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So....I've been creating a new Imperial planet so my regiment can have a home, and I was wondering what people would think of the fluff I'd thought up so far! Here it goes......

The planet of Lubyanka is a civilized world within the Segmentum Pacificus. While it is currently a civilized world, able to sustain its own population, the planet is beginning to trend towards hive world status, as major cities begin to grow and take up vital farmland for more factories and habs. It's location within the Segmentum Pacificus places it in close proximity to several Eldar craftworlds,most notably craftworlds Kaelor and Yme-Loc as well as many Imperial trade routes. During the Sabbat Worlds Crusade, Lubyanka grew wealthy from the passage of many Imperial Guard units and their camp followers from Segmentum Obscurus towards the warzone. Unfortunately, this Imperial supply and trade activity drew the attention of Eldar pirates and raiders, operating from their craftworlds as well as bases on moons withing the Lubyankan System.

The Lubyankan PDF was given the responsibility of purging the Eldar from their insystem bases on inhabitable moons within the system. Sub-Sector Command seemed to believe that one of the moons housed a webway gate, and tasked the Lubyankan PDF with finding and destroying it, in hopes of ending the Eldar attacks once and for all. While using standard Imperial Guard organization and tactics the Lubyankan PDF suffered severe casualties from the agile Eldar. Eventually, the casualties became high enough that Lubyankan Command reorganized its entire PDF structure away from Imperial Standard.

Instead of having regiments dedicated to single unit types such as Infantry, Armor or Artillery, the Lubyankan PDF was formed into Line Regiments, each of which contained a mix of armor, infantry, artillery and built in air support from Naval Elements within the system. The PDF also moved their logistics units out of the Line Regiments into more sedentary Logistic Regiments, granting the Line Regiments the mobility and speed of reaction they needed to fight the Eldar.

While the following campaign was long and bloody, the reorganization proved its worth, and the Lubyankan PDF managed to destroy the Eldar raiders, as well as a webway gate discovered upon one of the moons of Lubyanka herself! The Eldar raids upon civillian shipping and colonies, as well as the experience the PDF gained in fighting the Xenos scum has given Lubyankan Regiments both a strong hatred of the Eldar, as well as great experience in fighting the aliens.

When called upon to Found regiments for the Imperial Guard, Lubyanka avoids drawing unwanted attention to its unorthodox organization system by deploying two Line Regiments and a Logistic Regiments as one 'Regiment' on paper. However, in combat the single Lubyankan regiment breaks into its constituent parts fighting with the agility that their unorthodox organization grants them. While they could be reported to the Departo Munitorum for their unorthodox organization, so far Lubyankan regiments have fought with enough quality and valour to avoid being called out on for their organization.

Armor, artillery, and infantry divisions are specifically separated to limit the potential threat of anyone turning traitor after the HH

Uh, no. They're not.

The Imperial Navy was separated from the Imperial Guard, and Space Marines no longer could command Guard regiments.

Retribution wrote:Armor, artillery, and infantry divisions are specifically separated to limit the potential threat of anyone turning traitor after the HH

True enough, but certain regiments, such as cadian and catachan have proven themselves trustworthy enough to be permitted combined regiments.

Kanluwen wrote:Uh, no. They're not.

The Imperial Navy was separated from the Imperial Guard, and Space Marines no longer could command Guard regiments.

The Imperial Guard's countless regiments include all manner of infantry, cavalry both mechanized and not, artillery and war engines. Each particular regiment is normally uniform in organization inside itself, and often seem to specialize in one particular form of war. For instance, light infantry regiments can barely demonstrate any motorized transport and certainly possess no weapons that are not man-portable. In contrast, an artillery regiment can contain little else. This ensures that the Imperial Guard are at their strongest when multiple regiments are massed together, and is itself another deliberate stricture to ensure that large-scale rebellion by a military commander is difficult to organize.

Retribution wrote:

Kanluwen wrote:Uh, no. They're not.

The Imperial Navy was separated from the Imperial Guard, and Space Marines no longer could command Guard regiments.

The Imperial Guard's countless regiments include all manner of infantry, cavalry both mechanized and not, artillery and war engines. Each particular regiment is normally uniform in organization inside itself, and often seem to specialize in one particular form of war. For instance, light infantry regiments can barely demonstrate any motorized transport and certainly possess no weapons that are not man-portable. In contrast, an artillery regiment can contain little else. This ensures that the Imperial Guard are at their strongest when multiple regiments are massed together, and is itself another deliberate stricture to ensure that large-scale rebellion by a military commander is difficult to organize.

