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was reading over the agents codex announcement again and the first line of the article stood out to me

https://www.warhammer-community.com/2024/07/22/codex-imperial-agents-unleash-the-might-of-the-emperors-inquisition/

While billions of Guardsmen and [redacted] Space Marines fight the Imperium’s wars on the front lines

has GW framed space marines in this way? I think it's a pretty funny way to end space marine number debates if they just start redacting the number every time it would come up in an article or whatever

It looks like some people at GW are going back to framing marines this way.

All the way in 1996 and even 1991, they wrote that "In fact, Chapters have often exceeded this basic strength during times of prolonged war," and " - although more companies will be created and maintained in times of prolonged war.”

So since primaris happened in 2018, the amount of marines that surged into chapters has been described very vaguely but the most typical chapters have extra companies, just like described in those two quotes. The total number of new chapters that came from those events is also ambiguous.

There are many forum regulars and heavy commenters on 40k reddit who talk about marines having to hide extra companies or exceptional chapters getting away with big numbers. Usually they don't really incorporate those ideas from the '90s, and I think those ideas of very limited numbers just aren't very comprehensive takes.


For the '00s and '10s, most of the campaigns gave specific numbers of companies present at like Armageddon 3, Badab War, 13th Black Crusade, so players from that time are used to that. That time is obviously over and most current players aren't going to have these ideas that there are super limited number of marines.


The first standalone army book ever is also Codex: Space Wolves, not a generic one like Marines or Guard. It's a suggestion that huge numbers of chapters should be idiosyncratic like the Wolves are.

The man who writes the most important marine novels seems not to be have a better-in-the-00s attitude and that might be a reason there are [redacted] numbers of marines in that announcement

the full quote from the first Codex: Ultramarines is relevant here:



So not only is 1000 marines not a hard limit, it was never intended to be one, it's just an easy shorthand. While "A million marines" (a thousand chapters of a thousand marines) is useful as a ballpark, accounting for both overstrength chapters and those that are nearly destroyed, it's of very little practical benefit when talking about quantifying exact numbers.

And this was all before the Indomitus crusade flooded the galaxy with as many Primaris marines as are narratively required for any particular purpose.
Chapter destroyed but you want to use the name? Primaris reinforcements!
One company of your chapter explicitly wiped out? Primaris reinforcements!
Suddenly need an army of ludicrous size to appear and rescue a planet besieged by Tyranids? Primaris Reinforcements!

so the truth is, we've never actually known how many marines there are, it's just only recently that that fact is being acknowledged explicitly

I'm not sure that an exact number being unknown, and an exact number being deliberately hidden are the same thing.

 Lord Damocles wrote:
I'm not sure that an exact number being unknown, and an exact number being deliberately hidden are the same thing.

yeah, it's an ontological difference, and an interesting one. i think purposefully obfuscating it is something with a narrative quality, rather than just being vague

Or they’re just messing with us.

But, in terms of Chapter strength? I know there’s a tithe of geneseed to the Adeptus Terra every so often - but who is actually checking the numbers?

Consider that the Imperium isn’t just mind bogglingly vast, but more little pockets of absolute control dotted around the galaxy than a cohesive landmass. If you in fact had 3,000 Astartes active, and being Astartes scattered around various war zones? Is anyone out there really keeping a weather eye on your exact numbers, even century to century?

I suspect not, and almost certainly not in a particularly well organised manner. And so, whilst staying well clear of Legion strength (tens if not hundreds of thousands), you could significantly exceed the 1,000 recommendation without anyone being in any position to be able to notice? Especially given the inherent oddities not just of Warp Travel, but Astropathic communication.

I have to assume a given Chapter will have a pretty damned clear idea of who’s who and who’s where and how many - but that’s easily hidden from even the Inquisition.

That’s the Black Templar schtick. Keep sending crusade fleets out and no one notices or cares exactly how many Templars are actually running about. On the other hand, their combat tempo also pretty much guarantees that they are not really in a position to gather all together and have much more than a normal chapter anyway.

There’s also supply and demand.

Consider if Guilliman had been up and about during the initial Tyrannic Wars.

Once the scale of that threat was understood? Would there really be much harm in allowing specific Chapters to increase their numbers, in the sure and certain knowledge they’re going to be suffering horrendous losses anyway - and there’s little to nothing preventing sub-division of especially large Chapters as once happened to the Legions of old once the threat has subsided somewhat.

Likewise the threat of Ghaz. The Imperium could, conceivably, muster the sort of number and concentration of forces needed for a second Ullanor job. Get in, utterly ROFLstomp Ghaz and his closest cronies, breaking the back of the currently largest concentration of the Orky Menace in the Galaxy. Allowing fairly adaptive recruitment for Chapters assigned to such an effort would be of great assistance.

