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Made in us
Pestilent Plague Marine with Blight Grenade





While the Guard undoubtedly have an advantage over the CSM in terms of artillery and numbers, it has been shown in the fluff that the lasgun, the standard issue weapon of nearly every Guardsman, is downright useless against power armor. Once any Marines close the gap, it should be pretty much over. I'm not quite sure how, fluff-wise, any Guard unit can win once Chaos Marines have closed the gap, unless the Guard have reinforcements from other sectors of the Imperial military. Thoughts?
   
Made in pl
Horrific Hive Tyrant





 ArcaneHorror wrote:
it has been shown in the fluff that the lasgun, the standard issue weapon of nearly every Guardsman, is downright useless against power armor.
It is useless when 1 guy shoots but multiply it by a dozens and it may make the difference. Also IG have heavy/special weapons too which can hurt even power armour.
   
Made in de
Boom! Leman Russ Commander






I don't know how canon this is over the fluff as a whole (I so far only read the Ciaphas Cain novels) but from what I have taken away powerarmor is - while incredibly resistant - not immun to lasgun fire. The vulnerable spots are tiny and some of them have to be hit by multiple lasbolts before they yield, but that is guard for you. If you have a hundred guns firing on full auto, there are alway some lucky shots. And usually they should outnumber CSMs by more than 1:100.
Imagine it that way: the CSM shrugs away one bolt after the other, but they just keep on coming. After 500 hits, his lenses go blind (because there is only that much punishment armored glass can take), One of his kneejoints isn't working anymore because the constant lasbolts have melted it together, and finally after another 500 hits, a lucky shot hits right through a tiny hole in his rebreather that was drilled by 20 former shots hitting that exact spot...

Also: remember Guardsmen (not all but some) carry Krak Grenades. If the CSM Closes he risks to eat some of those. He might survive them thanks to his armor, but the Guardsmen have only to get lucky once, he has to multiple times.

Note that I'm not saying a CSM could not just walz through a hundred or maybe even a thousand guardsmen. Just that even powerarmor has its limits when it has to take on 1000 of simultanous lasbolts.



a little non-Canon reference: in the Astartes videos on Youtube (part 2 I think) there is one Astartes whose killing spree is checked for a moment by a Twin Multilaser. The thing shredds a lot of minions before hitting the marine and while it does not seem to penetrate in the first one or two seconds, it forces him into cover as one can see that the powerarmor starts to suffer from all the impacts.

This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2021/01/07 14:55:19


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Battleship Captain




Exactly so.

But no, 99% of the time, guardsmen in a close-quarters firefight or melee against marines are dead.

But the problem is....so what?

Put this in perspective: a chapter's 'deployable force' is it's battle companies - companies 2 through 5 - and veterans drawn from the 1st. Broadly speaking, that's 400-500 fighting men.

An average hive world, with roughly today's proportion of armed personnel, would field something like 128 million soldiers. Even allowing for 75% not to be front line fighters, that means to knock out half the fighting force, each marine would have to kill sonething like 32,000 enemies.

Marines are amazing, but whilst they win battles, they're the ones who need support to win wars....

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Battleship Captain





Bristol (UK)

You also have to remember that not all Guardsmen carry lasguns.
The sergeant (who should really be a corporal) sometimes carries a boltgun, bolt pistol, and/or powersword, another Guardsman often carries a plasmagun or meltagun perhaps, two of men may be humping around a heavy bolter or something heavier.
All of those weapons can pose a reasonable threat to power armour. Plus the krak grenades the squad may have.
Plus there's specialist squads dedicated to these sorts of weapons and armoured vehicles carrying heavy weapons as well.

Lasguns themselves can find weak spots such as lenses or seals, especially when pushed to dangerous power settings. Some guardsman may even have acquired some hotshot packs.

I like to think of the Imperial Guard as a "modern" military similar to the 20th/21st Century.
Don't forget Chaos Marines would be an extremely rare sight, you'd have to have seriously pissed off the wrong person to find yourself deployed to a sector where they're attacking.
   