You're really not reading that bit of background correctly, mate.

The statement is saying that a Light Infantry Regiment(such as the Tanith Ghosts, which specialize in infiltration and insurgency rather than frontal assaults) won't have anything that would give away their positions, by necessity.
Artillery regiments will "contain little else" for a simple reason:
To take anything else would dilute the regiment's strength.
Do artillery regiments have foot soldiers? Of course. And not just to defend the guns, if necessary. They have trained cadres of Forward Observers and Sentinel pilots attached who identify targets for the big guns and relay the coordinates back for firing solutions.

Look at modern day military forces for a comparison. They're not organized in this manner to prevent rebellion--but to specialize those forces. Giving them a specialized field ensures that they can, in fact, specialize in that field.

It's been proven over the course of history that fielding units of highly trained specialists in concert with other specialists will produce a far far better result than trying to force units into operating as a bit of everything. In the Imperium's case, it has the added benefit of a check to the power a regimental commander can gain.

I know that in theory most regiments are specialized....which is why I devoted a huge section to explain why these regiments are all fixed. And in universe....sure someone is going to complain that they aren't following the Codex Imperialis, but.. so far they haven't failed, and the Departo Munitorum probably has bigger things to worry about.


Kanluwen, I actually think you're both right.....Most of it is just natural separation due to purpose, but the Imperial Guard goes FAR beyond any modern division of forces so that a single regiment rebelling won't be a big problem. I know in the current Guard codex it specifically lists an incident where a...infantry regiment I think rebelled, and it emphasizes that the regiment was destroyed very quickly because it lacked any other equipment. A modern infantry regiment may very well have a good number of tanks and some artillery, but I have a feeling a Guard infantry regiment would have nothing but men and some Chimeras.

My take on the fluff is matched with retributions. Each regiment is made up solely of one thing (infantry, artillery, tanks) and then are later matched with other regiments to carry out a campaign. these two regiments are essentially one, but officially carry two different regimental names. Such as the 5th Infantry and the 185th Armored Tank Regiment.

Well, to get really, really technical:
A modern armed forces regiment designated as an Infantry regiment won't have tanks. They'll potentially have Infantry Fighting Vehicles(such as the Bradley or the Stryker) and Armored Personnel Carriers(of which the Stryker is one), which in this day and age especially in terms of Western armed forces can double as "light tanks" in a pinch.

In terms of artillery, that same infantry regiment won't really have much outside of some mortars, shoulder fired heavy weapons, etc.

The real heavy lifting comes from calling in air support.

"Tank" is kind of a broad statement to talk about modern armored vehicles, so that's where a lot of the confusion comes in when doing the comparison.

As for the 40k side?
Even Light Infantry regiments have a large quantity of vehicles.

However they're not combat vehicles. They're basically 6x6 flatbeds.

Not to go too far off topic, but wasn't the Stryker cancelled due to poor performance? Or maybe im thinking of something else...

You most definitely are thinking of something else, because the Stryker has been in service since the start of the invasion of Afghanistan.

There was something fairly similar in appearance to the Stryker called the "Grizzly" and another called the "Cougar", both of which were made by Blackwater. Both were canned due to Blackwater's supposed misdeeds in New Orleans after Katrina(which is a damn shame too--because the Grizzly and Cougar were amazing vehicles, with the Grizzly actually taking a tank round full on and the target mannequins inside being unharmed).

Kanluwen wrote:Uh, no. They're not.

The Imperial Navy was separated from the Imperial Guard, and Space Marines no longer could command Guard regiments.

Oh Space Marines still could if they wanted too. You gonna be that Guardsman who says. " Hey you big armored ! you cant do this!

DA's Forever wrote:

Kanluwen wrote:Uh, no. They're not.

The Imperial Navy was separated from the Imperial Guard, and Space Marines no longer could command Guard regiments.

Oh Space Marines still could if they wanted too. You gonna be that Guardsman who says. " Hey you big armored ! you cant do this!

Maybe, but the imperial general in command of 20,000 Guardsmen would have a problem

In terms of battlefield command?

Sure--Guard officers will defer to Space Marines, as common sense dictates the superhuman whose entire life has been nothing but war will be quite good at it.

In terms of overall command of things like a Crusade? There's a joint Tactica Command consisting of the Imperial Navy, Imperial Guard, Ecclesiarchy, Munitorium, Adeptus Astartes, and Inquisition who basically run the campaign.

But there's usually a Supreme Commander elected for any crusade campaigns

I Elect the Emprah


Automatically Appended Next Post:
I Elect the Emprah!

