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How is it possible that the Homeworld of the Emperor's favorite son, the home world of the Blood Angels, didn't have titans in the defense of Baal? Or at the very least, some Ad-Mech help? It seems like the only thing they had was a Team Fortress Style Castle manned by PDFs, serfs, the populace, IG Troops, and Blood Angels/Sub Chapters? Am I wrong here? Looking at the total forces lost lists no admech support, only Naval and Astartes forces.

I mean, even Ultramar boasts several legions of titans. Hell, it's the sole spot of real military power of the entire southern half of the segmentum, and it gets no Legio Titanicus support? Is this normal? Do the Blood Ravens have some form of enmity with the Ad Mech?

Because neither the Titan Legions or Mechanicus are beholden to the Astartes and the Astartes very much like not having people sticking their mechatendrites in their business, especially when they have a tower full of vampire monsters and raging lunatics.

And yet the lore is full of examples of Titans moving at the command of Astartes. Aren't all "tech marines" essentially Astartes/Mechanicus line sitters?

FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:
And yet the lore is full of examples of Titans moving at the command of Astartes.

Name one time.
Once.
Horus Heresy doesn't count eaither as this was under a differant orginizational schema.

Do Titan Legions when deployed into a warzone sometimes DIFFER to the overall theater command of a space marine? Yes, there is examples of that. Do Space Marines get to tell a titan legion when and where they deploy?


yeaaah no

Was it a black templar book where they are trying to fight through to the throne room before the world falls to chaos? I seem to remember a Princept getting uppity at how the marines were deploying them and then executed by his own team.

The Blood Angels are blacklisted by the AdMech for not sharing the Baal Predator STC.

The_Real_Chris wrote:
Was it a black templar book where they are trying to fight through to the throne room before the world falls to chaos? I seem to remember a Princept getting uppity at how the marines were deploying them and then executed by his own team.

Are you sure it wasn't the Iron Hands? "Wrath of Iron" has the Iron Hands, Guard & Titan Legions squabbling about who's actually in command IIRC.

FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:
And yet the lore is full of examples of Titans moving at the command of Astartes. Aren't all "tech marines" essentially Astartes/Mechanicus line sitters?

1 - No it isn't. If you bring up Helsreach you need to go back and read it because Grimaldus very specifically has to bargain/threaten Princeps Zarha to remain in the city to fight. The Titan Legions, Adeptus Mechanicus, Sororitas, Knight Houses, and Astartes are all largely independent of the Imperial power structure and it's only at the request of a theatre commander that they fight in a given warzone.
2 - Techmarine's first loyalty is to their Chapter, then Mars, and they only cannot share the secrets of Mars with the Chapter as part of the pact between the Astartes and the Priesthood. They do not belong to the Mechanicus.

The organisation of the Imperium is pretty much just a series of self-serving institutions all doing their own thing for their own reasons. Very few organisations can freely call upon the aid of other ones.

The fallout from the Horus Heresy pretty much codified this approach by separating out all the different military and pseudo-military factions so they didn't co-operate as much. Titan Legions were always fairly autonomous, but without the Crusade and the charisma of a Primarch to persuade them, they're now even more independent. They may well have tried to help, but warp travel is kind of fickle at the best of times, and many Legions would probably just as soon not put themselves at risk for little reward. Long gone are the days when a Primarch would just rock up to an Imperial world and commandeer whatever he felt like. If a chapter tried to do that to an unwilling Titan Legion they might find themselves on the wrong end of some very powerful weaponry.

Techmarines are indeed trained by the AdMech, but depending on the chapter, that can represent a strengthening of bonds between organisations, or a barely-tolerated duty. In the BA's case it's the latter, due to the aforementioned supercharged engines STC that they refuse to share.

BrianDavion wrote:

FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:
And yet the lore is full of examples of Titans moving at the command of Astartes.

Name one time.
Once.
Horus Heresy doesn't count eaither as this was under a differant orginizational schema.

Do Titan Legions when deployed into a warzone sometimes DIFFER to the overall theater command of a space marine? Yes, there is examples of that. Do Space Marines get to tell a titan legion when and where they deploy?


yeaaah no

Nope, I'm wrong. I thought the DoW Plaguewar series were titans, but it was knights. And it was a "warmaster" giving the orders.

FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:

BrianDavion wrote:

FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:
And yet the lore is full of examples of Titans moving at the command of Astartes.

Name one time.
Once.
Horus Heresy doesn't count eaither as this was under a differant orginizational schema.

