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Ok, I'm actually only interested in the Exterminatus part of the thread title.

I noticed yet another thread about SW and many posters saying that they should just declare Exterminatus on Fenris to be done with the Wolves.
And then there is yet another thread on the Tau where posters are says that the IOM should just declare Exterminatus on them and be done with them, its only a 100 worlds or so.

Really? Is the idea of irradicating a planet so easy that the IOM has several gross of these virus/planet destroying missiles just hanging around.

Now I admit I don't read a whole lot of BL books, but if the IOM can easily dump these all powerful destructive devices at will and at every little problem then 40K fluff is even more messed up than I think it is. Why not just cluster a few dozen together and send them into the heart of the hive fleets? Why bother dealing with orks at all if you can just carpet bomb their planets into oblivion one after the other? I would hope that Exterminatus is actually a very expensive logistal nightmare that its actual application is more theory than fact. Yes it can and has been done a few times but hopefully after each and every one someone says... "Damn lets never do that again.", with a whole room full of nodding heads in agreement.

I think people throw this idea around way to easily. Or am I really just missing something here?

Just dropping exterminatus bombs isn't really that easy....

you have to get rid of any other ships around first, than deal with the planets defenses...and those defenses are usually pretty good with the tyranids and the orks...

as for the T'au...I don't think they pose much of a threat anyway for the imperium to just "bomb the crap out of"

If the Imperium really wanted to get rid of the T'au...they would just throw guards and a space marine chapter at them and be done with them by space Christmas...

They said that about WW1 and WW2 too..


I would just bribe the orks to go taubashing, as they seem to be fairly adept at it Might not even need to bribe them, just point

The problem is that "Exterminatus" is something that is a broad concept.

"Exterminatus" can refer to an Inquisitor signing the order to bombard a Hive City completely off the map, right down to the last atom...or it can refer to the destruction of a world proper using things like virus bombs.

The Imperium is actually kinda hesitant to use the second one, even in offensive operations.
Why?
Because in destroying the world--you destroy what was important upon that world. There's a reason they send the Imperial Guard planetside, and it's not because they have a reality TV show called "Dateline: Frontline!".

Kanluwen wrote:"Exterminatus" can refer to an Inquisitor signing the order to bombard a Hive City completely off the map, right down to the last atom...or it can refer to the destruction of a world proper using things like virus bombs.

I'm fairly sure Exterminatus always refers to the entire world.

Still, that world would be lost - it is quite correct that this would be the chief reason for the Imperium to hesitate. If there's any chance that a couple million Guardsmen may take that planet, they won't do it, as saving the world means it could help produce more Guardsmen in the future, in turn bolstering the Imperium's forces. Exterminatus is always a last-ditch resolution, usually when a world is overrun by Tyranids or Daemons and the chances of ever (re)taking it drop to zero.

Releasing Exterminatus should be less of an issue, though. When a ship is in the position to land troops or bomb the surface of a world, it can just as much release a bunch of cyclonic torpedoes or similar nasty things.

In order to launch an Exterminatus on Fenris they'd have to take out the ground based anti-ship defenses. Missile silos, defense lasers, etc.. This requires a ground assault.

In any regard since the Imperium is a dying empire, exterminatus is actually fairly rare. Unlike bodies, the Imperium can't make new worlds and thus every one is precious to them, which is why they'll waste potentially millions of Guardsmen to save a world from Orks that could have just been cyclonic torpedoed.

Harriticus wrote:In order to launch an Exterminatus on Fenris they'd have to take out the ground based anti-ship defenses. Missile silos, defense lasers, etc.. This requires a ground assault.

A ground assault would require the ships to move into the same position that is necessary for Exterminatus, they'd just have to throw a couple bombs down instead of hundreds of dropships.
In the past, invading armies had no trouble with getting their feet onto Fenris, so I don't know if these supposed anti-ship defences are even there at all (could be due to climatic reasons? the harsh winds may interfere with targeting or somesuch). If they are, they're obviously not sufficient to prevent an attack.

