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I'm starting up inquisimunda, and i am playing ordo xenos, but i want everything in my band to stay fluffy as possible.

Im wondering, is it possible for a marine recruited into death watch (specifically, a DA Chaplain) to reach the rank of interrogator within the inquisition? or are astartes forbidden from attaining ranks within the Inquisition outside of the militant arms?

The Inquisition does not recruit Space Marines into their Orders as Interrogators or Inquisitors.

An Interrogator is, basically, an apprentice Inquisitor. He or she is studying under, and at the side of, a full Inquisitor in order to learn the tactics and art of being an Inquisitor. A Space Marine is built for battle, and is not suited for the more mundane tasks that an Inquisitor must handle. Years of painstaking, covert investigation, study, research, detective work, and all of the other things an Inquisitor must do to root out the Heretic, the Mutant and the Xenos. Interrogator is not an "honorary" title or rank... it's a defined role within the Inquisition, and one that implies further advancement later in life.

It's also fairly impossible to imagine a Space Marine apprenticing himself to a "mere human" Inquisitor for the decades it takes for them to learn it all. Inquisitors are all but required to be as good at politicking as they are at investigating the things they do, for the Inquisition is a byzantine organization, with its own internal factions, rivalries, loyalties and machinations.

Last but certainly not least, there's a saying in the Imperium (and in the real world): "A man cannot serve two masters". The Inquisition expects total loyalty to its goals and directives, to the exclusion of all else. A Space Marine's Chapter expects pretty much the same thing. How, then, can a Space Marine serve the Inquisition if his loyalty remains with his Chapter? What if, Inquisitor Space Marine finds his Chapter's homeworld at the heart of a Malleus Threat? Can he bring himself to commit Exterminatus on his own Chapter?

There's many reasons why Space Marines aren't made Inquisitors, these are just a few of them. Space Marines may, of course, work with the Inquisition, and be a part of an Inquisitor's retinue for a particular task or mission.

Ah! Thank you. I was wrong, thanks for setting me straight. I'm gonna come up with a new plan, then.

I'd broadly go along with Psiensis' answer, albeit with the caveat that it would not be utterly implausible that a Marine of very long service and high rank within the Deathwatch (imagine his chapter had been wiped out, or rendered inaccessible for centuries by a lengthy, remote deployment) might, with the sponsorship of a high-ranking Inquisitor or three be allowed to renounce his Astartes vows and join the Holy Ordos.

Hmm, yes. Personally, I'd go with what Andy Hoare wrote in a White Dwarf article from way back:

"It has also been known for a senior member of the Adepta Sororitas to leave the organisation entirely for higher office elsewhere, such as within the upper echelons of the Adeptus Terra, or the Inquisition – such an event is unheard of within the Adeptus Astartes, and far from common within the Imperial Guard."
- WD #292

Now, 40k doesn't really have a concept of canonicity, which means that you can still make up anything you want. It is even possible that there is some obscure BL novel out there that already did it. It comes down to what you think sounds "right" as per your own interpretation.

Alternatively, maybe there is some way that you can circumvent this issue? After all, if you go by GW's fluff, the Deathwatch is part of the Ordo Xenos, which means that a single Marine could well waltz around the galaxy being part of some Inquisitor's personal retinue or even lead an Ordo Xenos kill-team on their own, combining their personal experience and battle-prowess with the unique talents of more specialized Inquisitorial operatives.

Perhaps the Inquisitor RPG rulebook and Gav Thorpe's article on using Space Marines in it may provide a bit of additional inspiration:

http://www.games-workshop.com/MEDIA_CustomProductCatalog/m1320038_Using_Space_Marines.pdf

http://www.games-workshop.com/MEDIA_CustomProductCatalog/m1320030_Inq_Rulebook_part_2.pdf

Excerpt:
"There’s two ways to use Space Marines in my opinion. Either, he turns up occasionally, as I’ll detail later, or he replaces the Inquisitor as the hardest member of the warrior band. I would probably never have a regular warrior band in my group that contained both a powerful Inquisitor and a Space Marine. That was part of the reasoning behind Captain Artemis – he leads Xenos kill-teams, he isn’t just a member of one. And I don’t mean leading Grey Knight or Deathwatch squads!"

You want to use him as a PC or NPC?
If you really want an Astartes to be hanging with the Inquisitors, you could make the Astarte the watch captain of some middle of nowhere area. With some handwavium, you could, maybe, setup a bit of a power sharing arrangement between him and the Inquisitors in the region. Still a heck of a stretch though. And he'd never be part of the Inquisition proper, plus mixing an Astarte into an Inquisitorial band basically means that balancing combat would be near impossible. Anything that could be dangerous to the marine would go through the regular humans like wet cardboard. Not to mention that any investigative bits of the adventure would require either leaving him at home, or telling people that he's actually a ringer for their team on the inter-Ordo basketball league.

daveNYC wrote:Anything that could be dangerous to the marine would go through the regular humans like wet cardboard.

Not necessarily. GW's Necromunda and Inquisitor RPGs aren't as unbalanced as FFG's Deathwatch RPG when it comes to Marines <-> "normal" people. It would depend a lot on what kind of equipment the latter get to have, though.

Im a bit confused. Ive been reading about inquismunda and havent really seen that theres PCs or NPCs in it. Are you confusing the pen and paper RPG with inquismunda?

Necromunda wasn't an RPG. It was a skirmish game that used a slightly modified version of 2nd Edition 40K rules.

many of the gameplay and balance constraints to which Space Marines are subjected in the battles game of Warhammer 40,000

Interesting. Guess that pretty much lays to rest the idea that the 40K tabletop rules are an accurate depiction of the power and resiliency of Space Marines.