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Automated Rubric Marine of Tzeentch




dorset

as others have said, in the Lore, the key is concentration of fire, of getting such a high volume of fire onto the CSMs that thousand to one shots repeatedly happen. that, and all the non-lasgun weapons are brought to bear, the heavy bolters, the autocannons and missile launchers, the fire support form tanks, artillery and aircraft....

all that said, the Traitors know this as well, and are superhumanly good at planning around those advantages, finding the weak spot in the defences, etc.

So, they can still win battles, but suffer casualties in return, and a few dozen guardsmen for a single marine is still a favourable rate of exchange.

Spoiler:
The sergeant (who should really be a corporal) sometimes carries a boltgun, bolt pistol, and/or powersword, another Guardsman often carries a plasmagun or meltagun perhaps, two of men may be humping around a heavy bolter or something heavier.


just to go on a tangent here, but sergeants are often squad leaders in many modern militaries (The US in particular), with the British army being something of an exception in this regard by using corporals as section leaders. Now, while GW is a British company, the Imperial guard is not based directly on the British army, but on a mish-mash of different military traditions borrowed form various pop-culture sources(US in vietnam, ww2 russia, Lawrence of arabia, napoleonic drill with modern weapons, world war 1 germans, world war 2 germans, etc) most of which are American (or are introduced into pop culture though a american lens) and based on the US army rank structure.

thus, the guard is structured like what a non-military layperson thinks it should be: sergeants as squad leaders, lieutenants in platoon command with no platoon sgt or ssgt to assist/control them. companies are commanded by captians, not majors, and theirs almost no senior NCOs in sight. Field grade officers, and even generals, are commanding their units (units which are often vastly bigger than they should be in charge of, given thier rank), form a small foxhole with a single radioman for a HQ, or form the front with sidearm blazing. the army is mostly still un-mechanized foot infantry that walks into battle, with almost no command structure above the regimental level.

I could go on, but the point is that of sins against real world military, using sargents as squad commanders (in the manner of many real world armies) is among the least of them.

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/01/07 16:36:56


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Nuremberg

The background that is written from the perspective of space marines amps up their power because the point of space marines in fiction is a power fantasy.

The background written from the perspective of the Guard is more reasonable (though can also go over the top into power fantasy, as in Traitor General or whatever).

In my view the background has to be taken with a truckload of salt. The Guard will aim for weaker joints on the armour where possible, trying to hit an eye, an unhelmted head (given loads of them don't wear helmets), joints or whatever.

   
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 ArcaneHorror wrote:
While the Guard undoubtedly have an advantage over the CSM in terms of artillery and numbers, it has been shown in the fluff that the lasgun, the standard issue weapon of nearly every Guardsman, is downright useless against power armor. Once any Marines close the gap, it should be pretty much over. I'm not quite sure how, fluff-wise, any Guard unit can win once Chaos Marines have closed the gap, unless the Guard have reinforcements from other sectors of the Imperial military. Thoughts?


If you're basing the fact that lasguns are useless against power armor on bolterporn videos like Astartes, then other bolterporn videos prove that Chaos Space marines actually use a form of power armor made from papier mache rather than plastomantiocrete or whatever.

And they've also all been reduced from human-level intelligence to somewhere below a suicidal gorilla.

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/01/07 19:36:47


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As others have said, sheer volume of fire.

However I personally would view many of the "kills" by lasguns against CSM to be not actually lethal. They may be enough to incapacitate the Marine but if they can be evacuated (or their side takes the battlefield), they can actually be patched up.

Of course there are hits by meltaguns, lascannons, and the like which I would expect to be lethal.
   
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Tzeentch Veteran Marine with Psychic Potential





Kildare, Ireland

The point of power armour is that its very protective when used effectively- IE, like a knight used his armour, or a modern soldier uses theirs. Knights were not immune to enemy fire and didnt stand in the open inviting it.

If the Chaos marine can use APCs or field-craft to close the distance, he will be effective trading fire with the guard from cover, as he can afford to expose himself to enemy fire briefly to make 1 hit kills.

If he has to charge in the open getting hit by lasbolts with no cover or cultists to soak up that fire, his armour will heat up if it is not penetrated outright.Optical systems/autosenses fail, motive fibre bundles fuse and seize as their controls are disabled.

