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Hi, all.

A Fuff question, if I may. Now, I'm not an Astartes player, and I don't really know that much about their Fuff, so you'll have to forgive me if this is covered on page one of 'So you've just become a Space Marine.'

Just what is a Gene Seed? My understanding is that each SM has two Gene Seeds inside his body, one in the chest cavity, and one in the neck, and once these Gene Seeds are extracted their purpose is to grow the extra organs that are needed to create a SM in the first place, and I assume these new organs grow another pair of Gene Seeds so that the process can start again.

Is that correct?

If so, what were all the Primarchs about? Were the first SM Gene Seeds created from their parent Primarch's Gene Seed? It confuses me a tad, as I read that pre Great Crusade SMs could be created, but just very slowly. However, after locating the Primarchs, SMs could be created within a year, but this rapid creation caused defects in the respective SM Legions' Gene Seeds.

If, again, that's correct, why would having a Primach make the creation of a SM so much quicker? They obviously created SMs before the Great Crusade and before the Primarchs were found. So, how did the Primachs speed up the process once they were found?

It is possible, however, that I've gotten all of this wrong.

there isn't an object called a Gene Seed. That refers to the implants and genetic legacy of the chapter as a general reference.


The organs in question are called the Progenoids. Each marine has 2.

A single progenoid makes a single set of implants, including 2 new progenoids.


The Primarchs were the original sample from which all geneseed was created. Having the original source means you can correct any flaws that have happened in the interim.

Its also possible the Primarch's bodies actually created progenoids as part of their normal functions.

All the different implants and organs were likely based off of organs the primarchs had, just not as good.

Or they could have used the primarchs DNA to stabilise the organs of the space marines in question.

A progenoid gland contains the gene-seed, one gene-seed for each of the space marine implants (it is unclear in instances where there are two of an implant, like Lyman's Ear, if there are two gene-seed or one gene-seed containing enough material for both implants). In any case the Progenoid grows gene-seed for each implant including itself.

There are two Progenoids as you know, the neck implant mature at five years, the chest implant at ten. They can be harvested at any point once mature.

Once the gene-seed is extracted from the Progenoid it can be grown to maturity, ready for implantation, and is then termed a zygote.

Older background told us that accelerated implantation during the Great Crusade caused the instability that led to the Heresy. That has changed now and we only see fast implantation used by the Raven Guard once Corax gets access to the Primarch material held on Terra.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Originally those beings which became known as the Primarchs were only going to be the first of a new race of super-humans. This plan was thwarted when the Primarchs were snatched from Terra.

Using what little material remained the Astartes were created and looking at the Heresy novels, nothing altered once the Primarchs were rediscovered until Corax asked permission to try and rebuild his Legion using a new technique.

Cheers, guys. That clears things up.

There are two Progenoids as you know, the neck implant mature at five years, the chest implant at ten. They can be harvested at any point once mature.

Interesting, I wonder why then, when a SM dies in combat an Apothecary tried to extract the Progeniod(s), surely this should be done when they reach maturity? If they are being extracted upon death this would mean that the Progeniods have reached maturity, but for some reason not extracted prior to whatever campaign killed the Astartes, as I assume if the Progenion, upon death, hadn't reach maturity there would be no point for an Apothecary to extract them from a dead Astartes.

Just seems odd that these mature Progenoids aren't extracted prior to combat, even if it's in a field tent somewhere, rather then trying to operate on a corpse.

They are. Usually the neck one is removed in a surgical procedure while the other one is removed after death (Mostly because they tend to die in that procedure)

The chest progenoid can be removed safely. the one in the neck is more dangerous for the marine so its left till death. Don't want to risk losing a marine to an unnecessary surgery.

the first progenoid ensures the chapter's numbers remain steady, the second allows for growth. Naturally Progenoids can be lost in battle, so hopefully enough marines have both harvested to make up for that deficiency.

The chapter also stockpiles geneseed in the event of a disaster that depopulates the chapter.

Just as an addition, marines can live without their progenoids, as seen in Legion of the Damned.

And I don't feel marines don't have them extracted beforehand because they die on the operating table. In truth, it's not really known why the second progenoid isn't removed upon maturation like the neck progenoid is.

The theory that I've seen and agree with is that the longer a progenoid remains in a marine, the more of their honor, skill, and battle prowess might be passed on to the marine who recieves their geneseed. Whether this is true or just superstition isn't really known, but for me, it's a pretty good explanation.

@Grey Templar: I believe you have them reversed. The neck progenoid is easy to extract and is done first. The chest progenoid requires sawing through their black carapace. Certainly something that should be done on an operating table if you want to keep the marine alive.

 Tower75 wrote:
Cheers, guys. That clears things up.

There are two Progenoids as you know, the neck implant mature at five years, the chest implant at ten. They can be harvested at any point once mature.

Interesting, I wonder why then, when a SM dies in combat an Apothecary tried to extract the Progeniod(s), surely this should be done when they reach maturity? If they are being extracted upon death this would mean that the Progeniods have reached maturity, but for some reason not extracted prior to whatever campaign killed the Astartes, as I assume if the Progenion, upon death, hadn't reach maturity there would be no point for an Apothecary to extract them from a dead Astartes.

Just seems odd that these mature Progenoids aren't extracted prior to combat, even if it's in a field tent somewhere, rather then trying to operate on a corpse.

It is believed that, the longer the progenoids are in the Marine, the more of his fighting acumen and combat experience they absorb, and so the better and stronger Marines it will go on to make once they are implanted in a new Initiate. It is thought that some aspect of the Marine's experience can be inherited, genetically, by those Marines who are created from his progenoids.

I always understood that the neck gland is harvested as soon as it is available. The chest one is only harvested when the Astarte is dead or near-death.

I believe the procedure required to even attempt to do so safely damages other implants - such as the black carapace - if it doesn't outright kill the patient. Judging by the descriptions and supporting art, the Reductor that is part of the Apothecary's Narthecium seems to penetrate deeply into the Astarte's chest - it sounds/looks like that would kill him every time.

All Progenoids can be removed once mature and realistically, given that the loss of one (through physical trauma, high radiation and mutation we are told in the source material), would be a disaster for the Chapter, they would be harvested.

When it is pertinent to the story Gav Thorpe likes to mention Marines who've had mature Progenoids extracted. Iirc he has Dark Angel Captain in a HH story muse on this.

So, why all the stories of dead Marines being harvested. Firstly it used to be a game mechanism for victory points and this bled over into later novelisations of the setting. Secondly it is cinematic in a novel. Thirdly, BL authors not knowing what they are talking about!

For instance, the Silver Skulls in an SM Battles novel have only one Progenoid. My recollection is that this was not just a quirk of the Chapter but seemed to be an author mistake especially since it was made out to be a humiliation for an SM to lose his progenoid before death. Obviously absurd.


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So a lot of instances in the novels and fictionare merely rule of cool and any explanations of keeping Progenoids in longer than necessary is merely fans trying trying to rationalise the excessive use of Progenoid extraction on dead Marines but is not based on published material. If you think it sounds cool though then obviously you can go along with it if you so wish.

As to immature Progenoids being harvested it could well be that individual gene-seed mature within the Gland at different rates. This must be so if it takes twice as long for a Progenoid in the chest to mature. Some mechanism must slow the growth presumably but what that cause might be is not explained.

Also a tithe of gene-seed is sent to Mars for testing and with a view to creating more Chapters. Maybe some Chapters resent the loss and so send immature glands which they couldn't use anyway but who can really say.