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This is wracking my brain a bit, iv not read many of the 40k novels so im not sure if it has been covered. My knowledge of military is quite broad and recent modern armies generally try to salvage bodies and bring them home to families etc. Now the way i see it is the guardmen are based on ww1 maybe ww2 era military. That would suggest to me that they leave bodies on the battlefields due to the volume of dead men. And those that die in transit back to base are buried.

what do the guardsmen do in regards to regulars and commisars.

Are bodies just left?, or are my assumptions way of and they try to salvage them. Is it any different in regards to how dead commisars are dealt with?

Leave the bodies where they lay. It's more grimdark.

What do you think The Imperium uses as rations?

^^I like that but does the same apply for commisars.

What do you think they give the officers?

In both WWI and WWII, at least on the American side, bodies weren't just left in the field. Many KIA soldiers and sailors were buried in cemeteries built for American veterans in the European and Pacific theaters, and many were also brought home for burial. Many sailors were also buried at sea. You'd have to go back very far in time to find an army that did not police it's dead.

It's not called Corpse Starch for nothing...

Naah, that one comes from the billions of people who die in overcrowded Hives each and every die. I'd say Guardsmen are left where they are. The most you could ask for is a mass grave sanctified by some cleric of the Creed.

Dead guardsman for all meals, with heaping portions of grimdark for desert!

iproxtaco wrote:What do you think The Imperium uses as rations?

Yep. They're literally called corpse rations.


For gear in any case, a quartermaster retrieves it to be put to use again. Bodies? Mass graves, burning, etc.

I imagine the guard might pile up bodies to burn after a battle. It wouldn't make sense to leave rotting bodies laying around to promote the spread of disease.

coolyo294 wrote:Leave the bodies where they lay. It's more grimdark.

Your post win the day

On the OP....
They bury them after the battle in a massive shared tomb, carve the name of fallen Guardsman on tomb and go on ( like American memorial to Vietnam solders in Washington D.C, only with dead bodies beneath it, a LOT of dead bodies... ).


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iproxtaco wrote:What do you think they give the officers?

This one is good to

Is it the Munitorum Manual that recommends against having the men dig mass graves as part of pre-battle preparations? While dedication to preparedness is laudable this instance tends to be bad for morale. The other time this comes up that I can think of is Fifteen Hours, where again the dead are stripped of gear and buried.

mikeb2817 wrote:This is wracking my brain a bit, iv not read many of the 40k novels so im not sure if it has been covered. My knowledge of military is quite broad and recent modern armies generally try to salvage bodies and bring them home to families etc. Now the way i see it is the guardmen are based on ww1 maybe ww2 era military. That would suggest to me that they leave bodies on the battlefields due to the volume of dead men. And those that die in transit back to base are buried.

what do the guardsmen do in regards to regulars and commisars.

Are bodies just left?, or are my assumptions way of and they try to salvage them. Is it any different in regards to how dead commisars are dealt with?

I think this should cover it.




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Lynata wrote:It's not called Corpse Starch for nothing...

Naah, that one comes from the billions of people who die in overcrowded Hives each and every die. I'd say Guardsmen are left where they are. The most you could ask for is a mass grave sanctified by some cleric of the Creed.

Not unless you want disesase flying through your ranks and morale that even a commissar can't help.

In the end...it all depends on the regiment...

That video... was he saying solid green? Im no marujuana expert but it sounded like he was saying solid green is made out of people.

In Dead Men Walking, IIRC, the dead (and mortally wounded) are stripped of their gear and buried (even if they are still alive) in mass graves. In Flesh and Steel, IIRC, there is a point where the officers in command of the Riverine unit are pissed that they didn't have time to bring their dead with them so that they could give them proper burials in the custom of their homeworld (It was similar to a viking funeral, bodies on a boat sent down the bayou, not sure if they burned them or not).

I imagine, like most things in 40k pertaining to the Imperium, it depends on the (home)world in question.

Mike, he was saying SOYLENT green is people, watch the movie/read the book and get some culture.

I guess that the rest of the ''living'' guardsmen salvage the armour and weapons, to mainentnance, and use the equipment later on.
The bodies are left on the battlefield, unless it's a small battle, or the corpse is of a high ranked commander... (They didn't leave the Emperor on the ship, did they now?)

Frazzled wrote:Not unless you want disesase flying through your ranks and morale that even a commissar can't help.

Hence stuff like the rampant disease during the Badab Campaign - just too many bodies on the killing fields.

I don't think the IG goes out of its way to recover dead bodies. If the corpses are on the battlefield and the battle is still raging, it'd be too dangerous to recover them. Once the battle is over - maybe have a mass grave, if you can spare the time and manpower to bury the countless dead (thinking WW1 here). If the Regiments are needed elsewhere and have to press on, though, it could be considered a waste of time to spend days with dead bodies. The rank and file soldiers won't like it, but hey, this is 40k, so maybe the officers don't care much about what the common soldier thinks.

Could depend a lot on the campaign, the battlefield and the Regiment (plus its commanders), though. Catachans dragging their dead through the jungle in the midst of a campaign? Don't think so. Tallarn Desert Raiders recovering their dead to give them a proper burial? More likely.

As far as "return home" shipments are concerned, I'd say such luxury is reserved for the scions of nobility, and even then probably only at express request by some influential family, thus probably only being done for high ranking officers.

mikeb2817 wrote:That video... was he saying solid green? Im no marujuana expert but it sounded like he was saying solid green is made out of people.

He was saying soylent green, and it was made out of people to feed people.

Soylent Green is, indeed, people.

The IG Omnibus shows that civilians are often inducted into the war effort to collect and bury or incinerate the dead, of both sides. Generally burial/entombment for the allies, incineration for the enemy.

The dead of at least some Techguard regiments are "recycled". This can lead to some tensions with attached Imperial Guard regiments ( Dark Apostle, the IG general wasn't pleased when a Mechanicus magos suggested this course of action ).

Can't speak for other regiments but Vostroyans salvage heirloom gear; such as Carapace armor, knives, pistols, rifles and such then burn the body. The gear is passed to a new soldier. In Rebel Winter the Vostroyans gather the Vostroyan made gear, and use a flamer to burn the body so in the field i would say Promethium if stocks allow it or a match if they don't.
I would assume they burn Guard corpses after a battle for any regiment; though the rights and prayers said before so may differ.

They are either crushed under the treads of their tanks, or used to drown the enemy.

where possable, they probably give em mass graves.

otherwise they likely get left where they fell. the gear will be stripped as it costs money, guardsmen are free.



the reclycling the dead thing probably only happens on board ships and in hive cities where they need to conserve resources.

and even then, the difference between eating Corpse Starch and real food is like the difference between us going to McDonalds(Corpse Starch) and us going to Spagettii Factory(real food) in terms of affordability.

everyone can afford real food, but it isn't an everyday thing for most people.

They got eaten by tyranids.

I would imagine that if possible they either bury the dead or burn them, but if not possible due to time constraints or just trench warfare then the dead are probably left to rot.

IIRC there's fluff that talks about a planet that boasts both a Guard sanitorum for crazed Guardsmen, and also boasts a large servitor production facility.

Make of that what you wish.

The Soylent Green is PEOPLE!!!

...and the AdMech need parts for servitors.

According to various novels and products, the heads are all removed and skinned and the skulls are all collected and prepared to be placed beneath the earth.

Some regiments burn their dead - the Elysians do, at any rate, so I guess there is some formal burial/cremation that goes on.