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I think it is better not to think about it. GW´s writers have an alarming lack of a "sense of scale". Like many other writers, and like many, many people. Even people who have been scholarized have forgotten what they learnt and just make up numbers as they see fit.

According to Codex: Militarum Tempestus, the entire 62nd Rhoin Cobras regiment is formed by 190 soldiers. That means 1000 regiments are about 190.000 soldiers. To get a grasp of how big this army is, keep in mind that the number of soldiers Germany sent to Russia during IIWW is 12.000.000. That´s 63 times bigger.

Going by this, "1000 regiments" is a force so hilariously small that they wouldn´t be able to do anything in any modern war. They cannot take on a country, or even a big city. Let alone a planet. A sector wide attack? Hilarious. So I will assume a regiment can be 190 soldiers strong, or 190.000.000 soldiers strong, depending on the regiment. Which implies "1000 regiments" can include less people than "2 regiments".

And if you read the Codex: Tau it gets even worse. A few Tau can take down Hive Cities. And then you read the Tyranid dataslate and... wow... a full tyranic invasion uses scores of genestealers and 50 soldiers are a significant force against such a massive planetary invasion. And don´t forget we regularly read about 5 Marines saving worlds everywhere, by using bolter and chainsword until all of the enemies are dead.

So better not to think about it and just make up your own numbers.... the Imperium sent countless billions against the Tau, the Tau sent billions against the Imperium, and that´s all.

Yeah, the MT codex has a few cringe-worthy moment like the 190 men regiment or the one that jumps through the atmosphere to avoid being targetted by AS weapons.

Well to be fair the scions are even more elite than delta ops on earth. They are not supposed to be particularily numerous and are the banner boys of grenadier, karsikn type forces. Using their regiment number for any other guard numbers is like using inquisition or SoB numbers for guard numbers. They are super famous but a drop in the bucket as far as carapace armour hot shot lasgun troops go.

The Storm Troopers, which the MT are basically the new version of, have always been a very small, elite force of soldiers, numbering far fewer than even the Space Marines or the Sisters of Battle.

If I'm not wrong, Stormtroopers get at least some low-level genetic enhancements to make them into Captain America style super-soldiers to the Space Marine's posthuman warriors. So there's a bit of cost factor involved.

Probably the sort of genetic enhancements that ensure they don't develop glaucoma, diabetes, poor eyesight, congenital heart defects, and stuff like that. Probably some tweaks to ensure a certain baseline of athletic performance, but I also don't believe that such things are done until after the Schola age.

Meanwhile! The Tau take another hive world, yawn at death strike missiles and continue to grow.

Source: Codex Tau Empire

 Iron_Captain wrote:
It shows that the Imperium is now getting slightly cheesed off with the Tau.
Such a force would be enough to utterly crush the Tau Empire and its memory into space-dust.
Of course that is not going to happen though. GW will never advance the plot that far. And if they actually decide to surprise people and do it; the Tau will survive because of some deus (or maybe xenos) ex machina.

You mean like Abaddon sacking Cadia? Doesn't that happen at the same time as the 3rd Sphere Expansion?

The Tau won't get the same focus as Chaos until they're the same level of threat as Chaos. Right now, a few dozen hive worlds is small chips compared to the billions of Chaos Demons pouring out of the Eye of Terror.

It's kinda hard to focus on how awesome the IoM and how it can 'crush the Tau' when it's getting its butt kicked in by the Armless Wonder.

In 4th edition, Space Marine and Tau codices, it describes movement of troops away from the Tau front to reinforce Cadia, and then the Tau taking advantage of that to expand further.

The Tau are only relevant to the Imperials facing them in their local area of the galaxy. For everyone else, the Tau are off in a far-flung backwater of the galaxy and there are far more important fights to prioritize and send reinforcements to. This played out even in the Eye of Terror campaign, where the vast majority of players shunned the Tau warzone to lodge their games elsewhere.

EmpNortonII wrote:

You mean like Abaddon sacking Cadia? Doesn't that happen at the same time as the 3rd Sphere Expansion?

Have you seen this codex astra militarum, a company called GW sells?
Is a planet, called Cadia, sacked there ?

Iracundus wrote:In 4th edition, Space Marine and Tau codices, it describes movement of troops away from the Tau front to reinforce Cadia, and then the Tau taking advantage of that to expand further.

This was 1st damocles. Because Tyranids. And its part of the Warzone book.
Now this thread is about a later installment of GW's actual " buy our great awesome kits because our most recent fluff says they are awesome" publications.

Plus, as pointed out before: why change the setup of a small group of 1000 Rgt when you have billlions of them? Just SITNW...
Astra Militarum tithes of 50.000.000 per fortress world are not rare. AM regiments may be thousands or tens of thousands strong.

