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When the chapters were legions I'm assuming all that was required was above average intelligence and relative fitness.
In Fluff a standard battle brother will kill an entire Ork war band if he's smart and uses hit and run tactics.
A battle brother is worth a thousand guardsmen for superiority in magnitudes in every way.

 TheSaintofKilllers wrote:
a standard battle brother will kill an entire Ork war band if he's smart and uses hit and run tactics

Not a "standard" battle brother. They die all the time to Orks.

 TheSaintofKilllers wrote:
A battle brother is worth a thousand guardsmen for superiority in magnitudes in every way.

Not really. We've seen numerous examples of guardsmen killing marines, often with startling ease. They are nowhere near "thousands in magnitudes" outside of fanfiction.

Their own primarchs stated ten to one ratio. This is accurate to the game and accurate to how marines are depicted in most lore.

On average it takes 1 human to make a Space Marine.

However, I believe every single bolter round a Grey Knight fires requires the sacrifice of an innocent life.....

Melissia wrote:

TheSaintofKilllers wrote:a standard battle brother will kill an entire Ork war band if he's smart and uses hit and run tactics

Not a "standard" battle brother. They die all the time to Orks.

Well, he could refer to the Space Marine videogame. According to its makers, a single Space Marine could defeat a million of Orks!

And these days, I actually believe that "most fluff" does indeed make the Marines that awesome - though that is just because "most fluff" these days comes from Black Library novels rather than GW's own books, and arguably novels that have larger-than-life heroes with plot armour sell better to the fans than the protagonist dying on page 5. This isn't something unique to the Space Marines, either ... it just affects them more because 90% of BL's books are about them. Look at how Gaunt's Ghosts dispatch CSMs by the dozen and we get an idea how Marines might be perceived if most books were about the Imperial Guard.

That idea gets bandied around a lot, but the Space Marines of the official fluff are often just as powerful. It only took three partial Chapters to turn the tide and win the second war for Armageddon.

A single company of Ultramarines stopped the Tau invasion of Praetonis V.

It only too 772 Astral Knights to overwhelm the World Engines' "tens of thousands" of Necrons.

The Invaders destroyed an entire Eldar craftworld.

I mean, TBL's books may seem like they are the most over the top because we see the action at "ground level". But in the official GW fluff, Space Marine companies accomplish ridiculous feats, lol.

 Melissia wrote:

 TheSaintofKilllers wrote:
a standard battle brother will kill an entire Ork war band if he's smart and uses hit and run tactics

Not a "standard" battle brother. They die all the time to Orks.

 TheSaintofKilllers wrote:
A battle brother is worth a thousand guardsmen for superiority in magnitudes in every way.

Not really. We've seen numerous examples of guardsmen killing marines, often with startling ease. They are nowhere near "thousands in magnitudes" outside of fanfiction.

Their own primarchs stated ten to one ratio. This is accurate to the game and accurate to how marines are depicted in most lore.

You seem to be missing the "hit and run" part. In other words "oh snap, my rosarius field is down, time to run" or "they're pooling, time to put that car speed running to use"
An ork shoota will not penetrate Marine armor under any circumstances.
Normal marines achieve KD's of 1 to thousands. This is part of the fluff. A normal guardsmen will have trouble against one ork.
Do you know what a magnitude is? It commonly refers to squaring, cubing or tenth power.
"thousands of magnitudes" isn't proper grammer or usage first off, but to say the least it's better than a thousand times better.

An ork shoota will not penetrate Marine armor under any circumstances.

Lol, wut?

GW's fluff on Space Marine PA grants it a top-end of 85% effectiveness against small-arms fire.

 Psienesis wrote:

An ork shoota will not penetrate Marine armor under any circumstances.

Lol, wut?

GW's fluff on Space Marine PA grants it a top-end of 85% effectiveness against small-arms fire.

Marine skin is the same thing in most GW fluff, with marines taking lasgun rounds to their unarmored heads, and simply losing blood, and getting pissed.
In game to fluff logic "if the ap value isn't equal or greater than the save it has no chance of penetrating"
Again people I'll point this out again: In FFG which are one of the best sources of fluff, Marines have an average press of 2.7 tons and for Berserkers it's about 4 tons. Stop underestimating them.
There's an 50%+ chance of the surgery succeeding, there's a reason the imperium invests in them.