Retribution wrote:But there's usually a Supreme Commander elected for any crusade campaigns

Lord Commander Militant, actually. Not elected, either. Appointed by the High Lords of Terra--including the Inquisition, no less.

And that rank is only applicable to the overall commander of Guard and Naval forces, he has no say over the deployment of Astartes, Ecclesiarchal, or Inquisitorial forces.

Kanluwen wrote:

Retribution wrote:But there's usually a Supreme Commander elected for any crusade campaigns

Lord Commander Militant, actually. Not elected, either. Appointed by the High Lords of Terra--including the Inquisition, no less.

And that rank is only applicable to the overall commander of Guard and Naval forces, he has no say over the deployment of Astartes, Ecclesiarchal, or Inquisitorial forces.

I remember from IA: Taros that the Marines assigned to the crusade were frustrated with the overall commanding general because he wasn't using them as they wanted, it's my understanding that they fell under his control

I've got IA3 sitting in front of me.

I see nothing of the Raptors becoming frustrating with the Lord Militant in overall command.

Sounds good to me OP.

I have to disagree with you Kanluwen.....I'm reading through Gaunt's Ghosts right now, and in Necropolis it mentions that the Warmaster is deploying Guard forces as well as Astartes and AdMech by his own command. I'm not sure how BL publications rank against Forge World stuff, but....I think the Crusade's Warmaster (or w/e the hell his title is) has control over most if not all Imperial Forces in the Crusade. They were appointed by the High Lords after all, and the High Lords of Terra have representatives from most major Imperial organizations.

Necropolis is an old book, first off, which means it'll have a few inconsistencies when compared to standard fluff.
The book immediately prior to it, if you're not reading it in Omnibus format, has an Iron Warriors Terminator using a Plasma Cannon with a Thunderhammer to shred through the Vitrians and Ghosts as they storm the Shriven's position.

Second off, he's not deploying them. They're not under his command.

The Astartes are NOT under Guard Command, in any way shape or form. Just like the Adeptus Mechanicus does not answer to the Astartes, Ecclesiarchy, Inquisition, etc.

Any Guard Commander, even a Warmaster or Lord Militant, that treats them as lessers and tries to order them around will generally be snubbed, and the Astartes or even the Mechanicus will pull their support from the war effort out of feeling slighted.

Inquisitors, arguably the living manifestations of the Emperor's Will now, don't order(except for the morons who like being stonewalled) either of those two factions around. Simply because they don't stand for being ordered around like peons.

Now, will he have Astartes and Mechanicus forces that he can call upon? Sure. But he won't be commanding them.

They'll be under their own chain of command, but working in concert.

Once a Chapter or Legio pledges support it will generally follow the orders of the Lord Militant or whoever has been deemed supreme commander. Technically the don't actually have to because the are autonomous but thats were things get political. Remember nothing in The Imperium runs smoothly!

Never seen that bit, but I'd say there's probably a caveat of "if the orders suit them".

Otherwise, we'd have Space Marines being used as line infantry, Titans being used as field artillery against rebels using crummy tanks, etc.

If the General is a moron yes.

Or if the Marines think he's a moron, or if the Mechanicus don't trust him, etc etc.

Astartes have, as I said, their own chain of command. They do not fall under being given orders by anyone unless they're told by their Chapter Master to do so.

That's part of what caused friction during the 13th Black Crusade, and led to the Dark Angels withdrawing their forces from the Cadian Gate(alongside of their Successor Chapters following suit no less).

They refused to do what Creed asked(notice: this is Ursukar Creed. Arguably the highest ranked and most respected Imperial Guard Commander at this point in time. And he's not ordering. He's asking.) them to do, and felt slighted by the role they would have been given.

The Unforgiven were being asked, alongside of Guard force, to be diverted from the areas where Cypher was operating and reinforce Cadia itself. Azrael didn't like that, and tried to be given overall command of Imperial forces at the time. Grimnar, however, ended up getting it--and immediately offering to share power with Creed.

It resulted in Creed getting a bodyguard of Space Wolves, and Grimnar getting a unit of Guard Armoured under his command.

The imperium is a delicate balancing act of many factions.

Marines may be the lords of war...but are they Tactical Geniu....CREEEEEEED

ok, somebody has to actually explain that running joke to me....

KamikazeCanuck wrote:ok, somebody has to actually explain that running joke to me....

If you take Creed as an HQ choice you get the "tactical genius" ability, which allows you to infiltrate ANY single unit...as in you can infiltrate a Titan