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Not sure if this is the best home for this thread but hey ho and away we go.

So I've been reading up on some of the early background articles on the process behind which SM are converted from aspiring youngsters to one of the Emperor's finest death dealers and it occured to me that giving power armour to SM seems like a waste resources. Granted when it comes to void fighting, clearing space hulks etc it makes some sense and there's an argument for putting the Emp's finest inside the best armour the Imperium can muster to keep them safe, but given the nature of the process it does seem like a waste. You give them the ability to breathe poisonous atmosphere, but then put them in a suit with a rebreather. You go to great lengths to harden their skin and engineer them both chemically and materially to be much stronger, faster and more hardy than the average human, but then you put them inside a suit that needs a power pack and a neural interface to work properly.

It just seems very odd. Surely you'd get more mileage out of just having Space Marines fight without their power armour, and give the power armour to soldiers who are brave/intelligent/cunning etc, but physically a little weak? Or alternatively, just not bother with a bunch of the SM organs to speed up the process and reduce the failure rate among aspirants? I can see some of the arguments for combining the two but it just seems a little inefficient.

Thoughts?

Pure logic is not the best way to approach the 40k universe (or indeed any universe )

But there are some in universe "reasons"

Flak armour is not the only armour available for non Marines - even ignoring Sisters of Battle and Silence who both use power armour in thew ay you suggest, many Imperial Guard regiments have much better than Flak, it can laser reflective, light powered - there are even some steampunk battlesuit users.
Marines suffer little degredation of ability even with a armour breech or major damage.
Image and tradition matter - so paragons of the Imperium wear Power Armour, its availability is artificaly restricted.
The Imperium is often innefficent but there are politics and milleniums of history behind what appears to be odd desicions - look at any insitution or organisation that been around for a few years and stuff starts to creep in, make that 10,000 years and stuff becomes so ingrained its part of the relgiious beliefs....

Power armor does much more for a Space Marine than listed above. In no particular order it significantly boosts:

speed
agility
strenght
communication
threat analysis
targetting
protection from blast, kenetic, radiation, sonic, atmosphere
system backups
interface to marine vehicles

If you need troops that can function in poisonous atmospheres, you take IG and give them rebreathers. Even taking vet IG and giving them amazing rebreathers is super cheap compared to taking Marines.

If you need troops with body armor, you give your IG Carapace Armor (which is just a 4+). It may be half as good, but cost only a small fraction of the resources.

Space Marines aren't for when you need armored troops, or void-capable troops, or even really-super-good troops. They're for when you need the absolute best of the best, no expense spared, army-of-one BAMFs. In almost any engagement, you're overspending on either Power Armor or Marines; two Carapace Armors do more than one Power Armor. Two IG Vets do more than than one Marine.

So the IoM mostly produces IG. Mostly produces cost-effective good gear, and well-trained well-equipped soldiers. The Lasgun and IG armor are actually *really good*. The IG and Navy take on the average xenos or traitor or rebel or whathaveyou with ease. But when facing unstoppable tides of spore-creatures, living fleets, ancient robot aliens, literal demigods, Lovecraftian horrors, or other such 40k powers, "Professional, well-equipped, well-trained, and well-run" simply doesn't look to measure up. So they face it in bulk.

Marines aren't the backbone of the Imperium. They're supposed to be the 'Angels' of the Emperor, not his 'Shield'. They're small sects of warrior-monks. Ideally used as "super-Marines" - used in small concentrations for specific missions that require the most force possible in the smallest squad possible.

Looked at that way, Marines vs IG makes sense.

Marines are only a fraction

Maybe too small of a fraction. So small they don't really make sense.

They make sense, if they are used as a fraction. As a tool for a larger fighting force. They don't make sense as a fighting force in anything but a grimdark, regressive society.

They're about the right fraction of the IoM's forces, at least.

I can't really agree with that. I know I'm outnumbered. Don't really care.

That would be like giving your faction's killiest relic weapon to a line trooper instead of your most competent warlord.

Also you're probably more likely to lose that power armour if given to a slow, stupid and weak human

IG are faster than marines in 8th. Just sayin.

Yes. Equipment goes to those who need it most. Guardsmen are strong and need only t-shirts and flashlights to slaughter the enemies of the Imperium. Marines are weak and need the best equipment to have any chance of success.