TheSaintofKilllers wrote:In FFG which are one of the best sources of fluff [...]

They are a source of fluff. Whether or not they are the best, or even good, obviously lies in the eye of the beholder. And just because FFG Space Marines are much more impressive than GW's (especially with such interesting and realistic special rules such as sharing the damage of a single lascannon blast across the entire squad so that it may be nullified altogether) does not make them a standard, much like all the other little contradictions in FFG's books have little bearing on what GW writes in their own books.

There's a reason GW fluff describes the Marines are falling back on the Imperial Guard when things get rough.

 Lynata wrote:

TheSaintofKilllers wrote:In FFG which are one of the best sources of fluff [...]

They are a source of fluff. Whether or not they are the best, or even good, obviously lies in the eye of the beholder. And just because FFG Space Marines are much more impressive than GW's (especially with such interesting and realistic special rules such as sharing the damage of a single lascannon blast across the entire squad so that it may be nullified altogether) does not make them a standard, much like all the other little contradictions in FFG's books have little bearing on what GW writes in their own books.

There's a reason GW fluff describes the Marines are falling back on the Imperial Guard when things get rough.

They're not more impressive. That's the thing, they just have stats attached. Marines (from all sources) normally tear steel apart with relative ease barehanded. That implies even greater strength than the FFG RPG's
Marines have always been dramatically stronger and tougher than 7'6 780 pound human would imply (which is really friggin tough).
The skin of a marine alone could be equivalent to class 2 Ballistic proof armor. Then add the Black carapace completely covering their body which is made of particularly tough ceramite. Then add stuff like the fused ribcage, and reinforced, thicker bones. Then they have the hundreds of pounds of genetically improved muscle mass. Then we finally add the marine armor.

TheSaintofKilllers wrote:They're not more impressive. That's the thing, they just have stats attached. Marines (from all sources) normally tear steel apart with relative ease barehanded. That implies even greater strength than the FFG RPG's
Marines have always been dramatically stronger and tougher than 7'6 780 pound human would imply (which is really friggin tough).
The skin of a marine alone could be equivalent to class 2 Ballistic proof armor. Then add the Black carapace completely covering their body which is made of particularly tough ceramite. Then add stuff like the fused ribcage, and reinforced, thicker bones. Then they have the hundreds of pounds of genetically improved muscle mass. Then we finally add the marine armor.

And what I'm saying is that they have different stats attached.
In GW's Inquisitor RPG, Toughness works in a more realistic way in that it softens injuries, but - unlike with FFG's games - cannot prevent them entirely. Anything that punches through the armour will cause an injury; the target's constitution merely determines how bad or how superficial it will be. This avoids a huge problem with FFG's games -> people, and not only Marines, can actually become more resilient than the armour they wear, and take plasma shots to the unarmoured face with 0 damage. It also avoids shenanigans such as Space Marines becoming entirely invulnerable to lasguns and bolters. Oh, and speaking of: in GW's Inquisitor game, everyone gets the same guns.

You also have to keep in mind that FFG's RPGs are not a balanced ruleset like the 40k tabletop. They are biased "good guys vs bad guys" adventures with rules and stats differing from game to game, and the designers themselves have likened Deathwatch to movies such as 300, which should be telling. Never wondered why a Genestealer in DW has different stats than a Genestealer in Dark Heresy? A simple glance at the player characters' abilities and the mere concept of "Hordes" should also suffice to notice the plot armour that player Marines are given. It's no different from a Black Library novel, really.

If you're really going by FFG material, I suppose you have to ignore a lot of GW's own writings. For example, how could the Sisters of Battle be expected to successfully purge a Marine Chapter if their guns wouldn't be able to harm the enemy?

Once again, we arrive at the realisation that we are all cherrypicking as per our preferences.