Do Titan Legions when deployed into a warzone sometimes DIFFER to the overall theater command of a space marine? Yes, there is examples of that. Do Space Marines get to tell a titan legion when and where they deploy?


yeaaah no

Nope, I'm wrong. I thought the DoW Plaguewar series were titans, but it was knights. And it was a "warmaster" giving the orders.

it was a primarch whom was the regent of the Imperium. VEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEERY differant things. also even then he needed to secure cooperation first and only then once they AGREED to could he issue orders

Even Roboute Guilliman has faced some pushback from some of the original High Lords on Terra who argued that Roboute was violating his own post-Heresy rules about no person (including no Primarch) in the Imperium wielding such total power over all armed forces of the Imperium. The Imperium was so traumatized by the Heresy that they have decentralized everything to the point where it is impossible for anyone, even the High Lords or Primarch, to rule anything on a large scale. All the big institutions are independent of each other and any cooperation is only for a limited time or in limited locations, negotiated or agreed upon on a case by case basis.

A Primarch like Guilliman seems capable of getting their way in their local area through force of presence, administrative ability, and/or threat of force, but they cannot be everywhere at once all the time. That is the problem that Guilliman faces. He is a firefighter running around trying to put out the latest fire, but given no time to really try and reform things on a deeper level. All he has done so far arguably has been just the superficial reform necessary to get the Indomitus Crusade supplied and off the ground and spread the Primaris around. Those reform minded individuals he put in positions on Terra I expect will run into a bureaucratic wall and find their reforms drowned in a swamp of redtape and slow motion protest without his presence to help them. Even one of the conservative High Lords that opposes Guilliman's reforms, aided Guilliman practically on going ahead with the Indomitus Crusade because he felt that Imperium's state was divinely ordained and permitted by the Emperor and against that, Guilliman's attempts at reform would fail. Therefore there was no harm in letting him try and maybe afterwards he would return humbled and chastened, and be more willing to cooperate and less willing to try and fight the system.

I'll just say again, it seems extremely odd that the chapter planet of the BA was only defended by Astartes and PDF conscripts. Like, is this normal?

Yes because once again, the Astartes are largely independent of the Imperium, and having any other authority bar their own operating in any large capacity on their homeworld is a big no-no.

Right, but this isn't just any Astartes Chapter. This is the seat of power for the entire other half of the great scar. Am I wrong in understanding it's literally just them, and some of the navy? Against everything in their half? Even before he leaves, Bobby is like, Dude, here's a new ship port, and your old Battleship, I've re-built it!

But that's basically it. Just gonna leave you guys here with a few thousand still in packaging Primaris guys, and their weapons, oh, and I need you to defend this ENTIRE side of the scar. Cheers!, I'm outta here!

It is a bit weird that even after the Cryptus affair, Dante only really managed to gather successor Chapters and nobody else.

Then again, if James Swallow's books taught us anything, it's that Dante is basically incompetent when it comes to defending Baal...

FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:
Right, but this isn't just any Astartes Chapter. This is the seat of power for the entire other half of the great scar. Am I wrong in understanding it's literally just them, and some of the navy? Against everything in their half?

During the actual event, it wasn't just the Blood Angels though was it? It was almost every single Successor Chapter of Sanguinius' lineage, totaling to 29,000 Astartes, 21 Battlebarges, 94 Strike Cruisers and hundreds of smaller vessels and orbital defences. For comparison, there were only about 9000 Astartes present during the events at Vigilus (a rough estimate based on the number of companies present, with 1 company = 100 Astartes and 1 demi-company = 50 Astartes).

Even before he leaves, Bobby is like, Dude, here's a new ship port, and your old Battleship, I've re-built it!

But that's basically it. Just gonna leave you guys here with a few thousand still in packaging Primaris guys, and their weapons, oh, and I need you to defend this ENTIRE side of the scar. Cheers!, I'm outta here!

Nope, it's not just a few thousand Primaris, it's enough to rebuild the broken Chapters of the Blood back to fighting strength. Whole Chapters were founded with the Primaris reinforcements and the Chapters of the Blood went on massive recruitment drives to rebuild their numbers.
Guilliman didn't rock up for a day, give the Angels some toys then nope out either. He was there for some time but made it clear to Dante that he couldn't stay in Imperium Nihilus. However, I will say that the current timeline is a bit messy and doesn't make a whole lot of sense right now.

FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:
Right, but this isn't just any Astartes Chapter. This is the seat of power for the entire other half of the great scar. Am I wrong in understanding it's literally just them, and some of the navy? Against everything in their half? Even before he leaves, Bobby is like, Dude, here's a new ship port, and your old Battleship, I've re-built it!

But that's basically it. Just gonna leave you guys here with a few thousand still in packaging Primaris guys, and their weapons, oh, and I need you to defend this ENTIRE side of the scar. Cheers!, I'm outta here!

