Delvarus Centurion wrote:
Wyzilla wrote:
Crimson wrote:
odinsgrandson wrote:Since we've been talking about sizes of primarchs as well, I think it is useful to add in a few of those references.
I'd like to get page numbers on them, but I know that the 2nd ed Codex Ultramarines states that Marneus Calgar's power fists were used by Robout Guilliman (having been taken from a chaos champion he killed). So Calgar's hands are comparably sized with Guilliman's.
Also, in Angels of Death, Commander Dante is wearing the Death Mask of Sanguinious (indicating that Sanguinious' head was not monstrously larger than Dante's).
Those are concrete examples that clearly indicate that marines aren't smaller than Primarchs.
Also, the Lion Helm looks like a regular sized marine helmet. Giant Primarchs is a relatively recent
BL invention.
The Lion helm isn't the Lion's helmet, which should have been obvious for a very long time because it's MK 7, and Lion and the rest of the First Legion would have never even had access to the mark that was released during the Siege of Terra which the First wasn't present for. Even by early 2000's fluff it's obvious the Lion's Helm didn't actually belong to the Lion.
It is said to have been worn by the Lion, but granted that is old lore its in the 3rd edition codex, but Primarchs have their own custom armour, maybe MK7 helmet was a homage to the Lions helmet. But agreed that they are different sizes otherwise Azrael would be wearing the thing. Don't know where he got the idea that Primarchs are the same size.
I get my own personal biases from a lot of the older lore. I spent decades playing a game and reading the lore that never indicated that marines and primarchs were impossibly large, and I realized that
GW hasn't kept their fluff straight at all- and that there even seems to be deliberate contradictions from the different writers (the Movie Marines article- from the 4th edition and
WD #300- actually argues that Black Library fiction should not be taken as accurate lore).
A lot of the lore has changed over the years, but
GW still has a hard time keeping its retcons straight.
The idea that primarchs are the same size as marines comes from:
- The lack of any indication that they were tall throughout many editions of fluff. Saying nothing about their size for over a decade, while telling TONS of stories about them seems to indicate that their size is literally not noteworthy.
- Many of the Primarch's fluff falls apart if they're twelve feet tall:
Night Haunter used a secret identity to hide from the police ("You say the suspect was twelve feet tall- I'm sorry, but that could be anyone").
Alpharius and Omegon were supposed to have hidden among their marines like Sparticus.
The older stories of how the Emperor identified local tales of Primarchs was by their great deeds- and never by the "12 feet tall factor" which you'd think would be a dead givaway. I mean, either that or emps is dumber than an ork (they can always tell who's bigger).
- Several pieces of wargear indicate that wargear can be used by both primarchs and non-primarch marines. The Lion's Helm aside, the Guantlets of Ultramar were used by a random chaos champion, then Robourte Guilliman, then by non-primarch Ultramarines.
Likewise the Death Mask of Sanguinious was literaly a Death Mask of Sanguinious. Death isn't just a random adjective to make things more grimdark- death masks are real world objects. It is is a casting taken of the primarch's face after he died that was crafted into a helmet that is clearly of a size that normal marines can wear it.
- The first Primarch mini was the same size as the space marines of its time (and is way behind current scale creep). Yes, the miniatures are fluff, and the fact that the Lion's Helm is exactly the same size as a marine's helm was not a 'mistake.' It was made before the size difference existed in the fluff.
- Early artwork of primarchs and the emperor fail to show them being particularly larger than humans. This stretches into Mike McVey's famous diorama that uses normal terminator marine minis for the Emperor and Horus.
- The Space Wolves Codexs, 2nd ed states very clearly that Leman Russ wasn't the largest of the Space Wolves. It describes a particularly large veteran sergeant who was bigger than Russ (and his stat line was really unimpressive) They even put a picture.
I would also love to include more references to giant primarchs as well. I'm looking through the 8th ed core book now, but if you get me page numbers and books and I'll include them.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Banville wrote:Just to chip in, all the quotes I've read have suggested 7-7.5 feet tall. To the poster quoting a novel saying a marine is 'half again as tall' as a human with hands big as shovels, I believe it said 'seemed' in front of that description. It's therefore not an omniscient narrator it's more free indirect discourse, where the descriptions are coloured by the characters.
I think, apart from a few outliers, the consensus is 7 feet or so.
I've never heard of a marine being described as 10 feet tall. To put that in perspective, a ten foot tall marine would mean his shoulders would be where your ceiling and walls meet. The top of his head would be two feet above that.
What I have observed is this:
- Old
GW fluff did not feature particularly large marines. Lack of early remarks on marine size seems ti indicate that marine height was unremarkable.
-
GW current fluff has been pretty consistent about naming Space Marines as 7 feet tall- starting sometime during the 3rd edition, and after the rise of the Black Library. They've used that number for years now, and have been consistent.
- Black Library is consistent about saying that marines are very impressive in their size. They're not as concrete about it, but the words they use to describe the hugeness of marines can sometimes get out of hand.
BL also tends to focus on extraordinary individuals- meaning that quite a few
BL characters are exceptionally large, and are never below average height.
- Fans believe that marines can't all be exactly 7 foot tall- and that there would have to be taller and shorter ones. This is reasonable- but then they take the 7 foot number as the minimum rather than the average, and insist on adding half a foot to create "average" marine height os 7.5 feet.
The 7.5 foot number is not supported anywhere in official fluff- it is a complete fan invention.
Automatically Appended Next Post: I'd really love to gather citations for primarch sizes. Does anyone have any references?
Delvarus Centurion wrote:BrianDavion wrote:regarding primarch head sizes, Gulliman's head on his mini doesn't apper to be any bigger then a space Marines head, the size differances of the HEADS might be pretty minimal.
Well I wouldn't use the game as evidence as its not to scale, but I would assume like with growth hormones, when body builders take growth hormones everything grows, even their organs, so I would imagine that the same is true for the process of growth that happens with space marines, it would be odd to have growth that was pinpointed in areas more than they are in others, just from a biological way, but from a genomics kind of way, the Emperor did fine tune them, so he could have thought that, the Primarchs don't need massive heads, which is actually reasonable because brain size matters the bigger you are, as the dinosaurs had to have little brains because their heads were so massive as the neck wouldn't be able to hold it, due to the fact that brains are so dense (no pun intended), but space marines go through the more biological growth hormone way as they aren't born marines they go through a process of becoming marines.
I disagree that the minis and artwork cannot be used as fluff. They tell a story, just like the fiction and other lore, and the story tell does contradict much of the other fiction and lore.
The story that the minis tell us is that humans have "heroic" proportions with comically large heads and hands- but that they're evolving into something both larger and closer to ancient human proportions. Why it is that humans are undergoing these changes is a complete mystery and the inquisition is afraid to document these changes- even among abhumans (although they do document similar changes happening among the Ork people).
I get why most fans dismiss the story that the mini proportions tell, and it is definitely unsupported by the rest of the fluff.
I've considered citing sculpts (the old Leman Russ and the FG primarch minis) but I think that I am the only one who woudl find that entertaining or relevant.