 Lynata wrote:

TheSaintofKilllers wrote:They're not more impressive. That's the thing, they just have stats attached. Marines (from all sources) normally tear steel apart with relative ease barehanded. That implies even greater strength than the FFG RPG's
Marines have always been dramatically stronger and tougher than 7'6 780 pound human would imply (which is really friggin tough).
The skin of a marine alone could be equivalent to class 2 Ballistic proof armor. Then add the Black carapace completely covering their body which is made of particularly tough ceramite. Then add stuff like the fused ribcage, and reinforced, thicker bones. Then they have the hundreds of pounds of genetically improved muscle mass. Then we finally add the marine armor.

And what I'm saying is that they have different stats attached.
In GW's Inquisitor RPG, Toughness works in a more realistic way in that it softens injuries, but - unlike with FFG's games - cannot prevent them entirely. Anything that punches through the armour will cause an injury; the target's constitution merely determines how bad or how superficial it will be. This avoids a huge problem with FFG's games -> people, and not only Marines, can actually become more resilient than the armour they wear, and take plasma shots to the unarmoured face with 0 damage. It also avoids shenanigans such as Space Marines becoming entirely invulnerable to lasguns and bolters. Oh, and speaking of: in GW's Inquisitor game, everyone gets the same guns.

If you're really going by FFG material, I suppose you have to ignore a lot of GW's own writings. For example, how could the Sisters of Battle be expected to successfully purge a Marine Chapter if their guns wouldn't be able to harm the enemy?

Once again, we arrive at the realisation that we are all cherrypicking as per our preferences.

Everyone cherrypicks. You ignored the fact that starting FFG marines are actually weaker than GW's standard marines. (tearing apart steel (very weak in the 41st millennium) walls with their bare hands.)
Can we just agree that if they made everyone and their granddad into a Marine (happened in the crusades) the imperium would be curbstomping the completion right now.?

Peregrine wrote:The human cost of making space marines is irrelevant in how much of a waste they are. Life is cheap in 40k, and the Imperium has no moral problem with spending it.

The cost problem with space marines is a practical cost. Creating space marines and giving them their precious fortresses/religious rituals/etc and all the best equipment uses up resources that could be better spent on more guardsmen and nuclear missiles. After all, a space marine dies in an orbital bombardment just like a guardsman, so why spend the extra resources to create and arm a space marine? Their only purpose is to create propaganda heroes for the imperium. Their actual practical value in winning wars is nonexistent, but it's worth sending in a few marines and mopping up an enemy HQ or whatever so that the oppressed citizens of the Imperium can be united in their worship of the heroic defenders of humanity.

So could they be viewed as elite boarding troops and commanders who are an attachment to particularly unique looking orbital bombardment platforms. After all most of the volume and shape of a space craft has little influence on it's capabilities. The important part being mass and what it carries. The ships could therefore be thought of as having reduced energy and waste due to reduced mass of passengers. The most expensive part of a space marine force could therefore be thought of as the boltguns and their ammo rather than the space ships and armour.

Lynata wrote: Snipped...

Thankyou. That is an excellent resource of fluff.

Melissia wrote:Is that the only worth you see in humans in 40k?

I was hoping for a broader question...

Broaden the question then. I don't mind. Is there a innate value in the worth of a single human life in warhammer 40K? As far as I am aware only the emperor's life is considered valuable in and of itself. The majority of the population seems to consider the other people they do not know to only be worth the products they produce and the bullets they shoot. In dead man walking and other books we do see that the human bonds between individuals are still very much there but the non ultramarines space marines, the IoM administrative body, and certainly the Death Korps of Krieg appear to consider the average imperial citizen in context of material worth.

TheSaintofKilllers wrote:

 Psienesis wrote:

An ork shoota will not penetrate Marine armor under any circumstances.

Lol, wut?

GW's fluff on Space Marine PA grants it a top-end of 85% effectiveness against small-arms fire.

Marine skin is the same thing in most GW fluff, with marines taking lasgun rounds to their unarmored heads, and simply losing blood, and getting pissed.
In game to fluff logic "if the ap value isn't equal or greater than the save it has no chance of penetrating"
Again people I'll point this out again: In FFG which are one of the best sources of fluff, Marines have an average press of 2.7 tons and for Berserkers it's about 4 tons. Stop underestimating them.
There's an 50%+ chance of the surgery succeeding, there's a reason the imperium invests in them.

