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Made in us
Giggling Nurgling





Random question here, but do human mercenary groups exist at all? Or would everything be entirely and 100% tithed guard regiments and the like? I know RTs and all have personal armies at times, as do significantly wealthy individuals and all, but I wasn't sure if there was any lore that supported someone just... founding a regiment, hashing out a paid contract with planetary governors or Imperial Generals and marching off as soldiers of fortune.
   
Made in gb
Moustache-twirling Princeps




United Kingdom

Yes - non-Imperial human mercenaries are mentioned in a few places, and Freeblade Knights have hired mercenary regiments to support them.
   
Made in gb
Preparing the Invasion of Terra






There's nothing stopping a group of Mercs from existing within the Imperium in fact Helsreach makes specific mention of two nobles who hired some. One hired a huge group which got his entire estate destroyed by Orks looking for a good scrap and another hired an elite team of ex-Guard who used guerilla tactics to keep the noble and his family safe.
   
Made in us
Giggling Nurgling





Any particular groups and all? Looking at humans and in regimental size or thereabouts for numbers. I'm guessing from both you guys' comments that its more a nobility/planetary governor hiring type deal than a Astra Militarum sort of thing. Trying to get a gauge on how the lore already is before I try and wind up with a square peg and a round hole situation.
   
Made in us
The Conquerer






Waiting for my shill money from Spiral Arm Studios

The lore is very mutable and accommodating for something like this.

If someone was wealthy enough they could raise their own private army, somewhere in the galaxy. The Imperium has very few overarching laws that apply universally, none of which prohibit people from owning weapons and selling their skills with said weapons. Any restrictions of such activity would be strictly a local thing, and as such an organization provides a useful service there is little incentive to prohibit that activity.

Every time the Imperium disbands a regiment, there are gonna be a bunch of soldiers out of a job, but most likely still having possession of their gear. So it just makes sense to start working for those who will pay for some veterans to guard/attack something.

It is certainly possible that the Imperium itself might even hire mercenaries if they can't get enough troops to a location in time. If a mercenary group is available and they have no other options, paying some sellswords to do a job is hardly a bad option. Distasteful? Perhaps, but remember the Imperium is ruthlessly practical. Human mercenaries are hardly even a blip on the Imperium's moral code.

Mercenaries probably would prefer private contracts to ones with the Imperium itself anyway. The Imperium doesn't have an official form of currency to pay said mercenaries with, aside from Tithe credits. Mercenaries would want actual cash they could spend locally. For that you're gonna want local clients who'll pay in local currency, gold, silver, etc...

That isn't to say they wouldn't find themselves involved in a large conflict. Some governor/imperial bureaucrat finds himself involved in a war and hires a regiment of mercs to do personal missions for him/protect his butt because the normal Imperial Guardsmen aren't beholden to his agenda. And whoever is in command of the conflict probably won't object to additional troops being present, even if they are there for someone else and not the larger war goals.

Self-proclaimed evil Cat-person. Dues Ex Felines

Cato Sicarius, after force feeding Captain Ventris a copy of the Codex Astartes for having the audacity to play Deathwatch, chokes to death on his own D-baggery after finding Calgar assembling his new Eldar army.

MURICA!!! IN SPESS!!! 
   
Made in gb
Preparing the Invasion of Terra






It could be a Militarum Regiment that got bored of being settled and instead chose to hire the remaining Veterans out as Mercs to fill the void of combat. Could be on the payroll of a local noble looking to get some glory for political reasons or the Munitorum might have hired them as a sort of short term combat buff, sort of like a PMC.
   
Made in us
Giggling Nurgling





Very good points, actually. So, theoretically, if a wealthy enough individual hired up a group of mercs, organized them, trained them, equipped them, and then set out for conquest and glory then its feasible.

Aight. May tinker with this concept a bit. Unsure if it'll be for a tabletop army or some fiction, but we'll see.
   
Made in fi
Regular Dakkanaut



Whiterun

I imagine one reason why merc don't show up more often is the lack of models to sell.

