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Out of curiousity, which books portray marines as too powerful?I've yet to find any, really, and I've read a fair few. I may have missed something though. Is it just a bandwagon like many other 'arguments'?

 Vaktathi wrote:

 Kanluwen wrote:

Such as?
You've got Chaos Marines who won't have the "holy gak" reaction, you've got Orks(maybe--depending on force composition and other factors), Necrons, and Tyranids.
How common are Chaos Marines on fields where Officio Assassinorum operatives would be deployed?
How about Orks, Necrons, or Tyranids?

We don't know how often they're deployed against specific targets, that said, we do know that the Imperium sends assassins against CSM targets, the 3.5E book had a big section on a briefing given to take out each of Abaddon's chief lieutenants.

Yeah, and that was at the outset of the 13th Black Crusade. That's one of those circumstances where things are basically at "Gak Code--Cranked Up To 11".
Not only that though, those were the Imperium's best assassins being sent on what they knew was a one-way mission with no guarantee of success.

As for who will/won't take the morale hit, that's something that could be argued back and forth practically forever. One could argue hardened aspect warriors wouldn't be frightened at all (there's an obvious enemy to fight, unlike an unseen sniper taking lives at will), etc. Essentially you're looking at humans, tau, and a debatable portion of races that are not the greatest threat to the Imperium.

That gets into the whole "what's the greatest threat to the Imperium" thing though. Any faction could theoretically take the cake, dependent upon circumstances.

And again, you're making the same mistake that you're trying to accuse the Marine fanboys of.
The Marines are not going to be doing these drops as something purely intended to win them the day. It's the opening salvo for a sustained campaign, or something done at the height of the fighting during the campaign.

Except, time and again, we're given examples of them doing exactly what you say they're not. Hell, the first HH book opens this way if I'm remembering correctly, Horus and co. teleport to the faux-Emperor's throne room, slays everyone therein, and hooray victory!

Horus and the Justaerin were in Terminator armor, deployed en masse to the faux-Emperor's throne room, with power armored Marines as support.

Comparing the way the Imperium uses Marines now to how the Imperium used Marines during the Great Crusade is ridiculous though. They are two different fighting forces that share similar troops and names, that's all.

 BrotherHaraldus wrote:
Out of curiousity, which books portray marines as too powerful?I've yet to find any, really, and I've read a fair few. I may have missed something though. Is it just a bandwagon like many other 'arguments'?

UM Omnibus does to a great degree... though in one of them an Ultramarine gets beat to death by a rock-wielding mob of cultists.
SW Omnibus does to an incredible degree... in some cases so terribly, laughably so, and not just for SM-fan-wankery. Just some incredibly stupid plot contrivances.

 Psienesis wrote:

 BrotherHaraldus wrote:
Out of curiousity, which books portray marines as too powerful?I've yet to find any, really, and I've read a fair few. I may have missed something though. Is it just a bandwagon like many other 'arguments'?

UM Omnibus does to a great degree... though in one of them an Ultramarine gets beat to death by a rock-wielding mob of cultists.
SW Omnibus does to an incredible degree... in some cases so terribly, laughably so, and not just for SM-fan-wankery. Just some incredibly stupid plot contrivances.

I've read the UM omnibus but could find nothing of the like. Are you sure? Too much power that is.

 Psienesis wrote:

 BrotherHaraldus wrote:
Out of curiousity, which books portray marines as too powerful?I've yet to find any, really, and I've read a fair few. I may have missed something though. Is it just a bandwagon like many other 'arguments'?

UM Omnibus does to a great degree... though in one of them an Ultramarine gets beat to death by a rock-wielding mob of cultists.
SW Omnibus does to an incredible degree... in some cases so terribly, laughably so, and not just for SM-fan-wankery. Just some incredibly stupid plot contrivances.

No, it's not just. Avoid things on the Space Wolves in general, especially by Ben Counter. I made the mistake of reading a book on the Space Puppies once and was bombarded by the near spamming of the world 'wolf'.

 Psienesis wrote:

The issue is that much of the time the SM's are fighting exactly this kind of battle, and that there are those that think such a fight would obviously be won by the Space Marines. More to the point, we're talking a single IG regiment here against a chapter of Space Marines, one numbers in the uncounted billions, the other numbers roughly a thousand.