Power armour (PA) is represented as plot armour in many cases. In the horus heresy novels the PA of both sides is shown as not being able to withstand more than a single bolter round to the face. There are a large amount of SM's who die from double taps to the head there. Shootas are the ork equivalent to bolters. Additionally the emperor and primarchs have both shown that at least some greenskins can most definitely kill a space marine with their bare hands. The representation of SM being able to fight as if they were 1000's of guardsmen is a vast overstatement and PA while resistant to small arms fire is by no means invulnerable to it.

Unfortunately plot armour is often confused in these novels with power armour and so shoots and lascannons bounce off of it. I like the 10:1 comparison as it is actually somewhat logical. The SM appear to have the strength of 10 very strong men (3.3 tons is 10 times the bench press world record).

 ansacs wrote:

Peregrine wrote:The human cost of making space marines is irrelevant in how much of a waste they are. Life is cheap in 40k, and the Imperium has no moral problem with spending it.

The cost problem with space marines is a practical cost. Creating space marines and giving them their precious fortresses/religious rituals/etc and all the best equipment uses up resources that could be better spent on more guardsmen and nuclear missiles. After all, a space marine dies in an orbital bombardment just like a guardsman, so why spend the extra resources to create and arm a space marine? Their only purpose is to create propaganda heroes for the imperium. Their actual practical value in winning wars is nonexistent, but it's worth sending in a few marines and mopping up an enemy HQ or whatever so that the oppressed citizens of the Imperium can be united in their worship of the heroic defenders of humanity.

So could they be viewed as elite boarding troops and commanders who are an attachment to particularly unique looking orbital bombardment platforms. After all most of the volume and shape of a space craft has little influence on it's capabilities. The important part being mass and what it carries. The ships could therefore be thought of as having reduced energy and waste due to reduced mass of passengers. The most expensive part of a space marine force could therefore be thought of as the boltguns and their ammo rather than the space ships and armour.

Lynata wrote: Snipped...

Thankyou. That is an excellent resource of fluff.

Melissia wrote:Is that the only worth you see in humans in 40k?

I was hoping for a broader question...

Broaden the question then. I don't mind. Is there a innate value in the worth of a single human life in warhammer 40K? As far as I am aware only the emperor's life is considered valuable in and of itself. The majority of the population seems to consider the other people they do not know to only be worth the products they produce and the bullets they shoot. In dead man walking and other books we do see that the human bonds between individuals are still very much there but the non ultramarines space marines, the IoM administrative body, and certainly the Death Korps of Krieg appear to consider the average imperial citizen in context of material worth.

TheSaintofKilllers wrote:

 Psienesis wrote:

An ork shoota will not penetrate Marine armor under any circumstances.

Lol, wut?

GW's fluff on Space Marine PA grants it a top-end of 85% effectiveness against small-arms fire.

Marine skin is the same thing in most GW fluff, with marines taking lasgun rounds to their unarmored heads, and simply losing blood, and getting pissed.
In game to fluff logic "if the ap value isn't equal or greater than the save it has no chance of penetrating"
Again people I'll point this out again: In FFG which are one of the best sources of fluff, Marines have an average press of 2.7 tons and for Berserkers it's about 4 tons. Stop underestimating them.
There's an 50%+ chance of the surgery succeeding, there's a reason the imperium invests in them.

Power armour (PA) is represented as plot armour in many cases. In the horus heresy novels the PA of both sides is shown as not being able to withstand more than a single bolter round to the face. There are a large amount of SM's who die from double taps to the head there. Shootas are the ork equivalent to bolters. Additionally the emperor and primarchs have both shown that at least some greenskins can most definitely kill a space marine with their bare hands. The representation of SM being able to fight as if they were 1000's of guardsmen is a vast overstatement and PA while resistant to small arms fire is by no means invulnerable to it.

Unfortunately plot armour is often confused in these novels with power armour and so shoots and lascannons bounce off of it. I like the 10:1 comparison as it is actually somewhat logical. The SM appear to have the strength of 10 very strong men (3.3 tons is 10 times the bench press world record).

They're quite a bit bigger and heavier than Brian Shaw........
Always takes more than a "few taps". You're thinking of the Custodes (guy who took bolter to face) which are quite a bit stronger than marines can become.

