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i Never realy dug too deep into the 40k fluff but i do know as much as the imperium hinges upon the space marines and wondered what 40k would be like without them. the only problem i could think of is the imperial worlds falling at a rediculous rate and that the heresy would never have happned.

Let this be a fruitful topic

Better.

Greener

On a serious note, the Imperium would be stronger. Without the heresy, there would be major Chaotic based threat as the Emperor would of kept Chaos hidden and thus humanity wouldn't feed the gods. But they would have a smaller Empire.

There would be no Imperium.

Codices would probably get released on time.

I'd imagine there would have just been a corruption of the Imperial Army and Navy instead of the legions.

But more importantly, the Emperor wouldn't have been in charge, since he used the proto-Space Marines to take over Terra in the first place.

Mankind would never have survived beyond the Sol System.

If the Horus Heresy novels have revealed anything to us, it is that the Space Marines were the army. The army was just there to hold the ground the marines had taken.

The Space Marines were part of the Emperors grand plan. Without them he wouldn't have been able to take over the galaxy. At least, not within a reasonable timeline.

In a sense, it wouldn't be 40K.
As annoying as it is, sometimes, the Space Marines have pretty much come to symbolise 40K to many people, in the same way that Superman has come to define what a superhero should be like.

In an in-universe answer, however, I'd say that again, SM are integral to how the Imperium is now, so it's very likely that we wouldn't recognise the alternate 40K universe at all without the Marines.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

DeffDred wrote:

If the Horus Heresy novels have revealed anything to us, it is that the Space Marines were the army. The army was just there to hold the ground the marines had taken.

That's not strictly true, there are plenty of accounts of the Imperial Army taking systems on it's own. Indeed, the overall theme we get is that the SM were used pretty much as they are now, as shock troops and elite infantry to break open the systems that the Army couldn't.

That's not strictly true, there are plenty of accounts of the Imperial Army taking systems on it's own. Indeed, the overall theme we get is that the SM were used pretty much as they are now, as shock troops and elite infantry to break open the systems that the Army couldn't.

That's not how they were used in the Heresy. Nowadays the marines are small forces that break the enemy.

In the past entire legions of marines waged true war upon the foes of mankind.

The fleets were under the control of Horus and the other Primarchs. There were basically marines on every ship.

Space Marines as they are in fluff aren't inherently wrong or annoying. They are the fighting elite of the Imperium without with mankind would perish. This is fine. The problem comes from GW and the fact they keep churning out one MEQ Codex after another at the neglect of everyone else.

And yes, I understand they do that because MEQ's sells. However I'm describing the problem, not why they do the problem.

Almost every invasion was conducted by the Astartes. The Army was just a garrison force.

Without Space Marines, Warhammer 40,000 would be... just one of the dozens of other wargames published in the last few decades which just never caught on.

No Space Marines = no Warhammer 40000. It is as simple as that.
In a same manner just imagine what would HALO be without Master Chief and SPARTANS?

Would there be no Imperium though? If the Emperor had the same dream and vision could he not have done it without the Space Marines? Granted, the Imperium might not have been anywhere near as big as it is now and things would have been a lot tougher. But i still think there could be an Imperium to some extent.

Their would still be Men in Power armour, look at the guys in False Gods, the Auretian Technocracy and the 'False Emperor' from Horus Rising and Interex had forged some form of Empire amongst the stars and they were mere mortals.

So much had been achieved before the Age of Strife and their were no Space Marines around then.

We do all know that the game would have never cought on and it would have never happned but in the fluff i would assume that the imperial guard would have just taken thier posision and some elite troops have gained power armor and become almost space marines

The Orks would rule alot more probably, Tau would expand a lot more and conquer. It would be Tau ruling most likely.

Pilau Rice wrote:Would there be no Imperium though?

It's explicitly stated in the Rulebook that without the Astartes the Imperium would have fallen long ago. Toppling the Ork Empire of Ullanor, for instance, might not have been feasible without the Astartes Legions.

rockerbikie wrote:The Orks would rule alot more probably, Tau would expand a lot more and conquer. It would be Tau ruling most likely.

Did the Tau reverse engineer technology from crashed ships on one of their moons or something? They might be further behind technologically if the Imperium hadn't existed, and they'd also have to deal with different threats than they currently do (which may prove more of a challenge than the Imperium's distracted Eastern Fringe).

Pilau Rice wrote:Would there be no Imperium though? If the Emperor had the same dream and vision could he not have done it without the Space Marines? Granted, the Imperium might not have been anywhere near as big as it is now and things would have been a lot tougher. But i still think there could be an Imperium to some extent.

Their would still be Men in Power armour, look at the guys in False Gods, the Auretian Technocracy and the 'False Emperor' from Horus Rising and Interex had forged some form of Empire amongst the stars and they were mere mortals.

So much had been achieved before the Age of Strife and their were no Space Marines around then.

Ya, of like 2 planets. The Emperor conquerored 1,000,000 worlds in 300 years. Do you have any idea how crazy that is? It wasn't done with grunts with lasguns from earth.

KamikazeCanuck wrote:

Pilau Rice wrote:Would there be no Imperium though? If the Emperor had the same dream and vision could he not have done it without the Space Marines? Granted, the Imperium might not have been anywhere near as big as it is now and things would have been a lot tougher. But i still think there could be an Imperium to some extent.

Their would still be Men in Power armour, look at the guys in False Gods, the Auretian Technocracy and the 'False Emperor' from Horus Rising and Interex had forged some form of Empire amongst the stars and they were mere mortals.