Baal wasn't the 'seat of power' for Nihlus until AFTER the events of Devastation. The whole rift opening thing happened quite literally while the fighting was ongoing, with all the timey-wimey shenanigans that entailed. Iirc, the crusade fleet just appeared at the edge of the system and cut off the tyranid orbital support. Afterwards during the cleanup, Guillimen made Dante the commander of Nihlus and explained what was going on.

Honestly, IMO, the biggest mistake Dante made with the resources he had was moving that weird water thing from Secundus and allowing it on Primus, due to the contamination inevitability. Though given the circumstances, the choice was valid and and took down several waves of nid ground forces.

As far as the AdMech offering no support, it's likely that they were dealing with their own issues at the time. The nids aren't exactly known for precision attacks.

I guess it's just a relic of a book, written before a lot of the "Apocalpse" style warfare books took flight. Like even in the Gaunt books, Gaunt can leverage assets as a lowly guard commander that would have been critical to the defense of Baal Primus. For starters, Basalisks, Earth Shakers, and even Orbital Bombardment with Lance batteries.

Also I thought the water thing was a massive waste of a good weapon. Great, so they managed to kill a few million guants and larger forms. If they'd made it "air droppable" they could have wiped out the entire ground base in a few hours. It seemed like they could have made more effective use of it, thats all.

FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:
I guess it's just a relic of a book, written before a lot of the "Apocalpse" style warfare books took flight. Like even in the Gaunt books, Gaunt can leverage assets as a lowly guard commander that would have been critical to the defense of Baal Primus. For starters, Basalisks, Earth Shakers, and even Orbital Bombardment with Lance batteries.

That's because Gaunt is a Guard officer and as such can command Guard forces. Astartes are literally banned from doing that because Horus did a Heresy.

There's only Astartes at the Devastation because that's how it is. You don't find battalions of Guard defending Fenris or Mechanicus hosts on Chogoris.

What about the PDF Battalions of Ultramar, or the Force world of Deliverance. There are flaws in the statement "Asartes are banned from that" because it's so easily cast aside in the fluff. So like, the Imperial Fists have a "homeworld" technically on Terra. Would you have us believe that all of Terra wound not move to assault any force that threatened them?

Obviously Terra is not Baal. But the point remains, the Astartes area bound by fluff laws that are made of fluff, and cast aside whenever new fluff is created. There are currently entire Legions of Astartes under the command of RG. In violation of the entire reason the Codex was created. Where is that "law" now?

FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:
What about the PDF Battalions of Ultramar, or the Force world of Deliverance. There are flaws in the statement "Asartes are banned from that" because it's so easily cast aside in the fluff. So like, the Imperial Fists have a "homeworld" technically on Terra. Would you have us believe that all of Terra wound not move to assault any force that threatened them?

The Ultramar Defence Force is a point of irony for the Ultramarines. Their Primarch made it law that Astartes cannot command mortal forces and then mandated that his realm be guarded by troops trained by his sons but even then they are still not technically commanded by the Ultramarines Chapter. They are the PDF of the 500 worlds that are just better organised than most other PDF.
Deliverance is the Raven Guard's homeworld, and Kiavahr is the Forge World that it orbits. The Mechanicus of Kiavahr are not subordinate to the Raven Guard.

I'm also going to point you to the fact that the Blood Angels did in fact arm the people of Baal and used them as a militia when Leviathan landed and I am also going to point out that rallying civilians to defend their home is not a military force which means the laws set down in the Codex are maintained. When the fighting ends the civilians of Baal go back to being civilians.
The only mortal military personnel a Chapter commands are the Serfs. Any other time (such as Helsreach) is for the purposes of a single theatre or engagement and even then the mortal forces aren't truly under Astartes command and can just not follow their orders.
Any time Astartes truly command non-Astartes forces, it's treated with distrust and shock. For example, in Deus Incarmine when a group of Blood Angels takes thousands of civilian militia under their command for a "Crusade", the main POV character calls it out as a flagrant and dangerous violation of the Codex. Likewise in Spear of the Emperor, Imperial Navy ships are seen in the colours of the Emperor's Spears Chapter, and the Mentor Chapter Astartes is shocked at the violation of the Codex by a Successor of the Ultramarines, however, this is excused due to the dire military situation in Imperium Nihilus and the close bond the forces in that area share.

Obviously Terra is not Baal. But the point remains, the Astartes area bound by fluff laws that are made of fluff, and cast aside whenever new fluff is created. There are currently entire Legions of Astartes under the command of RG. In violation of the entire reason the Codex was created. Where is that "law" now?

No there aren't they were disbanded as soon as they were introduced in Dark Imperium because Guilliman didn't want to be accused of having his own personal Legion, singular BTW.
You are correct that the background gets changed but you are still very much wrong in this instance.