If he slows down or has his reflexes impaired he is a sweet target for snipers. Most of Astartes warfare is dsigned around creating the first scenario and avoiding the second.
   
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Junior Officer with Laspistol





London, Ontario

It's been said above, but 1 lasgun does not a victory make. 10 doesn't make a victory, even 100 isn't good odds... but 1000? Yup, that will do work.

Plus the Plasmaguns, Grenades, Missile Launchers, Lascannons, and other support weapons. Just like on the tabletop.

If a Marine makes it to CC with a Guardsman, that Guardsman's going to die. So... you fire a battle cannon at them and grant your fellow Guardsman a mercifully brief death. And then the Commissar gives you a cookie for following orders. Tea and Medals for all survivors!


If you think about it, the Astartes creation process has something like a 1% survival rate, or something ridiculous like that. So if you trade 100:1, the Guardsmen are still winning because there are a couple million of them deployed to a given warzone. The utterly staggering numbers of soldiers deployed make any kind of protracted warfare an inevitable loss. By the time you need to start *considering* your casualty rate, you've already lost.

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/01/07 21:58:04


 
   
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Norn Queen






One flashlight is worthless.

Over 9000 flashlights can create a black hole though sheer radiation pressure.

Power Armour isn't totally invulnerable, it's actually pretty weak in context of protection available in the 40k universe.

Astartes Power armour provides good protection against small arms fire, and still provides strength and mobility. Tactical Dreadnought Armour sacrifices all mobility for the ability to shrug off anything but dedicated anti-tank weaponry.
   
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Pestilent Plague Marine with Blight Grenade





the_scotsman wrote:
 ArcaneHorror wrote:
While the Guard undoubtedly have an advantage over the CSM in terms of artillery and numbers, it has been shown in the fluff that the lasgun, the standard issue weapon of nearly every Guardsman, is downright useless against power armor. Once any Marines close the gap, it should be pretty much over. I'm not quite sure how, fluff-wise, any Guard unit can win once Chaos Marines have closed the gap, unless the Guard have reinforcements from other sectors of the Imperial military. Thoughts?


If you're basing the fact that lasguns are useless against power armor on bolterporn videos like Astartes, then other bolterporn videos prove that Chaos Space marines actually use a form of power armor made from papier mache rather than plastomantiocrete or whatever.

And they've also all been reduced from human-level intelligence to somewhere below a suicidal gorilla.


I'm basing it on the scene in Avenging Son when a group of Guardsmen unleash their entire supply of ammo into a World Eater and barely scratch him. There's also a scene in Dark Imperium where the Death Guard aren't phased in the least bit by lasers, though Plague Marines are something of a different animal.
   
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Dakka Veteran





The real-world equivalent of lasguns (rifles, SMGs, etc.) are also largely useless at killing people. In battle, the overwhelming majority (90%+) of casualties are inflicted by artillery, machine guns, and other heavy weapons.

That's not to say that small arms are useless. They are very useful for pinning the enemy down, forcing him to keep his head down, and flushing him out of cover during an assault. But very few soldiers suffer wounds from rifle bullets.

Now, 40K is not the real world, etc etc. But the Imperial Guard does have its artillery and heavy weapons, and I expect those would do most of the killing against Chaos Marines.

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Longtime Dakkanaut




 ArcaneHorror wrote:
the_scotsman wrote:
 ArcaneHorror wrote:
While the Guard undoubtedly have an advantage over the CSM in terms of artillery and numbers, it has been shown in the fluff that the lasgun, the standard issue weapon of nearly every Guardsman, is downright useless against power armor. Once any Marines close the gap, it should be pretty much over. I'm not quite sure how, fluff-wise, any Guard unit can win once Chaos Marines have closed the gap, unless the Guard have reinforcements from other sectors of the Imperial military. Thoughts?


If you're basing the fact that lasguns are useless against power armor on bolterporn videos like Astartes, then other bolterporn videos prove that Chaos Space marines actually use a form of power armor made from papier mache rather than plastomantiocrete or whatever.