TheSaintofKilllers wrote:Everyone cherrypicks. You ignored the fact that starting FFG marines are actually weaker than GW's standard marines. (tearing apart steel (very weak in the 41st millennium) walls with their bare hands.)

No, I just think you're misrepresenting.
Where did it say that the Marine in the incident you are referring to (can I get an exact source please?) is an average Marine rather than a veteran?
Also, I think you are ignoring various special abilities in DW that grant large bonuses to your rolls, from using Fate Points to triggering your Demeanour to various talents.
Or you could of course simply roll well.

What exactly is the test for "tearing apart steel", anyways? I'm sure you are referring to something specific, so can you give us more information?

 Lynata wrote:

TheSaintofKilllers wrote:Everyone cherrypicks. You ignored the fact that starting FFG marines are actually weaker than GW's standard marines. (tearing apart steel (very weak in the 41st millennium) walls with their bare hands.)

No, I just think you're misrepresenting.
Where did it say that the Marine in the incident you are referring to (can I get an exact source please?) is an average Marine rather than a veteran?
Also, I think you are ignoring various special abilities in DW that grant large bonuses to your rolls, from using Fate Points to triggering your Demeanour to various talents.
Or you could of course simply roll well.

What exactly is the test for "tearing apart steel", anyways? I'm sure you are referring to something specific, so can you give us more information?

In a thousand Sons: When a 1k sons captain tests the strength of an demonically possessed Eldar Titan he says "these hands that can rend steel in their palms". He isn't boasting as he actually attempted it.
Ragnar also pulls off the hatch of a Leman Russ so he can toss in a grenade in a SW book.
Lightning Claws are 70 kg and space marines use them like people use rapiers. Brother of the Snake
In Eisenhorn the group is being monitored by a Slaaneshi SM. When they try something he runs through a concrete wall like its not there to get to them.

What you're talking about, TSoK, is a trend called "movie marines". Where the Space Marines become absolutely super-human in their capabilities, and truly do catch explosive tank shells in the chest and shrug it off like its no big deal, kill ten thousand orks with a bolt pistol (and one magazine), and other crazy gak like this.

The information that GW gives us, however, is not supportive of these feats. The SM are good, yes, very good... but not as good as you're making them out to be. The Deathwatch RPG is for players who want to play Movie Marines in an RPG. A common problem in all of FFG's RPGs (and I do play all of their 40K RPGs....) is that, just like 1st Edition WHFRP, the Toughness Stat eventually can and will be better than any physical protection you can put around your body. With a high enough Toughness Bonus, and enough Unnatural Toughness, you're more bullet-proof naked than a lesser human is in Power Armor.

ETA: You're also using BL, which can go either way with SM. Inquisitor Eisenhorn kills one (White Consuls Chapter) with a single shot to the face. That's just in the nature of a novel, it's meant to make characters interesting, and often does so by making them more (or less!) than what GW has presented us with. After all, if you were going to base the 40K war-game on FFG's rules, each SM troop would be an 800-point figure, because 3 of them could easily handle any other army you dropped on the table, which is simply not the case.

 Psienesis wrote:
What you're talking about, TSoK, is a trend called "movie marines". Where the Space Marines become absolutely super-human in their capabilities, and truly do catch explosive tank shells in the chest and shrug it off like its no big deal, kill ten thousand orks with a bolt pistol (and one magazine), and other crazy gak like this.

The information that GW gives us, however, is not supportive of these feats. The SM are good, yes, very good... but not as good as you're making them out to be. The Deathwatch RPG is for players who want to play Movie Marines in an RPG. A common problem in all of FFG's RPGs (and I do play all of their 40K RPGs....) is that, just like 1st Edition WHFRP, the Toughness Stat eventually can and will be better than any physical protection you can put around your body. With a high enough Toughness Bonus, and enough Unnatural Toughness, you're more bullet-proof naked than a lesser human is in Power Armor.