 Peregrine wrote:
Yes. Equipment goes to those who need it most. Guardsmen are strong and need only t-shirts and flashlights to slaughter the enemies of the Imperium. Marines are weak and need the best equipment to have any chance of success.

When you put it that way...

If only the IG were the premier force that GW promoted, and Space Marines were only available as a single squad in that army would you see the canon purpose for Space Marines. (Especially if they were given a special rule like 'Scratch my Back', allowing you to center blasts on them if they were in melee).

(And why I adored Inquisitor Lord Karamazov when I ran Guard in 6th\7th)

Wow. Another space marine hate thread? it's only been like 3 weeks.

I'll give you a serious answer. Power armor is designed for space marines because it makes them more lethal. Space marines have special augments that allow them to interface with the armor and it also enhances their speed and strength even more.to such a degree that they function as a force multiplier in the extreme. Often the tides of battle are changes just for a few of them being in an area.

I suppose one thing we an agree on is that powered armour provides more protection than flak armour.

The time investment in in Space Marines means that you would want to protect them more, so give them better armour, regardless of their physical strength and endurance.
Also if you have a limited supply of amazing and relic weapons you will give them to your best soldiers, who are arguably Sly Ma...er I mean Space Marines.
Power Armour and Bolters are also the signature tools of the Space Marine... while they may not be effective against the entire might of the Imperial Guard, they are inspirational too!

TarkinLarson wrote:
I suppose one thing we an agree on is that powered armour provides more protection than flak armour.

Not really.

1 suit of Power Armor provides more protection than 1 suit of Flak Armor.

But 1 generic unit of resources/logistics of Power Armor provides less protection than 1 generic unit of resources/logistics of Flak Armor. Because Flak Armor is so much cheaper to produce, and is COTS.

Quantity is a quality too.

Bharring wrote:

TarkinLarson wrote:
I suppose one thing we an agree on is that powered armour provides more protection than flak armour.

Not really.

1 suit of Power Armor provides more protection than 1 suit of Flak Armor.

But 1 generic unit of resources/logistics of Power Armor provides less protection than 1 generic unit of resources/logistics of Flak Armor. Because Flak Armor is so much cheaper to produce, and is COTS.

Quantity is a quality too.

Flak armor basically protects you from falling debris. Power armor protects against everything short of direct anti tank hits.

Power Armor protects you.

Equal cost of Flak Armor protects an entire... division?

And Flak Armor protects against most weapons. Just not legendary artifacts that spew energy in physical form. Or eldrich demigods. Or swords that can cut through tanks.

its a logistics impossibility to give every guardsman power armor. Now the Interects (spelling i forget) from the first horus heresey did have thier troops all in a smaller form of power armor, bu on the scale of the imperium and the number of engagments they are in that would be impossible to keep up with.

even in today's military the gear special forces are issued/ carry is leaps and bounds above what the standard grunt get. we are talking ceramic plates, force absorbtion through special under armor padding, weaves of synthetic fibers everywhere that make them abotu at resistant to conventional arms as one can reasonably be. But the cost and resoarces to equip every member of the military with said gear would be astronomical.

Power armor is given to the elites sent to the highest value units. It takes a lot of effort to make an elite space marine, and it takes comprably zero effort to train your typical guardsman. honestly the lasgun and the flakk armor are probably of more value to the imperium than the person wearing it.

"Marines aren't the backbone of the Imperium. They're supposed to be the 'Angels' of the Emperor, not his 'Shield'. They're small sects of warrior-monks. Ideally used as "super-Marines" - used in small concentrations for specific missions that require the most force possible in the smallest squad possible. "

This explains it best for me,

I also think that one of my main problems with 40K is that
the rules don't equal (or even come close to) the fluff

I still love the setting and minis, and still play the game!

If you want to use the minis in a different rules set that can better match the fluff of 40k,
try the old Tomorrow's War from ambush alley
(sadly out of print)

Chris

""Marines aren't the backbone of the Imperium. They're supposed to be the 'Angels' of the Emperor, not his 'Shield'. They're small sects of warrior-monks. Ideally used as "super-Marines" - used in small concentrations for specific missions that require the most force possible in the smallest squad possible."

Nothing says this more than being fed into a Tau gunline by the dozens. Or being liquified by IG artillery you can't see.

Bharring wrote:
Power Armor protects you.

Equal cost of Flak Armor protects an entire... division?

