperial Guard).

Frazzled wrote:Why is there no discussion of communication? What does the IG company have in the way of communication vs. a company of US marines. If you have to blob together in a wave then its WWI and you end up like in WWI, dead in a field from machine gun fire.

Well, since not all variables were considered in the OP's topic I couldn't elaborate.

It all boils down to location and which troops are to be considered. This opens up a huge can of worms as your question suggests.

Perhaps it would have been better to say a light company of US Marines VS. 100 Cadian Stormtroopers on earth if you see my meaning.

If the above was in fact the case, then of course the moderns would win as they would have operable sat com, horizon to horizon com, radio or heck, cell phones... the Cadians would have nothing...

@Melissa

Well, if IG flak armor can't stop a bolter round I don't want it... pfft...

Lets say we take the US army, a single regiment, armour, air support, everything they would have on a large scale operation and put them in different environments against the Imperial Guard equivalent.
For example, take the marines and put them in a jungle environment against an equivalent force of Catachans.
I can imagine it being like Predator, the marines would be annihilated. Catachans are highly specialised and an equivalent force would be highly experienced and have all the right equipment.
Take the same force of marines and place them in a city versus some Cadians. This would be a closer fight, both forces are more equally skilled in the built-up area, but again, considering Cadians are trained from an early age to defend their cities and are considered to be the best Imperial Guard, they would win on that alone.

Not to mention the Imperial Guard has Imperial Navy support, something we don't have (no military space assets).

Good point, we have absolutely nothing that could compete with an Imperial Warship. Ridiculously accurate lance strikes anyone?

Chapter Master Aeneas wrote:Im in college and I started the discussion started by maybe many IG fans is what would happen if they came here my friend says that 100 modern soilders v 100 guardsman in an open field that the imperial guard would have no significant advantage.

Let's see:

Imperial Guard use armor that's tough like 2x today's toughest Kevlar armor.
Lasgun, that makes your limb disappear if you don't have any protection at all. And that makes small plasma explosion per impact.
Some Guardsman know's from age of 5 to dismantle and have their own Lasgun.
Some Guardsman prefer close combat, any modern day solder sucks in this.
Lasguns can be recharged on sunlight and cannot be jammed. Longlas have range about 1500-2000km 100% kill shot.
Imperial Guard have zeal and fight for the Emperor, any modern day solder is just basic YAHOOO!!! who fights for money above all else...
I will not compare tanks at all, or artillery....
Nuff said...

Polonius wrote:

Thunder555 wrote:I'd say that soldiers are soldiers even in future, so it would be about the equipment. Lasgun vs moder rifle.. I'd say lasgun wins. If it didn't, why the hell would they use them after 40000 years?

Logistics. One of the biggest advantages of the lasgun is that it doesn't fire ammuntion, it can simply be recharged from nearly any power source.

IG armour can give some protecting from genestealers too (with 6's ) and they can punch through tanks. I doubt modern armours can offer much protection from knives without hindering your movements.
So yeah.. IG wins.

Modern militaries dont' worry about knives for the same reason they dont' worry about stopping crossbow bolts: they're rarely encountered in battle.

Well, not with the scale of modern battles, but with all the bunkers in WWII, and all the millions of infantry, they came in handy lol.




Automatically Appended Next Post:
Also, I think that the REAL question would be: would Chuck Norris take part in the fight?

And I have seen some comparisons of armour, no vehicles, just infantry.

And modern Flak armour would be the same as sci-fi flak armour, by virtue of them both being flak armour.

As amusing as it would be to see chuck norris shot all to hell as he arrogantly shouted his superiority, let's keep his dumb ass out of this.

im2randomghgh wrote:And modern Flak armour would be the same as sci-fi flak armour, by virtue of them both being flak armour.

No.

Maniac_nmt wrote:
38k years of dogmatically stale and never improving tactics which rely on, at best WW2 era strategies, and at worst medieval battle tactics (let's all line up and then trade shots).

A modern military, from a more advanced country would wipe the walls with the IG. Better equipment and support structures, better training, better tactics, etc.

Better tactics? Every country today is still using old WW2 tactics. The only difference is using small strike forces then large scale army's, and they use a lot more air-force than in WW2.
IG don't fight like that. The thing we see in fan-art is just to show us determination, in reality (40k) every Guardsman is using cover etc...
Our strategies are modern? We don't have anything about space battle, ship to ship in space attack or even taking down entire planet full of hostiles...And Guard actually has better equipment than any our today solder ( they even have satellite marking for theit Lasguns... )

Take the modern US military as an example. IG train for months and maybe even a few years? Ok, the average US officer has trained a minimum of 4 years before he even gets the lowest level butter bars. Weapons? How so, modern cruise missle, laser designation, vastly superior air support (A-10 >> then a wing of anything the guard has), guns that shoot around corners, dialed airburst underslung grenade launchers, drone support, forward air controllers, tanks that are over 20 years old and still can do 65 up and down hills and yet accurately land a round on a target, stealth fighters...

Logistics? You mean, oh good grief, the warp sucks everything into oblivion? Morale? Yeah, the same kind of morale that involves holding a gun to guys heads to make them fight (i.e. that's what comissars do, also, study your own history, forced conscription armies have NEVER had equivalent morale to all volunteer armies, this is exactly why the US does not force it's citizens to serve in the armed forces).