ETA: You're also using BL, which can go either way with SM. Inquisitor Eisenhorn kills one (White Consuls Chapter) with a single shot to the face. That's just in the nature of a novel, it's meant to make characters interesting, and often does so by making them more (or less!) than what GW has presented us with. After all, if you were going to base the 40K war-game on FFG's rules, each SM troop would be an 800-point figure, because 3 of them could easily handle any other army you dropped on the table, which is simply not the case.

I gave quite a few examples friend.
Space Marines live thousands of years without ever weakening, they are supremely superhuman. Is it that hard to understand and accept this?
Space marines are not alone in the fluff to tt nerf. Everyone but imperial guard (puny 'umies) are subject to this to a similar degree as space marines.
What do you mean TSoK? Do you mean A Thousand Sons?

Actually, we have a very few (as in, 2) examples of Space Marines living 1000+ years (not counting Warp shenanigans), and GW saying they live up to three to five times that of a normal human (thus, a ceiling of ~500 years, actual average probably ~300, as the average human of 40K doesn't have access to rejuvenat treatments.).

Previously, they didn't even have that, as the service studs in their heads represented a decade of service, not a century, and having three studs was a pretty big deal.

Thing to remember is, there's no actual canon in the setting. What we do have, though, is a whole lot of different sources saying different things, with some of those sources knowingly and intentionally being biased in some way, shape or form, and this is before you get into author bias, story necessities, plot discrepancies and just plain C.S. Goto-level shenanigans. In some BL novels, a SM will be akin to a god, and in others, they will die by the scores to bolter-fire. Abnett, IMO the best writer BL has in its stable, can go both ways, as fits the needs of his stories. In Eisenhorn, he has Marines getting one-shot by cultists, weird Xenos, Gregor himself... and then he has other Marines being absolute combat monsters (such as the Emperor's Children CSM that feths Gregor up pretty bad, until losing his head to a single swipe of a power sword). BL authors aren't interested in, or required to, stick to or establish any sort of "canon". What they're expected to do, though, is tell a good story. Personally, I only use BL details that fill in some aspect of the setting that just isn't touched on in other works, as it minimizes the chance for conflicts, and there are some BL authors I prefer over others (I still don't like how Abnett has all these Imperial starships flying around with, like, 30 living crew members and maybe 20 servitors... on a ship 2 kilometers in length. I also don't dig his version of servitors at all.).

Some people arrange their own order of "canon", for example, using materials/information published by GW directly (in a Codex, for example) over something published in a BL novel, over something published in a third-party source like FFG. The IP simply lacks a defined level of canon that the Star Wars universe had.

 Psienesis wrote:
Actually, we have a very few (as in, 2) examples of Space Marines living 1000+ years (not counting Warp shenanigans), and GW saying they live up to three to five times that of a normal human (thus, a ceiling of ~500 years, actual average probably ~300, as the average human of 40K doesn't have access to rejuvenat treatments.).

Previously, they didn't even have that, as the service studs in their heads represented a decade of service, not a century, and having three studs was a pretty big deal.

Thing to remember is, there's no actual canon in the setting. What we do have, though, is a whole lot of different sources saying different things, with some of those sources knowingly and intentionally being biased in some way, shape or form, and this is before you get into author bias, story necessities, plot discrepancies and just plain C.S. Goto-level shenanigans. In some BL novels, a SM will be akin to a god, and in others, they will die by the scores to bolter-fire. Abnett, IMO the best writer BL has in its stable, can go both ways, as fits the needs of his stories. In Eisenhorn, he has Marines getting one-shot by cultists, weird Xenos, Gregor himself... and then he has other Marines being absolute combat monsters (such as the Emperor's Children CSM that feths Gregor up pretty bad, until losing his head to a single swipe of a power sword). BL authors aren't interested in, or required to, stick to or establish any sort of "canon". What they're expected to do, though, is tell a good story. Personally, I only use BL details that fill in some aspect of the setting that just isn't touched on in other works, as it minimizes the chance for conflicts, and there are some BL authors I prefer over others (I still don't like how Abnett has all these Imperial starships flying around with, like, 30 living crew members and maybe 20 servitors... on a ship 2 kilometers in length. I also don't dig his version of servitors at all.).

Some people arrange their own order of "canon", for example, using materials/information published by GW directly (in a Codex, for example) over something published in a BL novel, over something published in a third-party source like FFG. The IP simply lacks a defined level of canon that the Star Wars universe had.