OtOH, one could imagine the possibility of lots of catachans in conflicts with the Tau leads to:
Codex Marbo / "the story of a single trooper beating the upstart Tau Empire into submission" just saying...

 1hadhq wrote:

EmpNortonII wrote:

You mean like Abaddon sacking Cadia? Doesn't that happen at the same time as the 3rd Sphere Expansion?

Have you seen this codex astra militarum, a company called GW sells?
Is a planet, called Cadia, sacked there ?

Iracundus wrote:In 4th edition, Space Marine and Tau codices, it describes movement of troops away from the Tau front to reinforce Cadia, and then the Tau taking advantage of that to expand further.

This was 1st damocles. Because Tyranids. And its part of the Warzone book.
Now this thread is about a later installment of GW's actual " buy our great awesome kits because our most recent fluff says they are awesome" publications.

Incorrect. The 4th edition Codices described movement from the Tau front to Cadia, in response to the 13th Black Crusade. 1st Damocles takes place around the time of Behemoth which is over a century before 999.M41 and the 13th Black Crusade.

Get your dates right first.

One such enemy is the Tau, a dynamic, technologically advanced race who have taken advantage of the recent redeployment of Imperial forces bound for Segmentum Obscurus and the beleaguered Cadian Gate to further expand their empire. The forces of the Ultramarines have fought the Tau before, during the Damocles Gulf Crusade, in 742.M41...

p. 20, 4th edition Space Marines Codex

The wording clearly shows the redeployment takes place after the first Damocles Gulf Crusade. 4th edition was also set at 999.M41 so "recent" is in relation to that.

Also the results of the Eye of Terror campaign:

"The Tau made several major expansions to their empire over the course of the Thirteenth Crusade. With Imperial attention elsewhere, and the local Tyranid and Ork menace temporarily contained, Tau settlement colonies and pioneer teams reached far and wide into the outlying systems of the Damocles Gulf, the Perdus Rift, and much further afield. Although the encroachment on Imperial space has been relatively minor, the Tau have established no fewer than five 3rd phase colony systems in a halo around their existing sept worlds. These massive areas of expansion are already being referred to as the Third Sphere Colonies by the diplomats of the Water Caste, and are rumoured to unprecedented numbers of human auxillaries. That the Imperium's attention is focused elsewhere is no doubt of comfort to those humans who have pledged their support to the burgeoning Tau empire. "

Aus WD 287, "Death by a Thousand Cuts" by Andy Chambers

 Totalwar1402 wrote:
ong with titans, fleets and a few space marine chapters it says that this force consists of 1000 regiments of Imperial guard. Now, to put that into perspective, the Damocles Gulf Crusade where they reach as far as Dalyth had only 19 regiments of guardsmen.

So, to me, that implies that this new crusade is aimed at not only driving the Third Sphere Expansion and Shadowsun back but the complete destruction of the Tau Empire. Just 19 regiments was able to push as far as the first sphere world of Dalyth. The descriptions given in the Farsight Enclave book about the campaign imply that it was taking most of the resources of the entire empire to hold back the Imperial advance. Even if you argue the Empire is a lot stronger than it was then, I doubt it could have changed that much in 250 years.

Wee correction.

In the original tau codex, it was clear theTau held on Dalyth only with the forces available on Dalyth. Three were no reinforcements from the rest of the tau empire. The imperials had seized control of the local space around the planet.

Remember ,the first thing the imperials did was annihilate the tau fleet that was in orbit over Dalyth. Then they invaded, and got bogged down. It was a missive regarding the tyranids, as well as the fear of a new tau fleet arriving (could arrive at any time...) coupled with stalemate on the ground, and no imperial reinforcements that made them pull out in the end. But there were no off world reinforcements for the tau. Thankfully, it was a vital sept, so they'd have had plentiful soldiers to hand. They were the reinforcements fir the tau, but they were already on the planet.

Iracundus wrote:




Incorrect. The 4th edition Codices described movement from the Tau front to Cadia, in response to the 13th Black Crusade. 1st Damocles takes place around the time of Behemoth which is over a century before 999.M41 and the 13th Black Crusade.

Get your dates right first.

Get your context right. And your dates.
This is 6th edition. 4th ed codices won't provide fluff of 5th or 6th ed...


Damocles 1 = 742M41 ( Imp.expedition )
Farsight = 760M41 ( enclaves )
Canovar = 813M41 ( crons met )
Gorgon = 897M41
Orks = 975M41
Lagan = 989M41 ( UM )
Nimbosa = 993M41
3rd sphere = 997M41 ( first Sept founded 310.997M41 )
Taros = 998M41
Zeist = 999M41
'riptide-bay' = 999M41


Armageddon = 998M41
Eye of Terror = 999M41


You see the problem? 3rd sphere started before Orks and Chaos moved...
Damocles 2 is also 999M41.