The same could’ve been done to the nascent Tau when they first started being a bother.

If you want to increase numbers, just found new Chapters.

The "1000 Marines per Chapter" wasn't strict even in 3rd-7th. For example, the Scout company has no formal size and could theoretically be a 1000 strong if the Chapter could recruit fast enough. Chapters with high attrition often have larger scout companies or extra scout companies.

Command elements, the Librarius, the Armoury etc. also have never counted.

It’s probably easier in terms of equipment, including ships, to increase existing Chapter headcount’s.

Sure, a Battle Barge might ferry around a single company. But those things are huge, and can almost certainly carry and effectively support a much higher number of Astartes.

Scout company getting huge is one of those things that forum regulars say as a trick or exploit to get around a hard cap that isn't there


There's no suggestion of huge scout companies. Even at the time, 2005, white dwarf would say theres no fixed scout company size and then immediately that "few Chapters will ever have more than 10 squads at any one time. Most will have significantly fewer, depending on the suitability of aspirants and casualty levels." No fixed size meant that they are small, not a secret exploit nobody's thought of yet.

They read replies that you can inflate numbers using the scout company, and don't forget about the armoury!, and then make that same reply themselves a few months later to roughly the same users whom they saw post it in the first place. They also habitually use these didactic phrases like "it's worth remembering" or "bear in mind that" which are effectively thought terminating.


Imo another reason to say [redacted] is that thousands and millions would both be wrong, and variants of million-plus aren't euphonius

Honestly, I just assumed the [redacted] was just getting into the spirit of the inquisition and didn’t ready anything into it.

Yeah, I think it's more tongue and cheek than anything. In-game lore, remember that every chapter goes on and on about "ooh, the precious geneseed! How will we survive if the rare geneseed is not kept!" But the Lamenters' numbers were severely down after the Badab war and penance crusade that the whole chapter was down to 200. For a fighting force, that seems very small in galactic-scale wars, but if you factor in the aspirants, those who get rejected, those who reject the geneseed, and so on- that's a LOT of time and effort for just those 200!

Then on the other side of things, you have the Black Templars who get by on a technicality- since they're on "Crusade" all the time, their umbers don't have to be a set amount, it's whatever is "necessary". So, for them- who knows? But defiantly more than 1,000.

It's also weird that the Marines are the "face" of 40k, but in lore they're so rare a regular citizen only hears of them as legends. I loved the back-and-forth in "Iron Within" where the governor and the Guard are arguing=
"We must call on the Angels of Death!"
"Those are a myth! They don't exist!!"
>Pushes Astartes signal button< "Hooray! Space marines!... Wait, why are they yelling "Death to the False Emperor...?"

Anyhoo, it could work both ways for propaganda. 1) Obs, you don't want to let your enemy know your numbers and 2) Imperial Citizens might either think the numbers are too small for all the time and effort/ too many for all the mysterious tech and implantation involved (Okay, now clones).

Geneseed is a weird one.

If your Chapter has been doing really well in terms of low casualties, high recovery rate for a few centuries, you likely have solid stocks of Geneseed, as it can be removed peri-mortem when it matures. As such, provided your main Chapter asset (home world, main fleet) remains relatively unscathed, you’ve a good position to start from in the face of horrendous losses.

But, if you’ve suffered high, but manageable attrition? You may struggle to maintain a comfortable stock of Geneseed. Enough to keep your numbers up, and enough to bounce from from 80-90% losses? Not so much.

This is why the tithe exists. Not just to keep an eye on purity and the founding of new Chapters when required, but to ensure it’s much harder for a truly catastrophic loss to occur in the first place.

And that in itself is a form of check and measure on the strength of a given Chapter. New Geneseed takes time to mature. And you only get two per Brother - and that’s assuming none are corrupted or lost during battle. For instance, ifs squad is vaporised by a Titan grade Melta weapon, you likely aren’t recovering diddly from that puddle of rapidly cooling goo. And so stockpiling over expansion is of greater concern.

It if the geneseed stick does run low, then they just force-breed some vat clones to act as repositories, and after a few accelerated generations, they are back up to strength.

Not familiar with that one?

 pelicaniforce wrote:
Scout company getting huge is one of those things that forum regulars say as a trick or exploit to get around a hard cap that isn't there


There's no suggestion of huge scout companies. Even at the time, 2005, white dwarf would say theres no fixed scout company size and then immediately that "few Chapters will ever have more than 10 squads at any one time. Most will have significantly fewer, depending on the suitability of aspirants and casualty levels." No fixed size meant that they are small, not a secret exploit nobody's thought of yet.