In Hammer of Daemons, it is heavily implied that the Grey Knight Alaric is recruited into the inquisition directly after the events of the book.

I rather suspect the Inquisition would accept a qualified Astartes who has served alongside them for a long enough time to know what is going on, assuming he had a patron. What I doubt is that the individuals chapter would allow it, so you'd either need a good reason for the chapter to go along with it, or the individual in question needs to be deceptive enough to go along with lying to or just never talking to his chapter again, a deception which many marines wouldn't go for.

Panopticon wrote:In Hammer of Daemons, it is heavily implied that the Grey Knight Alaric is recruited into the inquisition directly after the events of the book.

I rather suspect the Inquisition would accept a qualified Astartes who has served alongside them for a long enough time to know what is going on, assuming he had a patron. What I doubt is that the individuals chapter would allow it, so you'd either need a good reason for the chapter to go along with it, or the individual in question needs to be deceptive enough to go along with lying to or just never talking to his chapter again, a deception which many marines wouldn't go for.

The relationship between the GK and the Ordo Mallus is very different from the relationship between the Ordo Xenos and Deathwatch. GK are actually a 'real' chapter, while Deathwatch are seconded marines. Also, the expertise needed to fight daemons is much more in depth than what would be necessary to fight the various xenos threats. So I could see the potential for a GK to become a more integrated part of that Ordos.

However I do not think that making a Space Marine an official Inquisitor would ever happen. The changes that were made post-Heresy were done to prevent anyone from having enough power to rip the Imperium apart like Horus had done. In Inquisitorial rosette is an immense amount of power, and I think there'd be enough institutional caution to prevent that level of power from being given to someone like a space marine, who already has power a plenty.

Space Marine power comes from the chapter resources, without that they are not individually any more powerful than an Inquisitor, both the fluff and tabletop has plenty of non SM imperials who can take one down.

Mind you, that it would be amazingly rare and require a very special individual or set of circumstances to do so. It would need some good writing but I don't think it is impossible.

Panopticon wrote:Space Marine power comes from the chapter resources, without that they are not individually any more powerful than an Inquisitor, both the fluff and tabletop has plenty of non SM imperials who can take one down.

Mind you, that it would be amazingly rare and require a very special individual or set of circumstances to do so. It would need some good writing but I don't think it is impossible.

It would be faintly absurd...
Like DaveNYC said, there were specific measures put in place in order to stop Marines gaining too much power.
I doubt it would be possible in any role other than ceremonial...

Did you mean Interrogator as in Interrogator Chaplain?

Something unique, AFAIK, to the Dark Angels Chapter. I would think you would need to remain with the Chapter to ascend to such a rank. Unless in his time serving with the Deathwatch he encountered some Fallen and dragged them back to The Rock personally.

Veteran Sergeant wrote:Interesting. Guess that pretty much lays to rest the idea that the 40K tabletop rules are an accurate depiction of the power and resiliency of Space Marines.

For what it's worth, the 40k tabletop isn't an accurate depiction of anyone; it balances itself out by making every army appear "weaker" than it would be and warps people's perception by being abstracted. But as you can see in the Inquisitor RPG, it still isn't too hard to take a Marine down. Even with a lasgun.

Panopticon wrote:Space Marine power comes from the chapter resources, without that they are not individually any more powerful than an Inquisitor, both the fluff and tabletop has plenty of non SM imperials who can take one down.
Mind you, that it would be amazingly rare and require a very special individual or set of circumstances to do so. It would need some good writing but I don't think it is impossible.

Exactly - many soldiers even from the Imperial Guard's rank-and-file would be capable of using a bolter or plasma gun, which can have a devastating effect on Marines, as it's the same weapon systems they themselves are using. What gives the Marines an edge is "just" their toughness and experience as well as the fact that their opponents often lack such advanced weaponry, and of course the "shock and awe" style of their tactics often creating confusion that interferes with a concerted counter-attack. Which is usually the only way to stop a Marine assault, as most forms of defense will only give them the opportunity to fight on their own terms.

As for the topic at hand, it seems to me that Captain Artemis is the ideal way to go. He's the most that a Space Marine could achieve in terms of working with the Inquisition - a respected position of small-scale leadership without any actual political influence whatsoever. I suppose he has to report to some senior Inquisitor, but sadly the available material doesn't go into detail that deep.

Inquisitors can do literally anything they can get away with. They have no oversight save other Inquisitors.

If an Inquisitor wanted to recruit a Space Marine, he could and would. No one could stop him. Some might object after the fact though.

Also, it's never actually happened that we know of, but it's certainly within the realm of their possibility.

An Inquisitor can recruit anyone he wants, yes... into his retinue.

Recruiting someone as an Interrogator is an entirely different matter, as that station calls on more resources than just the individual Inquisitor's. The Inquisition, as an organization, has training facilities and educational facilities for educating their Interrogators and wannabe-Inquisitors in the finer points of Imperial Law, Inquisitorial procedure, history, precedent, hand to hand combat, advanced spy-tech, and so forth and so on. Think of it as "Witch-Hunter School" (or Heretic-Hunter School or Xeno-Hunter School).

As far as the DA go, I think their Interrogator-Chaplains are a separate thing entirely, as they are more concerned with gathering information about the Fallen, rather than assisting with some Xenos hunt in some backwater system. I believe the name of the two occupations is just similar, but not of the same organization.