A single IG Regiment is not "uncounted billions", it's a few thousand dudes/ettes. The Tanith First-And-Only was an infantry Regiment that had, at its height (the night it left Tanith) 3000 soldiers, just as an example. It was intended to have two other Regiments, bringing the total Tanith tithe to 9000 soldiers.

No I get that, I meant that there are uncounted billions of IG regiments and only 1000 chapters. Sorry if there was confusion about that.

Described, yes. But, then, see my point about a BL novel being a myth re-told well after the fact.

right, but even codex books describe stuff like this (at work right now so can't pull a direct source)

And the reason the Imperium bothers with them is because the God-Emperor bothered with them, and it is from his edicts that their power is derived. Say what you will about the High Lords of Terra, they operate as a "proxy government" in the name of the Emperor, just as they had in the time of the Great Crusade and the Heresy. There are things (including 10,000+ years of history and precedent) that dictate how they operate.

The Emperor did a lot of things, the Imperium as it stands now would horrify him, the Ecclesiarchy in particular.

... and getting rid of all of the Space Marines is not within their remit.

Actively getting rid of them yes, beyond their remit. Providing them with new fiefdoms, ordering new Foundings, providing AdMech support, etc is however all within their remit.

TiamatRoar wrote:

IIRC, It was stated/shown in another HH book (or possibly that same very one, though I think it was a Space Wolf incident) that what the Space Marines typically considered "victory" actually meant several months or years of mopping up operations by the Imperial Army.

At any rate, a lot of these cases are just a case of bad writing, I think. Unfortunately, there tends to be a lot of that.

this is true, there is a fair share of that

Co'tor Shas wrote:
I don't think the HH is really the nest example considering it was before the codex and it was marine against marine.

the first few HH books take place before the HH starts, there's no marine on marine combat.

 BrotherHaraldus wrote:
Out of curiousity, which books portray marines as too powerful?I've yet to find any, really, and I've read a fair few. I may have missed something though. Is it just a bandwagon like many other 'arguments'?

`The worst I've come across so far was Brotherhood of the Snake. They send in one marine to deal with a crashed Dark Eldar raiding vessel with dozens of surviving and marauding crew, had a single tac squad kill thousands of Dark Eldar in a single battle, and more.

 Psienesis wrote:

 BrotherHaraldus wrote:
Out of curiousity, which books portray marines as too powerful?I've yet to find any, really, and I've read a fair few. I may have missed something though. Is it just a bandwagon like many other 'arguments'?

UM Omnibus does to a great degree... though in one of them an Ultramarine gets beat to death by a rock-wielding mob of cultists.
SW Omnibus does to an incredible degree... in some cases so terribly, laughably so, and not just for SM-fan-wankery. Just some incredibly stupid plot contrivances.

The SW omnibus is made up of books that were mostly written at the time when the "silly" of 40k was still at its height.

Dark Eldar? Yes, that sounds a tad much if so. Anything else?

There's "silly" and then there's "this make no narrative, internally-logical sense".

I can deal with "silly". I cannot deal with a book that has things happen simply because the plot requires them to happen in order to progress. It is like the opposite of a deus ex machina... the story only advances because, against all previously-established (in the book) logic, something happens or something exists, to propel the plot forward.

Psinesis:

"A single IG Regiment is not "uncounted billions", it's a few thousand dudes/ettes."

The "uncounted billions" in that I think referred to the regiment itself, as there are countless regiments in the history of the Imperium.

Ah, ok, cause we apparently switched from a single battle of SM vs IG to all SM vs all IG.

right, but even codex books describe stuff like this (at work right now so can't pull a direct source)

Codices are supposed to be propaganda for their armies... or, again, are tales being told around the hab-fire (or the Administratum watercooler) by people removed from the event by two thousand years of time and a hundred thousand light-years of distance.

The Emperor did a lot of things, the Imperium as it stands now would horrify him, the Ecclesiarchy in particular.

That is not exactly supported in the fluff. There were cults (other than Lorgar's) worshipping him as a god in his lifetime, many of them on Terra itself, already building temples practicing the rites and rituals that would later become the Ecclesiarchy. He didn't seem to care.

What Lorgar did was waste too much time building temples and things, when he, as a Primarch, should have been out there conquering more worlds.

The Emperor as some sort of arch-atheist is... misleading, at best, and at worse something of a ret-con, to make the GC seem more like the Age of Enlightenment and the current era more like a slide back to the Dark Ages.

Providing them with new fiefdoms, ordering new Foundings, providing AdMech support, etc is however all within their remit.