They may have seen crazy aliens, I'll give them that, but it's not much more horrific than war already is.

US ? The Us only have one war strategy: Let's bomb the c*** out of everything and just send some Marines to loot.
And your officer that trains 4 years don't see c of combat. IG see in 4 years what we don't see in 4 life times ( if he survive that long ).
Superior air power? How about Orbital bombardment? or Lightning raid ( Lightnings are very fast since they dive from space ).
I won't say anything about IG tanks, you have IA and go read. Everything that Guard have in it's tank arsenal beat the c*** of everything we have today ( just see Baneblade ).

Just face it: nothing that we have today can even equal with IG. Even with our advance tech, they would vipe the floor with all of our army's at one strike. And for the end just remember, even if we were equal in any way with them - they have vast space fleet that can level our entire planet with one bomb.

Melissia wrote:As amusing as it would be to see chuck norris shot all to hell as he arrogantly shouted his superiority, let's keep his dumb ass out of this.

im2randomghgh wrote:And modern Flak armour would be the same as sci-fi flak armour, by virtue of them both being flak armour.

No.

Very well developed argument you should join BL

Also, chuck norris would just shut off the sun and watch them freeze

Chuck Norris doesn't die, he just puts life on pause

im2randomghgh wrote:

Melissia wrote:

im2randomghgh wrote:And modern Flak armour would be the same as sci-fi flak armour, by virtue of them both being flak armour.

No.

Very well developed argument

One does not logically follow from the other. Ergo, no.

hicks with artillery

Frazzled wrote:Why is there no discussion of communication? What does the IG company have in the way of communication vs. a company of US marines. If you have to blob together in a wave then its WWI and you end up like in WWI, dead in a field from machine gun fire.

An IG company, as Melissia said, will be tied together by squad level microbeads, and have the ability to call higher up with their vox caster.

That seems like its equal, but lets not forget that that vox caster has a ridiculously long range. They can make calls up to orbit, or to high command on another continent with those things. That's an improvement over modern day communications.

As for logistics, people forget that the warp is a lot more stable than people give it credit for. Yes, it is possible for ships to be sucked in and reappear thoussands of years later than they left, but the reason the Imperium shows up late for a lot of fights is more due to the beuraucracy than the logistics. Let's remember that (source = BFG rulebook) lots of stable warp routes exist between planets that have semi-reliable travel times.

Remember, the IG is dogmatic, but not stupid. The Tactica Imperialis is said to be good, but it's not perfect. When confronted with a situation, they don't go flipping through the Tactica to find an answer, they think back to an example or metaphor that can be applied to the current situation. It's a way for even the youngest officer to call upon millenia of warfighting experience.

As for equipment, let's go down the list.

Standard Small Arm: Lasgun vs. Assault Rifle

The lasgun wins this round. In addition to being lighter and more powerful, the lasgun is also much easier to resupply. Just recharge your powerpacks, or toss them in a fire if you're desperate. I've said it before, and I'll say it many times again, the lasgun is a logisticians wet dream come true.

Body Armor: Flak Armor vs. Bullet Proof Vest

Let's look at something. It's generally accepted that a heavy stubber is the rough equivalent of a heavy machine gun. The heavy stubber is AP6, which means flak armor will stop the bullet 1/3 of the time. I'd like you to show me where modern day infantry body armor could take a direct hit from a heavy machine gun, and save the man inside semi-reliably.

Special Weapons: Sniper Rifles, Grenade Launchers, etc.

The Imperium carries this one easily. Not only does it have grenade launchers and sniper rilfles that can be understood to be the equivalent of anything we use today. However, that's not counting things like plasma guns that allow even the lowliest trooper to threaten an APC from rifle range, and melta guns that can eviscerate even the toughest tanks with one shot. Modern militaries have nothing to answer this. The closest equivalen they could have would be something like the LAW, or other similarly small and light rocket launchers. Melta and plasma take the cake.

Heavy Weapons: Squad Support Weapons, Antitank Weapons, etc.

Heavy support weapons for a modern infantry army would include mortars, heavy machine guns, ATGMs, and shoulder launched SAMs. The Imperial Guard has mortars, uses the significantly more powerful heavy bolter and autocannon (which can deal with lightly armored vehicles as well). Missile Launcher and lascannons fulfill the role of ATGMs, and missile launchers can double for AA (especially against the low level support craft like attack helicopters) in a pinch. Admittedly, this is an area where a modern army might have roughly equivalent equipment, however lets not forget how prevalent these heavy weapons are in the IG as opposed to a modern army.

As far as infantry go, the IG have the advantage with better small arms, special weapons and a rough tie for heavy weapons (though more likely leaning in the Imperium's favor).

Tanks and other armor are harder to compare thanks to a lack of comparable data, but let me just make a point about aircraft. SAMs and AAMs do not kill by hitting the aircraft. They kill by detonating close by and filling the air with shrapnel and other crap that shreds the plane. THis works because most modern aircraft are either un or very lightly armored. Only aircraft like the A-10 have reasonably thick armor. Imperial aircraft tend to be relatively well armored, with things like the Thunderhawk armored as heavily as ground APCs. This additional protection can not be discounted, not can orbital support be ignored either.