Dates taken from 6th ed codices.

Iracundus wrote:

The wording clearly shows the redeployment takes place after the first Damocles Gulf Crusade. 4th edition was also set at 999.M41 so "recent" is in relation to that.

Which edition isn't set at 999.M41 ? None ?

Iracundus wrote:

Also the results of the Eye of Terror campaign:

"The Tau made several major expansions to their empire over the course of the Thirteenth Crusade. With Imperial attention elsewhere, and the local Tyranid and Ork menace temporarily contained, Tau settlement colonies and pioneer teams reached far and wide into the outlying systems of the Damocles Gulf, the Perdus Rift, and much further afield. Although the encroachment on Imperial space has been relatively minor, the Tau have established no fewer than five 3rd phase colony systems in a halo around their existing sept worlds. These massive areas of expansion are already being referred to as the Third Sphere Colonies by the diplomats of the Water Caste, and are rumoured to unprecedented numbers of human auxillaries. That the Imperium's attention is focused elsewhere is no doubt of comfort to those humans who have pledged their support to the burgeoning Tau empire. "

Aus WD 287, "Death by a Thousand Cuts" by Andy Chambers

It was interesting once.
Then we moved on to the present day, where the campaign you love so much has been excluded from the timeline.
Plain to see for any who are aware our GW overlords deemd it neccessary to add a name to the IG and stick with the theme "CADIA" there...
without a 13th black crusade beyond the Gate.

The Ork menace isn't contained if you paid attention to the 6th ed Tau codex.
Like the whole Eternal War isn't a 1:1 either, it is a everyone against everyone else.

except the 13th black crusade hasn't been retconned out of existance, it's just been set as "on going"

It's been retconned to it basically being a grinding stalemate, both on the ground and in orbit. That's a far-cry from the EoT campaign, where it was basically decided that Abaddon had mostly taken Cadia but had lost air superiority.

So the Crusade isn't retconned, but the events within it have been. Abaddon hasn't taken Cadia, Eldrad isn't dead, etc.

You can't (or probably shouldn't) increase the size of regiments to stupendous numbers or the entire regimental structure falls appart. Anything larger than a few thousand men per regiment would require some serious subdivisions within the regiment just to keep it halfway controlable. For stupid cannonfodder like Krieg soldiers huge numbers might even work, but let's be honest here, Krieg is hardly an example of military efficiency (let's throw bodies and equipment at a problem until it goes away, what could probably go wrong?).

GW's troops numbers tend to be consistently ridiculously low, probably because the writers think along the lines of the most recent, limited real world wars.

The German invasion of Russia in 1941 for example involved about 4 million Germans and 3 million odd Russians on the opening days. Given losses, rotations etc the total numbers run into tens of millions fighting over the whole four years.
And that's just one theatre of a civil war in a single low population by imperial standards planet.

If anything 8 million troops for a sector wide crusade is still ludicrously low by orders of magnitude!

KingDeath wrote:
You can't (or probably shouldn't) increase the size of regiments to stupendous numbers or the entire regimental structure falls appart. Anything larger than a few thousand men per regiment would require some serious subdivisions within the regiment just to keep it halfway controlable. For stupid cannonfodder like Krieg soldiers huge numbers might even work, but let's be honest here, Krieg is hardly an example of military efficiency (let's throw bodies and equipment at a problem until it goes away, what could probably go wrong?).

+1.

If a regiment could have 100 000 guardsmen it would also mean that
a) the commanding officer would be a general or higher, not a colonel / lt colonel that seems to the the most usual
b) have a very strange internal organisation - how big would a squad be? A company?
c) the idea of a "regiment" be wasted. In todays military a regiment/brigade/batallion is a fixed force that higher up can mix with other regiments to achive optimal performance (tanks and mech infantery for the invasion of Iraq, for example - while light infantery, special forces and airborne troops for invading Afghanistan (and don't make this into a political debate, please)). If the regiment already had an army mixture it wouldn't be a regiment, but an army.
d) each regiment would have an gigantic logistic and planning section to manage these hordes that is not shown i neither books nor codexes.
e) it is often mentioned that most regiment are either infantery, tanks, mech infantery or artillery to prevent mutiny (with extra trusted regiments like Cadians as an exception). That is unreasonalbe on the level of 100 000 soldiers per regiment.

I see regiments on the scale 1000-5000 men, organised into a number of companies on around 200 men each. Enough to have punch and durability but small enough to be able to deploy quickly and by smaller ship in one lift.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Ymorr wrote:
GW's troops numbers tend to be consistently ridiculously low, probably because the writers think along the lines of the most recent, limited real world wars.

The German invasion of Russia in 1941 for example involved about 4 million Germans and 3 million odd Russians on the opening days. Given losses, rotations etc the total numbers run into tens of millions fighting over the whole four years.
And that's just one theatre of a civil war in a single low population by imperial standards planet.

