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What injury would make Space Marine dead or to incapacitated for combat?

For example: I saw who knows how many times that Space Marine lose his arm and he continue to fight. And then I saw DoW II intro movie where Banshee stab marine in the belly and kills him instantly? I mean, they have double of all organs and much faster regeneration than any other Human, and they have died from sword in belly?
Under the same logic, to me at least, when he lose an arm he should fall into shock after some time. But he continue to fight until death (like Ultramarines banner holder Galatan).

Depends on who writes it and how much they like marines.

For instance Calgar lost both arms and legs in a fight and had to be carried out, if he was able to I think he would grab a bolt pistol with his teeth and try to keep going.

However the Howling Banshee's weapons aren't normal swords so it might have done more damage than it looked like.

If I remember right they have something in their Gene Seed to allow them to sort of block out the pain so really they could go for a while before their body just shuts down and is unable to function. Chapters like the Imperial Fists would have a higher tolerance to pain and do this more often.

Stabbing them in the head or heart would probably kill them instantly. They have two hearts, but it doesn't work the way GW seems to think they do. But the physiology of the marines have a fair few more problems to worry about anyway (fused extended rib cage huurrrr! ) so generally rule of cool takes over there.

I have always wondered how a SM can breathe with a fused rib cage?

Even for GW's strange standards, it seems completely unrealistic...

the Lungs expand through the belly area.


very few things can kill a marine outright.

he can survive one heart being destroyed.


Marines are also immune to the effects of Hydrostatic shock. most people who die a violent death don't die of the wound, but from the Hydrostaic shock. shockwaves travel through our, mostly, liquid body causing massive trauma. Marines are immune to this, most likely due to enhanced nervous systems and possable barriers in their body that resist the shockwaves.


marines are almost immune to bleeding to death. the severing of major artieries, usually multiple artieries, is required for this to happen. their blood begins to clot almost instantly so a superficial wound will stop bleeding quite quickly. a large artiery will have enough blood pressure behind it to force the clot outand keep bleeding. on a side note: Tyranids have developed a poisen that attacks the Blood cells of marines causing massive internal clotting.

n0t_u wrote:They have two hearts, but it doesn't work the way GW seems to think they do.

It works exactly how GW want it to. It's their universe lol.

In response to your question OP, Marines' blood clots instantly on exposure to air. Ergo, a severed limb by itself will not kill a Marine.

Grey Templar wrote:the Lungs expand through the belly area.

The rib cage is also larger than a normal man's, allowing room for the lungs to expand and contract without pushing on bone.

When half his body is gone and half his head and all his limbs are gone. That would mean he would just get bionics. *Cough* Captain Cortez *cough*
Probably poison or a beyond repairable heart would do it.

They're resistant to poison too. Which makes me wonder how much it took to put papa smurf down

Space Wolves come to mind when I say this, sometimes space marines become so fuelled by battle and rage, that pretty much nothing can bring them down. They sort of block pain kill everything they can lay their hands on that isnt faithful to the Emporer. Also, space marines overcome by the red thirst can fight despite grievous wounds fuelled only by anger and the will kill and drink the blood of their defeated foes. Pretty nasty stuff.

OP, the Banshee weapon is a power weapon, so to me the diruption field making contact with the liquid inside the marines body may have evaporated the water in his body, including blood etc. I think that alone would be enough to put a marine down.

Disruption fields just disrupt moleculer bonds allowing the blade to cut through the material.

if the field leaves without the blade doing anything, the bonds rejoin.


the heat would be there, but i doubt it would do much to a space marine.


and the marine that got stabbed in the gut is the marine in the next slide ripping the Banshee apart with a chainsword to the face.

I bet a lasgun shot through the eyehole of a marine helmet would kill him. Because that is the only way I can think of for my IG to bring down a marine.

GalacticDefender wrote:I bet a lasgun shot through the eyehole of a marine helmet would kill him. Because that is the only way I can think of for my IG to bring down a marine.

Marines don't die, they just rage quit.

"Dude! You could have blinded me! You know what, I'm not doing this anymore, I'm going home."

Marines can bleed out through limb loss note that garro nearly died after his fight wityh the warsinger in FotE but was saved by Fabius, obviously destruction of the head would do it, complete severing of the windpipe would kill one eventually without treatment but their body could survive for a while. Alot of marines dont die when they are too badly damaged but go into something the space wolves call the red dream where the catalepsean node shuts them down and puts them into suspended animation, this stops them from dying while their body heals or they can get attention from an apothecary. according to the space wolf books a marine can go too deeply into the red dream and never wake up and that this is probably the biggest killer.

Death is serious damage to the brain, usually caused by toxification for example by lack of oxygen, or bacterial infection, or just lack of nutrition. Obviously gross brain trauma (for instance, having your head shot off) has an equivalent effect. Toxification and injuries to the rest of the body can cause the collapse of the life support system of the heart and lungs in the torso.

A Space Marine will therefore die if his head is severely injured, or if his torso is severely enough damaged.

One can easily imagine a number of scenarios that would result in such serious injuries, such as head chopped off, run over by a tank, or melta bombed in the torso, and so on.

In general, wounds such as amputation of the limbs are survivable by humans if they receive appropriate medical treatment. The difference with SMs is that they can get along with less help and still keep functioning.