They don't seem to actually age in the typical way. Their hair may get white, but they'll still be a whole lot stronger than those whipper snappers by experience and growth of even more muscle. Dante is 1000+ and looks 20. They've never been killed out of combat, who knows? They are immensely superhuman and achieve KD's on average of 1 to thousands. That's canon in all sources.
Finally on topic: Humans are a $100 a dozen due to there being like quadrillions of them.

TheSaintofKilllers wrote:
They're quite a bit bigger and heavier than Brian Shaw........
Always takes more than a "few taps". You're thinking of the Custodes (guy who took bolter to face) which are quite a bit stronger than marines can become.

I literally am listening to as I typed this the horus heresy novel angel exterminatus where legion marines with helmets on are killed with 2 shots to the face from an iron warriors marine. This is a case where bolter kills PA SM.


If we assumed the movie marine level of SM abilities all discussion of the setting background becomes mute. A movie marine level of power for every SM means the IoM will win by simply putting a single SM on every planet with a single bolt pistol. None of the SM defeats make any sense whatsoever in this context. How could armagedon have taken more than 3 SM chapters worth of forces if the ~4 million orks should be equivalent to 400 SM? Armagedon should have been cleared up in a single season of fighting and the SM should not have taken a single casualty.

If we take the 10:1 SM:IG as a context that leads room for discussion as to the worth of a human life in this brutal equation that the IoM runs in its creation of SM, IG, and sacrifice of humans to create servitors.

BTW it appears that SM creation is much safer than I thought. Do you think the safety of the process and the recruitment planet state are tied together. ie ultramarines can recruit from civilized worlds as they do not waste thousands of lives to create a SM whereas SW have are creating "wolves" from failures fairly often so a civilized world would have difficulties accepting this?

 ansacs wrote:

TheSaintofKilllers wrote:
They're quite a bit bigger and heavier than Brian Shaw........
Always takes more than a "few taps". You're thinking of the Custodes (guy who took bolter to face) which are quite a bit stronger than marines can become.

I literally am listening to as I typed this the horus heresy novel angel exterminatus where legion marines with helmets on are killed with 2 shots to the face from an iron warriors marine. This is a case where bolter kills PA SM.


If we assumed the movie marine level of SM abilities all discussion of the setting background becomes mute. A movie marine level of power for every SM means the IoM will win by simply putting a single SM on every planet with a single bolt pistol. None of the SM defeats make any sense whatsoever in this context. How could armagedon have taken more than 3 SM chapters worth of forces if the ~4 million orks should be equivalent to 400 SM? Armagedon should have been cleared up in a single season of fighting and the SM should not have taken a single casualty.

If we take the 10:1 SM:IG as a context that leads room for discussion as to the worth of a human life in this brutal equation that the IoM runs in its creation of SM, IG, and sacrifice of humans to create servitors.

BTW it appears that SM creation is much safer than I thought. Do you think the safety of the process and the recruitment planet state are tied together. ie ultramarines can recruit from civilized worlds as they do not waste thousands of lives to create a SM whereas SW have are creating "wolves" from failures fairly often so a civilized world would have difficulties accepting this?

You know bolters are full auto rpgs that drill into the target and then produce a very hot explosion?
They aren't taps. OI course they off marines if they hit in the head.
Worth mentioning shootas aren't bolters. They're autoguns with bigger bullets that are as threatening to a marine in armor as a case of the sniffles.

 TheSaintofKilllers wrote:
An ork shoota will not penetrate Marine armor under any circumstances.

Stop.

No.

You're making gak up.

Basic lasguns can penetrate Marine armor given hitting the right location or just having enough of them hit the same location over time. Ork shootas have far more force and penetrative power than lasguns, in fact, they're often described as quite similar to SM bolters (if more crude).

 Melissia wrote:

 TheSaintofKilllers wrote:
An ork shoota will not penetrate Marine armor under any circumstances.

Stop.

No.

You're making gak up.

Basic lasguns can penetrate Marine armor given hitting the right location or just having enough of them hit the same location over time. Ork shootas have far more force and penetrative power than lasguns, in fact, they're often described as quite similar to SM bolters (if more crude).