And Flak Armor protects against most weapons. Just not legendary artifacts that spew energy in physical form. Or eldrich demigods. Or swords that can cut through tanks.

This is true... but it's a bit hard to quantify as we don't know the worth of a space marine vs a guardsman, and assumes that power armour is as available as flak armour. We're not arguing the worth of the guardsman vs space marine.... we're debating if powered armour is wasted on space marines being as they have other augmentations and skills.

You couldn't put all guardsmen in power armour as there is not enough of it. There is enough for Space Marines... it's kind of a force multiplier. A space marine without weapons or armour is more powerful than a guardsman (or 10, or how many?) with nothing. Give them all a gun - the 10 guardsmen would probably kill the space marine with lasweapons if he had a boltgun (and all were naked). Pop him in powered armour and them in flak and he'll probably kill all 10 of them. Now put a guardsman in powered armour and a boltgun and the marine in powered armour and a boltgun.... the space marine should win as he has faster reactions, durability etc. Put 10 guardsmen in powered armour and 1 space marine in powered armour with weapons, and the space marine will probably die then... the strength of the guardsmen is in numbers... 10 flak vests probably are cheaper than 1 powered armour suit... and I'd argue overall the the strength of the imperium is in the guard, not the space marines over... but given the limited number of powered armours (otherwise everyone would have them) it's probably worth giving them to the space marines - especially given the mythical and legendary and inspirational abilities of the space marines as "angels".

TarkinLarson wrote:

Bharring wrote:
Power Armor protects you.

Equal cost of Flak Armor protects an entire... division?

And Flak Armor protects against most weapons. Just not legendary artifacts that spew energy in physical form. Or eldrich demigods. Or swords that can cut through tanks.

This is true... but it's a bit hard to quantify as we don't know the worth of a space marine vs a guardsman, and assumes that power armour is as available as flak armour. We're not arguing the worth of the guardsman vs space marine.... we're debating if powered armour is wasted on space marines being as they have other augmentations and skills.

You couldn't put all guardsmen in power armour as there is not enough of it. There is enough for Space Marines... it's kind of a force multiplier. A space marine without weapons or armour is more powerful than a guardsman (or 10, or how many?) with nothing. Give them all a gun - the 10 guardsmen would probably kill the space marine with lasweapons if he had a boltgun (and all were naked). Pop him in powered armour and them in flak and he'll probably kill all 10 of them. Now put a guardsman in powered armour and a boltgun and the marine in powered armour and a boltgun.... the space marine should win as he has faster reactions, durability etc. Put 10 guardsmen in powered armour and 1 space marine in powered armour with weapons, and the space marine will probably die then... the strength of the guardsmen is in numbers... 10 flak vests probably are cheaper than 1 powered armour suit... and I'd argue overall the the strength of the imperium is in the guard, not the space marines over... but given the limited number of powered armours (otherwise everyone would have them) it's probably worth giving them to the space marines - especially given the mythical and legendary and inspirational abilities of the space marines as "angels".

tabletop sure, fluffwise probably the space marine in power armor defeats the 10 guardsman in power armor. When Horus met the Interects (sp?) he and his guard are partially unarmed/armored and the interects had full on bolters and power armor/weapons and the handful of space marines still escapes with 1 person capured, and zero other losses if I recall correctly. a few injuries but relatively unscathed from a whioel city force trying to capture them

On the TT, the're even more not-wasted-on-Marines.

Would you rather face:
10 Marines with a 5+ and 10 Guardsmen with a 3+
Or
10 Marines with a 3+ and 10 Guardsmen with a 5+

The first case makes it a no brainer to kill the more elite guys in weaker armor first.

Ratius wrote:Power armor does much more for a Space Marine than listed above. In no particular order it significantly boosts:

speed
agility
strenght
protection from blast, kenetic, radiation, sonic, atmosphere

The entire point of the thread is that a SM already has these qualities significantly enhanced vs a normal human. The suit of armour requires a backpack power unit and motors/servos, which implies that the SM's enhanced strength is largely wasted because the suit is doing most of the work anyway, thus it would be more efficient to either a) give the suit to some other highly capable but non-enhanced humans, think along the lines of Scions or such like, while SM became more lightly armoured troops, perhaps focusing on stealth and guerilla work, or b) that the process of creating SM could be made more efficient with less deaths during the development stage by not giving them as many implants, on the principle that the suit will provide them with the strength, speed and resilience required while the human inside will bring the determination/psychotic attitude required.

