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Today I've been looking at some Sternguard conversion for an upcoming Imperial Fist army I'm hoping to start and a question kept popping into my head.

Would Sternguard keep what MK power armour they were originally issued with or would they receive the newest version of power armour upon promotion?

This also leads me to a follow up question, will all new recruits then receive MK8 power armour as the forge worlds wouldn't continually make out of date versions would they?

I understand that the 40k universe has reverse technology in a way as tech priests have lost the ability to make certain pieces of equipment to the standard pre-heresy but surely the increasing MKs in power armour post-heresy must be improving (so MK4 onwards) in some small way right?

Cheers
Pastel

Some forgeworlds may only be able to make older variants because they never got retooled. Also Marines (and the Imperium at large) are funny in that they venerate older technology. Partly because of tradition and partly because the older stuff is actually more advanced/better. So veterans would probably be more likely to be in older marks of armour as they would be more inclined to access venerated chapter relics. New marines are likely to get whatever is available at the time, which might be brand new kit fresh from the chapter forges or the local forgeworld, or might be a hodge podge of older, not so venerated bits and pieces, depending on how good the chapter's supply line currently is.

They may also get issued armour depending in their role. Mk3 for instanceis still recommended for boarding actions due to its reinforced breastplate.

 Flinty wrote:
a hodge podge of older, not so venerated bits and pieces, depending on how good the chapter's supply line currently is

Lookin at you, Marines Malevolent

Cheers for info peeps. I was driving myself crazy this afternoon trying to figure this out by myself.

Sternguard would normally have quite mismatched armour. By the time a marine has reached veteran status he's usually inherited a fair few older armour pieces that may have been worn by great heroes of the chapter, or were present at great battles. Then there's broken armour parts being replaced by older/newer spares.
New marines don't get a suit of brand new armour. They get an old hand me down from the armoury, Mk.VIII is very hard to come by, most chapters only have a couple of suits at best. The IoM can't produce PA en masse, it takes a very long time for a suit to be produced these days, and most forge worlds can only make certain marks of armour, if any.