Not exactly. The AdMech operates independently from the HLoT (and are, in fact, an empire within the Imperium).

They also have, in many cases, ancient treaties with the Astartes that pledge material support in exchange for defense, favors, the providing of capture tech-relics and xeno-artifacts, all that kind of thing, that the HLoT are not going to force them to break (it's kind of a thing in the Imperium... as terrible as things may be, they sure do like to honor ancient contracts).



I had forgotten Brotherhood of the Snake... I think I had repressed the memory of it.

Must re-repress memories of Brotherhood of the Snake.

 BrotherHaraldus wrote:

... Too much power ...

is awfully subjective. You could be presented with a source that depicts a single marine captain slaughtering hundreds of orcs, their warboss, multiple squads of Chaos Space Marines, and then defeating a recently ascended demon prince in hand-to-hand combat while in free-fall over a distance of several kilometers, all in a single conflict, and still say; "well, that's not 'too much' power".

 Pendix wrote:

 BrotherHaraldus wrote:

... Too much power ...

is awfully subjective. You could be presented with a source that depicts a single marine captain slaughtering hundreds of orcs, their warboss, multiple squads of Chaos Space Marines, and then defeating a recently ascended demon prince in hand-to-hand combat while in free-fall over a distance of several kilometers, all in a single conflict, and still say; "well, that's not 'too much' power".

Titus always felt like he should have more bling (certainly more than his successor) for his power level, especially as an Ultramarine.

 Pendix wrote:

 BrotherHaraldus wrote:

... Too much power ...

is awfully subjective. You could be presented with a source that depicts a single marine captain slaughtering hundreds of orcs, their warboss, multiple squads of Chaos Space Marines, and then defeating a recently ascended demon prince in hand-to-hand combat while in free-fall over a distance of several kilometers, all in a single conflict, and still say; "well, that's not 'too much' power".

I do not actually think Titus was 'too' powerful. It was a shame that the single player CSM were so mindless, if they had been quick and tactical (Rolling around, charging you, using sustained fire, and so on) they would have been great, IMO. Their resilience mostly seemed believable.

The Daemon Prince was just a QTE. Barely counts as a real fight. Seriously, how do you dodge daemonic plasma cannon sorcery whatever bolts while falling? Marines may break the laws of physics and logic and look good doing it, but then there's that.

The combat against masses of Boyz seemed really plausible, though, like it did when you got into combat with a Renegade Guardsman. Assuming Normal difficulty, of course. I played it all on Hard but did not really notice much of a difference.

I'd prefer the Astartes remains the way they are currently depicted. It fits the settings well -- an hegemonic empire such as the Imperium is never truly united, it consists of various states and autonomous organizations capable of acting independently according to their own interest.
It's merely held together by the overwhelming power of the central state can conjure up to deal with any territorial insurrections/secessions, and the promise of protection that a single state cannot provide for themselves.

Self-interests differ from states to states, and inner-conflicts are common. The empire needs not to act unless it directly affects its survival, and will not act at all if it will not work towards its prosperity.

And thus the Adeptus Ministorum is endures alongside the Priesthoods of Mars, The houses of the navigators live in luxury while other psykers are shunned, barely tolerated, or even outright persecuted. Worlds against worlds within the Imperium itself over dispute of resources, trade routes, or ancient hatreds.

And the Imperium avoid dealing with these elements, knowing that any one of them can throw the Imperium asunder.

And the Adeptus Astartes is one such element. One such chapter can make a small empire within its borders, and several can enslave worlds at will, should they ever become united under a common interest.

This makes the dynamics of the Imperium far more fascinating than a territorial empire, ever in danger of ruination from forces within and without, yet cannot be held together without any of them. This also means that each such power fills an essential role, which no other can fill nor replace. Be it to eliminate uneasy elements within the nobles, or to insert compliance into the common hive-dwellers. The Astartes are the most threatening force a Imperium can muster, and are fear or respected by nearly all forces known to men, even the Astarte themselves. (except for Tyranids I suppose...)

It doesn't need Astartes for that. Governors do it well enough, and they're more likable anyway

 Melissia wrote:
It doesn't need Astartes for that. Governors do it well enough, and they're more likable anyway

Ah.. I believe you've misunderstood, I do not mean that a space marine chapter should enforce Imperial rule over a planet, that is the job of the governors; what I meant was that the Imperium will not act against the Space Marine chapters as a whole because they are potentially a major threat to the Imperium if they are forced to. They act well enough as special forces that will constantly try and seek out the enemies of the Imperium, and answer the call of aid whenever they see fit. Might makes right, and the Astartes and the rest of the Imperium know it well.