And they've also all been reduced from human-level intelligence to somewhere below a suicidal gorilla.


I'm basing it on the scene in Avenging Son when a group of Guardsmen unleash their entire supply of ammo into a World Eater and barely scratch him. There's also a scene in Dark Imperium where the Death Guard aren't phased in the least bit by lasers, though Plague Marines are something of a different animal.


Actually I thought there was a scene in Dark Imperium where a Plague Marine did eventually fall to lasgun fire. The rest of the Plague Marines still prevailed but it showed that enough shots (or lucky shots) will still take even Plague Marines out.
   
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Dakka Veteran



South Africa

Depending on which book you read they can't or they can with minor difficulty.

Ciaphas killed at least one in HTH but chalked it up to them being previously incapacitated.

Gaunt ambushed some who were ambushing an armoured convoy and dispatched them with only minor effort.

It's all just fantasy anyway.

KBK 
   
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Nuremberg

I like to imagine the game stats are actually representative of the power in universe. So Space Marines just suddenly became a LOT more resilient, and now match the fiction closer. I preferred when they only had 1 wound.

   
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Battleship Captain





Bristol (UK)

Problem with that though is that game stats vary depending on game.

For example, in 40k a bolter is rapid fire, 24" range, S4, AP0, D1.
In Necromunda it's rapid fire, 24" range, S4, but AP-1 and D2.
Meanwhilst, overcharged plasma in Necromunda is single shot, 24" range, S7, AP-2 and D3, 'Gets Hot'.
So it doesn't even scale evenly with 40k.

Game stats and rules are to fix within the context of the game, nothing more.

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/01/08 10:58:20


 
   
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Revving Ravenwing Biker



Wrexham, North Wales

I can't be the only one who'd like to see a video of platoon of guardsmen (ie well trained, well equipped, disciplined soldiers) defeat a marine squad (chaos or otherwise), including an officer taking a marine down with a power weapon.

I guess we can't have the ubermensch brought low by hoi polloi.
   
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Ridin' on a Snotling Pump Wagon






As explained? Numbers. Sheer numbers.

Because it’s not just Lasguns, is it? Grenades, special weapons, specialist squads, tanks, artillery. Thousands upon thousands of armed soldiers.

A hundred Guardsmen lost is nothing. But each fallen Marine (particularly for Traitors, who don’t have the resources of a Chapter) is a significant loss.

Do also keep in mind that relatively few Chaos Marine forces are more than a handful.

If you’ve got a raiding party of 20 nutters, such losses may prove very difficult to replace.

Then factor in that the Guard just don’t care. Sure, you could be tearing through a Platoon. But that means the Guard know where you are. And the opportunity to lob shells at you, and deal a crippling blow is more than worth any casualties caused on their own side by shelling a position.

This is why Chaos relies so heavily on Cultists - not all of whom are robe wearing loonies. It’s those Little Guys that keep the Imperium searching its ranks for further traitors, buying the time for the Marines to do what they need to get done.

   
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One might point out that Power armor is highly susceptable to being stabbed by bugs, or bug people, or even other power armored people with big knives. It's not immune to shooting.

That being said, not all guardsmen are conscripts. Most have training with their weapons, and can use precise aimed and volleyed fire. Guant's sniper Larken (With a long las) headshots over 10 Chaos Bezerkers in one book alone. It's not impossible.
   
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I would like to point out that the book where Guant's Ghosts killed a 5-man squad of Chaos marines, they were supported by an unknown number (scores at least) of local natives who employed some sort of magnetic crossbow armed with poison darts. They killed one - the dumb marine without a helmet, by pumping his head full of dozens of darts. All the natives served as basically distraction though, while Gaunt's Ghosts mostly took the other four out with sniper rounds through eye lenses, etc., and Gaunt himself killed one with his powersword (striking while the marine was distracted). The marines were shown as far, far too dismissive of the threat, incredibly arrogant and overconfident, rushed into an ambush and had no reason to suspect that Gaunt would be supported by a mini army of locals. So, (at least in that book) he didn't just casually kill them.