So much had been achieved before the Age of Strife and their were no Space Marines around then.

Ya, of like 2 planets. The Emperor conquerored 1,000,000 worlds in 300 years. Do you have any idea how crazy that is? It wasn't done with grunts with lasguns from earth.

Err

I said to some extent, I know that the Imperium wouldn't be any where near as big as it was with the Space Marines, like what I said in my post, so I miss your point. The Interex had more than two planets I'm pretty sure and the other guys had a system as far as I recall. It's not a million worlds, but it is an Empire.

SomeRandomEvilGuy wrote:

Pilau Rice wrote:Would there be no Imperium though?

It's explicitly stated in the Rulebook that without the Astartes the Imperium would have fallen long ago. Toppling the Ork Empire of Ullanor, for instance, might not have been feasible without the Astartes Legions.

For discussions sake then. They might not have even got as far as Ullanor without the Astartes, might have got stuck on Mars, they might have got wiped out by the Mechanicum.

The Interex seemed to get along just fine until the Warmaster showed up with his fleet.

It would be alot more like Fantasy.
Less Human and More Alien factions.

The IoM wouldnt exist but Humanity would, some conquered, some chaos worshipping, some small minor empires and a couple "major players" on the size scope between the Tau Empire and the Ultramarines empire.

One reason why 40k cant add more Xeno codexes is there are far too many Human one's taking up all the things that could make a particualr Xenos Codex "unique"

KamikazeCanuck wrote:Ya, of like 2 planets. The Emperor conquerored 1,000,000 worlds in 300 years. Do you have any idea how crazy that is? It wasn't done with grunts with lasguns from earth.

but he certainly did not colonize a million worlds in 300 years, a lot of those planet were probably even part of their own little empires. The Emperor probably subjugated more free human worlds than he rescued from their Xenos masters.
Humanity sure seemed to flourish in the 27,000+ years of Space travel before the Emperor. I think we'd be doing just fine, just not united under one Tyranical government.

Karnac wrote:
but he certainly did not colonize a million worlds in 300 years, a lot of those planet were probably even part of their own little empires. The Emperor probably subjugated more free human worlds than he rescued from their Xenos masters.
Humanity sure seemed to flourish in the 27,000+ years of Space travel before the Emperor. I think we'd be doing just fine, just not united under one Tyranical government.

Which was part of my point, the Imperium as it is today would not exist, but there could be an Imperium of sorts like something the Interex had or the other guys. I don't know if they had a name or not

And he did, his whole point of the Crusade, apart form finding the Primarchs, was reuniting the lost outposts of man with the Terra. If there were Empires already forged you joined them or you got smushed. If there weren't the Astartes then Empires might have willingly joined, recognising lost brothers from Terra, or told them to sod off.

I'm not sure i clearly understand the Topic at hand. Should i read it as:
- 40k without the Space Marine [i]Legions[/] (aka the STANDARD SM's)?
- 40k Without ANYTHING Space Marine (including the Primarchs)?
- 40k without the Emperor and HENCE any of the Primarchs + SM's?

without any space marines, just to the extent where te emperor never did any mariny things.

One thig we all forget is that there would be no leman russ tanks either as they would have nobody to name them after

KillerSkivil wrote:without any space marines, just to the extent where te emperor never did any mariny things.

One thig we all forget is that there would be no leman russ tanks either as they would have nobody to name them after

So the Emperor still exists on earth then? IoM would have far superior technologies and far better Tanks the LRBT and Land Raiders. while the Emperor was around, he was making new technologies all the time (like his throne and space marine equipment) and after he was reduced to a barely living sac of flesh it's the backwards thinking attitudes of Roboute Gulliman and the High lords of Terra that stopped all technological progress in the IoM.

So no space Marines wouldve resulted in a few Human empires around the Galaxy, alot less people in general as many would be killed or conquered by Xenos.

Also without imperial control and influence, im betting the human worlds near Tau space would've joined the greater good in greater numbers and have a bigger influence on Tau culture and military.

In a same manner just imagine what would HALO be without Master Chief and SPARTANS?

ODST

The Imperial Guard would become the main characters.

And we would have just another Starship Trooper like universes.
Both SPARTANS and Adeptus Astartes give uber-awesomeness to their respective universes.

Pilau Rice wrote:

Karnac wrote:
but he certainly did not colonize a million worlds in 300 years, a lot of those planet were probably even part of their own little empires. The Emperor probably subjugated more free human worlds than he rescued from their Xenos masters.
Humanity sure seemed to flourish in the 27,000+ years of Space travel before the Emperor. I think we'd be doing just fine, just not united under one Tyranical government.

Which was part of my point, the Imperium as it is today would not exist, but there could be an Imperium of sorts like something the Interex had or the other guys. I don't know if they had a name or not

And he did, his whole point of the Crusade, apart form finding the Primarchs, was reuniting the lost outposts of man with the Terra. If there were Empires already forged you joined them or you got smushed. If there weren't the Astartes then Empires might have willingly joined, recognising lost brothers from Terra, or told them to sod off.

Yes, I said conquerored not colonized. There'd be no Imperium and these isolated human outposts would be picked off by aliens like the Tyranid.

GW would lose about 60% of their total profits.

English Assassin wrote:Without Space Marines, Warhammer 40,000 would be... just one of the dozens of other wargames published in the last few decades which just never caught on.

Business-wise this basically.