Besides, The governors cannot intimidate rebels, and they are more likely to become rebels given how many worlds turned tau on Eastern Fringe, and all those Chaos affliated/Daemon Possessed cases too.They also don't normally have the power to conquer/occupy other planets considering the sector/segmentum Adminsitratum will typically react fast to these cases and call for any aid nearby. As a single force, or even a cabal of planetary governors, they remain insignificant to posse a threat, and are commonly held with lower status, subjected to the whim of the Adeptus Terra.

When an invasion occurs, a planetary governor will typically call for aid, and hold out in his/her palace, shielded by the PDF forces. Under such cases the prowess of an Astartes force will be respected, albeit not always appreciated. All of the Imperium know that the addition of a loyalist Astartes force means a higher odds of survival. (Unless it's Grey Knights, in which case you are #*$%ed either way).

 lcmiracle wrote:
the Imperium will not act against the Space Marine chapters as a whole

Yeah they do. All the time, in fact. Up to and including extermination.

 Melissia wrote:

 lcmiracle wrote:
the Imperium will not act against the Space Marine chapters as a whole

Yeah they do. All the time, in fact. Up to and including extermination.

In fact, the Ecclesiarchy once sent three SoB Orders to go fight the Space Wolves in their home system. This was after an act of aggression from the Space Wolves upon some Ecclesiarchy priests. The Ecclesiarchy seemed able to do this without special permission and didn't seem to get punished for doing so.

So yeah, the Imperium isn't at all scared to fight even the strongest Marine chapters, if they feel they need to.

 Melissia wrote:

 lcmiracle wrote:
the Imperium will not act against the Space Marine chapters as a whole

Yeah they do. All the time, in fact. Up to and including extermination.

...to a few chapters. Just like the Inquisitors may execute the Magos of the Adeptus Mechanicus in certain cases (Magos Lurd), and even then it takes a really good cause and a strong standing force to enact that kind of judgement on respected sects. The Abyssal Crusade, for example, was realized due mostly to the renown and power of Saint Basillius, having supports from several space marine chapters, and an convenient cause as corruptions are detected within the gene seeds from dozens of Space Marine Chapters, coincide with a huge warp storm.

It's like the persecution of the Knights Templars after the lost of Jerusalem in the Middle Ages, the people lost faith in the Knights, the French King can avoid paying debets to the Order, the Catholic Church needs scapegoat for the failure, and so arrested and tortured was the templars, and executed was their leaders.

[edit: Further points to make]: Saint Basilius was eventually punished by the surviving chapters from the Abyssal Crusade, slain after being revealed as a Chaos Apostle, having been confronted by supposed tainted chapter master of Vorpal Swords, simply because the Triumphant seemingly proved their purity by returning from the Crusade. As far as any by-standers (Inquisition, Adeptus Terra and the Mechanicus, etc.) is concerned, either side can be tainted (or both!), but none did intervene because it's messy business and it wasn't the first time one imperial organization came into conflicts with another.

Now imagine if the High Lords, or the Ecclesiachy was to suddenly stripthe entire Astartes organization of all their privileges in the 42nd Millenium (or demote them, in whatever sense possible), when the Space Marine forces are still significant and supports for them are high. Even if there is a good cause for doing so, none but the most obedient (and ill-fortuned, like the Lamenters) would oblige. Chapters, with the governors who owe favor to them, will openly oppose this order, and will think they are the righteous and their persecutors the traitors. There is no way the Imperium can de-emphazie the role of the Space Marines,

Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Troike wrote:

In fact, the Ecclesiarchy once sent three SoB Orders to go fight the Space Wolves in their home system. This was after an act of aggression from the Space Wolves upon some Ecclesiarchy priests. The Ecclesiarchy seemed able to do this without special permission and didn't seem to get punished for doing so.

So yeah, the Imperium isn't at all scared to fight even the strongest Marine chapters, if they feel they need to.

Yes they'd do so as needed, it's a situation where either the Ecclesiarchy acts, or they be seen as weak in front of the rest of the Imperium. Where are the Inquisition in this episode, did they see fit to forcefully intervene? Why did not the High Lords denounce either party, instead wait to see a moment for them to react without respite from the triumphant?

