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Due to so many defects is the space marine gene seed mutating so much that at one stage it will be too damaged to inplant into new recruits. If so the imperium is in a lot of trouble.

No. They aren't nor will they ever. They are GW's poster boys, the main area of stories for BL, and the biggest icon/most known symbol of 40k. Simply put, they won't be gone until all of GW is. Case closed.

TheRavenWolf wrote:Due to so many defects is the space marine gene seed mutating so much that at one stage it will be too damaged to inplant into new recruits. If so the imperium is in a lot of trouble.

Only certain Chapters have a major problem with mutation and most of those aren't used for new Chapters.
The majority of gene seed stock is either Ultramarine (which is pure) or Imperial Fist (which is fairly pure minus 2 minor organs) so new Chapters don't have alot of problems with mutation.

Lorgar's_Blessed wrote:No. They aren't nor will they ever. They are GW's poster boys, the main area of stories for BL, and the biggest icon/most known symbol of 40k. Simply put, they won't be gone until all of GW is. Case closed.

Fluff-wise, not shelf-wise

Fluff-wise even, no.

The UltraAwesomes geneseed is still lily-white, so you'll be drowning in Power Armor... forever!

And even though a large amount of chapter's have genetic defects, the majority of them are minor and do not affect them AND Mars has a vast amount of gene-seed stored away that can be use to create new chapters if need be.

and apparently the dark angels gene seed is the purest of them all (technically) but wont be used to create new chapters as the high lords don't trust them (silly gakkers lol)
doesn't stop them from making there own successor chapters though (and really Dark angels and space wolves are still legions but paint some of there dudes armour different colors to confuse officials)

and when you say marines are going extinct I would have to say no you got to remember there are the renagades and the traitors floating around as well(easily 10000 of each legion sitting in the eye)
we don't know ho many Black templars there are but they would recruit often

isn't there like 900 odd chapters of 1000 marines which replinish there forces when the need arises?

Just cause they're GW's poster boys doesn't mean they can't be going extinct.

After all, the timeline seems to be stuck at 999 M41 forever, and most of the fluff to date seems to advance the universe during the Horus Heresy or some other random time frames before that date. They could actually suffer some slow extinction process that will only reach its peak a thousand years later and we'll never know about it.

Actually, I can imagine that dropping hints about something like this could also bring in new SM fans from the emo kid demographic

I would have said that since most Chaos space marines survive all sorts of mutations and stuff, the Loyalists will probably be able to handle the flaws for a while yet.

crazykiwi wrote:and apparently the dark angels gene seed is the purest of them all (technically) but wont be used to create new chapters as the high lords don't trust them (silly gakkers lol)
doesn't stop them from making there own successor chapters though (and really Dark angels and space wolves are still legions but paint some of there dudes armour different colors to confuse officials)

and when you say marines are going extinct I would have to say no you got to remember there are the renagades and the traitors floating around as well(easily 10000 of each legion sitting in the eye)
we don't know ho many Black templars there are but they would recruit often

isn't there like 900 odd chapters of 1000 marines which replinish there forces when the need arises?

What? Ultramarines are the purest as they have every gland and organ produced and inserted with absolutely no irregularities in them. That's insane to think Dark Angels are purer.

Also, Space Wolves have only one successor chapter, and those are believed to have gone rogue or been killed quickly. Technically, Dark Angels do indeed have successor chapters, not just Death and Ravenwings. Also, Space Wolves are still the only true Loyalist Legion as they are organized the same way they were pre-heresy and still have decent numbers, though only like 3k or something.

Black Templars are actually less than Space Wolves as they are always crusading, always losing brothers and such. While their ranks probably replinish a bit quicker than most, they also lose more than any other chapter regularly does.

And seperate chapters do not replinish other chapters, they are seperate. If a chapter is reduced to three hundred men, they build up their scout forces, bump up current scouts to full-brothers, and hope they can fix this problem in a decade or less.

read the dark angels codex it states

"the dark angels are distinct in that therir gene seed is one of the purest and least degraded. There are no known aberrations in the dark angels genetic stock, which makes the fact that the high lords of terra have ordered few, if any subsequent founding s using the chapters gene-seed highly unusual"

and if I remember correctly the ultramarine gene seed has its problems or has the cursed founding (all ultramarine gene seed by the way) been retconned???

and as far as successor chapters for dark angels I don't count raven wing and death wing successors (they are part of each chapter the way I see it)
they have at least 6 successor chapters all referred to in there codex (and that doesn't mean there aren't more Dark Angels are sneaky that way)

and the space wolves still have one successor chapter as well though there name escapes me

Wasn't it the Wolf Brothers...? In any case they were cursed and were quickly wiped out by the Wulfen (I think).

I can see the point about the Dark Angel successors. True, they are complete and independant chapters in most respects but they have far more to do with their parent legion than most. They still hunt the Fallen just as strongly and they will take any captured Fallen or those suspected of knowing where to find them back to Caliban, the homeworld of the Dark Angels. This is highly unusual behaviour for a successor chapter.

Morgrim wrote:I can see the point about the Dark Angel successors. True, they are complete and independant chapters in most respects but they have far more to do with their parent legion than most. They still hunt the Fallen just as strongly and they will take any captured Fallen or those suspected of knowing where to find them back to Caliban, the homeworld of the Dark Angels. This is highly unusual behaviour for a successor chapter.

and they have some sort of council where Azreal is the head

crazykiwi wrote:
and they have some sort of council where Azreal is the head

Yeah, iirc all of the successors have their chapter master as a member of the Inner Circle.
Pretty much, they just seem to use this as a way around the whole "don't be a legion" bit. They could've been as bold as the Space Wolves, but why draw more attention when, well, you have such a terrible secret.

but on topic in the Tyranid codex it states that more chapters of marines are being established for the sole purpose of fighting the nids so even though they are taking losses I wouldn't go far as extinct even in death does a marine still serve his chapter (giving two lots of gene seed if I recall so one dead marine = 2 new recruits)

Black Templars are actually less than Space Wolves as they are always crusading, always losing brothers and such. While their ranks probably replinish a bit quicker than most, they also lose more than any other chapter regularly does.

Can't remember the source (or I'm just protecting it, I'm a journalist after all), but I can clearly recall reading somewhere that nobody in the Ministorium knows how many BTs there are, and that there could well be 10.000 (pre-heresy legion size). Maybe it was in the BT codex, don't have it myself...