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 CadianXV wrote:
Some great posts raised in this thread!
I'd like to point out a common misconception made by both authors and gamers: Cadia is not one world, it is a planetary system.

Well technically Cadia is just one world, and the Cadian System is a planetary system. The Cadian Gate would be the calm area in which things can pass safely out and into the Eye of Terror, guarded by the worlds of the Cadian System, with Cadia as its most important fortress world.

Now maybe if they didn't use Cadia to name everything, then it would be less annoying, and people wouldn't have any trouble with the language, and they wouldn't think that the Cadian Gate is guarded only by Cadia, or even think that the Cadian Gate is Cadia itself or something.

DrSchwartz wrote:Interesting investigative work there, however I don't think the fluff writers put much thought into the age of populations in warhammer 40k...

Me neither. It can be a fun game to try and find excuses for how it *could* work out, though.

Obviously 40k is just a huge exercise in hyperbole, but there is no reason not to offer a few explanations:

1) As stated already such a millitant society would likely have a far younger population.
2) "Under arms" is a fairly open description, Could have something like a large territorial army, where everyone of a certain age receives military training to act as a reserve force.
3) Such an economy, if self-contained, would be unlikely to work. However, given the important strategic nature of Cadia it would likely be propped up by resources from other Imperial worlds.

The big thing that doesn't seem to have been touched on is how many Cadian guardsmen would have to be guardswomen for this statistic to work. More boobies on the next plastic cadian sculpts please GW!

I have a question, why is it that reserves (or in this case soldiers rotated off active duty) are no longer under arms? as that literally makes no sense to me.
On a side note of how children are conceived or raised you simply have children be conceived when rotations allow and then when they're born you raise your child till you're on active rotation again and give your child to either a designated nanny or to the military you've already given the rest of your life to for them to care for while you're 'out'.

"Under arms" means their active job is to be a combat-fighter. A reservist or someone removed from active line duty is no longer "under arms" as their primary function is now something other than the prosecution of warfare.

Hmmh. Probably a matter of interpretation - supposedly some US handbooks state that "under arms" can also refer to a state of symbolical readiness where the member of a military organisation is not actually armed but partially equipped.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Under_arms

So, basically, think the cook in your restaurant and your family's doctor all wear a military uniform, and are missing only their armour and weapon. Just like the cook and the medic in a military base. Except that, on Cadia, the entire planet is the base.

It's the easiest way to explain that, at least going by Codex fluff, 70% of the Cadian people are "under arms" - most of them are not actually dedicated to a military post, but all of them are in a state of readiness where they can assume it within a matter of hours, if not minutes.

 Lynata wrote:
Hmmh. Probably a matter of interpretation - supposedly some US handbooks state that "under arms" can also refer to a state of symbolical readiness where the member of a military organisation is not actually armed but partially equipped.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Under_arms

So, basically, think the cook in your restaurant and your family's doctor all wear a military uniform, and are missing only their armour and weapon. Just like the cook and the medic in a military base. Except that, on Cadia, the entire planet is the base.

It's the easiest way to explain that, at least going by Codex fluff, 70% of the Cadian people are "under arms" - most of them are not actually dedicated to a military post, but all of them are in a state of readiness where they can assume it within a matter of hours, if not minutes.

Well, you have to remember that GW itself and all of it's most important staff members are very much British. So wouldn't it be more useful to look into U.K handbooks if we're going to try and determine authorial intent?

Kain wrote:Well, you have to remember that GW itself and all of it's most important staff members are very much British. So wouldn't it be more useful to look into U.K handbooks if we're going to try and determine authorial intent?

It would.

Do you have any?

... but even so, I wouldn't put it past the authors to simply have assumed that "under arms" includes reserves, specifically because they're no military experts with degrees in some academy who may know and be petty enough to stick to the exact wording of official definitions some pencil-pusher came up with a hundred years ago.

It helps that Cadia is at the state of constant warfare as most martial worlds are. In eisenhorn's novel I believe it's mentioned that childrens are being sent to fight wars among themselves. So, minimal effort is required to raise a children, later, superior Cadian culture overrides a lot of theirs character flaws in order to become full Cadians, even though, Cadia has highest heresy rating in the Imperium.

Highest heresy rating? What are you talking about?

In that Eisenhorn novel, it is mentioned by the Inquisitor-General (highest ranking Inquisitor stationed, permanently, on Cadia) that she has to put down Chaos Cults almost every other week. She comments that Cadia breeds recidivists like a latrine breeds mold (or some similar comparison, I forget the exact quote).

The idea of Cadia being a society that is 100% pro-Imperium, pro-Emperor is, basically, put out as a lie and a fabrication by Abnett in the Eisenhorn series. While the Cadians that Eisenhorn deals with on a daily basis fit that mold, it is indicated that, by no means, does the entirety of Cadian society fit the mold.

This is Cadia, you silly fool! Cadia! Right on the doorway of Chaos! Right in the heart of everything! The seepage of evil is so great, I have a hundred active cults to subdue every month! This place breeds recidivists like a pond breeds scum. This is Cadia! This is the Gate of the Eye! This is where the bloody work of the Inquisition is done!

-Inquisitor-General Neve


While Cadia doesn't fall to chaos due to extremely competent defenders, it still arguably have more chaos cults than any other Imperial world

You're missing something out here.. The population of Cadia 250,000,000. That's 250,000,000 people in the Cadian system, discounting those outside of the Cadian system.. This would consist of the PDF and the 20% of the rest of the population not in the military. Correct me if I'm wrong, but this is my interpretation of the statistics given.

Example: When you talk about the population of bacteria on one slice of bread, you don't factor in the population of the bacteria on the whole loaf (if Cadia is the slice, and the loaf is the galaxy). Bit of a weird example, but you know what I mean =3

250 million is a tad more than the population of Indonesia and a bit less than the USA. Its not very many people for a whole system with 4 fortress worlds and a militarised hive world (going by CadianXV's earlier post). 250 Billion would probably be closer to the mark.

Cadia is basically socially and economically constructed to be the Soviet Union in 1944 at all times.

I found this thread very informative, as this whole Cadia thing had me confused for a while (I even play IG). Now it makes a lot more sense to me.

I think what most people need to realize is that 40K authors pull numbers out of their asses. Pick a number large enough to sound impressive for whatever they were trying to impress and call it a day. Its also why very few books involving the same army actually has similar numbers. There is very little if any cross referencing going on.