Secondly, the Space Wolves also openly defied the Inquisition in the aftermath of the First War of Armageddon, where was their "punishment" other than a huge loss of forces that caused a huge loss of forces on the opposing side? The Inquisitor back away, knowing full well no one else would support either party, everyone else are just playing the waiting game.

No one make moves openly without worry about other parties, and no one party, can bring down another entirely. Except for the Space Wolves, just 'cause.

And the Ecclisiachy is not the Imperium, it's a part of the Imperium. A significant one, yes, but not the largest, nor the most powerful.

 lcmiracle wrote:
...to a few chapters.

I'd say it's more than a mere few. SoB fluff has implied that fighting rogue Marines is a standard thing for them, which would, perhaps, imply it being more than a few isolated incidents.

 lcmiracle wrote:
Now imagine if the High Lords, or the Ecclesiachy was to suddenly strip the entire Astartes organization of all their privileges in the 42nd Millenium

That's quite a bit more extreme than just wiping out a single Marine Chapter that is thought to be somehow corrupt.

 lcmiracle wrote:
And the Ecclisiachy is not the Imperium, it's a part of the Imperium. A significant one, yes, but not the largest, nor the most powerful.

That's not the point I was making. My point was that the rest of the Imperium didn't object to the Ecclesiarchy going to war with a prominent Space Marine Chapter, nor did they at any point order the Ecclesiarchy to stop.

The Imperium doesn't act against Space Marine Chapters? Somebody better tell that to the Minotaurs, cause they're out of a job.

 Troike wrote:

I'd say it's more than a mere few. SoB fluff has implied that fighting rogue Marines is a standard thing for them, which would, perhaps, imply it being more than a few isolated incidents.

Just like the Inquisition can have individual Techpriests, Confessors, High Lords of Terra, or even other Inquisitors "dealt with", given a justifiable cause.

 Troike wrote:

That's quite a bit more extreme than just wiping out a single Marine Chapter that is thought to be somehow corrupt.

Exactly why no one seem fit to reduce the Chapters' power, despite many chapters have been known to turn renegades/traitors.

 Troike wrote:

That's not the point I was making. My point was that the rest of the Imperium didn't object to the Ecclesiarchy going to war with a prominent Space Marine Chapter, nor did they at any point order the Ecclesiarchy to stop.

And my point, as in my first post, was that the reasons that the rest of the Imperium do not grasp more control over the Adeptus Astartes, and the Ecclisiachy does not openly go to war with the Space Marines despite the difference in their beliefs (remember how strictly the confessors control cults, use militias and planetary governors to wipe out the undesirables across worlds, persecute heretics and mutants, yet tolerates the existence of non imperial cult following post-human Space Marines), The Space Marines remain a wild card, despite being both powerful and autonomous, simply because they are powerful and autonomous, and a change in the status quo could potentially bring doom to themselves.

Now imagine if the High Lords, or the Ecclesiachy was to suddenly stripthe entire Astartes organization of all their privileges in the 42nd Millenium (or demote them, in whatever sense possible), when the Space Marine forces are still significant and supports for them are high. Even if there is a good cause for doing so, none but the most obedient (and ill-fortuned, like the Lamenters) would oblige. Chapters, with the governors who owe favor to them, will openly oppose this order, and will think they are the righteous and their persecutors the traitors. There is no way the Imperium can de-emphazie the role of the Space Marines,

Have the Inquisition consign their worlds to Exterminatus, then declare them Excommunicatus Traitorus.

... I should also point out that there are several Chapters, which I have already listed, that adhere to the teachings of the Imperial Creed. The Space Marines themselves are not a united force, and there exist Chapters that appear to have the sole job of wiping out other Chapters.

 lcmiracle wrote:

Now imagine if the High Lords, or the Ecclesiachy was to suddenly stripthe entire Astartes organization of all their privileges in the 42nd Millenium (or demote them, in whatever sense possible), when the Space Marine forces are still significant and supports for them are high. Even if there is a good cause for doing so, none but the most obedient (and ill-fortuned, like the Lamenters) would oblige. Chapters, with the governors who owe favor to them, will openly oppose this order, and will think they are the righteous and their persecutors the traitors. There is no way the Imperium can de-emphazie the role of the Space Marines,

To be fair, even if the chapters did have allies, again, the SM's themselves are so few that they could hardly match the martial might mustered against them, and it would be a fool Governor indeed that would side with the faction that's outnumbered several hundred million to one.