If anything 8 million troops for a sector wide crusade is still ludicrously low by orders of magnitude!

+1.

And 1941 was something of a special case on the Eastern Front, with the Germans advancing against unprepared Soviets troops. For a "real" IoM type of battle we should look at 1942-43, when the Soviets made enormous offensives against smaller, but high tech and far more movable Germans which is what a Imperium-Tau battle would look like.

So Regiments should have incredibly stupid and inefficient numbers because if they didn't we'd also have to change the command structure?

That's poor logic. If a different command structure is needed for larger sized regiments to function, then change the numbers. Fine.

 BlaxicanX wrote:
So Regiments should have incredibly stupid and inefficient numbers because if they didn't we'd also have to change the command structure?

That's poor logic. If a different command structure is needed for larger sized regiments to function, then change the numbers. Fine.

To Change the numbers doesn't help if GW can't identify the difference between believable scale and their idea of the 40k-verse.

 BlaxicanX wrote:
So Regiments should have incredibly stupid and inefficient numbers because if they didn't we'd also have to change the command structure?

That's poor logic. If a different command structure is needed for larger sized regiments to function, then change the numbers. Fine.

You cannot make oversized regiments workable (that is, if a regiment is suposed to be roughly as well lead as a modern day/ww1 /ww2 regiment) with the command structure established in the fluff.
Fluff regiments tend to losely follow the structure of modern day army formations, that is squad-> platoon-> company-> batailon (not always) -> regiment. Increasing the number of squads would lead to more platoons which leads to more companies which require more batailons which require...well, we have reached the end of the pole . It would make much more sense to simply increase the number of regiments for each campaign. These could then be further organised until we have a real army and not a badly lead mob.

In game turns, an AM army can fit 650 men in it's troops slots. Historic british regiments were about 900 men, so it is conceivable that GW modeled their usage of the term in those amounts. However that would make the initial assault of 3-5 regiments laughably small.

A regiment in modern terms is typically 3- 5000 men. But again 5 of these would generally only qualify as a modern army corp led by a lieutenant general.

Again, assuming a tithe fleet takes 10% of a population, with hive worlds significantly higher, you are talking about millions from each world. The equivalent of a army region led by a field martial.

I prefer to assume that each GW "Regiment" is the equivalent of a tithe force, and such represents a field army of 1-5 million. Thus sending 25 million men to fight the Tau is more realistic, and sending a quarter billion when that fails even better.

Durandal wrote:
(...)
Again, assuming a tithe fleet takes 10% of a population, with hive worlds significantly higher, you are talking about millions from each world. The equivalent of a army region led by a field martial.

I prefer to assume that each GW "Regiment" is the equivalent of a tithe force, and such represents a field army of 1-5 million. Thus sending 25 million men to fight the Tau is more realistic, and sending a quarter billion when that fails even better.

Yep, sounds good to me too.

While 25 million seems too low a number to do anything on a planetary scale, the Tau were a small unknown xeno filth, and the Imperium probably assumed there would be a gap in technology. And still the logistics of sending 25 million men to another star are hard enough to call it a "crusade". When it is found that the Tau are a force to be reckoned with, sending the equivalent of the military forces of a couple systems seems like the next logical step.

Durandal wrote:


I prefer to assume that each GW "Regiment" is the equivalent of a tithe force, and such represents a field army of 1-5 million. Thus sending 25 million men to fight the Tau is more realistic, and sending a quarter billion when that fails even better.

I doubt that a planet only tithe one regiment, and that the size of the regiment depends on the population size of the planet. It would be incredibly inefficient and lead to a lot of problems for the logistic corps. In todays military a company, batalion or brigade needs a certain amount of food, ammo, gasoline, spares etc, since every unit is of the same size. How would the logistics know the supply needs for the five regiments occupying Thossa 4, if one regiment consists of 500 men and another regiment consists of 100 000?

My impression is that each planet tithe a number of soldiers, depending on the population size and what else the planet can tithe. An industrial world may tithe Chimeras, tanks, ammo, electronics etc partly instead of men, while planets like Catchan only tithes soldiers since they have no industries to speak of. Then the soldiers are organized into regiments, trained and sent of planet.

Also, a big part of the Imperiums strategy is to avoid rebellion. That is why Space Marine Legions were shrinked from hundred of thousands into todays 1000 (with exceptions), that is why the Space Marines, Imperial Army and Imperial Navy are three separated organisations and why the Imperium is filled with check and balances like the Commissariat, Arbites, Inquisitors etc - everything to avoid too much power to be gathered in one pair of potentially traiterous hands. To keep the Imperial Guard in small, interdependent regiments would be in line with this reasoning. To not only have "regiments" of millions, but also give a planetary Govenor this force (however short during training, before sending them away) would be insane!