Knights got barely mentioned fluff, and never starred in stories before they got their current models.

If there was a dedicated range of mercenary models and a Codex for them, I reckon we'd see a lot more of them in stories.

Another more meta reason for their absence from stories is that much of the fluff is framed to be in some way propagandist in nature, or at least censored, for example Ciaphas Cain books are framed as censored excerpts of Cain memoirs.

To me it fits to the spirit of 40k that the use mercenaries is omitted from records, and credit for their achievements gets awarded to others, say Astartes.

Full of Power 
   
Made in gb
Battleship Captain




Your best source is the rogue trader book Battlefleet Korunus.

It goes into a lot of detail about the rules- the militis lex legis - covering mercs, and the mercenary licence - the pacto militarum - that lets you establish a mercenary company

Termagants expended for the Hive Mind: ~2835
 
   
Made in gb
Longtime Dakkanaut





I suppose anyone who hasn’t been drafted or tithed can pass themselves off as a mercenary if they have the kit.

However this 40K so I expect that if the imperium hired mercenaries they wouldn’t send them on a mission they wouldn’t come back from, avoiding payment
   
Made in gb
Longtime Dakkanaut




In theory, if you have money and maybe a spaceship or something, there'd be nothing stopping you raiding your own 'private' forces and offering them for sale. There's plenty organisations, groups and individuals in the Imperium that need security solutions both licay and on a bigger scale.

As far as the Imperium might see it, presumably they'd see this kind of thing as a 'civil' matter, assuming all contracts are signed and there's no whiff of any heresy.

In other words, could there be a G4(0K)S equivalent? Sure, why not!

greatest band in the universe: machine supremacy

"Punch your fist in the air and hold your Gameboy aloft like the warrior you are" 
   
Made in gb
Longtime Dakkanaut





Aren’t there even mercenary space marines? The broken shields, when there are just a few remaining members from a devastated chapter they go and get private work such as bodyguards for very wealthy/important planetary governors. I suppose they could undertake mercenary work unless it was against an imperial target.

And the non chaos renegade space marines must be available for the right price.
   
Made in it
Dark Angels Neophyte Undergoing Surgeries



Italy

mrFickle wrote:
Aren’t there even mercenary space marines? The broken shields, when there are just a few remaining members from a devastated chapter they go and get private work such as bodyguards for very wealthy/important planetary governors. I suppose they could undertake mercenary work unless it was against an imperial target.

And the non chaos renegade space marines must be available for the right price.
I think it is not possible outside the chaos during/after the Horus Heresy.

"The skies themselves burn, and we burn with them, yet we fight. This is our planet and ours alone."  
   
Made in gb
Preparing the Invasion of Terra






In the sandbox environment maybe there are some Merc Astartes out there but the hardliner in me says no.
Astartes might be independent but there are limits to this.
   
Made in us
Giggling Nurgling





So, here's what I'm looking at.

Wealthy individual, maybe the second or third son of a planetary governor, maybe just a generic nobleman's son, or whatnot decides he wants to play soldier and the PDF just isn't cutting it. Turns out he's got a sharp tactical mind and is a natural military officer. Dumps money out and suddenly he's got equipment and warm bodies.

Thinking primarily infantry with a few armored vehicles. The regiment is mostly, mostly uniform, but over time some stuff changes as new blood comes in. They recruit from wherever they go, so you've got everything from hive gangers and guard veterans who don't (or can't) settle down all the way to Bob from accounting who figures its now or never for an adventure of a (brief) lifetime.

Lets me use all the IG models, keep one general color scheme, and so long as equipment is mostly standard issue the officers don't care too much otherwise. So, the Catachan who just didn't feel like settling down after his service? He's in. The Krieger who failed to die for the Emperor and woke up on the field MIA a day later after his regiment had won and left? He's got a seat in the chimera. Bob from accounting? They taught him how to shoot, basic tactics, and how to not die too quick. Currently in the back of the chimera wondering what's he got himself into sitting between a giant slab of walking muscle and the creepy quasi-suicidal dude in the back of an armored death-mobile.
   