I think luck plays apart aswell just like real humans.
Because a modern soldier could loose both legs and arms and survive but could also be killed quite
quicly because of minor shrapnel in the leg cutting the artery.

Spinal Cord severance would also presumably cause problems for a SM I would assume?

yes, but if he survived that is probably quite curable.

from the prelavence of Bionic enhancements i would guess that Imperial Neuro surgery is quite advanced.

a severed Spinal cord is probably easy to fix. just slap some artificial nerve tissue in there and he's good to go.

And what kind of damage can power armor withstand? It is stated that can survive even tank fire, and we all saw SoB armor in SS intro deflecting Tau plasma weapons. And they have much-less weaker armor than SM.
I personally believe that the only true weakness in armor are limbs and head. And that armor will reflect bolter shells etc. but he can be breached by power weapons and AP bolter shell. And can Eldar basic weapons (the ones that Guardians use) breach it?

One of my captains had both his legs blown off in Afghanistan last august, he has 4inches left of his right leg and 6inches of his left, he has made almost a full recovery and is walking again on prosthetic legs. That is a normal man, granted he is highly motivated, but if he can survive that and be almost combat effective again in less than a year, then I believe a space marine would be insanely hard to kill.

one of my favorite examples is from the book nemesis where the eversor assassin throws everything but the kitchen sink at a luna wolf astartes and only manages to cripple him after which he almost starnggles him to death. suffice to say, head shots or coring out a space marines torso like an apple would be the only way I can see one being put down.

the reason the T'au plasma is deflecting is because of the Properties of Ceramite.

Ceramite has almost no Heat transfer index. meaning the heat of the Plasma doesn't go through the Ceramite well. Imperial Plasma, and the Plasma Rifles on T'au battle suits, have AP2 beacuse it is powerful enough to overwelm the Ceramite.

the T'au plasma deflecting was the weaker Pulse fire from the Fire Warriors and burst cannons which can't penetrate Ceramite.


it is true that the only weak spots on PA is the joints(which is true of just about any type of armor)


Bolt shells can crack Ceramite at close range and at a direct angle. at any sort of angle or range the Bolt shells will glance off.

Shurican weapons would rely on hitting joints or the Helmet to crack PA. the Shurican's will just shatter harmlessly off the actual plates.

Brother Coa wrote:And what kind of damage can power armor withstand? It is stated that can survive even tank fire, and we all saw SoB armor in SS intro deflecting Tau plasma weapons. And they have much-less weaker armor than SM.
I personally believe that the only true weakness in armor are limbs and head. And that armor will reflect bolter shells etc. but he can be breached by power weapons and AP bolter shell. And can Eldar basic weapons (the ones that Guardians use) breach it?

Anything has a chance of getting through that chance is small so it doesn't really matter most of the time.

Grey Templar wrote:
the T'au plasma deflecting was the weaker Pulse fire from the Fire Warriors and burst cannons which can't penetrate Ceramite.

No kidding? Taking the fact that in DoW FW insanelly overpower Space Marine squads at range and damage it would be impossible to me to imagine that their weapons is not that powerful to breakthrough SM PA.

Brother Coa wrote:

Grey Templar wrote:
the T'au plasma deflecting was the weaker Pulse fire from the Fire Warriors and burst cannons which can't penetrate Ceramite.

No kidding? Taking the fact that in DoW FW insanelly overpower Space Marine squads at range and damage it would be impossible to me to imagine that their weapons is not that powerful to breakthrough SM PA.

You can't use game stats as an accurate representation of background info...
rules=/=background
This applies for the DoW games as well.

GalacticDefender wrote:I bet a lasgun shot through the eyehole of a marine helmet would kill him. Because that is the only way I can think of for my IG to bring down a marine.

Space Marine power armor doesn't have "eyeholes". Those things are part of their autosenses and not more vulnerable than any other part of the helmet.

If that sensor gets damaged, it's probably not putting a hole in his helmet. Although it would blind him if they were both damaged and he'd have to take his hat off to see. So it's still a vulnerable spot.

Grey Templar wrote:the reason the T'au plasma is deflecting is because of the Properties of Ceramite.

Ceramite has almost no Heat transfer index. meaning the heat of the Plasma doesn't go through the Ceramite well. Imperial Plasma, and the Plasma Rifles on T'au battle suits, have AP2 beacuse it is powerful enough to overwelm the Ceramite.

the T'au plasma deflecting was the weaker Pulse fire from the Fire Warriors and burst cannons which can't penetrate Ceramite.


it is true that the only weak spots on PA is the joints(which is true of just about any type of armor)


Bolt shells can crack Ceramite at close range and at a direct angle. at any sort of angle or range the Bolt shells will glance off.

Shurican weapons would rely on hitting joints or the Helmet to crack PA. the Shurican's will just shatter harmlessly off the actual plates.

If ceramite has a low heat transfer rate it would be easier to burn through than a normal metal. Low heat transfer means it does not conduct the heat away so the point of impact will heat up very quickly.

It'll warp the Ceramite sure enough, but it won't go all the way through which is whats important.

a more powerful plasma blast will be able to burn through the armor, but untill you get something powerful enough it won't have much effect(aside from the damage to the armor itself)