To say nothing of the fact of the High Lords consisting of the masters of the IG, AdMech, Inquisition, Ecclesiarchy, etc. those are not enemies I'd want to have for the sake of an ally that cannot guarantee protection.


That's the problem with the SM's as currently written. They're just so few as currently written that they should be easily overrun and survive largely through the same means as Superman, namely plot armor.

 lcmiracle wrote:
Just like the Inquisition can have individual Techpriests, Confessors, High Lords of Terra, or even other Inquisitors "dealt with", given a justifiable cause.

Something like this actually came up before. I notice you're saying "justifiable cause", as if wiping out a Marine Chapter is a weightly decision that is avoided if possible. But that doesn't fit with how the Imperium has to be extremely vigilant for heresy and stamp it quickly if it's spotted. Obviously I'm not saying that Imperial organisations can go around wiping out Marine Chapters on a whim, but if there's evidence then they'd be free to act upon it.

Also, note how autonomous the Ecclesiarchy was when they attack the Space Wolves. Do you think that, if attacking Marines was such a huge deal, that the Imperium's leadership would allow the Ecclesiarchy to go after the Wolves so openly? Yet one act of aggression (and suspicions of heresy) was apparently cause enough for the Ecclesiarchy to go attack the Wolves, and the High Lords never told them to stop.

Oh, and has the Inquisition ever "dealt with" a High Lord? An example would be interesting to see.

 lcmiracle wrote:
Exactly why no one seem fit to reduce the Chapters' power, despite many chapters have been known to turn renegades/traitors.

Don't really understand the point you're making. Why would they punish all Marine chapters when they can and do target them individually?

And my point, as in my first post, was that the reasons that the rest of the Imperium do not grasp more control over the Adeptus Astartes, and the Ecclisiachy does not openly go to war with the Space Marines despite the difference in their beliefs (remember how strictly the confessors control cults, use militias and planetary governors to wipe out the undesirables across worlds, persecute heretics and mutants, yet tolerates the existence of non imperial cult following post-human Space Marines), The Space Marines remain a wild card, despite being both powerful and autonomous, simply because they are powerful and autonomous, and a change in the status quo could potentially bring doom to themselves.

*sign* Are you so fond of skipping line? The reverse of the coin would be: if attacking a space marine chapter isn't that big a deal, why didn't the other organizations join the sisters of battle? Because they don't want to anger either faction.
Why did the Imperium wait so long before formally dealing with Huron? Despite all per-existing evidence show that they've neglect their annual tithe, and attacking the Mechanicus? You are saying that the space marine are spread thin, not knowing non-fleet based chapters have their own mortal PDF? Are the successor chapters not more bounded to their predecessor and brother chapters?
The space marines needs not to be re-emphasized, they right where the Imperium wants them to be: stay out of our ways, else I'll have to bust my head to rip you a new one. And even that they've been shown to have failed. Anymore emphasized the Imperium will have to anhilate the nearly the entire space marine chapters

why didn't the other organizations join the sisters of battle? Because they don't want to anger either faction.

Because the Imperium exists under the axiom "Divided we Stand." It takes someone with a lot of sway to bring the disparate factions of the Imperium together into a common cause. This is often an Inquisitor, but it can also be a very high-ranking Imperial Guard Commander who has been handed the reigns of a Crusade, or the Chapter Master of a very famous, First-or-Second Founding Chapter who hasn't pissed off a lot of people.

Also, while the SoB have their allies amongst other SM Chapters, there aren't a large number who are going to jump into a war alongside them, since the SOB are known for doing their own churchy thing, and also for purging signs of heresy and corruption wherever they see it... and what is corrupt is in the eye of the beholder.

u are saying that the space marine are spread thin, not knowing non-fleet based chapters have their own mortal PDF?

Why would they know? There are no reliable means of inter-stellar communications in the Imperium. Hell, interplanetary communications, or even just communications on a single world are not particularly reliable.

Are the successor chapters not more bounded to their predecessor and brother chapters?

Depends on the Chapter in question. Not all of them are like the DA.

Well that makes Ultramarine and the DA, BA the most dangerous SM chapters won't they? And even a lone chapter like SW can feth over two factions, the Imperium would be mad not to think twice before attacking a SM chapter.

You'd think the agents of the Imperium'd learn from the case of the Sons of Malice... never fight SM without first getting other SM forces to join you (GK)