Snake Tortoise wrote:Also you're probably more likely to lose that power armour if given to a slow, stupid and weak human

Who said anything about giving it to the slow or the stupid. I explicitly stated you would give it to highly cunning and/or intelligent humans. You don't lose anything by giving it to a weak human, because that's the entire point of having power armour; it has a power pack on the back precisely so it can fee energy to the motors and servos and confer super human strength upon its user.

Xenomancers wrote:Wow. Another space marine hate thread?

How is this a SM hate thread in any way, shape or form? The underlying premise of the question is that SM are highly robust, strong, athletic fighters, and as such don't need power armour in the first place. I can't see how praising the basic excellence of a SM neophyte constitutes hate?

G00fySmiley wrote:its a logistics impossibility to give every guardsman power armor.

Indeed. Which is why nobody that I can see in this thread is suggesting doing that.

TarkinLarson wrote:We're not arguing the worth of the guardsman vs space marine.... we're debating if powered armour is wasted on space marines being as they have other augmentations and skills.

At least someone read the opening post.

To discuss if it's "worth" it, you have to compare other options - do you mean worth it compared to giving the Power Armor to Guardsmen? Compared to building more Flak Armor? Compared to making a really nice shiny chair?

That's where Guardsmen come in. Because the question is "what else would you do with those resources". Because, if you have no answer to that question, there's no value in *not* giving Marines PA. Making it a trivial question.

Bharring wrote:
Power Armor protects you.

Equal cost of Flak Armor protects an entire... division?

And Flak Armor protects against most weapons. Just not legendary artifacts that spew energy in physical form. Or eldrich demigods. Or swords that can cut through tanks.

Flak armor is basically kevlar...it is close to useless against laser weapons.

 Ratius wrote:
Power armor does much more for a Space Marine than listed above. In no particular order it significantly boosts:

speed
agility
strenght
communication
threat analysis
targetting
protection from blast, kenetic, radiation, sonic, atmosphere
system backups
interface to marine vehicles

I think the point is that it can also do those things for refular soldiers so why not spread the resources around instead of doubling up on your investment into you gene-enhanced super soldiers.

Concentration.

If it makes you 50% harder to kill and 50% deadlier, and you have guys that are 50% harder to kill and 50% deadlier.

The 50% harder to kill from the armor allows the 50% deadlier part of the Marine to be leveraged further.

The 50% deadlier from the armor goes further on a Marine because they're 50% harder to kill.

Put another way, if a normal guy is 100% normal survivable and 100% normal deadly, a marine is 200%/200%, and armor is +100%/+100%, you get to double dip on both categories on the Marine.

Put the PA on a normal guy, and you're so deadly you kill twice as many guys in the same scenario. And you live twice as long, so twice as many scenarios. You get a 4x improvement, which means allocating the PA to the normal guy gave you effectively +3 normal guys.

Put the PA on a Marine, and you're now at 300%/300%. Sure, you only improved his deadliness and survivability by half vs improving the Guardsman by doubling it. But he went from being 4x as good (twice as killy, twice as durable) to being 9x as good (three times as killy, three times as durable). Putting the PA on the Marine effectively gave you +5 normal guys.

So a PA Guy + Marine would be worth 8 "normal guys", whereas Guy + PA Marine would be worth 10 "normal guys".

(All numbers are directionally accurate, but not numerically accurate, obviously.)

All that is assuming the enhnacements are directly additive; that there's no positive synergy between armor and being super killy/durable.

Martel732 wrote:
""Marines aren't the backbone of the Imperium. They're supposed to be the 'Angels' of the Emperor, not his 'Shield'. They're small sects of warrior-monks. Ideally used as "super-Marines" - used in small concentrations for specific missions that require the most force possible in the smallest squad possible."

Nothing says this more than being fed into a Tau gunline by the dozens. Or being liquified by IG artillery you can't see.

Power armor is always going to lose to a direct shot from a tank (or artillery), there’s just no way around that. You send guardsmen in against that stuff in the first place; marines are better utilized for CQC, not artillery target practice.

Where it’s most useful is against other infantry. Unless the enemy infantry is packing anti-tank Weapons, I don’t think it’s unreasonable to get 2-3:1 odds on marine efficiency.

From where I'm sitting, power armor loses to pulse rifles pretty damn fast.