Other than that I agree about the reasons for hesitating with such a drastic measure, of course.

I think it's more that the Wolves WANT the enemy to land, so they can have a proper fight

Fenris' defenses are centered around The Fang and the Wolves themselves.

They try not to meddle too much into the affairs of the 'mortal' Fenrisians, believing it gives them a much better class of warrior candidates.

If the Wolves are gone on campaign somewhere or something of that nature, an enemy feasibly could mount an assault on Fenris' population proper--but even then not The Fang.

The munitions use for exterminatus don't work on any other target then a living planet.

Virusbombs will kill all biological life it can get to, and increase decomposition by an insane amount, this, in turn, releases ginormous amounts of methane and other flamable gasses into the atmopshere, which will be what lights the whole planet on fire. The planet itself is never actually destroyed, just completely purged of surface life.

If you were to use them on, for instance, a hive fleet, the virus would just die in the void and do feth all.

Exterminatus is a complicated process, but it can be expedited if you really had to.

a full blown exterminatus involves...

1) Virus Bombs: These torpedo munitions release a Virus that attacks all living material, causing death and release of biological gasses as byproducts of the Virus's replication. Eventually, the entire planet has been ravaged and the Virus eventually dies with no hosts to replicate in.

2) A Lance Strike or some other bombardment is fired at the planet. This ignites the gasses that the Virus released into the Atmosphere and the entire planet is wreathed in a firestorm which both burns away anything that managed to survive the Virus(sealed suits like PA) and it also blows the atmosphere away.

3) Clyclonic Torpedos: This is an optional step and is usually only used against Necron Tomb Worlds or planets who's very surface must be denied. The Torpedos burrow into the crust of the planet and detonate their massive payloads. the explosions cause the planet to actually break apart into massive asteroids.


In theory, all you would have to do to really up a planet would be to drop a single Torpedo with a Virus Bomb. the Virus will quickly multiply and destroy the planet. It would take longer then normal, but the end result would be no less inevitable. you could do this to a Tau world and basically force an evacuation, which could still get them if any of the Virus gets inside the escape shuttles, and lets not discuss what happens if too many fires break out during the evacuation.

Exterminatus is the last resort for a reason. The only acceptable reasons are Tomb worlds, Ork invasion army reaching incredible mass (rare), or Tyranids about to finish off a world. Never used against Chaos Daemonworlds. Best case senario, it does nothing. Worse case, It gives them ideas.

Lynata wrote:

Kanluwen wrote:"Exterminatus" can refer to an Inquisitor signing the order to bombard a Hive City completely off the map, right down to the last atom...or it can refer to the destruction of a world proper using things like virus bombs.

I'm fairly sure Exterminatus always refers to the entire world.

Still, that world would be lost - it is quite correct that this would be the chief reason for the Imperium to hesitate. If there's any chance that a couple million Guardsmen may take that planet, they won't do it, as saving the world means it could help produce more Guardsmen in the future, in turn bolstering the Imperium's forces. Exterminatus is always a last-ditch resolution, usually when a world is overrun by Tyranids or Daemons and the chances of ever (re)taking it drop to zero.

Releasing Exterminatus should be less of an issue, though. When a ship is in the position to land troops or bomb the surface of a world, it can just as much release a bunch of cyclonic torpedoes or similar nasty things.

I think you can declare exterminatus on a city, a chapter, or a world.

Durza wrote:

Lynata wrote:

Kanluwen wrote:"Exterminatus" can refer to an Inquisitor signing the order to bombard a Hive City completely off the map, right down to the last atom...or it can refer to the destruction of a world proper using things like virus bombs.

I'm fairly sure Exterminatus always refers to the entire world.