A lasgun is also quite a bit more powerful than a shoota per shot. It's just not nearly as rapid. And no, shootas don't.
Where are you getting this fluff from. In a GW source marines take lasgun shots to the head, and only suffer a crack in the black carapace, and a bit of blood loss. You noticed Lynata didn't comment on this? Because that happened in a codex to a raged out standard battle brother.
Lasguns are meant to be reliable. Powerful? hell naw.
Why would a marine ever expose say his armpit? That would be life threatening to a marine. Hell of a shot to make on something running towards you about 60-80 KPH.
Bolters also explode after drilling with their synthetic diamond tips, while moving far faster than shooters due to more understanding of firearms. Shootas don't do any of these things. Shootas are not bolters.

Yes, we have Dante and one other guy, though it is noted that Blood Angels are especially long-lived for Space Marines (obviously meaning that they aren't immortal, otherwise this would not be a thing said about BA). It is also noted that, even though he's lived for 1,100+ years, he knows that he shouldn't have lived this long, and he's getting tired. Dante is the exception that proves the rule, rather than evidence of the "average" Space Marine.

Then we have Bjorn the Fell-Handed, who is over 10,000 years old, but is a Dreadnought. The fact that he's at all coherent, even though they activate him once every thousand years or so, is pretty incredible.

 TheSaintofKilllers wrote:
A lasgun is also quite a bit more powerful than a shoota.

Again, making gak up.

If you want to know where I'm getting my fluff, only the best places-- C:SM, C:Orks, C:IG. Additionally, the depictions of lasguns and ork shootas in the Ciaphas Cain novels matches this, as well.

 Melissia wrote:

 TheSaintofKilllers wrote:
A lasgun is also quite a bit more powerful than a shoota.

Again, making gak up.

If you want to know where I'm getting my fluff, only the best places-- C:SM, C:Orks, C:IG. Additionally, the depictions of lasguns and ork shootas in the Ciaphas Cain novels matches this, as well.

I edited the above heavily. I'd appreciate it if you read that.
Worth mentioning shootas are also prone to random explosions, and have a spread at 100 yards of like 30 feet.

 TheSaintofKilllers wrote:

 Melissia wrote:

 TheSaintofKilllers wrote:
A lasgun is also quite a bit more powerful than a shoota.

Again, making gak up.

If you want to know where I'm getting my fluff, only the best places-- C:SM, C:Orks, C:IG. Additionally, the depictions of lasguns and ork shootas in the Ciaphas Cain novels matches this, as well.

I edited the above heavily. I'd appreciate it if you read that.

Your edit is wrong. Again, you're making gak up.

Actually, an Ork shoota is both stronger AND has a better rate of fire than a lasgun. Lasguns, as per the Imperial Infantryman' Uplifting Primer, don't really have a good rate of fire. Far lower than modern firearms.

 Psienesis wrote:
Yes, we have Dante and one other guy, though it is noted that Blood Angels are especially long-lived for Space Marines (obviously meaning that they aren't immortal, otherwise this would not be a thing said about BA). It is also noted that, even though he's lived for 1,100+ years, he knows that he shouldn't have lived this long, and he's getting tired. Dante is the exception that proves the rule, rather than evidence of the "average" Space Marine.

Then we have Bjorn the Fell-Handed, who is over 10,000 years old, but is a Dreadnought. The fact that he's at all coherent, even though they activate him once every thousand years or so, is pretty incredible.

This comes back to this.....they never weaken despite being over a thousand years old, and have never been killed by anything but combat.
This is worded in all the codexes so we're supposed to believe they're biologically immortal.
Edit: Damn phone.

Let me ask this. Is everyone who thinks PA suited people can take an infinite number of shoota and lasgun shots aware that to kill someone in armour you do not have to penetrate said armour. You can cook them alive inside the armour or you can rattle them to death. Heck full plate armour in the middle ages was usually not cleaved to kill the knight but rather a warhammer was used to simply pound the person inside to death.

I could believe a SM took a lasgun to the head...assuming it was angled to skim him. It is much like I could take a bullet but only if it hits me right.