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Nuremberg

Hmmm. I really disliked that sequence to be honest, and I am not one of these people who needs Space Marines to be Goku levels of overpowered. It just seemed like they did not really represent a threat, and I think they proper should.

I remember the scene in First and Only when the Plague Marine shows up, and it is a real "Oh gak!" moment, and they bring it down with hot shot lasgun fire.

   
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I think I was talking about the 1st book? where they assault the secret underground base with the forbidden technology (Trying to avoid spoilers here) and Larkin gets left up top to stop the assaulting Chaos Forces.

there is also the scene in a book where he is visited by a literal Saint, and takes out a bunch of "Chaos troops" with just his rifle?

Finally there is the assault of Vervin Hive, where he and I think several other scouts personally hold off the invasion of one of the gates, of assaulting Chaos forces.

I don't know if abnett means power armor chaos boys, but in the first book it is very clearly Khorne bezerkers.

Now all in all, Abnett plays extremely fast and loose with the fluff, and all his characters can do things that normal humans cant. Only Sandy Mitchell comes second in terms of normal human ridiculousness. (Cain outduels a Black Legion Chaos Space Marine Captain in single combat)

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/01/08 15:44:42


 
   
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Nuremberg

Space Marines get to kill major heroes of other factions in their fiction all the time. I got no problem with other factions doing it back.

   
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South Africa

 Grumblewartz wrote:
I would like to point out that the book where Guant's Ghosts killed a 5-man squad of Chaos marines, they were supported by an unknown number (scores at least) of local natives who employed some sort of magnetic crossbow armed with poison darts. They killed one - the dumb marine without a helmet, by pumping his head full of dozens of darts. All the natives served as basically distraction though, while Gaunt's Ghosts mostly took the other four out with sniper rounds through eye lenses, etc., and Gaunt himself killed one with his powersword (striking while the marine was distracted). The marines were shown as far, far too dismissive of the threat, incredibly arrogant and overconfident, rushed into an ambush and had no reason to suspect that Gaunt would be supported by a mini army of locals. So, (at least in that book) he didn't just casually kill them.


But according to the Lore some would say that 5 Marines are enough to subdue a planet. What's that post human dread thing and the speed enhancement of the Marines means a platoon v platoon should go to the Marines in easily 99.999999999999%bof engagements.

KBK 
   
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Nuremberg

5 marines to control a planet only works if the planet is the planet from The Little Prince.

   
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II'd say more 19th century Zanzibar. Conquered in approximately half an hour by the Royal Navy....Morale's important if the revolting populace are more loyal to the Imperium than the revolting leader 5 marines to kill him will rather easily subdue a world.

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 Llamahead wrote:
II'd say more 19th century Zanzibar. Conquered in approximately half an hour by the Royal Navy....Morale's important if the revolting populace are more loyal to the Imperium than the revolting leader 5 marines to kill him will rather easily subdue a world.


Exactly - the vast majority of a sane normal world would be non-combatants. So the Marines only have to kill their way through the leader's guard to get to them. Furthermore don't forget marines are basically angels from the god-emperor of mankind in the setting. After a while shooting them moral is going to fragment fast. Not only is small arms doing nothing but they are screaming at you about the Emperor and killing those going against his will etc... One would expect a world that isn't corrupted would start having many turning tail and turncoating and joining the marines.




And yep +1 to all the above in terms of the guard using a lot of other weapons other than lasguns. Those are there for your grunts, but you've got loads of other weapons along the way. Also look outside of weapons. Sappers and trenching teams can setup traps, pitfalls and explosive wiretraps and the like. Why not lure that marine until he's standing on a mound of C4 and then set it off. Sure you lose many troops in luring the marine to that spot, but then he's blown to bits. They just aren't going to stand toe to toe one on one with Chaos marines - esp if those marines come with allies like demons, psychers and the like.

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 Llamahead wrote:
II'd say more 19th century Zanzibar. Conquered in approximately half an hour by the Royal Navy....Morale's important if the revolting populace are more loyal to the Imperium than the revolting leader 5 marines to kill him will rather easily subdue a world.


Does it really count as conquering a planet if the population were already loyal to the Imperium? I think it's just a silly bit of background.

   
 
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