Made in us
The Conquerer






Waiting for my shill money from Spiral Arm Studios

You could definitely have a space marine go rogue and abandon their duty to the Imperium, but also not join Chaos. Maybe his mental conditioning was faulty so he decided to make his own way in the world.

Naturally, this is treacherous on the part of the Space Marine. So if the greater Imperial government catches him he'll be in trouble, but Space Marines are nigh mythical for most people so they may not think too deeply about it when confronted with a real life space marine. They may not even think twice about paying him for a job. They're just giving a servant of the Emperor what he needs.

IIRC, the Fallen members of the Dark Angels actually kinda sustain themselves with this kind of work. I seem to recall a novel where the main DA characters were investigating rumors of a Space Marine mercenary, who turned out to be a Fallen.

Self-proclaimed evil Cat-person. Dues Ex Felines

Cato Sicarius, after force feeding Captain Ventris a copy of the Codex Astartes for having the audacity to play Deathwatch, chokes to death on his own D-baggery after finding Calgar assembling his new Eldar army.

MURICA!!! IN SPESS!!! 
   
Made in us
Longtime Dakkanaut




The Space Wolves have effectively a permanent contract to provide Astartes to a Navigator House in exchange for services rendered. Mercenary doesn't for a moment mean Renegade.
   
Made in gb
Longtime Dakkanaut





I used the phrase broken shields, but it’s possible I meant black shields. Space marines that have abbadoned their legion or chapter for various reasons, some time banding together sometimes doing their own things
   
Made in us
Longtime Dakkanaut




mrFickle wrote:
I used the phrase broken shields, but it’s possible I meant black shields. Space marines that have abbadoned their legion or chapter for various reasons, some time banding together sometimes doing their own things


You're referring to 30k Blackshields...which really arent a thing at the present point in the timeline. Not to be confused with Blackshields that head over to the Deathwatch, which are an entirely different entity.
   
Made in gb
Preparing the Invasion of Terra






Blackshields were formed from disillusioned Astartes during the Heresy. They formed petty empires and raided both Loyalist and Traitor forces.
They weren't Mercs though just generally unaligned factions that by the time of the Scouring had either aligned themselves with Horus, the Imperium, or in very rare cases escaped eradication like the Ashen Claws, although they would be doomed to slow extinction cut off from the supplies gained from Imperial allegiance.
   
Made in gb
Longtime Dakkanaut





I think the point of my imaginings is that space marines are time and time again shown to be able to exert all the free will required to go off and do their own thing, including being a mercenary, assuming they aren’t caught and prosecuted as a traitor
   
Made in us
Regular Dakkanaut





Most mercenaries are going to be tied to a single planet or solar system. Most contracts will realistically consist of subfactions fighting among each other. Planetary nobility getting into squabbles or starting wars for fun, Necromunda style gangs fighting over turf, or some rando who needs protection from the local flora and fauna.

On the bigger scale, mercenaries moving between warzones are likely to be seeking employment from merchants, rogue traders, or pirates. You need someone who not only can afford to hire voidship and mercs, but someone who has political and financial interests spanning multiple star systems. Most such factions are effectively governments, and already have means to enlist or create armies from their own human subjects. Just like real Earth history, there is probably a significant revolving door between hired mercenaries, pirate/outlaw gangs, and the desperate and destitute. The types of factions willing and able to pay thousands of men, with their gear, to load up on a voidship and go jaunting around are few. And there's always the chance that an employee will renege on their promises--a Lord General gathering mercs only to conscript them in lieu of pay, a Mechanicus Magos using them for cannon fodder and stripping the survivors for spare parts, etc.

Then of course you have highly specialized groups like Knight houses, fighter wings, etc who can demand the sort of money and respect that going from warzone to warzone entails.

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/08/03 18:22:54


 
   
 
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