Still, that world would be lost - it is quite correct that this would be the chief reason for the Imperium to hesitate. If there's any chance that a couple million Guardsmen may take that planet, they won't do it, as saving the world means it could help produce more Guardsmen in the future, in turn bolstering the Imperium's forces. Exterminatus is always a last-ditch resolution, usually when a world is overrun by Tyranids or Daemons and the chances of ever (re)taking it drop to zero.

Releasing Exterminatus should be less of an issue, though. When a ship is in the position to land troops or bomb the surface of a world, it can just as much release a bunch of cyclonic torpedoes or similar nasty things.

I think you can declare exterminatus on a city, a chapter, or a world.

Exterminatus is always the world. It refers to various procedures that result in the death of a world.
HGowever an Inquisitor could simply issue orders to level a city or destroy a chapter so it doeesn't make much difference.

There are as many ways to commit exerminatus as there are authors to make them up. IT cna range from simple orbital bombardment (eg Cyrene), to cyclonics or virus weaponry (most common, it would seem), to overloading a particularily volatile planetary power grid (which can range from simply obliterating the surface of the planet, to reducing the planet to an asteroid field, as in the case of St Josemane's hope.)

Effects can range from simply killing all life and rendering the surface uninhabitable for an indefinite period of time (generations or centuries, depending on source) to destroying the planet outright (blowing it apart, removing the atmosphere, etc.) In the case of the former planets have been recolonized as hive worlds (Tallarn and Krieg being obvious examples. Loyalists also managed to survive the virus bombing of Istvaan III)

Exterminatus is always declared on a planet. However there are cases of mass extinction that have been conducted or proposed without calling it Exterminatus (Caves of Ice, Black Tide if I remember right) and there are cases of weaponry that is typically used in Exterminatus being used in a more tactical role (tactical deployment of cyclonics to destroy cities, or virus bombs to wipe out armies or cities, rather than blowing the whole thing apart. Hell cyclonics have been used in anti-ship warfare on at least one occasion I recall - Bleeding Chalice.)

purplefood wrote:
Exterminatus is always the world. It refers to various procedures that result in the death of a world.

Exterminatus refers to the world's population, not the world proper.

The "main" weapons utilized for Exterminatus will not generally destroy the world, just all the life upon it.

Kanluwen wrote:

purplefood wrote:
Exterminatus is always the world. It refers to various procedures that result in the death of a world.

Exterminatus refers to the world's population, not the world proper.

The "main" weapons utilized for Exterminatus will not generally destroy the world, just all the life upon it.

I kinda meant that but i can see where it's unclear...

There's a very noticeable difference between the two.

While Exterminatus does not "destroy the planet", it potentially can render it uninhabitable and destroy whatever natural resources the planet had that made it valuable enough to colonize and defend in the first place.

The line between "destroying the planet" and "destroying all life on the planet" isn't a very well defined one. If you get very pedantic about "life" (EG microbes and stuff) you can end up digging pretty deep for life (kilometres deep if I recall where some of the simplest forms of life can exist.) And there are of course places (like hive worlds) where worlds are mostly/entirely sheathed in metal, or where they may dig deep below ground (in the case of the latter, Tallarn, Krieg and Valhalla are all examples). Destroying all life on a feral world would be comparatively easier.

And of course it depends on what you mean by "destorying" the world - destroying its biosphere? Wrecking the climate? removing the atmosphere or oceans (Exterminatus can do both of the latter, esp when we get into cylonics and the more extreme bombardments. But even the firestorm-inducing types of virus bombs can potentially destroy the atmosphere as well.) Maybe you just blast huge holes in the crust, or blow it off. Or it may mean reducing the entire planet to incandescent gas (like the planet killer does).

All cases of planetary destruction are Exterminatus, but not all Exterminatus results in planetary destruction.

Clyclonics are very rarely used because a planet may still have tactical value as a military base or mining facility, and it is possable to Terraform an exterminated planet(a very lengthy process) so they do like to keep options open.