They read replies that you can inflate numbers using the scout company, and don't forget about the armoury!, and then make that same reply themselves a few months later to roughly the same users whom they saw post it in the first place. They also habitually use these didactic phrases like "it's worth remembering" or "bear in mind that" which are effectively thought terminating.


Imo another reason to say [redacted] is that thousands and millions would both be wrong, and variants of million-plus aren't euphonius

There is at least one canon example- Exorcists- who have two extra Scout companies, in their case to sustain their exceptionally high attrition rate from Scout to full Marine due to their possession rituals. It is entirely within scope that a Chapter can maintain an oversized scout complement. "Few will ever have more than ten" is the same as "some do get more than ten"


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:Geneseed is a weird one.

If your Chapter has been doing really well in terms of low casualties, high recovery rate for a few centuries, you likely have solid stocks of Geneseed, as it can be removed peri-mortem when it matures. As such, provided your main Chapter asset (home world, main fleet) remains relatively unscathed, you’ve a good position to start from in the face of horrendous losses.

But, if you’ve suffered high, but manageable attrition? You may struggle to maintain a comfortable stock of Geneseed. Enough to keep your numbers up, and enough to bounce from from 80-90% losses? Not so much.

This is why the tithe exists. Not just to keep an eye on purity and the founding of new Chapters when required, but to ensure it’s much harder for a truly catastrophic loss to occur in the first place.

And that in itself is a form of check and measure on the strength of a given Chapter. New Geneseed takes time to mature. And you only get two per Brother - and that’s assuming none are corrupted or lost during battle. For instance, ifs squad is vaporised by a Titan grade Melta weapon, you likely aren’t recovering diddly from that puddle of rapidly cooling goo. And so stockpiling over expansion is of greater concern.

Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:Not familiar with that one?

The vat growth for propagating progenoids is from Index Astartes. Apparently takes 55 years to generate a full 1000 geneseed from 1 original progenoid. Never checked the maths on that myself (it takes ten doublings to get to >1000, but the differential rates of 5 years and 10 years for each gland is too much maths for me) but it is possible the progenoids mature quicker in the vats.

Remember mature progenoids can be removed from living Marines- most veterans shouldn't be walking round with progenoids anyway.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Not familiar with that one?

Most easily accessed here in the section on Founding New Chapters

https://www.warhammer-community.com/2016/11/16/rites-of-initiation-the-making-of-a-space-marine/#:~:text=An%20initiate%20receives%20training%20before,physically%20fully%20grown%20before%20then.

Apparently coming from the 2002 Index Astsrtes.

I can't not read it as swearing. The text is drawn from the observations of an Inquisitor who's really got a bug up his backside about Space Marines, but his scribe dutifully redacts the expletives before the reports get submitted.

 Daia T'Nara wrote:
I can't not read it as swearing. The text is drawn from the observations of an Inquisitor who's really got a bug up his backside about Space Marines, but his scribe dutifully redacts the expletives before the reports get submitted.

"@!#?@! Space Marines." - Inquisitor Qbert

 Haighus wrote:

There is at least one canon example- Exorcists- who have two extra Scout companies, in their case to sustain their exceptionally high attrition rate from Scout to full Marine due to their possession rituals. It is entirely within scope that a Chapter can maintain an oversized scout complement. "Few will ever have more than ten" is the same as "some do get more than ten"

Yes we do have this wide possibility. The OP is about having an ambiguous number and not strictly limited number of marines. The exoricsts though have always had 12 formal companies. There was never a limitation of having to sneak extra scouts into a scout company.

I also love the respect it gives to the implied characters. If you're a marine in a chapter that's undertaking some massive confrontati9n and expanding recruits, you would need to solve pr9blems. The pr9blems are thing like how we are going to assign staff and allocate the caseload to chaplains apothecaries and commanders of overseeing hundr3ds of extra neophytes. You and I would do it by forming extra companies, or teams or branch offices or whatevers relevant irl

 Flinty wrote:

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Not familiar with that one?

Most easily accessed here in the section on Founding New Chapters

https://www.warhammer-community.com/2016/11/16/rites-of-initiation-the-making-of-a-space-marine/#:~:text=An%20initiate%20receives%20training%20before,physically%20fully%20grown%20before%20then.

Apparently coming from the 2002 Index Astsrtes.

The probation part is from Origins of the Legiones Astartes. If someone's a fan of GW space marines, that WD art8cle is what they're a fan of, that's been transposed and iterated on, but Origins is where it comes from.

It doesn't seem like chapters ever do this, just the Magi who make new chapters